[Ads-l] These/those ADJ of N_pl (Was Re: intrusive "of" intrudes further)

[Wilson Gray]

These sentences don't have all that much of oddness about them, if _that_
be preceded by _all_.

On Mon, Jan 25, 2016 at 11:10 PM, Neal Whitman <nwhitman at ameritech.net>
wrote:

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> Poster:       Neal Whitman <nwhitman at AMERITECH.NET>
> Subject:      These/those ADJ of N_pl (Was Re: intrusive "of" intrudes
> further)
>
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> To add to the mix, here are some COCA examples of (in Zwickyan
> terminology)...
>
> +of E(xceptional) D(egree) M(arking) with demonstrative determiner, with
> plural noun, without number agreement.
>
> Maybe the standard one doesn't have *_that_* *_big_* *_of_* *_pecs_*.
>
> You know, the news of the settlement didn't really make *_that_* *_big_*
> *_of_* *_headlines_* in the state, but it showed two things.
>
> Whenever Dignan came to visit me he would act like he and Swifty weren't
> *_that_* *_good_* *_of_* *_friends_*, but that was just to make me feel
> better.
>
> And we really before her didn't have *_that_* *_good_* *_of_* *_doctors_*.
>
>
> These examples aren't that remarkable (these aren't that remarkable of
> examples?) given what we've seen here before. The most relevant of
> Arnold's collection of posts is this one
> (http://arnoldzwicky.org/2012/04/12/innovative-edm/), where he discusses
> Jon Lighter's find "not that good a looking men". But I looked for them
> to find out how their numbers compared with similar examples with
> "these/those". Do they even exist? As it turns out, yes:
>
> +of EDM with demonstrative determiner, with plural noun, WITH number
> agreement
>
> *_These_* *_deep_* *_of_* *_lines_* in my cheeks ain't all due to hard
> wind and burnin' sun.
>
> And then we would go right over Afghanistan after that and the Taliban
> and stuff didn't -- wasn't known to have these -- *_those_*
> *_sophisticated_* *_of_* *_missiles_*.
>
>
> I found all of these examples by searching for "this|that|these|those
> [jj*] of [n_pl]", and these were all the examples I found.  I love the
> stumble as the speaker tries to figure out which demonstrative form to
> use in the last one.
>
> Neal
>
> On 12/29/2015 11:33 PM, Neal Whitman wrote:
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> > Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> > Poster:       Neal Whitman <nwhitman at AMERITECH.NET>
> > Subject:      Re: intrusive "of" intrudes further
> >
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> >
> > And now, from my other, 17y.o. son:
> >
> >       [Incandescent light] is a lot warmer OF a light [than fluorescent].
> >
> > This sentence also brings in another syntactic peculiarity, i.e. how
> > something that means "A light that is A lot warmer" (2 indefinite
> > articles) is phrased with just one indefinite article, i.e. not "*an a
> > lot warmer (of) a light."
> >
> > Neal
> >
> >
> > On 12/7/2015 6:07 PM, Neal Whitman wrote:
> >>  From "What if Will Smith had played Neo in /The Matrix/?",
> >> /Entertainment Weekly,/ #1393, Dec. 11, 2015, 6. 41:
> >>
> >> In a recent interview with /Wired,/ Smith admitted he would have
> >> "totally messed up /The Matrix/" had he accepted, saying, "I wasn't
> >> SMART ENOUGH OF AN ACTOR to let the movie be, whereas Keanu was."
> >> (emphasis added)
> >>
> >> On the one hand, this is an "of" where we haven't seen it before: it's
> >> not with "too," "how," "as/so," or "this/that" (or even "very,"
> >> looking at my earlier example). You'd just expect prenominal "a smart
> >> enough actor". On the other hand, we do have the standard "enough OF a
> >> [NOUN] to [VERB]," which is so very close to what Will Smith said.
> >> Maybe we have a production error, blending "enough of an actor" with
> >> "a smart enough actor".
> >>
> >> Neal
> >>
> >>
> >> On 11/5/2015 10:58 PM, Neal Whitman wrote:
> >>> And this morning, from my 15yo son:
> >>>
> >>> "It just wasn't very good of an apple."
> >>>
> >>> Neal
> >>>
> >>> On Nov 5, 2015, at 9:50 PM, Cohen, Gerald Leonard <gcohen at MST.EDU>
> wrote:
> >>>
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> >>>> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> >>>> Poster:       "Cohen, Gerald Leonard" <gcohen at MST.EDU>
> >>>> Subject:      Re: intrusive "of" intrudes further
> >>>>
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> >>>>
> >>>> The "of" in "various of scientists" seems explainable as a blend:
> >>>> "various =
> >>>> scientists" + "a number of scientists" (and perhaps "a lot of
> >>>> scientists").
> >>>> Gerald Cohen
> >>>> ________________________________________
> >>>> Jonathan Lighter [wuxxmupp2000 at GMAIL.COM
> >>>> <mailto:wuxxmupp2000 at GMAIL.COM>],Thursday, November 05, 2015 6:18 =
> >>>> PM, wrote:
> >>>> How about this, attributed to a presidential candidate whose name
> >>>> you would
> >>>> recognize in a twinkling?
> >>>> "And various of scientists have said, 'well, you know there were alien
> >>>> beings that came down and they have special knowledge and that's
> >>>> how.' You
> >>>> know, it doesn't require an alien being when God is with you."
> >>>> (I mean, how about the "of"?)
> >>>> JL
>
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-- 
-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

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