ineptshieldmaid: downbythegreenwood:
Mar. 17th, 2016 12:46 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
dragonlady7via http://ift.tt/1Mp0RQJ:
ineptshieldmaid:
downbythegreenwood:
“he’s not done that” “he’s not had coffee”
why do these strike me as britishisms? am i being crazy here?
like, as soon as a character uses that construction they go all british in my head.
“he hasn’t done that/he’s never done that” “he hasn’t had coffee”
that’s how an american would put it. ?
but i could be crazy. i wish i knew more about linguistics.
P sure that’s because “he’s not done” IS a Britishism.
Americans don’t contract “has” to “s”– it’s always “is” to “s”, and “has” only contracts in the negative, to “hasn’t”. So, “he’s not done” is always “he IS not done”; we’d say “he hasn’t done”.
The word “got” and “gotten” is almost exclusively American as well, possibly related to this. We’d say “he hasn’t gotten it yet” instead of “he’s not got it yet”.
I don’t know linguistics, I just have experience. The dialects have diverged and re-merged a couple of times for various reasons, so things like this happen.
ineptshieldmaid:
downbythegreenwood:
“he’s not done that” “he’s not had coffee”
why do these strike me as britishisms? am i being crazy here?
like, as soon as a character uses that construction they go all british in my head.
“he hasn’t done that/he’s never done that” “he hasn’t had coffee”
that’s how an american would put it. ?
but i could be crazy. i wish i knew more about linguistics.
P sure that’s because “he’s not done” IS a Britishism.
Americans don’t contract “has” to “s”– it’s always “is” to “s”, and “has” only contracts in the negative, to “hasn’t”. So, “he’s not done” is always “he IS not done”; we’d say “he hasn’t done”.
The word “got” and “gotten” is almost exclusively American as well, possibly related to this. We’d say “he hasn’t gotten it yet” instead of “he’s not got it yet”.
I don’t know linguistics, I just have experience. The dialects have diverged and re-merged a couple of times for various reasons, so things like this happen.
