Timeline for Is "in the old decades" grammatically correct?
Current License: CC BY-SA 3.0
10 events
| when toggle format | what | by | license | comment | |
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| Oct 21, 2013 at 21:09 | answer | added | MrHen | timeline score: 4 | |
| Oct 13, 2013 at 11:11 | comment | added | Kris | I think this is a perfectly legitimate question for ELU. A phrase does not have to be idiomatic so long as it is grammatical, unambiguous, and makes sense. Depending on the context, I would certainly use the expression to reference a period of, say 30-40 years duration, from a time that is several decades old, not the recent past. What is wrong with the phrase per se? | |
| Oct 12, 2013 at 21:13 | review | Close votes | |||
| Oct 13, 2013 at 11:13 | |||||
| Oct 12, 2013 at 19:13 | comment | added | Edwin Ashworth | Expressions start somewhere before they catch on (if they ever do), and perhaps vinny lammie's blog ('The good old decades') is starting a trend. However, I'd say that most Google hits for "old decades" are from people who can't handle idiomatic English, or chance juxtapositions (he was old decades ago, etc). | |
| Oct 12, 2013 at 19:12 | comment | added | Janus Bahs Jacquet | To answer your second question: no, “in the old decades” does not mean the same as “a few decades ago”. The latter specifically talks about a few decades ago (for example, the 1970s or 1980s if seen from 2013), whereas ‘the old decades’ would be quite a bit further back in time. | |
| Oct 12, 2013 at 19:07 | comment | added | John Lawler | It's grammatically correct, but it's very strange. The old days is the idiom, and, while decades makes sense (In past decades, ...), the old decades has to refer to 'those old decades that we discussed earlier'. | |
| Oct 12, 2013 at 19:06 | answer | added | ex-user2728 | timeline score: -4 | |
| Oct 12, 2013 at 19:05 | comment | added | Peter Shor | There's nothing grammatically wrong with "in the old decades", but no native English speakers actually use it. They'd say "in earlier decades" instead. | |
| Oct 12, 2013 at 19:02 | review | First posts | |||
| Oct 12, 2013 at 20:56 | |||||
| Oct 12, 2013 at 18:46 | history | asked | IcySnow | CC BY-SA 3.0 |