"Your being a hobogoblin is fine with me."
Ant
My friend said "Your being a hobogoblin is fine with me." was correct in
terms of English/grammar usage. I disagreed becaues of "Your" part. Does
anyone find this sound funny/weird?
Thank you in advance. :)
--
"When an ant gets wings, it loses its head." --Bosnian Proverb
/\___/\
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Nick Spalding
on Tue, 11 Aug 2009 15:49:40 -0500:
> Hello.
>
> My friend said "Your being a hobogoblin is fine with me." was correct in
> terms of English/grammar usage. I disagreed becaues of "Your" part. Does
> anyone find this sound funny/weird?
>
> Thank you in advance. :)
The your is fine with me but I would prefer hobgoblin.
--
Nick Spalding
BrE/IrE
Don Phillipson
news:OeadnfIW3vT5RBzX...@earthlink.com...
> My friend said "Your being a hobogoblin is fine with me." was correct in
> terms of English/grammar usage. I disagreed becaues of "Your" part. Does
> anyone find this sound funny/weird?
As well as grammatical, this is normal everyday English. People
say things like "I don't mind your voting AB, it's your being a
CD that I cannot stand."
--
Don Phillipson
Carlsbad Springs
(Ottawa, Canada)
HVS
> Hello.
>
> My friend said "Your being a hobogoblin is fine with me." was
> correct in terms of English/grammar usage.
Yup; he's correct.
> I disagreed becaues
> of "Your" part. Does anyone find this sound funny/weird?
Nope; perhaps a tad formal, but that's all.
--
Cheers, Harvey
CanEng and BrEng, indiscriminately mixed
Derek Turner
> My friend said "Your being a hobogoblin is fine with me." was correct
'Being' is a gerund and takes the possessive. End of. Your asking is fine
by me.
James Hogg
>Hello.
>
>My friend said "Your being a hobogoblin is fine with me." was correct in
>terms of English/grammar usage. I disagreed becaues of "Your" part. Does
>anyone find this sound funny/weird?
Your friend's usage is correct. It may sound weird to you if you
expected it to be "You being a hobogoblin is fine with me", and
you will certainly come across that form as well, especially in
informal spoken English.
Your question being asked is fine with me.
--
James
Adam Funk
> Ant wrote, in <OeadnfIW3vT5RBzX...@earthlink.com>
> on Tue, 11 Aug 2009 15:49:40 -0500:
>
>> Hello.
>>
>> My friend said "Your being a hobogoblin is fine with me." was correct in
>> terms of English/grammar usage. I disagreed becaues of "Your" part. Does
>> anyone find this sound funny/weird?
>>
>> Thank you in advance. :)
Both "you" and "your are OK. (Fowler, otherwise quite sensible in
many respects, had a big problem with what he called the "fused
participle", and would have allowed only "your" in that construction.)
> The your is fine with me but I would prefer hobgoblin.
I think he's talking about a goblin who hops on and off trains (such
as the City of New Orleans).
--
It is probable that television drama of high caliber and produced by
first-rate artists will materially raise the level of dramatic taste
of the nation. (David Sarnoff, CEO of RCA, 1939; in Stoll 1995)
Eric Walker
> My friend said "Your being a hobogoblin is fine with me." was correct in
> terms of English/grammar usage. I disagreed becaues of "Your" part. Does
> anyone find this sound funny/weird?
No. To understand why, you have to understand what, grammatically, the
word "being" is, which is a _gerund_. A gerund is a word form derived
from a verb, but it is not itself a verb, it is a noun. Because it is a
noun, the sentence requires the genitive ("possessive") case--"your"--for
the pronoun "you".
If one said "Your hat is fine with me," no one would dream of recasting
it as "You hat is fine with me."
