Date:  Fri, 26 Jan 1996 10:02:03 EST

From:  Larry Horn <LHORN[AT SYMBOL GOES HERE]YALEVM.CIS.YALE.EDU>

Subject: Positive _any longer_?



I'm passing along this datum and query from David Dowty:



>>   Every heard of "positive _any_longer_", i.e. used in a [non-negative]

>> upward-entail context like positive _anymore_? This morning, while

>> NPR's "Morning Edition" on my clock radio was dragging me out of a

>> sound sleep into a semblance of consciousness, I realized that the

>> asterisk light in my brain was flashing, and when I had come to a bit

>> more, I realized it was because I was hearing something like

>>

>>   "(It seems that) the purpose of citizenship any longer is to ..."

>>

>> By the time I was awake enough to grasp why this sounded funny, I

>> could not longer remember what the actual sentence was. But I did

>> catch that the speaker was the mayor of Missoula, Montana, a Mr.

>> Kemitz (or Chemitz?). Happen to catch this? Have you ever heard

>> _any_longer_ used this way?



We've talked intermittently about positive "anymore" here, and I've enjoyed

reading Murray's 'Positive _anymore_ in the Midwest' (in the "Heartland"

English volume edited by Tim Fraser), but I certainly haven't come across this

apparent extension, blend, or whatever. Seems like people are willing to say

anything any longer.

  By the way, I remember him as being Kookie [not Kooky] Burns. 77 Sunset

Strip, right? Haven't thought of him in decades. Lend me your comb, indeed.

I'm not sure I ever figured out what it might mean to be "the ginchiest", but

there it was.



--Larry