(no subject)

[ivyfic]

Enough is enough. Someone explain to me how something with such poor grammar could be up on the official Torchwood site? OK, yes, Torchwood, but: "it was just stood there"???

I've been noticing this a lot lately (just ask trakkie), this grammatical construction. "He's sat next to Jensen"; "jared was sat next to jensen"; "now he's sat on the end of the bed"; etc. Who conjugates verbs like that? Is this some common British colloquial conjugation I've just never heard of? I see a verb conjugated like this about once a day and it's like nails on a chalkboard.

It was just standing there! or It just stood there!
He's sitting next to Jensen! or He sat next to Jensen! or He's seated next to Jensen!
Jared was sitting! or Jared sat! or Jared was seated!
Now he's sitting on the end of the bed! or Now he sat on the end of the bed! or Now he's seated on the end of the bed!

And even then I'd object to the abbreviation since it confuses "was" and "is." Just, argh people!

Comments

[sasha-b.livejournal.com]

My British friend says that all the time. I guess it is Brit slang.

[ivy03.livejournal.com]

Well, now I have a means of spotting British fanfic authors.

[trinityvixen.livejournal.com]

The Torchwood thing I could believe was a Briti-cism. Otherwise, wtf?

[http://users.livejournal.com/_abulafia/]

Is this some common British colloquial conjugation I've just never heard of?

Yes. I researched it after hearing Derren Brown use it -- as far as I can tell, it's a piece of dialect speech that has its roots in Northern England but is sometimes affected by Southerners.

[ivy03.livejournal.com]

Butbutbut--it's wrong! It just doesn't make any sense!

[http://users.livejournal.com/_abulafia/]

But it's not like a grammatical error like a homonym mistake is a grammatical error -- it's clearly not a mistake because it's not the kind of mistake anyone would make unintentionally.

I mean, also, it can add color to a sentence, e.g. "I was sat there all nice and cozy in my blanket."

[http://users.livejournal.com/_abulafia/]

But it's not like a grammatical error like a homonym mistake is a grammatical error -- it's clearly not a mistake because it's not the kind of mistake anyone would make unintentionally.

I mean, also, it can add color to a sentence, e.g. "I was sat there all nice and cozy in my blanket."

[mylodon.livejournal.com]

British colloquial usage, definitely; also to be heard in the variation 'He was sat sitting there'.

[ivy03.livejournal.com]

'He was sat sitting there'
aaaaaaaauuuuggghhh! My eyes!

[veryschway.livejournal.com]

I was pretty sure that "it was stood there" was correct grammar, albeit odd.

I mean, there's nothing grammatically wrong with it, that I can tell. "He stood the mannequin next to the table in the display." "The mannequin was stood next to the table." "She sat the child on the bed." "The child was sat on the bed." These might be hard on the eyes/ears, but I'm not sure what would be technically wrong with them. They don't seem structurally different from the following pair: "She positioned the chair next to the bed." "The chair was positioned next to the bed." (But I'm not sure there's nothing wrong with the sat/stood sentences, either--it's just really unclear to me what could be wrong with them, other than mere oddness.)

Isn't this just an instance of the same thing that goes on when we say someone was "stood up"? No, we don't mean that the person was literally "stood" anywhere, but if my date stands me up, then I have been stood up. Same construction, right?

[ivy03.livejournal.com]

It is correct grammar...if the meaning is that someone else placed the person there. In this case, though, the meaning is "Dean sat down. He was sitting." Not "someone put him in a seated position."

So saying "Jared was stood next to Jensen" makes me think he's been propped like a mannequin.

[veryschway.livejournal.com]

OK, I think I've just hit upon what's wrong with the sit/sat construction, at least.

I'm not sure it actually matters very much who is positioning whom. What rules it out is that it's always bad grammar to say that "X sat Y on the table." The word "sat" is just wrong here--it should be said that "X set Y on the table." The verb "to sit" never takes a direct object--this is why Jared can't be sat anywhere at all.

So not only are you correct that such uses of the word "sit" are wrong, but this would also (unsurprisingly, perhaps) rule out such Britishicisms as "I sat the exam" as technically ungrammatical.

Phew! Glad that's settled. I'm still not sure exactly what would be wrong with "I am stood at the bar," though. Again, I don't think it matters who does the positioning--certainly, I can cause myself to be standing at the bar just as anyone else could cause me to be standing there, and I don't see what difference the distinction would make to the appropriateness of the verb "to stand," if it's ever appropriate at all. But again, I'm just not sure, and could be totally wrong. ::shrugs::

[ivy03.livejournal.com]

I still have a hard time picturing when you'd say "I am stood at the bar" rather than "I am standing" or "I had stood," but I'm not sure about grammar anymore. It just sounds wrong to me. I think, if it's a Britishicism I need to hear it spoken to get used to it. After all, I've gotten used to people saying "I can has."