Re: "Barely but booleanly"

Would the prosody make a difference? IMD, in a sentence like "I can do
anything", I'd probably put quite a bit of emphasis on the anything,
whereas "I know any Chinese vocabulary" is patterned just like "I know
some Chinese vocabulary", without emphasis on any.

(And yes, I'm well aware this is not prescriptively correct. I use it
consciously.)

On 6/9/08, Eugene Oh <un.doing@...> wrote:
> On Tue, Jun 10, 2008 at 12:19 AM, Kelly Alioth Drinkwater <
>  mizunomi@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>  > Really? Uh oh. How about "I know any Chinese vocabulary"?
>  >
>
>
> In fact, I think this is even more likely to be interpreted the opposite of
>  how you intended. For one, I construed you correctly the first time, but was
>  thrown off by this sentence. Is this "positive 'any'" a common feature of
>  people's speech in many places? I have never heard of it before and in fact
>  instinctively class it as prescriptive-wise incorrect, given the meaning of
>  "any".
>
>
>  Eugene
>

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