[Ads-l] Possessive plurals

[Herb Stahlke]

I think I spelled youse as a plural because it agrees with plural guys.  The possessive apostrophe would go on the NP "youse guys," not just on guys.  I hear things like "You can park youse guys' cars over there."

On June 1, 2023, at 12:27 PM, Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at yale.edu> wrote:

Hmmm.  I've heard that a lot as a plural, without the possessive.  Your
orthographic rendering suggests the same:  "youse guys" as in "youse" +
"you guys", not you's guys(')" as a possessive. But it's not in my active
repertoire, so I'm just speculating.

On Thu, Jun 1, 2023 at 12:23 PM Herb Stahlke <hfwstahlke at gmail.com> wrote:

> The pleonastic possessive I've heard here in the Midwest (Mi, Wi, Oh, In)
> is "youse guys."
>
> On June 1, 2023, at 10:36 AM, Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at yale.edu>
> wrote:
>
> Another factor may be double inflection, as when the past tense of
> “sleepwalk” is rendered as “sleptwalked” or when the plural of “housewife”
> is pronounced “houzwivez” /hauzwaivz/, although I concede that “you guys”
> is not a compound like those two (or “res publica”, to hark back a ways)
> but a phrase.
>
> LH
>
> > On Jun 1, 2023, at 9:31 AM, Ben Yagoda <byagoda at UDEL.EDU> wrote:
> >
> > This reminds me of two things. First, a pleonastic possessive I’ve been
> noticing for five or six years: rendering the possessive of “you guys” as
> “your guys'.” (I’ve mostly heard in in speech, but I imagine in print an
> apostrophe would come after the s, as I’ve written it.) First heard it on
> “Car Talk,” when a caller asked for “your guys’ opinion.” My guess is that
> it stemmed partly from the fact that “you guys’” sounds the same as “you
> guys,” unless you go for the awkward extra syllable (as in Jonathan’s
> example” “you guyzez.”
> >
> > The second thing that comes to mind is something I’ve heard a few times
> recently: pronouncing the plural “incidents” as “incidences.”
> >
> > Ben
> >
> > www.benyagoda.com <http://www.benyagoda.com/>
> >>
> >> Date:    Wed, 31 May 2023 12:02:18 -0400
> >> From:    Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at GMAIL.COM>
> >> Subject: Possessive plurals
> >>
> >> I've been watching these Latin lessons on YouTube:
> >> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aWUlrL6E_QU
> >>
> >> The instructor (a native speaker of English evidently, and
> >> youthful-sounding)  is clearly well educated, and he knows Latin.
> >>
> >> However, he says "abLAYtive" instead of "ABlative." He also talks about
> >> "female," "male," and "neutral" nouns instead of masculine, feminine,
> and
> >> neuter. More to the point, though, he routinely pronounces English
> >> possessive plurals with an excrescent "iz."
> >>
> >> Exx: students' > "studentsiz"
> >>       soldiers'   > "soldierziz."
> >>
> >> Is this something we should be doing? Or is it just a pedagogical
> stratagem?
> >>
> >> JL
> >> --
> >> "If the truth is half as bad as I think it is, you can't handle the
> truth."
> >>
> >> ------------------------------------------------------------
> >
> >
> > ------------------------------------------------------------
> > The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>

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

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