Re: USAGE: gotten

On Sun, 2002-06-23 at 21:05, Thomas R. Wier wrote:
> Quoting Tristan McLeay <kesuari@...>:
>
> > I was just installing Windows XP today and happened to notice that it
> > said 'If you've had a computer before, you've probably GOTTEN things the
> > way you like it', or some-such like that (the actual wording isn't
> > important, 'gotten' there is being used in the same way as it was on the
> > banner).
> >
> > 'Gotten' there seems wrong to me (and my younger brother, who generally
> > speaks more Americanly than I do). Is that some usage of 'gotten' that
> > hasn't (yet) passed into Australian English, or is it ungrammatical in
> > the US too and just somehow managed to slip through?
>
> Almost all varieties of American English have two functionally distinct
> past participles of the verb <get>:  <got>, which is homophonous with
> the preterite form, and <gotten> which is not.  The former is used only
> when "I've got (to)" is equivalent to "I have" or "I must". In all other
> circumstances, <gotten> is used.
Umm... so that means that I'm right and WinXP was wrong? (Because 'You
probably have things the way you like it' is correct?)

> <gotten> is actually the original form that predominated in the
> US until the above exceptions were imported from Britain. This is
> one of those instances where American English preserves an archaic
> feature no longer current in British English, much like Americans
> still often say "fall" for the season known in Britain as "autumn".
I resent you're saying I speak British English! :P <--- recognising that
my English is probably much like a dialect of British English.

> (Likewise, sometimes RP has features that strike Americans as
> old-fashioned, like the use of "amongst" instead of "among".)
Which reminds me: does 'whilst' get misused in the US? I've noticed it
appears to have become somewhat trendy down here and people are just
using it as a direct synonym for 'while' in all circumstances.

> > (My brother suggested that 'gotten' is used more to mean 'received',
> > although 'I've gotten it' sounds wrong to me, too... I never (rarely)
> > use 'gotten'; my younger brother does.)
>
> That's interesting.  Does that suggest that your brother's
> use of English is heavily influenced by American dialect?
I don't know about 'heavily', but it is moreso than mine. (Which is
somewhat normal in Australia these days... When we aren't England, we're
America... Too lazy to be ourselves, I guess...) I, for example, don't
watch much television (and when I was younger was limited to watching
the ABC which has a much higher proportion of Aussie and British stuff
than commercian tv. does), and so missed out on a chance for it. My
English has also been influenced by other things: I can't decide whether
to say /kA:s@l/ or /k{s@l/, for example, and use /grA:f/ for -graph in
at least some words (like 'telegraph' and 'paragraph', but not
'electromyograph' (which I have said a reasonable amount of times: you
need to know about electro-oculargraphs, electromyographs,
electroencephylographs and electrocardiographs for Unit 3 VCE
Psychology)).

Tristan

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