English Sentences Without Overt Grammatical Subjects

RonButters at AOL.COM RonButters at AOL.COM
Tue Apr 26 17:39:54 UTC 2005


I don't remember if McC considered the possibllilty that "Fuck you!" (and
"Shit on you!" "Piss on you!") are subjunctives, but it seems to me worth
thinking about. They translate into the nonidiomatic "May you become fucked," "Let it
be that you are shit [up]on," "It is hoped that you might be pissed" on, and
the like. The problem in McC's envisioning of the question lies in the word
"subject." What is missing is the understood anonymous AGENT. Thus "Fuck you!"
etc. are in the same class as "Drop dead!"

I agree that "Go fuck yourself!" and "Fuck you!" are not the same grammatical
construction.



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