--
Cordially,
Eric Walker, Owlcroft House
http://owlcroft.com/english/
John Lawler
Close. This is an example of the OTW (One True Way) fallacy,
which holds that there is only One True Way to produce any
construction (like a gerund phrase, in this case). The OTW which
is referred to is the requirement for the possessive (my, your, his,
Bill's)
instead of the objective (me, you, him, Bill) or the nominative
(I, you, he, Bill) as the subject of a gerund phrase. This is almost
always correct (though it's more formal in some circumstances),
but the objective is also correct, no matter what the Usage
authorities may say. There's no reason why it shouldn't be
(use of the possessive provides nothing that use of the
objective doesn't), and it's much more common than the possessive.
It's not quite true that "A gerund is a word form derived from a
verb,
but it is not itself a verb, it is a noun." A gerund is in fact one
of the
forms of a verb (in English it ends in -ing) but it is verb enough to
take a direct object, which no noun can do, and it can't be modified
by a definite article, which practically any noun can do.
His playing the tuba disturbed me.
*The (Bill's) playing the tuba disturbed me.
See the post in .sig below for more on gerunds.
There are almost always a number of ways to produce most
constructions; the OTW is mostly a matter of making personal
taste into an ironclad Rule, which is always an error.
-John Lawler http://www.umich.edu/~jlawler/aue/gerund.html
"Democracy must be something more than two wolves
and a sheep voting on what to have for dinner.
-James Bovard,
Steve Hayes
>Hello.
>
>My friend said "Your being a hobogoblin is fine with me." was correct in
>terms of English/grammar usage. I disagreed becaues of "Your" part. Does
>anyone find this sound funny/weird?
The "your" part is fine, I wondered about the "hobogoblin" bit, though.
--
Steve Hayes from Tshwane, South Africa
Web: http://hayesfam.bravehost.com/stevesig.htm
Blog: http://methodius.blogspot.com
E-mail - see web page, or parse: shayes at dunelm full stop org full stop uk
James Hogg
That rule works very well with pronouns. There are times when the
possessive form before a gerund sounds odd, though. The Oxford
Guide to English Usage says:
"When using most non-personal nouns, groups of nouns,
non-personal pronouns, and groups of pronouns, there is no choice
of construction; the possessive would not sound idiomatic at
all."
Examples include:
Due to her father and mother being married.
The air of something unusual having happened.
He had no objection to some of them listening.
How many people would prefer the following?
Due to her father and mother's being married.
The air of something unusual's having happened.
He had no objection to some of them's listening.
The Guide also says:
"When the word preceding the -ing form is a regular plural noun
ending in -s, there is no spoken distinction between the
possessive and the non-possessive form. It is unnecessary to
write an apostrophe:
If she knew about her daughters attending the party."
Unnecessary, maybe, but I would not find it odd to see:
If she knew about her daughters' attending the party.
--
James
Eric Walker
[...]
> How many people would prefer the following?
>
> Due to her father and mother's being married. . . .
At the very least, one.
But most of these examples, as always with the matter of the genitive and
gerund (an entry one will find, under one or another title, in most usage
manuals), rely on artificially forcing unnatural castings, as compared to
those that a careful writer or speaker will use. It's like the old
classic objection to "It is I" when most literate people would say "I am"
in most instances where the matter arises.
The most basic rule of all when there seems to be a clash between logic
and idiom is "recast". That doesn't somehow magically convert logic to
illogic: writing sound English relies on both grammar and sensibilities.
Perhaps the best overall discussion of the instant matter is to be found
in Bernstein's book _The Careful Writer_, at "Genitive With Gerund". But
even he, and those who argue for exceptions, concur that the particularly
difficult (and, as I say, largely artificial) cases they adduce are, in
Bernstein's own words, "exceptions to a general practice".
And none of this has anything whatever to do with the actual example in
hand, for which, as already noted, any variance is simple error, the end.
(I just do not understand people whose entire focus on English usage
seems to be developing unusual and artificial castings in which the
simple, clear, and sound rules of the tongue are strained. If it's to
prove you are clever, OK, fine, you are very clever: now can we return to
everyday sound English practice?)
