Search results for 'tag:Genitives tag:English grammar' matching tags 'Genitives' and 'English grammar'

Re: Possessive of a proper name

Cool Breeze — Sun, 29 Jun 2008 07:37:15 GMT

Anonymous
Please advise re the cat which belongs to Grace. Because Grace ends with an /s/ sound I wonder if it Is Grace's cat? Or Grace' cat?

I agree with Yankee. Yet, it must be said that there is a tendency among today's grammarians to standardize the often entangled genitive of English. That may deprive English of some of its most fascinating ways to denote possession. This charming jumble wouldn't be there if a Language Academy had had its say about it a few centuries ago. Here are a few examples from Otto Jespersen's Essentials of English Grammar:

"Note especially for conscience' sake, for goodness' sake (on account of the following s); before sake the s is also sometimes left out, even if the word does not in itself end in s: for brevity sake, for fashion sake."

Re: He insisted on my/me singing a song.

Cool Breeze — Mon, 14 Jan 2008 16:31:40 GMT

Grammar Geek wrote:
Singing is a gerund, a noun, so it takes the possessive my.

This is rather peculiar, I think. I have encountered the same thing on these forums many times. Native speakers say: "A gerund is a noun." Do they teach it that way in American schools and universities? Grammatical terminology varies greatly from country to country but I have yet to meet a grammarian who says a noun can have an object:

I insisted on his speaking English.

Furthermore, all nouns can have an adjectival attribute; in other words, we can put an adjective before them:

He likes old books.
Merry old England fascinates me.
Little Mary wanted to go out.
Useful information was given to everybody.

So, if gerunds are full-fledged nouns, the following is correct:

Correct speaking English is easy.

Few consider it correct. A gerund is neither a noun nor a verb; it's a cross between them. It has some qualities characteristic of nouns and some that are characteristic of verbs. It resembles a verb in that it can take an object, for instance.

Therefore, "I insist on him speaking English" and "I insist on his speaking English" are equally grammatical. In the first sentence, him is used due to the influence of the preposition on, which is normal English grammar. In the second sentence his is used because speaking is a noun to an extent, even though it's not a complete noun. It has long been customary to consider possessive forms (my, his, our) of personal pronouns better than the object forms (me, him, us) as subjects of a gerund. It also used to be common to consider the basic or common form of other words better in this position:

I insist on John Smith speaking English. (Also: John Smith's)
I insist on everybody speaking English. (Rarely: everybody's)

In the past 30 or so years I have noticed a tendency in American magazines and newspapers to prefer the genitive even in cases where it sounds and looks ludicrous. I assume this can be ascribed to rising standards in education. Nevertheless, there has never been a grammatical justification to consider one of the alternatives better. The tendency to consider the possessive form the better seems to me to stem from grammatical ignorance rather than a good knowledge of it. There is no grammatical or historical justification for preferring either form.

Cheers
CB

Re: On the saxon genitive ... again

Cool Breeze — Mon, 14 Jan 2008 12:24:08 GMT

Welcome to EF, Cla! Grammatically both are possible in English. Obviously, there's nothing wrong with the genitive version Einstein's equations as he is the father of his equatuions and nothing in English grammar prevents us from using the genitive. However, it is also possible to use a proper noun (Einstein) before another noun in its basic form. This usage makes the proper noun adjectival and is especially common in place names:

a London night club
Waterloo Bridge
Gatwick Airport

Of course Einstein isn't a place but I see nothing wrong with the Einstein equations. In the realm of science, there is sometimes vacillation in the use of such phrases owing to the fact that English is the leading language of science and therefore scientists from about 200 countries write theses in English. Their command of the language may vary considerably, which results in errors now and then. I think in this case both are correct, though.

CB

Re: Britney Spears

Clive — Sat, 29 Dec 2007 23:33:14 GMT

Hi guys,

What do you expect, she's Britney Spears sister.

Apart from the 'genitive' consideration, I'd expect this to be written as What do you expect? She's . . .'

As a wild generalization, I wouldn't necessarily expect people who are interested in Britney's sister's pregnancy to be greatly concerned about correct English grammar.

Best wishes, Clive

Re: Britney Spears

Cool Breeze — Sat, 29 Dec 2007 21:21:53 GMT

Kooyeen wrote:
Anyway, I'm not sure I'm right, because I just looked for some video about that, on Youtube, because I wanted to "hear" it. It turned out on CBS they said "Britney Spears sister", not "Spears's".

Hi Kooyeen

You may be interested in what Otto Jespersen says about the genitive in his Essentials of English Grammar:

"While we have the full genitive in James's wife, St James's Park, Keats's poems, Chamber's Journal, the ending is left out in other names - chieflly classical - ending in a sibilant:

He has done Hercules' share.
St Agnes' eve.
Pears' soap.

Note especially for conscience' sake, for goodness' sake (on account of the following s); before sake the s is also sometimes left out, even if the word does not in itself end in s: for brevity sake, for fashion sake."

Had there been a language academy in England in days gone by, it might have tried to get rid of some of the above in its efforts to streamline the grammar. People don't always take kindly to what a language academy suggests, though. Genitives like Britney Spears' sister are more common in AmE than BrE.

