Posted by R. Berg on November 30, 2002
In Reply to: Monkey Say, Monkey Do posted by S Maddock on November 30, 2002
: Has anyone heard, or know the meaning of this phrase?
"Monkey see, monkey do" is a traditional phrase used for commenting on someone's (often a child's) tendency to imitate whatever he or she sees someone else doing. Eric Partridge, "A Dictionary of Catch Phrases American and British," calls it a Canadian and U.S. catchphrase originating about 1925, "by c. 1950, also English, but . . . [used] rather to describe the learning of a a process, which, although performed thereafter with reasonable competence, is never actually understood."