Comments on: Everyone’s position on linguistic correctness

By: James Tauber

James Tauber — Thu, 13 Nov 2008 03:15:35 +0000

Of course, saying “model” instead of “modeling” actually was a grammatical mistake on my part :-)

By: James Tauber

James Tauber — Thu, 13 Nov 2008 03:14:45 +0000

Why do you think “between her and I” is wrong? Shakespeare used “between him and I” in the Merchant of Venice. Schoolboy notions of “objective case” fall short of accurately model English as any linguist will tell you. See http://jtauber.com/blog/2008/0.....mar_rules/ for numerous examples.

By: davidw

davidw — Wed, 12 Nov 2008 22:09:44 +0000

Mickey, of course. I made a stupid but pleasingly ironic mistake. I’ve fixed it (and put the wrong mistake in strikethrough font). Thanks.

By: Mickey Coalwell

Mickey Coalwell — Wed, 12 Nov 2008 20:45:44 +0000

You write,

< was disappointed to hear Obama use the phrase “between her and me”

Wasn’t Obama grammatically correct in this instance? The objective case of each pronoun is called for after the preposition “between,” isn’t it? “Her and me” is the compound object of “between.”

By: Mickey Coalwell

Mickey Coalwell — Wed, 12 Nov 2008 20:45:21 +0000

You write,

By: Crosbie Fitch

Crosbie Fitch — Wed, 12 Nov 2008 17:01:49 +0000

I walked right into that one didn’t I?

Dare I enquire as to whether you are also a ‘Do Do’ sort of guy?

I certainly won’t touch your Ah’m.

Oh oh! Don’t tell me, you’re a “Will Do” sort of guy too…

I ain’t too bothered meself. I do or I do not, with perhap a doing, but ne’er a try.

By: davidw

davidw — Wed, 12 Nov 2008 16:38:12 +0000

Sorry, Crosbie, but “can’t” is not in my vocabulary. Ah’m a Can Do sort of guy.

By: Crosbie Fitch

Crosbie Fitch — Wed, 12 Nov 2008 16:20:49 +0000

I deduce you’ve misspelt cahn’t as phonetic emphasis of Higgins’ British dialect?

If so, am I right to infer you’d be inclined to pronounce it ‘caynt’ or ‘cant’?

Tut tut.

:-}