# do donuts <with><in> his car



## High on grammar

Hello everyone:
I came across the following sentence on Google Books, and I believe it should be <*in* his car> not <*with* his car>.

He would repeatedly do donuts *with his car* in front of our apartment.
Sexual Assault on the College Campus
By Martin D. Schwartz

Thanks.


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## boozer

No, it is the car that is making the donuts, not he. The car is an instrument. Very much like cutting with a knife. Have you checked the meaning?


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## boozer

This is a perfect doughnut:


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## High on grammar

boozer said:


> No, it is the car that is making the donuts, not he. The car is an instrument. Very much like cutting with a knife. Have you checked the meaning?



Yes, I know what it means. I am talking about the grammar of the sentence, which is very different from your "knife" example.


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## grassy

I agree with boozer. "In his car" emphasizes that he did donuts inside his car, which is a strange and pretty meaningless thing to say.
Also, please note that in the original sentence _donuts_ is inside inverted commas to indicate that it's not the usually meaning of the word.


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## High on grammar

boozer said:


> No, it is the car that is making the donuts, not he.



What you're saying doesn't make sense. A car cannot do that by itself. The driver needs to get behind the wheel, start the engine and perform the maneuver.


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## boozer

You are simply wrong, sorry to say, and it should be 'with'. Here is one example:

... drover onto the practice football field at Cooper Sr. High to make some donuts with his Dodge Charger...
Born Gray in a Black and White World

He does not do the donuts with his bare bottom. It is the car's wheels that make the donuts.


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## High on grammar

“I wish I would see someone *doing donuts* *in my Lexus*, I'd put this size 9 shoe all up in them,” she announced.
By Carolyn Y. Edwards
Not Your Typical Day


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## grassy

Here the emphasis is on somebody sitting _in_ her car, doing "donuts".


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## boozer

grassy said:


> Here the emphasis is on somebody sitting _in_ her car, doing "donuts".


 Agreed. And even here I would use 'with' and place the logical stress on 'my'.


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## High on grammar

Here's another example from another native speaker of English:

It looked an ancient and delicate site, but that didn't stop the brothers burning around _doing doughnuts *in*_* the Land Rover*, whilst I got out to look at the towers.
Iranian Rappers and Persian Porn
*A Hitchhiker's Adventures in the New Iran*
By Jamie Maslin


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## boozer

So you still believe that 'with' is wrong, after the exchange of examples and opinions? Okay, use whatever you want - I suppose nobody would notice anyway.


High on grammar said:


> ... and I believe it should be <*in* his car> not <*with* his car>.


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## Loob

I'd have thought both "with" and "in" work.

(Not that I've ever performed the manoeuvre)


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## High on grammar

boozer said:


> So you still believe that 'with' is wrong



No, but the context should call for it.

Here’s another example from* Daily Voice:*

Police: Teen Charged In Fatal Accident Caught Doing Donuts *In* Hummer

dailyvoice.com


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## Loob

High on grammar said:


> No, but the context should call for it.


I can't see why the context would call particularly for one or the other, HoG.


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## boozer

It does look like people use 'in' as well and I have to say I was surprised to hear that. The 'in' version would sound to me particularly ambiguous if the verb 'make' was used, as in here:
...David, a senior in our youth ministry, was making donuts with his car while...
Youth Ministry from the Outside In

Now, if David was making donuts in his car, would you not think for a moment that he was actually cooking in his car?


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## High on grammar

Loob said:


> I can't see why the context would call particularly for one or the other, HoG.



_* *You might be able to do donuts in your tiny car, but can you do that with that big truck?_
_Even here I think "*in*" works better. _


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## tunaafi

To get back to your original question:





High on grammar said:


> I came across the following sentence on Google Books, and I believe it should be <*in* his car> not <*with* his car>.
> 
> He would repeatedly do donuts *with his car* in front of our apartment.


'With' is neither incorrect nor unnatural in that sentence.

So, when you say "I believe it should be <*in* his car> not <*with* his car>", your belief is purely a personal preference,


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## velisarius

When I read "doing doughnuts in the car", I thought it meant "(policemen) eating doughnuts in the (patrol) car". 

You can sit in the car and do doughnuts (in the car), or you can use the car to do doughnuts (with the car). Same difference.


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## heypresto

Finding examples with 'in' won't make 'with' incorrect. For every example you can find with 'in', there will be another one with 'with'. Just a few random examples from a quick google:

_I guess you get boring when you go home because doing doughnuts with the Renault when you take us home at night is a lot more excitement than I can handle . . .

Messing around, he and Jackson found excitement when doing doughnuts with the trucks.  

For example, you heard your teen was doing doughnuts with the car in the school parking lot. 

Peel Regional Police arrested and charged two individuals after they were found doing doughnuts with their car while impaired . . .  

The Boating Forum - Doing "Doughnuts" With A Boat! _


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## High on grammar

tunaafi said:


> 'With' is neither incorrect nor unnatural in that sentence.
> 
> So, when you say "I believe it should be <*in* his car> not <*with* his car>", your belief is purely a personal preference,



You are right. I guess I am an "*in*" person in this case. "*With*" just doesn't sound right to me. 

Which would you say: <he came here *in* a red car> or < he came here *with* a red car>?


