Re: THEORY: Natural language change (was Re: Charlie and I)
| From: | Raymond A. Brown <raybrown@...> |
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| Date: | Tuesday, September 21, 1999, 5:51 |
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At 4:36 pm -0500 20/9/99, Thomas R. Wier wrote:
.........
> I've been watching the distinction between
>the present perfect and the simple past tense in my area
>of the country for a while, and I think the preterite is slowly edging
>the present perfect out. I remember distinctly a couple months
>ago hearing someone at the elevator in the complex where I live
>saying "Did you do your homework yet?", where I'd reflexively say
>"Have you done your homework yet?" -- the whole way up to my
>floor I could think of nothing else. Such incidents are now not
>infrequent in my experience.
YEP! In my recent two week visit to New England I heard such usage all the
time. I got the distinct impression that the two tenses - preterite &
(present) perfect - had fallen together, just as they have in quite a few
natlangs (including Classical Latin :) But whereas in French, Romanian &
southern colloquial German it's the preterite that's disappeared, in New
England it seemed to be the perfect that was distinctly moribund.
[....]
>
>Well, it's great to have you back! Personally, I think the list
>isn't the same without you and Ray, among others. :-)
Gee - thanks ;)
Ray.