fluffyhamster wrote:Of course, the definitions in some learner's dictionaries of the function (meaning-use) of the idiom are quite informative to begin with!
OALDCE6: don't blame me (spoken) used to advise sb not to do sth, when you think they will do it despite your advice
LDOCE4: don't blame me spoken used when you are advising someone not to do something but you think that they will do it in spite of your advice
Actually, the functional explanations that the above dictionaries offer seem "disjointed" and don't ultimately make a whole lot of sense. I feel that they could be improved, and lack the 'acceptance in the now of another's stated course of action' element (or rather, the "acceptance") that I "worked out" (above)...so the issue is hardly whether somebody is going to do something or not (they most likely are, and we have "accepted" that), but rather the likely
outcome/end result/net effect of their decision when (not if?) it is completed (as we "know", "fear" it indeed will be).
The overall function, then, is one of (note,
indirect) "prediction", describing the likely future scene as it plays out in our mind's eye, and this focus in turn has the effect of "indirectly asking a person to
reconsider what they seem to be intending to do, in the light of a possibly unwanted outcome that they may not have fully considered, rather than directly predicting the unwanted outcome and drawing a too forceful conclusion from it" - note that there is no "modal of probability/likelihood" in the main clause of the phrase (see also the above discussion of "bald" statements, implicature etc).
It therefore seems that there is more involved here than (directly) "advising", and the likelihood that somebody will do something silly or bad is not really the issue (rather, the resulting "badness" is, which may well affect more than just the two current speakers, and in turn re-affect them - "repercussions", usually unintended consequences and all that).
Maybe all of this can and will be worked by the students out on the basis of the examples alone, rather than from a close consideration of the functional definitions. (Anyone fancy rewriting the definitions, the, or do you still reckon they will suffice as they are?).
Functional definitions are, however, useful to and often used by teachers, so it is important that they are formulated as explicitly as possible to help us gather and inspect them, in order to develop the best (clearest, most realistic) activities possible; probably not enough attention is being paid in lexicography to defining functions clearly and consistently (the focus is mainly on avoiding circularity in finding synonymous substitutes for the entry words rather than phrases).
'Used to advise' is perhaps too general...or is generality a necessary convenience and perhaps even a strength? Either way, the following remarks about likelihood ('when/but you think they will do it, despite your advice') seem pointless, when it is the "prediction" (condition, event, "seen" "scene" etc) in the
if-clause that follows the phrase's stem which is the obvious and natural focus (which has a discernible functional effect overall, with implications for the phrase's exact functional definition).
After all, I know how much time it takes to answer all these posts, and I figured you were tired. I wouldn't blame you for taking a rest.
