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xkcd again, but now on linguists and their weird habits (mander.xyz)

submitted 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago) by lvxferre@mander.xyz to c/linguistics_humor@sh.itjust.works

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I feel slightly offended. Because it's true.

(Alt text: "Do you feel like the answer depends on whether you're currently in the hole, versus when you refer to the events later after you get out? Assuming you get out.")

xkcd source

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[–] Signtist@lemm.ee 20 points 9 months ago (8 children)

I feel like I'd use "Fell in a hole" if I took up most of the space of the hole, and could probably get out on my own, while I'd use "Fell down a hole" if I took up very little of the space of the hole, and couldn't get out on my own.

[–] lvxferre@mander.xyz 16 points 9 months ago (2 children)

If I were to rely on my "guts":

I fell in a hole - I was already inside the hole, and I fell.
I fell down a hole - I fell completely, I reached the ground of that hole.
I fell into a hole - I was outside the hole, and my fall made me enter the hole. That's probably how I'd use it, in a typical situation.

However I'm not a native speaker, and my L1 is rather relaxed when it comes to what prepositions convey. And from a quick websearch, Google lists 3.3M occurrences for "fell in a hole", 2.2M occurrences for "fell into a hole" and 820k for "fell down a hole"; that hints for me that, by default, speakers would use "in a hole" here, unlike I would.

[–] callipygin@reddthat.com 4 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago)

I could say "I fell in a hole" to mean either case (I was in or out of the hole beforehand), but for "I fell into a hole" I would only use it when starting outside the hole. (native speaker)

Like on the one hand it could mean "I fell [while I was] in the hole"

But it could also mean "I fell [and then I was] in the hole"

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