Query

[dcseain]

Is cotton a verb in your dialect of English? What about brook?

Examples:

We don't brook that [a]round here [what] we don't.
He doesn't cotton to that none too well [at all].

I ask because i used cotton in replying to a comment by a New Englander, and it struck me after the fact that she may not understand; but i know she'll ask if she can't figure it out.

Comments

[dmlaenker.livejournal.com]

Brook isn't even a noun in my dialect.

Or rather, it is, but it describes a named phenomenon elsewhere, not a common phenomenon here (i.e. if I were telling someone where I was and I happened to be in, say, Illinois, I'd say "there's a creek running by behind me called Oak Brook" or whatever).

[dcseain.livejournal.com]

Interest, especially seeing as you're from further south than i am. Though, you're from the coast, not inland, and from an area with a very strong military influence, even moreso than around here.

Run, Creek, Stream, Brook, in that order, are terms for minor river tributaries where i grew up, though Brook seems more used in Britain and New England than down here. Stream and Brook are more generic to me than Run and Creek.

I gather cotton parses in your native dialect, since you only commented negatively on brook?

[dcseain.livejournal.com]

Interesting even. :)

[selki.livejournal.com]

especially seeing as you're from further south than i am. Though, you're from the coast

OTOH, so am I, and I'm aware of "brook", but I've only ever read it (not sure I've heard it out loud) in combination with "no defiance", e.g., this from India News Online, It indicates that the King will brook no defiance of his authority. (http://news.indiamart.com/news-analysis/nepal-deuba-detentio-9410.html)

Brook seems to me to be more of an absolute word, connected to authority, as opposed to "cotton" which is more like a general-population "like" or "warm up to" and potentially applied to lots of things. "We don't cotton to foreign cars around here."

[perlandria.livejournal.com]

I understand and use both.
But I am a Californian of Michigan mother and a Tennessee father. In general, I use cotton for a more emotional and stubborn slower reluctance that is nigh unbreakable and brook for something sharper and more of an intellectual ethical reaction that can be changed with work.

[nancylebov.livejournal.com]

Neither, though I have at least a rough understanding of both.

In my dialect (ideolect) a crick is smaller than a creek.

[dcseain.livejournal.com]

That usage of crick is not uncommon in some dialects, according to the Wikipedia article on Stream (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Streams). The people i knew who say crick that way were from the area around Bedford, PA.

[perlandria.livejournal.com]

Crick is also used in central Utah, where Fork is said Fark. The vowel shift around there is fascinating.

[mobmama.livejournal.com]

"crick" is also used in rural Texas, where i spent several long years. :-)

[not-the-pope.livejournal.com]

As well as the south coast of Oregon (a state with a remarkable number of transplants from West Virigina).

[selki.livejournal.com]

In my dialect (ideolect) a crick is smaller than a creek.

Sort of true for me: that's the connotation I have with crick, but I have a vague feeling that that's just because people who say crick tend to be from where their creeks tend to be smaller than creeks from around me

[flyingwolf.livejournal.com]

LOL :)

(though personally I think they are meant to be the same - just that some people don't say "creek" correctly)

[dcseain.livejournal.com]

selki's understanding of crick matches the research i've done on words for streams. In scientific usage, rivers and all their tributaries are streams, with crick being a step smaller from a creek/run.

I've been to places where crick is a misprounciation of creek, also.

[flyingwolf.livejournal.com]

that's why I emphasized that it was my understanding of the words. I don't think I've heard anyone purposely call anything a crick and mean it to be something smaller than a creek. (I'm from Berks County, PA and had a naturalist for a Grandfather so I've done my share of playing in creeks and doing stream studies)

[madbodger.livejournal.com]

Cotton, yes, I grew up in the land of. Brook, only in the
sense of (abbreviated) donnybrook, used in its verb form.

[dcseain.livejournal.com]

Interesting in the brook bit there, as i've not yet found evidence of the usage i showed of brook is derived from donnybrook, and seeing definitions of donnybrook, i see not how they could be related. I always forget that you're from further south than i am.

