frightened by solecism

[Dennis R. Preston]

>larry,

You're right. I was thinking about the "logic" behind it (from a
linguistically-naive prescriptive point of view) rather than the item
itself.

dInIs



>At 1:10 PM -0400 4/10/02, Dennis R. Preston wrote:
>>>Could your pharmacist be a prescriptivist? "... in fact, he sent us
>>>several new ones."
>>
>>Drugs is drugs.
>>
>>dInIs
>>
>>
>>
>>>I phoned my pharmacist today and the pharmacist said, "Your doctor didn't
>>>send us no new prescription for you."
>>>
>
>dInIs,
>
>A judgment needed here.  Can you really say (wearing your best
>negative concord hat)
>
>Your doctor didn't send us no new prescription for you--he sent us
>several new ones?
>
>I'd predict (in fact, I do predict, in various writings) that this
>sentence should be impossible, in the same way as its standard
>English counterparts
>
>#Your doctor sent us no new prescription(s) for you--he sent us
>several new ones.
>#Your doctor didn't send us any new prescription(s) for you--he sent
>us several new ones.
>
>as opposed to, say,
>
>Your doctor didn't send us ONE new prescription for you--he sent us
>SEVERAL new ones.
>
>or maybe even
>
>Your doctor didn't send us A ([ey]) new prescription for you--he sent
>us SEVERAL new ones.
>
>both of which are possible (as instances of "metalinguistic
>negation"), if perhaps somewhat cutesy.
>
>larry

--
Dennis R. Preston
Professor of Linguistics
Department of Linguistics and Languages
740 Wells Hall A
Michigan State University
East Lansing, MI 48824-1027 USA
Office - (517) 353-0740
Fax - (517) 432-2736