THIRD WHICH: ON THE GOWTH OF "AMERICANISM" EVERY WHICH WAY.
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I remember that I was slightly disillusioned when I first consulted A Supplement to the Oxford English Dictionary I(1972) for a renewed explanation concerning the growth of the Americanism every which way, because it refused to accept the view of Webster's Third New International Dictionary on the following, "prob. by folk etymology fr. ME everich way, fr. everich every+wey way" (Wbs. 1961 : 788). That is, I was dissatisfied with the Supplement's entry, "for U.S. read orig, and chiefly U.S.; also ever(y) which a way(S);・・・;so every which: whichever, every"(Supp. I: 988). I did appreciated, however, the numerous examples that had been appended.Actually, I had already felt a little frustrated with the explanation of everywhich way in the main body of OED, where it ran in parallel with other phrases like every mother's son and every now and then(OED III, 1933: E-344).The suspicion I harbored against OED concerned a seemingly insignificant inconsistency between the aboveand the analysis it gave to each : "The early use of each corresponded closely to the mod. use of its compound EVERY(=evereach)" (OED III: E-2). If the editors had already scented out the root of every to this degree in its various prototypes euerich, euerilc, and everyche, they had to account for every which way quite differently from every mother's son and every now and then, given their reputationof being devoted to "historical principles". Surely, they could have demonstrated another way leading a hypothesis where every whichwould be interpreted as a product of splitting, forexample every-itch, or rather as a metanalytical restoration of the former "evereach", With its split ending transformed into which through a kind of folk etymology.As such, it seems likely that the editors of OED and Supp. are guilty of having painted themselves into a corner. They may have taken cover behind a conventionalism, feeling responsible for proviing their readers with reliable information, especially given the ever-increasing pressure for empirical positivism during those three or four boom decades of structural linguistics. In fact, the growthof every which way had rarely been traceable in any written records before the latter half of the nineteenth century, even in the United States, perhaps because of its colloquiality. OED was, therefore, extremely prudent in dealing with the problem.We may ask, however, whether we are morally prohibited from showing a few hypothesis about the origin of a word or phrase especially in a dictionary edited on etymological principles. Actually, OED does give a hypothesis on the generic process of each, where three different origins are supposed to have interacted with each other in five possible ways during the course of developing into the modern form (OED III : E-1-2). Far from being disappointed in their indecisivenes, we are always very grateful that they open our eyes to a rich possibility of further explorations. This is why I saw something lacking in the treatment of every which way in OED and Supp", and felt inclined to look for a philologicalframework that would reveal some British roots of the Americanism.
- 岩手大学人文社会科学部の論文
- 1986-02-05
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