Catherine from Dallas asks about I don’t cotton to, meaning something isn’t to one’s taste or that someone doesn’t get along with it. The expression is often heard as Southern US English, but the verb cotton goes back hundreds of years in England, where it was tied to textile work. To cotton wool apparently meant rubbing it to raise the surface so pieces of cloth would fit together. From that idea of fitting well came uses such as she doesn’t cotton to him and I’m not cotton with so-and-so. This is part of a complete episode.
Transcript of ““I Don’t Cotton To” Traces Back to English Textile Work”
Hello, you have A Way with Words.
Good afternoon. This is Catherine Parr.
Hi, Catherine. How are you doing? Where are you calling from?
I’m calling from Dallas, Texas.
Well, welcome to the program, Catherine. How can we help you?
Well, I had a question. I have been hearing for a number of years, especially from elderly relatives, the expression, I’m not cotton to.
I’m not cotton to.
And it’s referring, I guess, to something maybe that they’re not in favor of or they’re not really, you know, that’s not their choice.
And it’s obviously very Southern, but I’m just wondering where it came from.
So you might say, I’m not cotton to Justin Bieber.
Exactly.
You’re not?
So that’s Southern.
Martha, you’re Southern?
Yeah.
Oh, I heard my mother saw that.
Yeah, I heard my mother use cotton as a verb all the time.
She’d say, she doesn’t cotton to him.
Yes, yes, yes.
Mm-mm—
Or I’m not cotton with so-and-so.
Yes.
Right?
I see.
Right, yeah, yeah.
Well, you know, it’s interesting.
It gets associated with Southern English all the time, but it goes way back.
It goes all the way back to England.
Isn’t that cool?
Yeah, prior to Texas even being a state.
Oh, I see.
That long ago.
Okay.
Hundreds of years ago.
And apparently the word cotton, Catherine, was used as a verb.
And I’m not sure I completely understand this, but it had to do with working cotton, the fabric or the thread.
And if you cottoned wool, for example, you rubbed it in order to sort of raise the surface and make it fit with other pieces of cloth.
Does that make sense?
Is this a way of like making it stay together or a way of feeding it into machinery?
Or making it the same level?
So this is out of textiles in the textile industry or out of sewing in the home or maybe a little of both?
I think it’s from the industry for sure, but probably both.
And so if materials cottoned well, then they fit together well.
That’s my understanding of it.
Oh, okay.
So this was from a time and a place where we were much closer to fabrics because we probably made our own, right?
Right, right.
Bolts of cloth and the sewing kit in the house was probably an ordinary thing.
So it might be the kind of language that you would expect to hear from your mother or your family members, right?
Right, right.
Just trying to get all that material to fit together.
That’s interesting because I was putting it more with like cotton as far as like picking cotton.
I was thinking in terms of that as opposed to the actual textile or fabric.
Right, right.
That’s what I always thought growing up, and I just thought it was the weirdest thing that my mother would say.
But, you know, it became part of my vocabulary just because I heard it.
But you don’t hear it much anymore.
I don’t think I do.
It sounds a little dated and a little old-fashioned, but I think most folks who read have probably come across it enough that at least understand it, right?
Right.
You know, if you’re any kind of book reader at all, it shows up in a wide variety of classic fiction.
Well, it’s a lovely linguistic heirloom, so you hang on to it, okay?
Okay, thank you.
Okay, thanks so much for calling, Catherine.
Bye-bye.
Appreciate it.
Bye-bye.
Bye.
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