08.12.08
I recall Vonnegut writing, “And so it goes.”
I’m fascinated when persnickitors peer into certain English locution voids and see purgatory and hell and not simply a vacuum that both nature and language abhore. I regularly refer to ain’t as a word villified persnickitorially on grammatical grounds (and not, more appropriately, on contextual grounds) depite the word’s perfectly grammatical foundations. Ain’t, as my defense goes, fills a void because we have no “am not” contraction. So, occasionally in conversation, I go, “Ain’t doesn’t deserve such disrespect.”
I sense the cringing. Eww! “Goes”, goes the persnickitors’ lament.
Allow me to agitate the lamenters. Though using go to identify the beginning of a direct quote is relatively and slangishly new, not to mention (I’ll readily admit) annoying, it fills a void. Say is a synonym, but is less precise because say can signal paraphrase, or even non-speech. (”That suit says ‘professional.’” Indeed? In what sort of accent?) Go generally signals a precise quote. (”I’m sure you’re familiar with our national anthem. This is how it goes . . .”). And using go is less pretentious than “occasionally in conversation, I say, and I quote . . .”
Now that I’m going the way of the cringe-making fool, let’s next discuss conversational “air quotes”—informal “sign language” (picture the air quotes as I write that) sympatico with using goes instead of says. Though, air quotes can be and are annoying, I accept them. And I accept them despite the fact that the air finger gesture used to communicate such quotes looks a lot like Tim the Enchanter warning King Arthur that “death awaits you all with nasty big pointy teeth” in Monty Python and the Holy Grail. Air quotes accomplish in gesture what the punctuational squigglies do in writing. Why do some folks get so annoyed over a relatively new gesture in conversation when we similarly employ so many other gestures? If body language is OK, why not body punctuation? Who hasn’t closed an emphatic statement with a sharp pointing gesture? Air period!
Ultimately: sometimes in informal speech, anything goes.
And you can quote me on that.
(By the way, here’s Tim the Airquoter:)
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