[chaosdancer.livejournal.com]

Both in Kentucky, neither in Ohio - though of course being a child of TV, I've heard both before.

One Kentuckyism I thought was interesting is that they'd ask you to do something "If you don't care" instead of "If you don't mind."

And it's funny, but in Ohio they say "crick" throughout much of the state. I thought that was a southern thing too, but apparently not.

(And where my dad comes from, a crick is a "rill." :)

[netpositive.livejournal.com]

Hmm. I grew up in Northeastern Maryland, so I understand both just (or as they might say, "jes'") fine. I'd agree with perlandria that "cotton to" is more of a "it's my preference not to like something, and I'm entitled to my opinion even if it's wrong" action. More of a dialect word to my ears, whereas I think "brook" grew out into the general language when coupled with "no interference".

[louiseroho.livejournal.com]

Brook is.
Cotton is not.

[mobmama.livejournal.com]

i'm originally from NYC, as are both my parents -- altho, they are were both linguists/wordsmiths.

to me, 'cotton to' is much more informal, and personal; you would hear that settin' around the local poolhall or somesuch. whereas using 'brook' in terms of 'we don't brook that around here' sounds so much more formal and rather group-minded .. . . almost governmental/military in its connotation.

[kmhoofnagle.livejournal.com]

I grew up here in Woodbridge and then Alexandria. Brook is definitely a verb and part of my working vocabulary. I actually think of it as standard literate english.

I can't imagine a planet where people wouldn't know what the noun form of brook is, but I don't think of it as being common usage locally in Virginia. If I had to come up with a reason, to my mind, it's because we don't *have* brooks in Virginia much. We have creeks (smaller and slower) and rivers (bigger and around here often slower). Very few streams (faster moving than creeks and a little more substantial). No brooks (narrow like a creek, but moving more water faster and with more noise) that I've ever seen.

The verb cotton, to my mind, is most definitely some sort of backwoods dialect, but I'm not sure whose backwoods. My relatives in AR and MS would understand it (as I do) but they probably wouldn't use it. It's not part of my common usage at all anywhere in the southeast/south central that I know.

I am possessed of a true huntin', fishin', rodeo-ridin' Uncle Bunkus. And he wouldn't say it either.

[dcseain.livejournal.com]

I grew up in Alexandria until i was 4, then in Dale City, and i learned both verbs growing up from people in the neighborhood. Back then, Woodbridge/Dumfdries was a bit more rednecky and backwoodsy than it is today, to say the least.

Until i was 10, the rodeo came twice a year to a meadow at the edge of our neighborhood, where Bluefin Dr and those house are off of Minnieville Rd today. Of course, back then, Minnieville was only a two-lane road, rather than the 6-plus-turn-lanes with median it is today.

[kmhoofnagle.livejournal.com]

I did something similar. Alexandria (really Fairfax County south of the City of Alexandria) until about age 7. Moved to Woodbridge from 7-13. Lakeridge really. My house backed onto the reservoir. I can't remember what the cross street off of Rt 1 was, but I was super-near Occoquan (sp?). Anyhow then back to Alexandria for highschool. And OMG, you're not kidding! Prince William County was *country* then.

(Incidentally, I would rather die than ever live in an "opening up" suburb ever again because of how horrible it was watching farmland turn into sprawl.)

[flyingwolf.livejournal.com]

no and no (though I *might* have heard brook used that way. maybe.

[not-the-pope.livejournal.com]

Where I grew up in SW Oregon, neither "brook" nor "cotton" would normally be used in everyday language, although probably understood. Especially by those weirdos who read a lot and paid attention to language on TV. :-)

[(Anonymous)]

Not a common expression but context always helps.

Does cotton mean 'take well to the idea'?

[dcseain.livejournal.com]

cotton - take well to the idea

That's a good way to put it. Take would be a good synonym, and i think is in wider usage.