Go without "to"

Marlon   Fri Dec 30, 2005 10:29 pm GMT
Hi, in many american series I've heard that when people are going to start a new activity at the moment, they say "let's go celebrate, do something" Is this possible? Having a verb go after the go verb and not use the to.
John   Fri Dec 30, 2005 10:31 pm GMT
Hi :-)
Travis   Fri Dec 30, 2005 10:45 pm GMT
Yes, that is the normal form that one uses in such constructions in North American English, as one never uses "to" in NAE if one is speaking about specificially starting some activity, without any indication of any actual movement at all. One can use "to" here, but it has a distinctly different meaning, in that it indicates movement that *enables* one to do the activity in question, rather than starting said activity itself.
JJM   Fri Dec 30, 2005 11:09 pm GMT
"Is this possible?"

Obviously it must be.
Eric   Mon Feb 13, 2006 6:36 pm GMT
"is this possible?"

Not when speaking English :)
Tiffany   Mon Feb 13, 2006 7:46 pm GMT
Do not listen to Eric, he is misinforming you. In his narrow perception, AmE is not "proper" English. This is a normal form in AmE, as Travis said, perfectly acceptable.
Eric   Mon Feb 13, 2006 8:01 pm GMT
No misinformation or narrow perception from my part, since I was referring to English (British) English witch is the language. And in English that is not the correct way of expression. If one choose to use another variation of the language that is up to that person of course, however if it should be correct one needs to check the language itself...period. I apologise for being unclear in my previous post.

Good luck Marlon with the English
Tiffany   Mon Feb 13, 2006 8:25 pm GMT
Well, thank you Eric, you just confirmed what I said. He thinks BrE is the only variation that deserves to be called English.

I'm sure you can figure out what you want, Marlon, but English is English. It's his own personal agenda that only British English is correct. Most others I know do not subscribe to this view. Good luck, we've answered your question. It is correct and quite possible in AmE.
Eric   Mon Feb 13, 2006 8:36 pm GMT
Once again, you misunderstand me and frankly, you seem to do it on purpose. There is no such thing as the term BrE, only English (yes British), however if you wish to point out any other variation of the language you can for instance say AmE, to stress that you are referring to the American variation of the language. The problem here seems to be that you become offended by a simple fact, when I explained to Marlon how to find out the proper term or expression. By doing so he can choose whether he wants to use English or another variation of the language. And again Tiffany, his mentioned example is not the correct way regarding English (British). The only way that it could be correct is if you claim that American variation of the language is the correct (authentic, origin language). And that it is not as both you and I know. There is no reason to be so easily offended, there is no need for that. Everyone is entitled to there opinion, but NOT there own facts. That includes me, and I have followed that creed in the posts.
Uriel   Mon Feb 13, 2006 9:37 pm GMT
Adam! I didn't know you had a brother! How cute.

Marlon: you can use go + a verb, as in "go celebrate". It's slightly different than saying "going to celebrate", which means that the celebrating is a future activity that is not immediately imminent. In fact, it is also possible to say "I'm going to go celebrate tonight", using both constructions.
Eric   Mon Feb 13, 2006 10:03 pm GMT
To bad that people do not take the time to read the posts. If they did they would not get irrational and take offence of simple facts. Instead all too many get into the "verbal abuse mode", how colourful.
american nic   Tue Feb 14, 2006 1:48 am GMT
British English is no more 'English' than North American English is. They are both perfectly acceptable varieties (or really dialect groups) of the same language. Just because the form of the language spoken in the 1500s was spoken in the same location as much of British English is now, it is no more the official form of the language than any other.
Uriel   Tue Feb 14, 2006 4:20 am GMT
It IS difficult to say that one variety is "better" or more standard than another in a language that went global over 200 years ago. Besides, even British English has evolved and changed since then; it has not been static. So what standard can it claim to set for the others? It's like saying only Saudi Arabians can be "true" muslims, since the religion was originally invented there; what, Moroccans and Malaysians don't count, since their rituals may be somewhat different?
Travis   Tue Feb 14, 2006 8:04 am GMT
>> To bad that people do not take the time to read the posts. If they did they would not get irrational and take offence of simple facts. Instead all too many get into the "verbal abuse mode", how colourful.<<

The matter here is that what you say is *not* rational and is *not* fact, as much as you might believe such to be so. The matter is that the current North American English dialects and English English dialects are both descended from 15th Century English dialects, with neither being "more original" than other, and with many of the characteristics of spoken English English dialects today having developed since that point. Furthermore, it is hard to claim that spoken NAE is somehow more innovative than such as a whole, when one considers things such as the loss of the subjunctive in spoken English English (still alive and well here even in everyday speech), the loss of rhoticity, the loss of forms such as "fall" (as in the season) and "gotten", and ubiquitous glottal-stopping of many a southeastern Englishperson... Anyways, attitudes like yours do very little to make a good impression of Englishpersons in general for North Americans like myself, even though luckily people like you are in the minority as Englishpersons go.
Uriel   Tue Feb 14, 2006 8:15 am GMT
Uh... "Englishpersons", Travis? :}