Hung or Hanged
Situation: The screen froze, and the computer pulled back its ears and dug in its heels, refusing to do anything.
How should we say it? This was the topic on my class yesterday. Should we say my computer hanged yesterday or my computer hung yesterday?
The opinions differed. But at the end of 30 minutes of lively and energetic debate all faces turned to me.
This is what makes English lively—and why I love this language.
Let’s start at the beginning
Hang has two forms of simple past and past participle: hanged and hung.
Technically, it would be correct to say my computer hanged and my computer hung. Grammatically speaking nobody argues against either. But common usage, connotation, dictates otherwise.
For a very long time, hanged has been use to describe the process of hanging a person by the neck till dead. So, we have sentences like, “The court sentences the culprit to be hanged by the neck till dead”. And in the Europe and the Americas people used to be hanged left right and centre. Hanging and burning at the stakes were matters of routine.
Since this was a rather melancholic business, people started gradually avoiding this word when they didn’t mean execution, and started using hung instead. So, they started saying
- I hung my socks on the chair
instead of
- I hanged my socks on the chair.
- My computer hung last evening.
- The mobile hung after I downloaded the movie.
If you say, My computer hanged last evening!
- Whom did it hang?
And if you say, “My computer got hanged last evening”.
- Who hanged it?
The accepted way is:
- My computer hung last evening.
But, and here’s the funny part, for all the Nazism involved, we read a lot of hung related to execution:
- He was hung at sunrise.
Yes, this is an Americanism almost all the way. I don’t know of any other country using this expression.
Personally speaking
Although I follow this practice of saying hung and not hanged, I don’t see any constructive benefit in this so-called difference, except to maybe give the grammar Nazis a handle to beat you with. Also, you don’t score any brownie points by using hung instead of hanged with reference to non-humans. It’s just that someone will aim a brickbat between your eyes. And I’m not in favour of receiving brickbats – between my eyes or anywhere else on my body.
Idiomatic expressions
But, permit me to give you some useful expressions using hung that you could use in your everyday communication:
1. When you are overly concerned about something or somebody, or preoccupied with somebody or something:
- He was hung up on the latest mobile phone.
- He was so hung up on his latest girlfriend that he failed in his exam.
2. When you are delayed
- She was hung up in traffic.
- I am hung up in this meeting
3. Disconnect a call
- He hung up after I asked him his name.
4. To be anxious
- He was hung up on the details.
- They were all hung up before the exams.
5. To retire (hang up boots)
- He hung up his boots after the last deal.
- On his 75th birthday the doctor decided to hang up his boots.
- The boxer hung up his gloves after the last bout.
6. To rely on something or somebody
They hung their hat on the newly appointed engineer.
7. To not give up (hang tough)
The US president is hanging tough on withdrawing the army from Afghanistan.
- The army hung tough and released Point 4590 and Tiger Hill from the occupying forces of Pakistan.
So, now, I’m sure these words will be use they way they are generally used. Don’t give the nazis a handle to beat you with!
See you in the next!
