Is the phrase dog eat dog or doggy dog? Find Out Here

The expression comes from old contract law and was meant to ensure that a stipulation would apply to all situations. In this sense, intensive doesn’t make sense because intensity or concentrating on a single topic has nothing to do with the validity of a situation.

When you hear an expression and then learn what it means, it’s tempting to use it later on in your writing, especially if you’re trying to create a more natural tone. However, writing what you hear can lead to all sorts of newly minted expressions—such as “doggy-dog world,” instead of the correct “dog-eat-dog world” (a term that Cambridge Dictionary defines as being “used to describe a situation in which people will do anything to be successful, even if what they do harms other people”).

For people who speak and write English as a second language, learning how to use idioms and phrases correctly can be infuriating. It’s easier when you are a word-origin nerd like many of the team members at Stickler, but even people who grew up as native English speakers have a hard time using these expressions in their writing. Take a look at these seven mistakes and keep an eye out for them in your own work!

The word moot means “debatable, open to debate, doubtable.” It can also describe something that’s of little practical value or relevance. When someone makes a moot point, he is talking about a topic or thought simply to debate it, but ultimately whatever comes out of the conversation won’t have any practical use in the real world. Mute as an adjective means “silent, not speaking,” and is used to describe people rather than points.

In biblical Jewish tradition, the high priest would “place” the sins of the people on a goat on Yom Kippur (the Day of Atonement). By sending this goat into the desert, the people were symbolically sending their sins away from them. This has made its way into modern usage, where the definition of a scapegoat today is someone who is blamed for other people’s mistakes or for things that go wrong, especially when it makes a difficult situation easier for a group to handle.

Let’s unpack the meaning of the term dog-eat-dog and its origin. I’ll also show you examples of how to use this idiom in a sentence.

When you are in a dog-eat-dog competition, you will do everything to win, even if it harms other people. Other people are also willing to be ahead at your expense when they are in a dog-eat-dog industry.

Doggy dog, when used in the phrase doggy-dog world, is an eggcorn resulting from a mishearing of dog-eat-dog.

The phrase dog eat dog world is incorrect because it does not use a hyphen. Instead, you should say dog-eat-dog world as in “It’s a dog-eat-dog world out there.”

The expression dog-eat-dog comes from the Latin proverb, “a dog does not eat the flesh of a dog.” Now, this phrase has nothing to do with dogs. It first appeared in English print in 1543 but only got famous in 1732 in Thomas Fuller’s book entitled “Gnomologia.”

“Because we were going to spend so little time with them before Schmigadoon, and they were going to spend so much time apart while they were in Schmigadoon, that’s how we came up with the idea of the flashbacks,” Paul told TheWrap. “Because I thought, it’s really important that people root for this couple to be together. So we need to see bits of the relationship beforehand that hopefully resonate throughout that episode. In the writers’ roo,m we kind of highlighted, here’s a moment where she wants him to do something and he won’t do it because he’s closed off. And that’s thematically, so much of what the show is about. And then you want to see the first time they say ‘I love you’ to each other. It was kind of finding these pivotal relationship moments that can make us root for them as a couple, but also highlight, here’s the beginning of a problem in their relationship. Josh is closed off and Melissa is kind of controlling and has this idea in her head of what a relationship would be and is really pushing to make that happen.”

Paul had plenty of places to throw in sweet and relatable moments like that, as Melissa and Josh’s relationship pre-Schmigadoon is showcased in several flashbacks throughout the first five episodes of the show, which airs its Season 1 finale next week and has not yet been renewed for Season 2.

“Schmigadoon!” fans learned it’s a ruff — er, rough, world out there on this week’s episode of the Cecily Strong and Keegan-Michael Key-led musical comedy series, as now-split couple Melissa (Strong) and Josh (Key) have still yet to reunite with each other in the show’s titular town ahead of next Thursday’s Season 1 finale. Their inability to see eye to eye in Episode 5, titled “Tribulation,” was mirrored in a flashback to the earlier days of their relationship, when confusion over the phrase “dog-eat-dog world” sparked a huge fight between the two.

“It means like it’s a rough world. You can be brought down so low, a dog would have you for a pet. You’d be doggy to a dog,” Melissa replied.

Melissa’s insistence that the term is actually “a doggy dog world” and Josh’s insistence it’s so not is based on real conversation that happened between “Schmigadoon!” co-creator Cinco Paul and his wife, Amy.

Dog Eat Dog Idiom Meaning – English Expression Videos

When Josh first hears Melissa say it the incorrect way, he goes: “Hold on, hold on. Doggy dog? Oh, Mel, you just put me in a really difficult position because I need you to keep saying doggy dog, but it’s my obligation to tell you that the expression is ‘dog eat dog.”

But Melissa is certain that “dog-eat-dog” doesn’t make sense because “dogs don’t eat dogs, that never happens.”

“It means like it’s a rough world. You can be brought down so low, a dog would have you for a pet. You’d be doggy to a dog,” Melissa replied.

“That was my wife. That scene, Allison Silverman wrote the scene, but the scene actually happened between me and my wife, where she said, ‘It’s a doggy dog world.’ And said, ‘Wait, what? Oh, sweetheart, no. I have to inform you.’ Yes, that came from real life,” the “Schmigadoon!” showrunner told TheWrap. “My wife, Amy, does not enjoy the spotlight, so she will not enjoy me revealing this. But there’s quite a bit of — she’s also a doctor — there’s quite a bit of her in this show.”