which we're going to get through this

[Jonathan Lighter]

Not five minutes after writing the above, I heard State Department spokesman
Michele Bond on CNN say the following: "...if the child is taken to a
treaty-party country, which the United States and Brazil have been
treaty-party countries for many years."

JL

On Thu, Jun 4, 2009 at 9:38 AM, Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at gmail.com>wrote:

> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> -----------------------
> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at GMAIL.COM>
> Subject:      Re: which we're going to get through this
>
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Herb wrote, " I don't remember hearing it used much by college educated
> speakers.  The social contexts have been working class."
>
> "Working class" may be correct, but I can't count the times I've read this
> construction on freshman themes since the '70s. And in speech, of course,
> it
> remains common.
>
> OTOH, conjunctive "which" in my experience means "and," though Herb's ex.
> sounds more like "but."  That would be new to me.
>
> Arnold undoubtedly knows of some analytical articles.
>
> JL
> .
> On Wed, Jun 3, 2009 at 10:44 PM, Herb Stahlke <hfwstahlke at gmail.com>
> wrote:
>
>  > ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> > -----------------------
> > Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> > Poster:       Herb Stahlke <hfwstahlke at GMAIL.COM>
> > Subject:      which we're going to get through this
> >
> >
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> >
> > There are a couple of TV ads on currently featuring a working-class
> > guy telling his family, in one, and his son in the other, that he may
> > get laid off.  In the family ad he saiys something like "We may have
> > to postpone some promises, which we're going to get through this."
> > Those are not the exact words, but the use of "which" is as he uses it
> > in the ad.  I suspect the usage may be employed by the writers as a
> > marker of class, and I've heard it before in sentences like "We were
> > going to go on a picnic Saturday, which it rained."  I don't remember
> > hearing it used much by college educated speakers.  The social
> > contexts have been working class.
> >
> > Wh-indefinite pronouns or question words started to show up as
> > relative pronouns in the 10th c. under the influence of Latin, but
> > with the demise of English as a written standard after the Norman
> > Conquest, the shift disappeared until English once again became a more
> > widely used written language in the late 13th c.  The wh-relatives
> > came into literate, educated English between about 1300 and 1600, with
> > a few changes in usage after that.  The King James Version (1611)
> > translates the first phrase of the Lord's Prayer as "Our father which
> > art in heaven," but since about the 18th c. "which" has not been used
> > to refer to humans.
> >
> > The usage of wh-relatives does seem to be related to level of
> > education, and I wonder if the use of "which" as a sort of
> > coordinating conjunction, as above, might be a hypercorrection.
> > Speakers who don't have the professional class rules governing "which"
> > know that some people use "which" in ways in which they themselves
> > don't.  The "which" plus coordinate clause construction arises as an
> > unsuccessful attempt to emulate those rules.  Treating these sentences
> > in this way is a WAG.  I've searched the ADS-L archives for postings
> > dealing with "which," and I found the usual "that" vs. "which"
> > discussions, quite a few of them in fact, but none dealing with the
> > coordinating usage.  Does anyone know of scholarship that deals with
> > this construction?
> >
> > Herb
> >
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> >
>
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