James Hogg
>On Wed, 12 Aug 2009 08:18:32 +0200, James Hogg wrote:
The examples in the Guide are all taken from real literature
(Orwell, Conan Doyle, Anthony Powell, Compton Mackenzie). Of
course, that doesn't necessarily mean that they don't sound
unnatural to some readers, but they can hardly be described as
artificial castings. The first example is from Shaw:
"Travellers in Italy could depend on their luggage not being
stolen."
I wouldn't change that to "luggage's".
The last example is from Arnold Bennett:
"He had no objection to some of them listening."
I wouldn't change that to "their".
--
James
Eric Walker
[...]
> This is an example of the OTW (One True Way) fallacy, which
> holds that there is only One True Way to produce any construction (like
> a gerund phrase, in this case). The OTW which is referred to is the
> requirement for the possessive (my, your, his, Bill's)
> instead of the objective (me, you, him, Bill) or the nominative (I, you,
> he, Bill) as the subject of a gerund phrase. This is almost always
> correct (though it's more formal in some circumstances), but the
> objective is also correct, no matter what the Usage authorities may say.
This is, of course, an attempt to vitiate the everyday simple by recourse
to the unusual. When one is dealing with forms that do not possess an
inherent genitive form, felicity can be problematic. But when the
subject of the gerund has a simple, standard genitive form--possessive
adjectives (my, your, his, her, our, their), proper nouns (John's, the
Queen's, Florida's, simple noun forms (the boy's, my friend's)--there is
no alternative that is not slovenly English. It is only when the subject
is a rambling construction that infelicity rears its head.
In sum, as Bernstein--an ardent apologist for exceptions in this matter--
put it: "use the genitive with the gerund whenever it is possible. . . .
When the genitive does not seem to be possible, a slight reconstruction
of the sentence--frequently accompanied by improvement--is a possibility
that should be examined. . . . [I]t is hard to take issue with [Fowler]
when he says that [the fused participle] is corrupting English style."
And, as Dr. Johnson so often and famously put it, there's an _end_ on't.
--
Eric Walker
Just so. But, as I elsethread quoted Bernstein: "When the genitive does
not seem to be possible, a slight reconstruction of the sentence--
frequently accompanied by improvement--is a possibility that should be
examined." As habitual perusers of usage manuals will well know, even
the best writers occasionally nod off, which is why such manuals
typically take all their counterexamples from eminent sources.
The point, as is usually the point with most grammatical issues, is not
whether or not most people will understand what is meant; the point is
whether or not most literate readers will feel, at the very least, a
sense of unease with a given construction, that something is not quite as
somehow it ought to be. Such unease, even when it does not invoke actual
cervical displacement, still impedes that quiet, even flow of thoughts
from writer to reader that all careful writers seek.
Pablo
> Both "you" and "your are OK. (Fowler, otherwise quite sensible in many
> respects, had a big problem with what he called the "fused participle",
> and would have allowed only "your" in that construction.)
Heh. I'd prefer "That you be..."
--
Pablo
CDB
> Eric Walker <em...@owlcroft.com> wrote:
>> On Tue, 11 Aug 2009 15:49:40 -0500, Ant wrote:
["you(r) being"]
>
> It's not quite true that "A gerund is a word form derived from a
> verb,
> but it is not itself a verb, it is a noun." A gerund is in fact one
> of the
> forms of a verb (in English it ends in -ing) but it is verb enough
> to take a direct object, which no noun can do, and it can't be
> modified by a definite article, which practically any noun can do.
>
> His playing the tuba disturbed me.
> *The (Bill's) playing the tuba disturbed me.
That seems to be true only when there is a direct object. The proof
of the pudding is in the eating. We're going to see the Changing of
the Guard. Rage against the dying of the light. The playing of the
tuba...
[...]
CDB
> El Tue, 11 Aug 2009 22:17:11 +0100, Adam Funk escribi�:
>
>> Both "you" and "your are OK. (Fowler, otherwise quite sensible in
>> many respects, had a big problem with what he called the "fused
>> participle", and would have allowed only "your" in that
>> construction.)
