Ok, confused non-native speaker is confused.
When I was in school I was taught that you "wait for" something, as in: "I'm waiting for a friend", "I'll wait for the patch", "I'm waiting for bmolsson to make sense" etc.
"Wait on" is what a waiter does.
Yet, I noticed recently that people would post around the interwebs "I'll wait on a patch".
I'm aware that living languages keep evolving all the time and grammatical constructions or meanings of words can change all the time, but in this case I'm not sure if it's a change in language use or just bad internet grammar (see also: there/their/they're or it's/its).
Quote from: Syt on June 14, 2011, 10:57:49 PM
Ok, confused non-native speaker is confused.
When I was in school I was taught that you "wait for" something, as in: "I'm waiting for a friend", "I'll wait for the patch", "I'm waiting for bmolsson to make sense" etc.
"Wait on" is what a waiter does.
Yet, I noticed recently that people would post around the interwebs "I'll wait on a patch".
I'm aware that living languages keep evolving all the time and grammatical constructions or meanings of words can change all the time, but in this case I'm not sure if it's a change in language use or just bad internet grammar (see also: there/their/they're or it's/its).
Colloquial, certainly. I'm not sure if it still counts as bad grammar (it works syntactically, but not in context).
It's used pretty interchangeably.
The one that gets me is waiting "in line" or "on line". Like in a queue.
(https://languish.org/forums/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.collegemagazine.com%2Ffiles%2Fimage%2Fwaiting-in-line.jpg&hash=bafd280a586c41a8bfde90dd55e2b64fb4de478a)
In line
(https://languish.org/forums/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.myfacewhen.net%2Fuploads%2F395-little-girl-on-phone.png&hash=a2b9b7e55af1af043321b10d5ab09fac2c12343b)
On line.
Native speakers don't know English.
People on the internet are stupid.
"Wait on" is an Americanisation and therefore an abominable desecration of the English language.
To me "wait on" has a slight connotation of impatience that "wait for" does not.
Quote from: MadImmortalMan on June 14, 2011, 11:22:32 PM
The one that gets me is waiting "in line" or "on line". Like in a queue.
I hate it here. "Next on line." :bleeding:
I'm just waiting on a more definitive description of the differences between "wait for" and "wait on". ;)
Waiting on seems to have become somewhat synonymous with waiting for.
Quote from: Admiral Yi on June 15, 2011, 07:08:52 AM
To me "wait on" has a slight connotation of impatience that "wait for" does not.
quoted for truth.
Quote from: Brazen on June 15, 2011, 06:19:14 AM
"Wait on" is an Americanisation and therefore an abominable desecration of the English language.
"I'm not waiting on a lady...I'm just waiting on a friend."
Written by an Englishman, though.
My biggest gripe is:
"I should of gone home."
Should of?? :huh:
Quote from: Admiral Yi on June 15, 2011, 07:08:52 AM
To me "wait on" has a slight connotation of impatience that "wait for" does not.
I believe this is correct. To "wait on" implies you can't do anything until someone/something else does something, while "wait for" implies that you are doing something in the meantime.
"I'll get some food while we wait for the next bus."
"I had to wait on the bus for what seemed like an hour."
Quote from: Josephus on June 15, 2011, 08:43:40 AM
My biggest gripe is:
"I should of gone home."
Should of?? :huh:
That's your
biggest gripe? :huh:
"Of" for "have" is a mere colloquialism. No one deliberately uses it in writing except when transliterating speech. There are thousands of word substitutions like that, and always have been; "Ax" for "ask," and the like (probably more in Britain than the US). I certainly don't see any utility to griping about it.
I see it in writing, on forums and the like, all the time.
Is it an americanism or an engrishism?
In Swedish, we say "vänta på" or "waiting on" and it becomes natural to translate it that way.
Quote from: grumbler on June 15, 2011, 08:48:46 AM
"I had to wait on the bus for what seemed like an hour."
I read that like you were stuck in traffic for an hour.
Quote from: Warspite on June 15, 2011, 09:15:41 AM
Quote from: grumbler on June 15, 2011, 08:48:46 AM
"I had to wait on the bus for what seemed like an hour."
I read that like you were stuck in traffic for an hour.
Yeah, not a good example. Maybe "I had to wait on my lawyer's answer for an hour."
Quote from: Josephus on June 15, 2011, 08:59:14 AM
I see it in writing, on forums and the like, all the time.
Yes, but that's just illiteracy. Not a colloquialism.
Quote from: Josephus on June 15, 2011, 08:59:14 AM
I see it in writing, on forums and the like, all the time.
Are you expecting proper grammar on a forum? :unsure:
Quote from: Josephus on June 15, 2011, 08:59:14 AM
I see it in writing, on forums and the like, all the time.
I rather suspect that you hang out in illiterate circles. I've never seen "of" used in place of "have" in writing (transliterations of speech aside) and, even if I I had, it isn't as annoying as people not using any capitalization or punctuation or sentences and just writing one long rambling string of words after another until it is hard to even fucking tell what they are talking about if anything okay understand what I mean