Re: Ass metonymy (WAS: a bad essay)

On Feb 5, 2009, at 9:22 PM, Sai Emrys wrote:

> This looks suspicious to me:
>
>> If a koala goes in the water it won't be able to breathe with its
>> little short ass. It'd fucking drown soon aas it take one step
>> into the water. While they at the river trying to get something to
>> drink a bear could just come to him and snatch its ass up. It
>> doesn't know protection because they don't have protection. What
>> they little ass going to do? It can't scratch him. The bear will
>> beat his fucking ass.
>
> Namely, "What they little ass going to do?".
>
> It seems to me that this ass-metonymy is invalid even in AAVE
> ("African American Vernacular English" - an academic's way to say
> "ebonics"), though the other instances are.
I don't know about how valid it is, but this reminds me: I recently
read something that listed a few examples of metonymy, and it said
something about "buttocks" being used to refer to a person. I
remember wondering at the time which languages that happened in
(besides colloquial English). Questions:

1. What are some other languages where this specific metonymy occurs?
2. Where might I have read that? I am currently reading _Describing
morphosyntax_, but I'm not sure where to look. (And the book isn't
searchable through Amazon or Google... grrr.)

>
> It's hard for me to articulate why though. Something to do with
> agentivity, I think; one can say e.g. "you best sit yo ass on the
> curb" or "I'mma make yo ass do [something]". But one can't say e.g.
> "yo ass just stepped up".
>
> Comment or correction from those of you who've dealt with this more
> (either by living in the right neighborhoods or studying them)?
>
> - Sai