Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Language/2013 July 16

= July 16 =

Dr. Livesey (character)
How is Livesey's name pronounced? Is it like "alive" or like "Liv Tyler"? Dismas |(talk) 02:28, 16 July 2013 (UTC)
 * Arrr, it be Liv-see in the only true version, at the 4:30 mark, blast yer scurvy scurviness. The same be so in this audio book around 1:25. Clarityfiend (talk) 04:01, 16 July 2013 (UTC)
 * Thank ye, matey!! Dismas |(talk) 04:20, 17 July 2013 (UTC)

Consecutive prepositions
For our collective sins, our language now glories(?) in the expression "to sign off on", meaning to approve a proposed new law, policy, whatever. And it appears in the passive, such as "expected to be signed off on".

This opens the door to such curiosities as 3 consecutive prepositions, e.g. expected to be signed off on in June, or to be signed off on at the G8 Summit, or to be signed off on on Tuesday. Even 4 in a row is possible without any sleight of hand: "expected to be signed off on in at most 3 weeks from now".

Can 5 or more consecutive prepositions be achieved, by this or any other accepted construction, within the constraints of unexceptionable grammar, and without resorting to contriving unlikely scenarios? --  Jack of Oz   [pleasant conversation]  22:34, 16 July 2013 (UTC)
 * Is it too contrived if I mention the mother who took a book about Australia to her child's bedroom, only to be asked, "Mommy, what did you bring the book about Down Under up for?" Angr (talk) 22:37, 16 July 2013 (UTC)
 * "The book that I didn't want to be read out of from about Down Under up for" is the traditional version. Tevildo (talk) 22:44, 16 July 2013 (UTC)
 * Basic version is "What did you bring that book that I don't want to be read to out of up for?" (though not all would generally considered to be true prepositions in that context). I'm sure that "Down Under" could be added in,  but something seems to be slightly off in your sentence. [[Image:SFriendly.gif|20px]] -- AnonMoos (talk) 12:17, 17 July 2013 (UTC)


 * See http://www.esl-library.com/blog/2013/05/09/preposition-or-adverb/.
 * —Wavelength (talk) 23:10, 16 July 2013 (UTC)


 * You may, Jack, be interested in separable verbs and their counterparts, phrasal verbs. μηδείς (talk) 00:10, 17 July 2013 (UTC)


 * This one just occurred to me: "Some people might be OK with it, but I cannot put up with off on it at". --   Jack of Oz   [pleasant conversation]  00:12, 17 July 2013 (UTC)
 * Is there an "all" missing at the end of that sentence? (It does seem to meet the five prep requirement). 01:37, 17 July 2013 (UTC)
 * No, I was referring back to my example above, where "off on it at" occurs. But you've given me a new idea for a 7-prep concatenation:
 * "Some people might be OK with it, but I cannot put up with off on it at at  all." --   Jack of Oz   [pleasantries]  02:08, 17 July 2013 (UTC)


 * I want to point out, in "sign off", I don't think off is a preposition, I think it's a particle (like "up" in "look up", etc.); see Preposition.
 * That being said, it's not hard to find examples with lots of actual adpositions occuring next to one another. Pinker has the example (also repeated in List of linguistic example sentences "Daddy, what did you bring that book that I don't want to be read to out of up for?"? r ʨ anaɢ (talk) 01:19, 17 July 2013 (UTC)


 * It may be better to think of a term like "to sign off" as a compound word. English compound lists the "verb-preposition" compound as a possible compound word.  While the example isn't spelled with a space (tumbledown) that's an orthographical issue, which is not always consistent with spoken or understood language.  There are English compounds that are spelled without spaces (online, underside, tumbledown) and those that are (player piano).  The classification of a term as a "compound word" versus "word + modifier" is sometimes a bit arbitrary, but I think one can think of "sign off" in the compound sense because the word "off" does not merely modify sign, the term "sign off" itself has an idiomatic meaning which is distinct from either individual word, and that meaning does not port well when you remove either morpheme to other contexts.  -- Jayron  32  01:45, 17 July 2013 (UTC)
 * I agree that sign off is a phrasal verb, or compound word. Originally, though, I think off was an adverb rather than a preposition in this construction. I can't think of an instance when sign off as a phrasal verb would be followed immediately by a noun phrase, which indicates that off in this phrase does not have a prepositional function. The same is true of up in put up with. Generally, when there appear to be two prepositions in a row, one of them is either an adverb or a verb phrase particle that originated as an adverb.  Marco polo (talk) 13:59, 17 July 2013 (UTC)


 * Thanks to all those who corrected my false premise. For my sins, I shall now take a 6-day wiki-break.  --   Jack of Oz   [pleasantries]  17:15, 17 July 2013 (UTC)