Re: [MLUG - DISCUSSION] New verb!

["Jonathan King" <EMAIL:PROTECTED>]

On 6/6/07, Mike Miller <EMAIL:PROTECTED> wrote:
> On Wed, 6 Jun 2007, Jonathan King wrote:
>
> > More seriously, a google search for "was/is flawed by" (with plus
> > signs where needed) picks up tens of thousands of hits, mostly in
> > headline-like settings. So I guess here's another way to look at it:
> >
> > Term                # of Google hits
> > "flawed"                  19,500,000
> > "was/is flawed"         2,200,000
> > "flawed by"                 435,000
> > "was/is flawed by"       127,000
>
> "Your Analysis Is Flawed," by Mike Miller
>
> I'm just kidding because I think it is OK, but do you get my joke?  A lot
> of the hits seem to be of that style.

There is no question that the verb uses of "flawed" are predominantly
found in close variants of the essentially "fixed phrase" you point
out. An extreme lexicalist/construction account would therefore
suggest that the analysis of "flawed" as an independent verb by is
(wait for it) flawed.

Other extreme cases of this in English is seen for the highest
frequency sense of the verb "curry", which is used in the fixed phrase
"curry favor" and for the noun "aspersions", which occurs in phrases
like "cast aspersions" and almost nowhere else. "To and fro" is also
pretty clearly a single lexical item, and the sole place where you are
likely to see "fro" used, to the embarrassment of all "dumb"
spell-checkers that let you use "fro" elsewhere.

More seriously, "flawed by" is the construction that most obviously
points to the fact that some people really do use "flaw" as a verb.

jking

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