"I'm going to have _her_ a party."

Laurence Horn laurence.horn at YALE.EDU
Wed Sep 21 15:04:58 UTC 2011


Or, when sung by a woman, "I'm going to have _him_ a party".

Interesting; it's not quite a personal dative (as in "I'm gonna have me a party") because of the non-coreference and not quite an ordinary benefactive (as in "I'm gonna give/throw her/him a party) because of the verb.

LH

On Sep 21, 2011, at 2:19 AM, Wilson Gray wrote:

> A line from the song, "Ain't That Good News?" by Sam Cooke.
>
> --
> -Wilson
> -----
> All say, "How hard it is that we have to die!"---a strange complaint
> to come from the mouths of people who have had to live.
> -Mark Twain
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org

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



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