Prescriptive Linguists

[David A. Daniel]

Well, yes, if you go around saying things on the order of "Which car did you
put Mary in the garage?" then you are, in fact, speaking gibberish. And,
then, after having wandered the planet for 40 years, repeating that question
to all upon whom you have come, you hear, "The Buick," you will be realized.
You will have encountered another human who (1) understood the question, (2)
knew Mary and (3) put the car in garage as she asked. And it shall have been
the evening and the morning of the first day.
DAD



> There was a post in which the poster said that someone else had said >that
> the question "Which car did you put Mary in the garage" was a correct
> English sentence.

I think this part refers to me, as I did post that this sentence was
acceptable to me. I didn't say the sentence was a "correct English
sentence" though, whatever that means.

Clearly there is some kind of regional/dialectal difference in opinion
as to the acceptability of the sentence: those who speak correctly on
one hand, and those who, like me, speak gibberish, on the other. :-)

> What I am saying is: This is poppycock. That sentence is gibberish in
> English. It is English words used with non-English structure and syntax.
The
> fact that there may be a few folks out there who understand what the
> sentence means is irrelevant.
>
> Another sentence was proposed: "He's the one that saw you your hands."
>
> What I am saying is: Though this is somewhat more intelligible than the
> Mary/car situation, it is still English words being used with non-English
> structure and syntax (also, was he the one that looked at her hands or
sawed
> them off?).
>
> Here are some more English words being used with non-English structure and
> syntax: "That car blue is the car new of the my mother." (Portuguese and
> Italian syntax and structure, English words.) Many Anglophones reading
that
> are going to understand it after, perhaps, in some cases, a little
thought.
> Does that make it a correctly formed English sentence? Nope.
>
> That is what I am saying.
> DAD
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> Quoting "David A. Daniel":
>
>> ...If said descendants were Portuguese/Brazilian we would get a lot
>> of "I go to the cinema with the my friend Carlos," or "The your mother is
>> you calling," or "Where is the my car new?" (Italian too). Just because a
>> seemingly fluent speaker says something doesn't make it correct even
>> acceptable, or even understandable, among those who do not share the same
>> multi-linguistic background/knowledge.
>> DAD
>>
>
> A "multi-linguistic background/knowledge" isn't necessary for these
> structures
> to occur or be understood, if I understand correctly that you mean
> proficiency/competence/familiarity or even just more than passing exposure
> to
> more than one language.
>
> While in my example another language provided an analogy that made the
> ditransitive use of "saw" understandable in the sentence "he's the one
that
> saw
> you your hands" I could also have taken an analogy from  English itself:
for
> example a sentence like "He's the one that wrote you the letter."
>
> Are you saying that it's only because of language contact that such a
> structure
> exists? Or are you saying that it's only because of contact that the
> acceptability of ditransitive use creeps onto other verbs?
>
> michael
>
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>
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> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>



~Will Salmon

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The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org

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The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org