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GLIM, Spring 1996, volume 2
Swarthmore College student publications (1874 - 2013)
1996-04-01
reformatted digital
16
b. The administration screwed me over.
c. Dad screwed the fresh peas over.
d. The people were screwed over.
e. The book was screwed over.
These example sentences suggest the following argument struc-
tures:
screw over: A. Agent
B.
where Theme is usually an animate human entity.
This time we see that along with a required agent in the active
construction is a syntactically required theme. We cannot speak of
an agent “screwing over” without specifying the “screwed over”—
a theme is not entailed in 4a, and the sentence is just not compre-
hensible. Besides that, the theme must be of a specified set, the set
of animate human entities, as it is often strange for inanimate
objects to get “screwed
over” by an agent.
Although what is hap-
pening in 3c might be
understood, it is a bizarre
reading; Dad could possi-
bly have dropped or
burned or smashed the
“screwing them over.”
Even saying he “messed
up the fresh peas” (by
adding too much salt) or
“screwed up the fresh peas” (by leaving them out in the sun) makes
mote sense.
Similarly, in the passive construction, a theme is obligatory, and
must usually be taken from the aforementioned set (3e is bizarre in
the same way 3c is). While the people could have been “screwed
over” by a bad president, the press, etc., the book could not be
acted upon in the same way. This verb intrinsically suggests a
manipulative action which can only be accomplished by a think-
ing and reasoning individual upon another such individual who
could presumably react to this action (a person will not usually put
effort into maliciously manipulating fresh peas or books, which can
have no observable reaction to being “screwed over”). Even if
there is no agent involved, we do not usually describe inanimate
objects as having been “screwed over,” in the verbal or adjectival
passive. There are some exceptions; for example, “The country was
screwed over (by Nixon)” is perfectly legitimate, even though
“country” is not an animate individual. It is, however, presumably
a collection of them, and therefore an entity which could react and
be affected by the catastrophe of being “screwed over” in a way
inanimate entities could not.
We can now conclude that “mess up” and “screw up”
differ from “screw over” in some cases of lexical analysis,
argument structure, and truth conditions. Yet all three
verbs are often used interchangeably, putting the more
unusual circumstances discussed aside.
(5) a. His teacher messed him up. (by
giving him a bad grade)
b. His teacher screwed him up.
c. His teacher screwed him over.
It seems intuitive that Rick “messing
up” the cake in 3c can be overlooked
because he was just careless about it;
that doonit constnne Perhaps tt 1s has first birthday and he
got a little “messy”
The sentences above essentially connote the same cat-
astrophe causation, with perhaps slight semantic variance.
Each version is as likely to be uttered as the next under the
same given context. Confusion in deciding which verb to
employ may even arise due to this, since the verbs, as
demonstrated, are really not identical. How, then, does a
speaker choose between the verbs in this group when con-
fronted with a situation calling for denotation of catastro-
phe causation, given that such overlaps and confusion
exist? Put another way, since the variances in meaning for
these verbs are significant yet slight, would it thereby be
advantageous to bypass this family in favor of some verb
which does not produce such overlaps?
This brings the discussion to the “scrod phenomenon,”
the permanent adaptation of a newly invented catastrophe
causation verb in the lexicon of many individuals intro-
duced to it, something I have witnessed first-hand. The
scientific extent of
this phenomenon can-
not be precisely tabu-
lated, but I estimate
that 10-12 students on
campus __ (including
myself), and an addi-
tional 20 individuals
associated with these
students (family,
§ 2 friends, etc.) are part
with tt. of it, meaning that
they engage in proper
everyday usage of the verb “scrod.” It all started with a
paragraph I found highly fascinating in The Language
Instinct by Steven Pinker:
In Boston there is an old joke about a woman
who landed at Logan Airport and asked the taxi
driver, “Can you take me someplace where I
can get scrod?” He replied, “Gee, that’s the first
time I’ve heard it in the pluperfect subjunc-
tive?
I proceeded to share this linguistics joke with several of
my friends early last year. Being from out west, they had
initial difficulties deciphering why the joke was funny,
though after I explained that “scrod” was a seafood spe-
cialty in Boston, they decided it was at least somewhat
amusing. Thereafter, we somehow discarded the lewd con-
notation of the word (addressing that issue would likely
result in another paper), and began using “scrod” almost
purely as a catastrophe causation verb. Some versatile
usages of “scrod”:
(6) a. You scrod my shirt. (by spilling
paint on it)
b. The cops scrod me. (by giving me
a speeding ticket)
c. I was scrod (by the cops).
d. That movie was scrod. (it was
poorly. made)
GLIM, Spring 1996, volume 2
Swarthmore College student publications (1874 - 2013)
1996-04-01
reformatted digital