{{Short description|Dialectal use of 'anymore' with positive polarity}} {{DISPLAYTITLE:Positive ''anymore''}} {{wiktionary|any more}} '''Positive ''anymore''''' is the use of the adverb ''anymore'' in an affirmative context.<ref name=OED>{{cite encyclopedia | year = 2002 | title =any more, ''adv.'' | encyclopedia =Oxford English Dictionary | publisher = Oxford University Press | location = Oxford and New York}}</ref> While ''any more'' (also spelled ''anymore'') is typically a negative/interrogative polarity item used in negative, interrogative, or hypothetical contexts, speakers of some dialects of English use it in positive or affirmative contexts,<ref group=notes>This refers to morphosyntactic context, and not necessarily to connotation. Positive ''anymore'' may express negative feelings about a situation, but it is not a negative polarity item, which can occur only with a negative word such as ''not'' or ''doesn't''.</ref> with a meaning similar to ''nowadays'' or ''from now on''.<ref name=OED/><ref>{{Cite book|title=Analyzing Variation in Language: Papers from the Second Colloquium on New Ways of Analyzing Variation, Part 3|last1=Hindle|first1=Donald|last2=Sag|first2=Ivan|publisher=Georgetown University Press|year=1975|editor-last=Ralph W. Fasold|editor-first=Roger Shuy|chapter=Some more on anymore}}</ref> The difference between negative (NPI, short for "negative polarity item") ''anymore'' and positive ''anymore'' can be characterized as follows:
* Negative: "I don't eat meat anymore" → "I used to eat meat, and (but) I don't now" * Positive: "I eat meat anymore" → "I didn't eat meat before, and (but) I do now"
Positive ''anymore'' occurs in some varieties of North American English, especially in Philadelphia and the Delaware Valley, Baltimore and its suburbs, as well as the Midland variety widely spoken in Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Kansas, Iowa, and Missouri; its usage extends to Nevada, Utah and some other western U.S. states.<ref name=Labov73>{{Citation |last=Labov |first=William |contribution=Where do grammars stop? |title=Report on the Twenty-Third Annual Round Table Meeting on Linguistics and Language Studies |editor-last=Shuy | editor-first=Roger |place=Washington |publisher=Georgetown University Press |pages=43–88 |year=1973}}</ref> It also occurs in parts of Ireland and Northern Ireland.<ref name=Trudgill>{{cite book |last=Trudgill |first=Peter |title=Language in the British Isles | year=1984 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |location=Cambridge}}</ref>
Regarding prescriptive recommendations on usage, ''Garner's Modern English Usage'' echoes the typical prescription that it not be used in writing intended to meet approval with prescriptive readers, scoring it as "misused" and Stage 1 (rejected) on Garner's Language-Change Index (similar to the Heller & Macris index):<ref name="GMEU4">{{cite book | last = Garner | first = Bryan A. | title = Garner's Modern English Usage | publisher = Oxford University Press | location = New York, NY | year = 2016 | isbn = 978-0190491482 }}</ref> "In a linguistic study of Missourians,<ref>Gilbert Youmans, 'Any More on ''Anymore'',' 61 ''Am. Speech'' 61, 61 (1986).</ref> informants considered this dialectal usage 'well established, though controversial.' [...] That means that the informants were all familiar with it, but many didn't like it. The findings would probably hold throughout most of the United States."<ref name="GMEU4"/> Both ''Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary''<ref>{{Citation |author=Merriam-Webster |title=Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary |date=12 July 2023 |url=https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/anymore }}</ref> and ''the American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language''<ref>{{Citation |author=Houghton Mifflin Harcourt |title=The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language |url=https://ahdictionary.com/ |access-date=2017-06-29 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150925104737/https://ahdictionary.com/ |archive-date=2015-09-25 |url-status=dead }}</ref> have usage notes covering the positive use and its distribution.
Some linguists theorize that the North American usage derives from Irish or Scots-Irish sources.<ref>{{Citation |last=Murray |first=Thomas E. |contribution=Positive ''anymore'' in the Midwest |title="Heartland" English: Variation and Transition in the American Midwest |editor-last=Fraser |editor-first=Timothy C. |publisher=University of Alabama Press |location=Tuscaloosa |pages=173–186 |year=1993}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last=Montgomery |first=Michael |title=From Ulster to America: The Scotch-Irish Heritage of American English |year=2006 |publisher=Ulster Historical Foundation |location=Belfast}}</ref>
==Examples== The following examples illustrate the use of positive ''anymore'' in Irish or North American English speech, as recorded by lexicographers or sociolinguists.
* "A servant being instructed how to act, will answer 'I will do it any more'." (Northern Ireland, {{circa|1898}})<ref>{{cite encyclopedia | year = 1898 | title =any | encyclopedia =The English Dialect Dictionary |volume= 1 | publisher = Oxford University Press | location = London |editor-last=Wright |editor-first=Joseph |page=63 |url=https://archive.org/details/englishdialectdi01wriguoft |access-date =21 December 2009}}</ref> * "Any more, the difference between a white collar worker and a blue collar worker is simply a matter of shirt preference." (Madison, Wisconsin, 1973)<ref name=OED/> * "Everything we do anymore seems to have been done in a big hurry." (Kingston, Ontario, 1979)<ref name=OED/> * "I'll be getting six or seven days' holiday anymore." (Belfast, Northern Ireland, 1981)<ref name=Trudgill/> * "Anymore we watch videos rather than go to the movies." (Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, c. 1991)<ref>{{Citation |last1=Wolfram |first1=Walt |last2=Schilling-Estes |first2=Natalie |title=American English: Dialects and Variation |year=1998 |publisher=Wiley-Blackwell |location=Malden, MA}}</ref>
==Notes== {{reflist|group=notes}}
==References== {{reflist}}
Anymore Category:English grammar