Doers, Keepers and

Several years ago, many people laughed at George Bush for saying "I'm the decider." This seemingly innocuous statement was widely considered a major gaff. This might be perplexing to someone who is not well versed in the nuances of the language. A pretty good "quick and dirty" rule in English is: to refer to the agent that performs an action, add the "-er" to the verb designating that action. Thus, one who fights fires is a firefighter. One who hunts is a hunter. And so on.

But like many "rules," this one has whole a mess of complications. There are many words used to describe agents performing actions that do not follow the -er pattern, and there are many that do, but in unexpected ways.

One who fishes, for example, we would be tempted to call a fisher. And this was once common, like in the King James Bible when Jesus says "I will make you fishers of men" (Matthew 4:19). But today we would say "fisherman" or even "fisher-person," as many people are keen to remove gender references from language. Gender references in language are controversial, though, so if a non-native speaker said "fisher-person," they would be corrected in many instances even if they knew what they were doing.

Another oddball is "keeper," which does mean "one who keeps," as in, "the keeper of the kingdom." But it can also mean the the thing kept. When a fisher catches a big fish, she might say, "that's a keeper." One who tends bar is a bartender, but if that same person is seen as "keeping" the bar, they are a "barkeep."

Sometimes the -er rule holds, but the word choice is unexpected. In baseball, the player who swings the bat is the batter, not the swinger. "Swingers" are married people that have sex with other people in an open arrangement. So calling the batter the swinger would really get a laugh. The player who catches the ball thrown at the batter is the catcher. But the person who throws the ball at the batter is not the thrower, but the pitcher. When any other player throws the ball, it's a throw, but when the pitcher throws the ball at the batter it's a pitch. The person who delivers the mail is not a mail-deliverer, but a mail carrier. One who builds houses is a builder, but it is more common to say "carpenter," even though there is no corresponding verb "to carpent."

President Bush wouldn't have gotten in any trouble if he would have said, "I'm the decision maker," but even this is kind of uncommon. It probably would have been most uncontroversial to say "I make the decisions." But a big problem here is expectations. Breaking grammatical rules is often a feature of good rhetoric. By applying the rule in an unexpected way, the utterance becomes more memorable and distinctive. So when Bush said "I'm the decider," this may have been a conscious rhetorical move. The American people, however, were accustomed to making fun of him for other silly things that he said. So instead of seeing this as cute or clever or whatever, Bush sounded like a child.

Now that you are thoroughly perplexed, be advised that the -er rule is perfectly fine in terms of understanding. More often than not, it will work well enough to convey your meaning, and even if you end up looking silly you'll learn something.

Get it on or get on with it.

Prepositions can get you in trouble. This especially likely to happen when you know you need to use one, but don't know exactly which one to use. You are forced to guess, which usually involves a crude translation of the prepositions of your native language. The results are unpredictable, and it is easy to embarrass yourself.

Take the three expressions: "Get on," "Get on with it," and "Get it on." All three are easily confused with each other by their words alone, but their meanings are radically different. I think the first is more common in British English. You would ask "How are you getting on with the new neighbors?" to ask about someone's general impression of the situation with the new neighbors. As in, "we're getting on well. They are nice people." "To get on" is basically equivalent to "how's it going," which I think is more common in American English. As in, "how's it going with the new neighbors?" "It's going well, they are nice people."

This is all part of boring small talk. But if you were to use another expression and say, "how are you getting it on with the neighbors," you would be asking a very different question: "how are you having sex with the neighbors?" because "Getting it on" is a euphemism for "to have sex." Saying this wouldn't be the end of the world, to be sure; people would probably know what you meant and the situation would probably resolve itself without trouble. But more than likely you want to look smart and be smooth; and, god forbid, if the person you are talking to is having sex with the neighbors you just might get more information than you wanted to have.

Misusing "to get on with it" is less of a problem. "Getting on with it" is simply proceeding to do or begin something that is being delayed for some reason. It is often an expression of impatience, or an expression that the thing to be done is unpleasant. A related expression is "to get it over with." For example: "after three hours in the waiting room at the dentist's office, I was thinking, 'jesus let's just get on with it!' If I'm going to get my tooth pulled, I just want to get it over with." These two expressions, "to get on with it" and "to get it over with" are very nearly interchangeable.

But not totally interchangeable. Bringing all these together in a sentence: "If you are getting on well with someone, and you want to get it on with them, you would probably like to just get on with it." However, you would not want to "get it over with." You want to "get on with" getting it started, not with concluding it. In general, you should not use either "get on with it" or "get it over with" in any situation that is even remotely amorous or romantic. You may be thinking it, but you probably won't get on well if you say it.

About this blog

Learning English as a second language must be a long, torturous road. As a native speaker, I can only imagine. In a language class, you will learn all about grammar and vocabulary, but this still leaves you ill-equipped to really use the language naturally and 'blend in' with native speakers. The truth is that much of learning a language isn't really about language. It's about rhetoric, etiquette and culture.

When you drive around in a car, there are rules of the road. There are posted speed limits, stop signs, and conventions that are supposed to keep everyone from crashing into each other. But the thing is, you find that on some streets, the posted speed limit is thirty miles per hour, yet everyone around you goes forty five. If you drive the speed limit, you run more risk than if you break the law and drive with the flow of traffic. You are put in a position of doing wrong to do right. To be a safe driver, you have to know the rules and also know when and how to break them.

Learning a language is like driving. What you learn in English class is what linguists call prescriptive grammar. Prescriptive grammar is like the rules of the road. It is what authorities such as teachers think people ought to do. Teachers will slyly act as if this is all there is to language, but it's not. Knowing that everybody goes forty on third street is different kind of rule or convention that is just as important. This is what linguists call descriptive grammar. Descriptive grammar is how people actually talk.

There are many rules in English that no one really follows, or that they follow in some cases and not in others. Mastery of language involves knowing all the rules, and knowing when and how to break them. That is what I plan to write about here. If you are learning English and wrestling with this, please tell me in the comments what you are having trouble with and I may be able to help. If you are a native speaker of German or Spanish, please go start a blog like this for your language!