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“what do you allow?†when asking for your opinion.
I've read "allow" or " 'low" to mean "opine" in old novels, but never heard it myself. I'm pretty sure I've run across it in Clemens—didn't Aunt Polly use it?—and maybe in Steinbeck too. Not just your family, then, and if I'm not mistaken Tom Sawyer was from parts further west, Alabama maybe (I forget).
Bob Bridges said:
I've read "allow" or " 'low" to mean "opine" in old novels, but never heard it myself. I'm pretty sure I've run across it in Clemens—didn't Aunt Polly use it?—and maybe in Steinbeck too. Not just your family, then, and if I'm not mistaken Tom Sawyer was from parts further west, Alabama maybe (I forget).
North Missouri on the Mississippi River.
RobertB said:
"Opine" seems too strong to be synonym of "allow", and it does not go with "I"-- You hear "I allow that..." but seldom or never "I opine that..."
I think that I, too, seldom or never hear "I opine that..." but I think that is only because the word "opine" is antiquated. But it is a verb that comes after a subject so, "I opine", "you opine", "he/she opines" is really the most logical use of the word. And, knowing the meaning of "opine", it is a perfect synonym for what my understanding is of "allow." I have heard this phrase many times in my youth by people who are no longer with us, so I haven't heard it in years now, but it always made me feel that the speaker was giving his opinion when he used it.
RobertB, your understanding of "allow" is correct, at least as the word is used normally and nowadays. It isn't that "opine" is strong enough to be synonymous with that meaning, but that "allow" has at some times and places been used idiomatically to mean something much weaker, weak enough to be nearly synonymous with "opine".
Think of changing the meaning of "allow" to be near to the sense of "admit": "He was always a mischief-maker, but I'll allow he got much better once he got married." From there it's only a small change from "admit" to "opine"—which, by the way, means "express an opinion".
“Allow†is not for initiating an opinion though -- It's good for bouncing off an existing idea to say that you agree half way. For instance you wouldn't go into a room and announce “I'll allow he'll get much better once he got married." But if there is an ongoing discussion of whether marriage will be panacea to all his problems, then the statement makes sense. So in that one way “allow†is still different from “opine.â€
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