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## entangledbank

Can I just say that I had never heard of 'doing do(ugh)nuts' until two minutes ago? I didn't even know there was such an activity, let alone that it had a name.


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## tunaafi

High on grammar said:


> Which would you say: <he came here *in* a red car> or < he came here *with* a red car>?


That's a completely different situation.


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## london calling

High on grammar said:


> What you're saying doesn't make sense. A car cannot do that by itself. The driver needs to get behind the wheel, start the engine and perform the maneuver.


No, boozer is correct. I remember a couple of years ago there was a hoo-ha in the UK when Matt whateverhisnamewas did some donuts in Central London as part of an episode of Top Gear. Blithering idiot.


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## boozer

Maybe it was the Top Gear after Clarkson, Hammond and May left, because none of them is Matt...


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## london calling

boozer said:


> Maybe it was the Top Gear after Clarkson, Hammond and May left, because none of them is Matt...


It was. The one presented by Chris Evans and Matt something, a US actor who was in 'Friends'.


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## kentix

I would say "in".

The donuts I'm familiar with from growing up were generally done in snowy parking lots.

Or maybe not with "in" or "with" at all. The use of a car is assumed. You can't do donuts without one.

A: I heard they got in trouble.
B: For what?
A: They were doing donuts in the parking lot.

- - - - - - - - -

They were playing tennis *with/using* a racquet.

Which is correct?

Neither. They were playing tennis. 

Added:
The COCA database shows two examples of "in", one example of "with", and the rest  (11 examples) with neither, in the form I showed above.


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## Packard

High on grammar said:


> No, but the context should call for it.
> 
> Here’s another example from* Daily Voice:*
> 
> Police: Teen Charged In Fatal Accident Caught Doing Donuts *In* Hummer
> 
> dailyvoice.com



Without reading the article I can tell you that you cannot do donuts in a Hummer.  The vehicle has to be rear wheel drive only to do donuts.

Note:  I was brought up calling this "cutting donuts", but when I search online that verb is not in use; "do/doing" is the current terminology.  We used to cut donuts in the snow in parking lots.  This was before "drifting" was in existence as a sport.


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## High on grammar

london calling said:


> No, boozer is correct. I remember a couple of years ago there was a hoo-ha in the UK when Matt whateverhisnamewas did some donuts in Central London as part of an episode of Top Gear. Blithering idiot.



I’d rather stick with “*IN*”; I don’t want to be labeled as someone who is grammatically challenged_._


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## Loob

Are you saying that all those who are happy with "with" are grammatically challenged?


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## JulianStuart

High on grammar said:


> You are right. I guess I am an "*in*" person in this case. "*With*" just doesn't sound right to me.
> 
> Which would you say: <he came here *in* a red car> or < he came here *with* a red car>?


He was in his car cutting doughnuts with a knife (not in a knife  ).  He was making doughnuts with his car.  It was his car he was making doughnuts with.


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## grassy

High on grammar said:


> I don’t want to be labeled as someone who is grammatically challenged


You won't. Maybe only font-challenged.


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## Roxxxannne

I will boldly step in here and say that I'd use either one: 'with' to emphasize whose car is being used and 'in' if I'm imagining Travis out there on the back road intently doing donuts one after the other.

Ryan was doing donuts with his dad's car right in front of his dad's brother's house.
Travis was out all night doing donuts in his car on the back road to Canaan.

By the way, I wonder if in the old days they did doughnuts.


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## kentix

Roxxxannne said:


> Ryan was doing donuts with his dad's car right in front of his dad's brother's house.
> Travis was out all night doing donuts in his car on the back road to Canaan.






Roxxxannne said:


> By the way, I wonder if in the old days they did doughnuts.


In the COCA database there are 3 examples with donuts and 11 with doughnuts.


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## JulianStuart

kentix said:


> In the COCA database there are 3 examples with donuts and 11 with doughnuts.


Donuts seems to have seeped into the printed world in the post-war era and flourished in the 70s to the 90s. 
(Interestingly, the frequency of "donuts" in the "GB" corpus may be our best estimate yet of the misclassification in the database of works as "GB" when they are "US"  The word is a good example of one no BE speaker would deliberately spell that way)


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## Roxxxannne

If only donuts were confined to  all-nite eateries.


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## High on grammar

Roxxxannne said:


> I will boldly step in here and say that I'd use either one: 'with' to emphasize whose car is being used and 'in' if I'm imagining Travis out there on the back road intently doing donuts on after the other.
> 
> Ryan was doing donuts with his dad's car right in front of his dad's brother's house.
> Travis was out all night doing donuts in his car on the back road to Canaan.
> 
> By the way, I wonder if in the old days they did doughnuts.


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## High on grammar

Thank you all.


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## High on grammar

Loob said:


> Are you saying that all those who are happy with "with" are grammatically challenged?



Of course not. I am saying there may be (might be) people who would consider "*WITH*" wrong.


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## heypresto

And there are definitely people who consider those that consider 'with' wrong wrong.


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## High on grammar

heypresto said:


> And there are definitely people who consider those that consider 'with' wrong wrong.





And vice versa. English is, after all, a free language.


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## Loob

High on grammar said:


> And vice versa


No.
The people who consider those that consider 'with' wrong wrong are right.


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## High on grammar

Loob said:


> No.
> The people who consider those that consider 'with' wrong wrong are right.



Thanks.


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