Expert: Ted Nesbitt - 4/10/2007

Question
Dear Mr. Nesbitt,

my family of origin has always used "sit up" as a call to dinner.  Not as a posture commentary as in "sit up and don't slouch", but as in "dinner's ready, come sit up".  Some think this is very odd.  I suspect it's a colloquialism.  Are you familiar with others using "sit up" in this way?

Answer
Dear Naomi:

Because I have spent a great deal of time looking for your answer and trying to type this message, PLEASE do not give me a low rating for timeliness.  A lot of people think that the volunteers at Allexperts (1) get paid large sums of money to answer questions [WE ARE PAID NOTHING!] and (2) we do nothing but sit at our computers waiting for questions to arrive [I ACTUALLY WORK A 60-75 HOURS WEEK, AND GET PAID FOR 40 HOURS.]

The basic answer to your question is that you and your family are correct.  I have heard the expression many times, both in the United States and in Great Britain.

"The Oxford English Dictionary" [OED] is the BEST resource for tracing word and phrase origins.  Here is the entry from the OED:

1856 S. WARNER Hills of Shatemuc xvi. 162 ‘Will you sit up, cousin?’..: the meaning of the request being that he should move his chair up to the table.

That entry means that the first known usage in WRITTEN English was in the year 1856.  It appeared in Warner's novel, "The Hills of Shatemuc."

However, "The Dictionary of American Regional English,"  [DARE] Joan Houston Hall, Chief Editor, Belknap Press of Harvard University, 2002, has a somewhat DIFFERENT background.

According to the DARE entry, the phrase appears as "sit up" AND "set up." They mean the same thing, but one is used in one part of the country, the other in a different part.  Predominantly, the expressions are used in the South and Southwest, although there are some spots in the Midwest and other areas where it is used.  

I'm not going to be able to type the complete entry from DARE, but here is a little bit of the information:

SET UP -- verb phrase -- also "sit up" -- also as a verb phrase, "to set up or sit up to (the) table."  To pull one's chair up to the table, take one's seat for a meal; hence the noun "set-up" or "sit-up," which is the taking of one's place (at the dinner table).

First written usage in 1843 [Hall's "New Purchase"] -- "Well! come, sit up."  This sit-up we instantly performed.

Later, in the same book, there is this passage:

When the "set up" is ordered, the gentlemen seat themselves alongside, and partly under the table.

In 1886, from "Appalachians," -- "Set up to table, men; supper's ready, sich as it is."

1899 -- Green, Virginia -- "Folk-Speech" -- "A person who told to "sit up" and "catch hold"; that is, to sit up to the table and help himself to the food.  "Catch HOLT" is also used.

1941 -- from New England -- "Both sit up and set up occur throughout the region with the latter form being far more frequent; the longer form 'set up to the table' also occurs several times."

1982 -- from Brooks' "Quicksand" -- "We're just ready to sit up.  Come and join us . . . Mary's food was delicious."

So, Naomi, the English dictionary says 1856.  The American dictionary says 1843.

Of course, any word or phrase appears in SPOKEN LANGUAGE long before it is ever written down.  I would be willing to wager that "sit up to dinner" was used in regular folks' homes LONG BEFORE 1843!

My grandmother always used "It's time to sit up to dinner."

My mother did not.  For her, it was "Come to dinner."

In today's world, it's "May I take your order" at the fast food drive through!

Ted Nesbitt