I Never Did

[LARSSON at vax1.mankato.msus.edu]

David Pelovitz writes (re: the Kenosha Kid phrase):
"I tend to think it is linguistic play on the idea that a word
as a unit of information may contain less than a words worth
of information.  Almost every one of those six words comes
to hold a different meaning in at least one of the constructions
TP offers in that sequence.  Is the Kenosha Kid a person,
a dance or a baby goat?
 
The point is not simply that no word has absolute
meaning, but that the entire statement does not have
an absolute meaning.  Which would seem to question both
analog and digital communication"


Good point, though I would mention that something similar was done on tv's
THE MANY LOVES OF DOBIE GILLIS in the early 1960's.  Thalia tells Dobie
that to go out with her, all he has to do is "Get money from your father."

In a typical direct-audience address, Dobie responds:
"GET money from my father?
Get MONEY from my father?
Get money FROM my father?
Get money from MY father?
Get money from my FATHER?"


But then Dobie was sort of a self-deconstructing sitcom at its best, anyway.

Don Larsson, Mankato State U (MN)