Nancy e-mailed to ask about AmE
cater to versus BrE
cater for. This is where the
book that I got for my birthday comes in handy. In it, John Algeo writes:
In CIC [the Cambridge International Corpus], cater for is more than 100 times as frequent in British texts as in American; cater to is 3 times as frequent in American texts as in British. In the sense "provide food (at a party)" British prefers cater for or possibly cater at; American also uses the verb transitively: cater a party.
What can I add to that? Just that
catering is used more broadly in BrE than in AmE. For instance, a Scrabble comrade describes herself as
working in catering. In AmE, I'd expect that to mean that she is an events caterer--someone who shows up to feed people at parties and conferences. In BrE, it means that she works in the food branch of the hospitality industry. In her case,
catering is the department of the university that's responsible for the cafés/tea bars/restaurants on site.
Since Algeo so neatly took care of that case of verb
complementation, I should move on to another challenge: a complementation difference that Algeo missed. John (coming to us through the
Association of British Scrabble Players) writes to say:
One phrase not yet covered (as far as I can tell) isbeat up on = to attack physically or verbally (Websters 11th Collegiate). This strikes me (oops no pun intended) as exclusively North American, the equivalent British phrase being "beat up"
Where does the "on" come from? It appears to be a relatively recent addition. The 1937 version of Webster's New International Dictionary, Second Edition Unabridged lists only "beat up" - (sense b) Slang to thrash (a person) esp. soundly.
John, come and be one of my students--I love the ones who do a bit of research before coming in with a question. Ten (BrE)
marks/(AmE)
points for laying the groundwork! Let's start by comparing
beat and
beat up:
(1) Batman beat the Joker(2) Batman beat up the Joker.
(1) is ambiguous. It either means that Batman struck the Joker or that Batman won against the Joker. (2) indicates that Batman physically beat the Joker until some conclusion was reached--i.e. the Joker soundly thrashed. This involves the completive
particle up, which we've seen
before. The OED notes that
beat up is originally AmE, and the first example of it (in an
O. Henry story) is from 1907. Next year we can celebrate its hundredth birthday in print, then.
Then there's
beat on:
(3) Batman beat on the Joker(4) Batman beat on the door.
(3) sounds odd in many dialects, but (4), with an inanimate object, sounds better. If we use
beat on with an animate object as in (3), it can sound like the object is not so animate--perhaps the Joker is unconscious or otherwise being very passive about being beaten. (Note that the participial form is
beaten in standard BrE and AmE, but can be
beat in informal and non-standard contexts, as in the AmE phrase
It can't be beat = 'it's the best'.)
On also seems to give a more repetitive connotation--it's the same spot on the door/the Joker that is being struck repeatedly.
Batman beat the door/Joker sounds a bit more like the door/Joker is being struck all over.
So, now we come to the one that John wondered about:
(5) Batman beat up on the Joker (AmE)
Here we get both some completiveness from
up and some impugned inanimacy from
on. (Or at least, this is my reading of the situation.) Here, Batman pretty soundly (AmE dialectal)
whupped the Joker, but the Joker didn't offer much resistance. As John's dictionary quotation indicates, this is often used figuratively. So, if you don't agree with what I've said here, you can beat up on my ideas in the comments section. I'll be passive about it in the sense that I probably won't be on-line to defend myself when you comment. But if you say something
cleverer than what I've said here, I'll only thank you for the beating. After all, blogging is a form of intellectual masochism.