Great points, Herb. As is the case with far too many curiosities, I haven't
taken the time to write down all of the instances I feel bombarded with. I'm
going to make a point to do so moving forward though.
I'm fairly certain that the examples I encounter are fairly prototypical
examples of the derivational -ly suffix that changes word function from
adjective to adverb and was, at one time, required for the adverb function.
Here is an example I just heard on the news tonight: "The odds against her
didn't stop young Anna....despite her illness, she talks fast and cheery
about her new school and friends."
And just a bit later on a popular television show: "But do you see how
strange he walks?"
On a student paper in tonight's stack: "Shelley writes mysterious, evoking a
sense of nightmare and vertigo."
My friend said this on the phone tonight: "I'm cautious and drive slow. So
sue me!" (Although you point out that this -ly is considered optional.
Also, isn't there a popular commercial that encourages us to "eat healthy"?
On Thu, May 14, 2009 at 8:28 PM, STAHLKE, HERBERT F <[log in to unmask]>wrote:
> John,
>
> Could you give us some examples? With some adjectives the adverb is formed
> by zero-derivation, as in fast/fast. With others the -ly is optional, as in
> slow/slow/slowly. In some cases the -ly is not adverbial, as in friendly.
> For an adverb like hardly, the semantic connection to hard is obscure. And
> then there are cases like careful/carefully, where omission of -ly reflects
> a difference in dialect or register or both. Do the examples you're seeing
> cluster into any of these categories?
>
> Herb
>
> Herbert F. W. Stahlke, Ph.D.
> Emeritus Professor of English
> Ball State University
> Muncie, IN 47306
> [log in to unmask]
> ________________________________________
> From: Assembly for the Teaching of English Grammar [
> [log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of John Dews-Alexander [
> [log in to unmask]]
> Sent: May 14, 2009 6:57 PM
> To: [log in to unmask]
> Subject: Re: Suffix-dropping
>
> I've been amazed at the loss of the derivational suffix -ly that routinely
> marks adverbs.
>
> Bill's talking about inflectional suffixes, I know, but I couldn't help
> mentioning the loss of -ly.
>
> I'm not one to cling to language bits that are rusting out and
> disappearing, but it really took me by surprise that -ly is not a productive
> part of the language for many speakers.
>
> If you focus on it and really listen to current language usage on
> television (both scripted and unscripted), in radio, and with the people you
> encounter, you'll notice it too.
>
> John Alexander
>
> On Thu, May 14, 2009 at 5:41 PM, Spruiell, William C <[log in to unmask]
> <mailto:[log in to unmask]>> wrote:
>
>
>
> I’ve read a ton of student papers over the past two weeks, and based on
> this batch and those from the last couple of years, I’m starting to get the
> impression that a greater percentage of my students every year are dropping
> inflectional suffixes (plurals, tense-markers) and finding it difficult to
> notice the omissions when proofreading (I haven’t been formally counting, so
> I could be mistaking something I’ve just noticed for a trend, though). I’ve
> always seen some of this in examples where the suffix isn’t audible in
> normal speech, particularly if the suffix is well on the way to being a
> kind of fossil in the particular expression(e.g. “ice tea” – you can’t hear
> the realization of the {-ed} suffix before [t], and “iced” in that
> expression is probably a unitary adjective rather than a participle for most
> speakers who do use the –ed in writing). That’s absolutely normal, and over
> time the suffix-less form can become the norm (“ice cream” used to be “iced
> cream”).
>
>
>
> What I’m seeing, though, are forms like “I was read this book” or “These
> short story are….”; they’re in papers written by native English-speakers who
> don’t speak any of the dialects that would normally drop those suffixes, and
> the same students do use the suffixes in speech (it’s exactly the reverse of
> the usual situation, in which students don’t know they have to write bits
> that they don’t say). If I draw attention to a line in which there’s a
> missing –ing, etc., the students frequently *can’t* see anything unusual
> about it; their usual reaction is to look at it for a minute, then get rid
> of a comma (if there is one) or add one (if there isn’t). It’s that
> inability to notice the “gap” that I’m particularly intrigued by. If I read
> the section out loud, they immediately notice the omission (and I then tell
> them that they need to coerce friends into reading papers out loud for them
> as a coping strategy). It’s not a language issue at all; it’s just an
> orthographic one.
>
>
>
> I know similar effects can be associated with mild forms of dyslexia, but I
> find it hard to believe that fully 15 - 25% of the student population is
> even mildly dyslexic. I realize this is starting to sound like a variant
> of “Geezer Rant #325A; Those Darn Kids Won’t Write Right” but I’m curious
> about whether anyone else is noticing similar patterns, or whether this has
> been common all along and I’ve somehow managed not to notice it (which,
> given the rest of this post, would be rather amusing for everyone but me…).
>
>
>
> ---- Bill Spruiell
>
> Dept. of English
>
> Central Michigan University
>
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