"Marry off" | Imamother

amother

Emerald

Tue, Feb 13 2024, 8:30 pm

Is it used? Yes
Is it grammatically correct? No

But I'm chassidish in boro park and everyone talks this way. Totally normal to say" I married off last week" or "I'm marrying off next week"

NechaMom

Tue, Feb 13 2024, 8:32 pm

tigerwife wrote:

Lol. According to a recent thread, Choirmistress would be the woman for this job.

I don’t think it’s similar to running off. You can say, “and off she ran” but not “and off she married”. In the first example, off is referring to the direction/ place the subject ran to. But when you say married off, it’s not a direction but part of the verb phrase. You need to include off. It is not the same as “She married her daughter” (yikes!). Married indicates an action happening to the subject. Married off indicates an action that the subject is doing.

Never thought I’d have so much fun with a frumspeak grammatical question!

You did a good job explaining why it’s different than walked off. A+
So married off is just a two word verb.
Now what’s the difference between “She ran”(complete sentence) and “She married off”(incomplete)?

tigerwife

Tue, Feb 13 2024, 8:42 pm

Maybe it’s like an infinitive?

I love
I married

These are complete on their own but have a different meaning when you add infinitives:

I love to
I married off

I love to what?
I married off who?

I love to go swimming.
I married off a grandchild.

Remember this is all theoretical because I don’t know if “Marry off” is grammatically correct to begin with. I’m just trying to explain why my gut feeling is that it needs a subject.

I’d love to hear an expert weigh in and maybe grade my guesses Smile

Vintage?

ittsamother

Tue, Feb 13 2024, 8:50 pm

Also, I would say it has to do with the fact that the verb "married off" is something you do to someone else. "Ran" is something you do yourself. Think of "slapped". Would you consider it a complete sentence to say "She slapped." or would you require it to say who or what she slapped? What about "She photographed." or "She peeled." I would think you would need to identify what or who the subject applied the action to.

octopus

Tue, Feb 13 2024, 8:54 pm

It's a dangling participle. It's grammatically incorrect. And Rebbetzin Sheila Feinstein a'h taught me that at my first job interview. She was a wonderful boss and a wonderful person

NechaMom

Tue, Feb 13 2024, 8:56 pm

ittsamother wrote:

But married off is only used when talking about a child. All your examples have many options and need clarification. Here it’s always your child. It’s almost like “I gave birth”. You’re also not completing the sentence by specifying to whom you gave birth.
I married off last week.
I gave birth last week.

NechaMom

Tue, Feb 13 2024, 8:59 pm

octopus wrote:

It's a dangling participle. It's grammatically incorrect. And Rebbetzin Sheila Feinstein a'h taught me that at my first job interview. She was a wonderful boss and a wonderful person

That is very interesting.

ittsamother

Tue, Feb 13 2024, 9:04 pm

NechaMom wrote:

Others said above that "married off" is one two-word verb. "Gave birth" is two separate things. "I married off" is more equivalent to "I gave". You still need to specify what it is you gave. Ah, you gave birth. Ah, you married off a child.

And you can marry off anyone! You can marry off your mother, if you're the one making the wedding! You can marry off your friend's three children in Australia, if you're the one funding their weddings for them. You can marry off your dog if you make your dog a wedding...

NechaMom

Tue, Feb 13 2024, 9:17 pm

ittsamother wrote:

You’re right.

amother

Tue, Feb 13 2024, 9:21 pm

The concept of marrying off is not incorrect. In the olden days, people married off their children, as did kings and queens. And today we do things similarly, in chareidi society, so we still use the term.
It's just the phraseology "marry off" without the subject at the end that is incorrect.

pause

Tue, Feb 13 2024, 11:19 pm

It's not a dangling participle. It's a transitive verb that's missing the object.

Transitive verbs must have a direct object where the action of the verb passes to it from the subject. It receives the action of the verb.

"Did you marry off?"
The subject is you. You are doing the action of marrying off. But whom are you doing it to? That's the info that's missing. A sentence with a transitive verb that's missing the object, the receiver of the action, is incomplete.

pause

Tue, Feb 13 2024, 11:26 pm

A dangling participle is a description that is missing the noun it's describing and often ends up inadvertently describing a different noun.
For example: Looking around the yard, the leaves weren't raked.
Looking around the yard seems to be describing the leaves... ! But unless, the noun is added we don't know whom it's actually describing.
Correction: Looking around the yard, I noticed that the leaves weren't raked.

DrMom

Wed, Feb 14 2024, 1:51 am

amother OP wrote:

Sorry I wasn't clear about my question.

Yes, I know "Marry off my daughter " is frumspeak. It's not necessarily a negative expression, but it connotes the idea of the parent taking the responsibility of marriage for the child as his or her own, as opposed to the secular worlds, where people get married and are not "married off". In our world, (generally) parents are involved in finding a spouse, arrange the wedding, pay for the setup of the couples home, etc.

My question was really asking about using the expression "marry off" without inserting the child.
Have you married off?
I already married off.

(Where I come from, someone might say, "I married off a daighter.")

To me, those sentences are missing a predicate.
I was wondering if others agree

Agree 100%.

amother

DarkRed

Wed, Feb 14 2024, 12:50 pm

It's the same with other words that come from Yiddish-ausgearbet is fine in Yiddish, but worked out does not mean the same in English. And so many more....

octopus

Wed, Feb 14 2024, 1:33 pm

pause wrote:

I'm not a grammarian so maybe some other grammar experts can weigh in. I'm not entirely convinced you can call the word "off" a verb. I'm not convinced what you are saying is correct.

ittsamother

Wed, Feb 14 2024, 1:59 pm

octopus wrote:

I'm not a grammarian so maybe some other grammar experts can weigh in. I'm not entirely convinced you can call the word "off" a verb. I'm not convinced what you are saying is correct.

Good ol' Google says "Marry Off" is a phrasal verb, which is "an idiomatic phrase consisting of a verb and another element, typically either an adverb, as in break down, or a preposition, for example see to, or a combination of both, such as look down on."

ittsamother

Wed, Feb 14 2024, 2:08 pm

Basically, is it grammatically correct? I suppose so. Same way that "She photographed." or "He poked." would be. Technically, it has a subject and a verb and that's all you need.

But it's awkward wording to leave any of those examples as a complete sentence like that. I would find it very weird if someone asked me "Did you ever poke?" Or "Have you photographed yet?" if that answers your question, OP.
I would ask, "Have you married off a child yet?" or "Have you ever made a wedding in the Palace?" etc.

peace2

Wed, Feb 14 2024, 2:41 pm

pause wrote:

Thank you! I was reading through before I posted to see if anyone would say this. It's incorrect because you're missing the object of the sentence. I'm loving all the grammar nerds uniting Smile

ittsamother

Wed, Feb 14 2024, 2:53 pm

I've been looking into transitive and intransitive verbs more. While a transitive verb requires an object, does the object have to be specified in the sentence to be complete? For example.
"She saw a huge spider on her table. She slapped! She killed! She disposed!"
We all get the context right there, clearly she's doing it all to the spider. Are those three last sentences all incorrect, and it must be written as "She slapped it! She killed it! She disposed of it!" or are they technically correct, just slightly awkward.