User:Ricardiana/grammar

The Great Noun + -ing Debate

Here's a boring sentence for you: "All we are assuming about the Wiener-Kuratowski implementation is that x=(y, z) is stratified, with x being given a type index two greater than the index assigned to y and z."

The writer of that sentence will not ride off on the Stallion of Literary Triumph, it's true, but the sentence at least seems harmless, does it not? Ah. And yet here on Wikipedia it is likely to be called ungrammatical, even "trashy." And therein lies a tale.

My interest in this problem started with this sentence, which I wrote for the article on The Hardy Boys: "The characters were portrayed as in their early 20s, with Frank working as a reporter and Joe still in college." That sentence won't win any prizes either, but I assumed it was grammatical. During a peer review, however, I was told not so - that it violated the rule of "noun plus -ing."

When I asked around about this rule, here on Wikipedia and elsewhere, I discovered that no one could name any book or text that discussed it. I therefore set about doing some research. The result was the discovery of a debate that has actually been quite heated. I'll outline that debate below; as you will see, there is no authoritative consensus on the subject.

Because there's no consensus, I submit that the usage should not be outlawed here. In any case, I hope the following little review will give people some useful background on the subject.

The general problem


The general problem is this: What type of word can precede a gerund? Must it be a possessive? Can it be a genitive? Can it be in the objective case?

The debate continues
The entry on "Genitive before a gerund" in The Columbia Guide to Standard American English by Kenneth G. Wilson, p. 210, says that the construction of g before g used to be taught as a matter-of-course (as correct) and has now fallen into obscurity. (This explains why it "sounds wrong.") William Safire in The right word in the right place at the right time beginning on p. 1 cites a dispute over the issue of possessive before gerund in the 1920s between W. H. Fowler and Otto Jesperson. Fowler believed the genitive was essential before gerunds, but Jespersen disagreed. Antonin Scalia (!) ... yes, it's in the chapter ... believes that using a genitive is correct, but ommitted doing it on an occasion it seemed very odd. Words to the Wise by Michael Sheehan, p. 102, says that the question of what can precede a gerund turns on what you want to emphasise in a given sentence (this was Scalia's argument, actually) and that authorities are divided pretty much 50-50 on the question. Note 6 on p. 228 of Nineteenth-century English by Merja Kytö, Mats Rydén, Erik Smitterberg says that these gerundial constructions were first condemned by the Fowler brothers. The chapter to which this is a footnote investigates the occurrence of the construction in the 18th, 19th, and 20th centuries; it appears to have been used little, if at all, in the 18th century, and to have been very commonly used in the 19th and the beginning of the 20th, before Fowler & Fowler decided against it, after which usage is still frequent, but less so than in the 19th c. The chapter argues also for the inherent grammaticality of these constructions. There is a discussion of the issue beginning on p. 48 of TALKS ON WRITING ENGLISH SECOND SERIES (1901). The author argues again that the choice of word prior to the gerund should be based on what word you want to emphasize. There's more, but that's enough for now. Ricardiana (talk) 16:47, 2 June 2009 (UTC) One more: there is an extended discussion of the issue here in the American Heritage® Book of English Usage. A sample (because I can cut and paste): "gerund and possessives (fused participle). Some people insist that when a gerund is preceded by a noun or pronoun, the noun or pronoun must be in the possessive case.

Accordingly, it is correct to say I can understand his wanting to go, but incorrect to say I can understand him wanting to go. But the construction without the possessive, sometimes called the fused participle, has been used by respected writers for 300 years and is perfectly idiomatic." Ricardiana (talk) 16:57, 2 June 2009 (UTC) Tony, I think you might be interested in the entry for "possessive with gerund" in MWDEU. It quotes the following examples from an 1867 letter by Lewis Carroll: "in hopes of his being able to join me" and "the music prevented any of it being heard". I think that's basically what this section is about – otherwise sorry for the intrusion. They give a history of the dispute whether such constructions are admissible at all, and if they are admissible, whether the possessive is allowed or perhaps even required. It starts: "From the middle of the 18th century to the present time [...] grammarians and other commentators have been baffled by the construction. They cannot parse it, they cannot explain it, they cannot decide whether the possessive is correct or not. The earliest commentators, Harris and Lowth 1763, were distinctly hostile to the possessive case." They conclude: "Both forms have been used by standard authors. Both forms have been called incorrect, but neither is." --Hans Adler (talk) 13:36, 2 June 2009 (UTC)

Arguments against
"With" used loosely as a conjunction. The word with is sometimes used as a quasi-conjunction meaning and. This construction is slovenly because the with-clause appears to be tacked on as an afterthought. For example, the sentence everyone else grabbed the easy jobs with me being left to scrub the oven could be revised as since everyone else grabbed the easy jobs, I had to scrub the oven. Or it could be split into two sentences joined by a semi-colon: Everyone else grabbed the easy jobs; I had to scrub the oven. Instead of with, find the connecting word, phrase, or punctuation that best shows the relationship between the final thought and the first, and then recast the sentence. (Chicago MoS, 15th ed., 193, section 5.190)