Is "I am sat" bad English? I believe it is incorrect and instead either the present continuous
I am sitting
or the predicate adjective
I am seated
should be used.
I hear this quite often, however, and ultimately usage overrules formality. Does anybody know where this originated or how to describe it grammatically?
Forms like "I am sat here" and "they were stood there" are common in certain dialects of English (such as Yorkshire, where I live), but are not regarded as standard English, which prefers "I am sitting here" and "they were standing there".
They are examples of stative verbs, which in many languages have a different grammar from other verbs, but exactly how the form arises I don't know. [Edit: also, they don't pattern with the class of verbs usually called "stative" in English, in that they do have continuous forms: "I am sitting" etc.]
Some notes on all this from the OED...
The transitive verb to seat meaning “to cause to sit down” is first cited in 1623’s Henry VIII. Seated meaning “sitting down” is an adjective derived from the transitive verb to seat, and whose earliest citation in English is from Scott in 1817.
The simple past and the past participle of the much older verb to sit are both simply sat, and nothing more. Its reflexive and transitive senses, respectively meaning “to seat oneself” and “to cause someone to be seated”, date from time immemorial. Some relevant citations for the “I am sat” sort of sense include:
It is interesting to note that the older sate spelling includes several 19th citations, including Thackeray’s Vanity Fair of 1848.
I can in summary find no hint of condemnation in the OED for the use “I am sat”. However, these entries have not been updated since the Second Edition of 1989, and it is possible that more recent hypothetical opprobrium for such things has not yet found its way into being reflected there.
[1] i. ?I am sat
ii. I am sitting
iii. I am seated(? denotes questionable grammaticality)
In [1ii], the gerund-participle sitting is just a simple verb -- indicating that the subject is sitting.
In [1iii] we have the past participle used in what The Cambridge Grammar of the English Language calls the ascriptive use of be (a kind of copular clause).
[1i] sounds wrong. Is it wrong? No. It's just not standard usage.
In the ascriptive use, PC [predicative complement] denotes a property and characteristically has the form of AdjP or … NP.
That is, an ascriptive copular clause takes the form NP + be + AdjP (or + NP, but we definitely don’t have an NP here). A verb can be inflected to be used as an adjective by using the gerund-participle form or the past participle form. Sat is the past participle of sit and thus, unless I’m missing something, [1i] must be grammatical.
This, of course, does not apply when the preterite and past participle are not syncretised. Consider the following:
[2] *I am want [preterite]
ii. I am wanting [gerund-participle]
iii. I am wanted [past participle]
[2i] is ungrammatical, while [2ii] and [2iii] are fine.
In summary, I am sat is an example of the ascriptive use of be.
I would accept all of
but also the transitive or passive forms of seat and sit
That only leaves
which I find difficult to reject, though here sat has a passive tone to me.
Colloquially, "I am sat here" or "I am sat there" carries with it a sense that someone has done it to you. As in the construct "She sat me down and told me ...". It's typically used when telling a story or complaining. You wouldn't use it for a circumstance like being at your desk working or at home watching TV under normal conditions. You might use it for being in a doctor's waiting room, or outside the principals office. I suppose if you felt trapped at work (or even at home) and strongly wanted to be somewhere else, you might: "She's in the hospital, and I'm sat here with nothing to do, but no way to get to her and keep her company."
The unresolved question is whether or not it is acceptable to say I am/was sat/stood intransitively. more generally <>. As a southern UK speaker I hear this construction more and more frequently and I am puzzled by it. I would use the verb to-have in these cases e.g. I have sat/stood, I had sat/stood or use the continuous e.g. I am/was standing/sitting. When I hear "I am sat here" or "I am stood there” etc. I wonder "by who", i.e. I take it to be transitive.
Colin Fine above says "Forms like "I am sat here" and "they were stood there" are common in certain dialects of English (such as Yorkshire, where I live), but are not regarded as standard English, which prefers "I am sitting here" and "they were standing there". If so we note "I am/was sat/stood" = "I am/was sitting/standing" not "I have/had sat/stood". So a Northerner would say “I was stood at the bus stop when you drove past” meaning “I was standing at the bus stop when you drove past”; but would not “I was I was stood at the bus stop but then I walked home” meaning “I stood at the bus stop but then I walked home”
In such Northern dialects what verbs other than to sit and to stand use the past/past participle in lieu of the gerund (verb-ing). E.g. would you say I am/was ran/left/bought/swam instead of I am/was running/leaving/buying /swimming? and if not why not? What is the rule?
Etymonline has to sit, Proto-Germanic *setjan and to set, Proto-Germanic *satjan. Very similar. Perhaps that in some northern dialects the distinction between to sit and to set was given up. Influence of Norsk? Old Norse for to sit is sitja, for to set setja. Sitja and setja might easily have been muddled into one verb in northern dialects. But such a question would be the task for dialect specialists.
It appears that, though extremely awkward, it would be correct, as sat is the past part of sit. Seat is a similar verb that means "to sit down."
Side note: sit may be transitive or intransitive, but seat is always transitive and must take a direct object.
All those verbs which do not admit of being combined with the substantive verb, are called intransitive or neuter : such as, sit, stand, lie, sleep, &c. We can say, I am trained, loved, watched, &c. ; but we do not say, I am sat, stood, slept, &c.-The etymologic interpreter; or, An explanatory and pronouncing dictionary of the English language (1824)