>
> Heh. I'd prefer "That you be..."
If you use that construction, it has to be "That you are...", if
goblinhood is established (as it is here, I believe), or "That you
should be...", if goblinhood is merely conceptual.
Pablo
> Pablo wrote:
>> El Tue, 11 Aug 2009 22:17:11 +0100, Adam Funk escribió:
>>
>>> Both "you" and "your are OK. (Fowler, otherwise quite sensible in
>>> many respects, had a big problem with what he called the "fused
>>> participle", and would have allowed only "your" in that construction.)
>>
>> Heh. I'd prefer "That you be..."
>
> If you use that construction, it has to be "That you are...", if
> goblinhood is established (as it is here, I believe), or "That you
> should be...", if goblinhood is merely conceptual.
Surely, "that you be" or "that you may be" (should be?) is just normal
sunjunctive?
--
Pablo
Pablo
> Surely, "that you be" or "that you may be" (should be?) is just normal
> sunjunctive?
Shit. Bloody San Miguel. "Subjunctive".
--
Pablo
Donna Richoux
> El Wed, 12 Aug 2009 16:09:40 +0000, Pablo escribi�:
>
> > Surely, "that you be" or "that you may be" (should be?) is just normal
> > sunjunctive?
>
> Shit. Bloody San Miguel. "Subjunctive".
It's OK, we know that people misspell stuff. Just don't do it when
you're trying to make someone else look bad.
As for "that you be," could you please give an entire sentence? The
original example was "Your being a hobgoblin is fine with me." What did
you have in mind? "That you be a hobgoblin is fine with me" sounds
pretty weird.
--
Best wishes -- Donna Richoux
Prai Jei
continuum:
> On Tue, 11 Aug 2009 15:49:40 -0500, ANT...@zimage.com (Ant) wrote:
>
>>Hello.
>>
>>My friend said "Your being a hobogoblin is fine with me." was correct in
>>terms of English/grammar usage. I disagreed becaues of "Your" part. Does
>>anyone find this sound funny/weird?
>
> The "your" part is fine, I wondered about the "hobogoblin" bit, though.
It's a good strong ale. After enough I might start talking favourably thus
to the bottle.
--
ξ:) Proud to be curly
Interchange the alphabetic letter groups to reply
Prai Jei
continuum:
>> The your is fine with me but I would prefer hobgoblin.
>
> I think he's talking about a goblin who hops on and off trains (such
> as the City of New Orleans).
http://beergeek.stores.yahoo.net/wyho.html
Pablo
> It's OK, we know that people misspell stuff. Just don't do it when
> you're trying to make someone else look bad.
Not in my repertoire(sp?). I know bugger all about grammar, hence it was
a question.
> "That you be a hobgoblin is fine with me" sounds
> pretty weird.
Sounds fine to me. Perhaps I'm weird? I think I need an English
transfusion. Too much learning Spanish, methinks.
--
Pablo
Adam Funk
> Adam Funk set the following eddies spiralling through the space-time
> continuum:
>
>>> The your is fine with me but I would prefer hobgoblin.
>>
>> I think he's talking about a goblin who hops on and off trains (such
>> as the City of New Orleans).
>
> http://beergeek.stores.yahoo.net/wyho.html
Yes, I even have the t-shirt.
--
Taken on the whole however this is a fine disc and a good example of
the current pop scene attempting to break out of its vulgarisms and
sometimes downright obscene derivative hogwash.
(Julian Stone-Mason B.A., 1972)
Adam Funk
> That rule works very well with pronouns. There are times when the
> possessive form before a gerund sounds odd, though. The Oxford
> Guide to English Usage says:
>
> "When using most non-personal nouns, groups of nouns,
> non-personal pronouns, and groups of pronouns, there is no choice
> of construction; the possessive would not sound idiomatic at
> all."
>
> Examples include:
> Due to her father and mother being married.
> The air of something unusual having happened.
> He had no objection to some of them listening.
>
> How many people would prefer the following?
>
> Due to her father and mother's being married.