Cheers
CB

Re: Joy to the world, the lord is "COME" ????

Cool Breeze — Tue, 26 Dec 2006 20:06:53 GMT

I always thought it was a remnant of the French (Norman Invasion, 1066). There is a handful of verbs in French conjugated with "to be" rather than "to have" in the passÃ© composÃ© (past) tense. Rise, [to be] born, arrive, leave, go (all "coming and going" verbs) are some examples. We also sing "He is risen" and we allow for "he is gone" as well as "he has gone".

Hi Philip

There has been vacillation between be and have as the perfect auxiliary in the Germanic languages - that's what I really meant to say in my previous post - but to my knowledge no one has ever maintained this usage derives from French. As a matter of fact, French had little effect on English grammar in terms of grammatical structures although the number of loan words is remarkable.

One of the structures derived from French is the of-genitive, which most scholars believe is based on the de-structure of the French language. And of course the word order of e.g. court martial reflects French grammar.

The only tenses Old English had were the present tense and the preterite (past tense); in other words, the Angles, Saxons and Jutes who invaded Britain in the 5th century didn't take the perfect, pluperfect and the future tense with them from the continent.

Cheers
CB

Re: "question and answer" or "question-and-answer"

Cool Breeze — Sat, 16 Sep 2006 07:36:42 GMT

J Lewis: Thank you for the explanation of 'soccer'. I knew it had been coined from 'association', but didn't know it had been done by the British.

Words like 'clothesline' are in dictionaries, so it's understandable that the plural s is there. A United Nations assembly is not in dictionaries and since nations does not denote time or distance, the apostrophe can be omitted, in my opinion anyway.

Grammar Geek: According to all the grammar books I have seen, the s-genitive can be used to denote time and distance and thus expressions like a two hours' walk are correct English. It may not sound natural to some but is certainly used by distinguished, native writers. A two hours' walk is from Otto Jespersen's Essentials of English Grammar. Perhaps the grammarians dislike the idea of English being too restricted in usage and have included examples of usage that may not be very common in everyday conversation.

Cheers
CB

Re: The use of the genitive with inanimate objects.

khoff — Thu, 24 Nov 2005 00:46:20 GMT

Paco -- I'm sorry English is so frustrating! A few comments come to mind:

First, I can see how it seems to you that the current chaotic state of English is a result of generations of laziness regarding grammatical rules, but I would prefer to think of it this way: the current flexibility of the English language results from a process of natural evolution.

Secondly, I must say that in 50 years of speaking English, and the usual number of years of taking English classes in school (and paying attention), I had never heard the rule that the 's genitive should only be used with animate nouns until I started reading this board. Now that I think about it, I would say that I generally do observe it -- I would be more likely to say "the table leg" rather than "the table's leg" -- but it would never have occurred to be before to consider "the table's leg" as incorrect grammar, and it still really does not bother me a bit. (As opposed to, say, "those kind of pants," which still sounds terrible to me even though I know it is sanctioned by reputable grammarians.) If I heard someone say "the table's leg" I would not think (as Mr. Micawber stated in another thread) "oh, that's a non-native speaker." I wouldn't think twice about it. Maybe this rule is still more active in British English and fading out in America.

Finally, I agree that it is probably a near-impossible task for someone who is not surrounded by spoken English to learn to speak like a native -- but also, that it is not necessary. Your English is excellent, Paco, and your knowledge of English grammar far, far surpasses that of the ordinary native speaker. Foreigners tend to speak English a little more formally, a little less colloquially than natives, but that's interesting and charming. What a dull place the world would be if we all spoke exactly alike!

Now I have to go decorate cookies and bake pies - tomorrow is Thanksgiving. Bye!

Re: Posessive or not?

BIA — Thu, 30 Jun 2005 19:19:40 GMT

Davkett, thanks, that was a silly mistake("came over")!

Thank you all, it's clear to me about structures with a hyphen.

As for the other variant, possessive (or genitive?) is probably a wrong term. I came across these examples - ten minutes' break, an hour's drive etc. in A.J.Thomson's,A.V.Martinet's Practical English Grammar, which was first published in the 60's, so I thought they might be a bit outdated. I also saw similar structures before in some Russian English Coursebooks. So is this variant not used at all nowadays?

Re: Negation

khoff — Tue, 10 May 2005 00:35:19 GMT

Hi Paco - glad I could clear up a misunderstanding. Yes, the most common meaning of "he has not lived here for 5 years" would be "he has been gone for 5 years." I think your explanation of why you didn't understand it this way is really interesting. And I think, as usual, you're being too hard on yourself. Very few , if any, native speakers understand English "completely"! Your understanding of English is amazing -- don't blame yourself for not having the same intuitive understanding that a native speaker has, but be proud that your knowledge of English grammar is much more complete than that of the average native speaker. (For instance, I had never heard the term "Saxon genitive" until reading it in this forum a couple of days ago.)

Now, as for "I haven't learned English for ten years" -- it would be better to say, "I haven't studied English for ten years" (meaning, I stopped - or suspended - the study of English ten years ago) At the moment I can't really explain why, except that studying is the active process (taking classes, reading grammar books, etc.) and learning is the result. One might say, "I've been studying French for years, but I haven't learned very much."

Nice talking to you, as always.