Most (but not all) of the time, "due to" should be eliminated, as in
that example. "Because her father and mother were/are married..."
sounds much better.
--
hmmmm: sounds like the same DLL hell problem my cousin had. try
deleting all DLLs in your Windows/system32 directory and see what
happens. (Bryce Utting)
Donna Richoux
> El Wed, 12 Aug 2009 19:22:59 +0200, Donna Richoux escribi�:
>
> > It's OK, we know that people misspell stuff. Just don't do it when
> > you're trying to make someone else look bad.
>
> Not in my repertoire(sp?). I know bugger all about grammar, hence it was
> a question.
Right. I wasn't trying to make *you* look bad. I was just offering some
free advice. There's no need to worry and swear about the occasional
honest typo, that's all.
--
Best -- Donna Richoux
Nick
> On 2009-08-12, Prai Jei wrote:
>
>> Adam Funk set the following eddies spiralling through the space-time
>> continuum:
>>
>>>> The your is fine with me but I would prefer hobgoblin.
>>>
>>> I think he's talking about a goblin who hops on and off trains (such
>>> as the City of New Orleans).
>>
>> http://beergeek.stores.yahoo.net/wyho.html
>
>
> Yes, I even have the t-shirt.
Is that the "lager boy" one?
--
Online waterways route planner: http://canalplan.org.uk
development version: http://canalplan.eu
Adam Funk
> Adam Funk <a24...@ducksburg.com> writes:
>
>> On 2009-08-12, Prai Jei wrote:
>>
>>> Adam Funk set the following eddies spiralling through the space-time
>>> continuum:
>>>
>>>>> The your is fine with me but I would prefer hobgoblin.
>>>>
>>>> I think he's talking about a goblin who hops on and off trains (such
>>>> as the City of New Orleans).
>>>
>>> http://beergeek.stores.yahoo.net/wyho.html
>>
>>
>> Yes, I even have the t-shirt.
>
> Is that the "lager boy" one?
Yes.
--
A: Because it messes up the order in which people normally read text.
Q: Why is top-posting such a bad thing?
A: Maybe because some people are too annoyed by top-posting.
Q: Why do I not get an answer to my question(s)?
CDB
> El Wed, 12 Aug 2009 08:36:11 -0400, CDB escribi�:
>
>> Pablo wrote:
>>> El Tue, 11 Aug 2009 22:17:11 +0100, Adam Funk escribi�:
>>>
>>>> Both "you" and "your are OK. (Fowler, otherwise quite sensible
>>>> in many respects, had a big problem with what he called the
>>>> "fused participle", and would have allowed only "your" in that
>>>> construction.)
>>>
>>> Heh. I'd prefer "That you be..."
>>
>> If you use that construction, it has to be "That you are...", if
>> goblinhood is established (as it is here, I believe), or "That you
>> should be...", if goblinhood is merely conceptual.
>
> Surely, "that you be" or "that you may be" (should be?) is just
> normal sunjunctive?
The version with plain "be" isn't idiomatic, even in North America,
where the bare subjunctive (I just typed "subjuctive") is still common
in some contexts. I wouldn't blink at "That you may be" in that
context, although I don't think I'd use it.
Wood Avens
wrote:
>On 2009-08-13, Nick wrote:
>
>> Adam Funk <a24...@ducksburg.com> writes:
>>
>>> On 2009-08-12, Prai Jei wrote:
>>>
>>>> Adam Funk set the following eddies spiralling through the space-time
>>>> continuum:
>>>>
>>>>>> The your is fine with me but I would prefer hobgoblin.
>>>>>
>>>>> I think he's talking about a goblin who hops on and off trains (such
>>>>> as the City of New Orleans).
>>>>
>>>> http://beergeek.stores.yahoo.net/wyho.html
>>>
>>>
>>> Yes, I even have the t-shirt.
>>
>> Is that the "lager boy" one?
>
>Yes.
Ah, my local brewery!
--
Katy Jennison
spamtrap: remove the first two letters after the @