Demontrraiive pronouns are marked for deixis and number in IModE: this,

These, that, those. An interesting asymmetry is that the plural pronouns these and those can be used in reference to humans, the singulars this and that cannot: thus, for instance, those who but not **thatwoo (Jespersen 1909-49: II 406; Quirk, Greenbaum, Leech & Svartvik 1985: 6.41-2). Poussa refers the gap ultimately to the loss by ME of gender distinction in the demonstratives, with a consequential chain of morphological, syntactic and semantic changes (1992). In writing, the gap becomes evident well before our period, despite an isolated use of pronominal this and that with human reference in Browning's verse (Poussa 1992: 402). The gap once established, usage of the singular demonstratives for human reference takes on a pejorative (or at least demeaning) sense:

(19) 'Would you like to marry Malcolm?' I asked. 'Faney being owned

By thatI Fancy seeing it every day!'

(1905 Elinor Glyn, Vicissitudes of Evangeline 127 [OBD, Poussa])

The gap does not apply to formulas of introduction (This is John), which Poussa characterises as equative, nor to derived interrogatives. It is a curiosity that the normal response in America to an unrecognised telephone caller is Who is this? (OED s. v. this B. lb), in Britain Who is that?, a difference which can only be twentieth century in that context but which may go back to earlier differences. Conceivably it is a matter of 'positive politeness' (increased involvement) vs. 'negative politeness' (greater social distance); see Brown & Levinson on the role of deixis in politeness strategies (1987: 121,205).

There is a special form for genitives in independent or disjunctive function: compare this book is mine/hers with my/hrr book. Only where the attributive genitive ends in - s are both forms identical. The disjunctive use of its is 'extremely rare' (Quirk, Greenbaum, Leech & Svartvik 1985: 6.29); the OEHs sole example is from Shakespeare (s. v, B). Here is one:

(37) and his voice was about four times its usual size, just as his body

Was four times its (1902 Nesbit, 5 Children viii.154)

The area of personal pronouns is one of those where our reliance on the written form may perhaps be misleading, since pronouns have always had strong (stressed) and weak (unstressed) forms in speech; see CHELA: 144 on OE, and note, for instance, the irregular development of the long vowel in you (CHEE III, forthcoming). However, the modern weak forms (e. g. /m/ 'em 'them', /i/ 'he') do not appear to encourage confusion or syncretism.

One kind of case selection, objective ~ subjective, only affects pronominal NPs in ModE, and there has been real change here during our period in the following environments: (A) in disjunctive use (bare responses); (B) afterwords which may be prepositions or conjunctions: but, except, save and especially as and than; and (C) as subject predicative. Let us take A and B first, illustrating the variation from a set of children's stories, with the historically older usage given first:

She revealed her lack of education by Jane Austen's lights, a delicacy of characterisation which would not work now. The majority of Jespersen's examples are 1 SG (1909-49: VII 227-36).

The newer usage in C, objective case in subject predicative function, (44), can be traced back to the end of the sixteenth century, though the older usage, (43), remains possible for some speakers in PDE:

(43) 'Oh, if it's only /,' he said; [original emphasis]

(1904 Nesbit, Phoenix x.215)

(44) a. 'It's only me', said Jimmy. (1907 Nesbit, Enchanted castle \.\1)

B. 'I beg your pardon...'

'It's us that beg yours,' said Cyril politely.

(1906 Nesbit, Amulet mM)

C. 'It's themY cried Robert [original emphasis] (ibid, xiv.280)

Note that the grammatically proper 1 SG subjective of (43) is spoken by an adult curate rather than by the children of most of the other speech examples. Given the long period over which this case variation is attested, it may be possible to see not just whether first person led third in adopting objective case, but where second person fitted in.16

In all these types the objective form is taking over, though the change has not yet gone to completion. It has been a change introduced 'from below', and as this material shows, in first person before third at least in disjunctive use.

Another environment where the objective form is taking over, this time from the genitive, is subject of an - ing.

(45) a. I donWike his being late. b. IdonWike him being late.

(The variation seen in (45) is not confined to pronouns but shows up in most singular noun-headed NPs too, as a choice between presence and absence of 's.) This change is discussed in section 3.6.4.3.

In many varieties, pronoun case forms in co-ordinate NPs are not always the same as elsewhere - and are a great bugbear of prescriptivists. Objective forms in subject position are common, if non-standard:

Him and me

Emonds even goes so far as to argue that the objective pronouns in (41), (44) and (46) are the only normal usage for any language (like ModE) that lacks morphological case-marking, and that for theoretical reasons the older standard represented by (40) and (43) 'is not part of a dialect spoken (and hence acquired) as a native language by any natural language speech community' (1986: 93).

Conversely, and perhaps not with the same groups of speakers, subjective forms may occur in object positions:

(47) and between you and 7, 1 believe we must not mention the matter to him (1795 Mrs Meeke, Count St. Blancard (Minerva Presss, epr. Arno, ,977) ).ii.66)

Conjoined NPs likej/o* andIm examples like (47) are arguably widespread enough among educated speakers in PDE to be called standard (beside the 'correct' and historically expected you and me)}1 Neither (46) nor (47) is all that new. Loss of case distinction in second person pronouns may have played some part in the (46) type, though in most varieties he and /are quite secure as subjective forms when not co-ordinated. If, as seems plausible, (47) is a hypercorrect reaction to the stigmatised (46) - 'Use forms Xandl, because X and me is wrong' - its occurrence well before the heyday of published prescriptive grammar, e. g. in Shakespeare, is problematic. See Jespersen (1909-49: VII 238, 271-3), Visser (1963-73: section 270), and Tieken-Boon van Ostade (1994). And why (even without the certainties of current theories of formal syntax) should (46) be so common anyway?

One possibility is to see it as a symptom of a general retreat of subjective forms to ever fewer environments, with objective pronouns clearly the unmarked case (for personal pronouns: who/whom goes the other way). The only environment in which subjective personal pronouns seem under no threat is as subject of finite verbs, and (46) is perhaps evidence of a stricter delineation of that environment. The prototypical subject pronoun is of unambiguous person and number, constitutes the whole of its NP, and has the potential for concord with the verb.18 Furthermore, a pronoun of the first or second person is mainly deictic in function, a pronoun of the third person anaphoric. These are the syntactic and pragmatic features of the prototypical subject pronoun. It may be that «o«-prototypical subject pronouns are increasingly defaulting to the unmarked, objective case form. Two co-ordinated NPs will often differ in person, and the resultant NP may differ in number from its constituent NPs. In some dialects, then, a pronominal NP whose overall person and/or number bears an uncertain relation to the person/number of a pronoun within it, may no longer meet the conditions for use of a subjective form. Pronouns which are modified, making them less like deictic or anaphoric elements and somewhat more like referential nouns, may likewise fail to be marked as subjective. Hence such data as (48-9), where a pronoun in subject function does not constitute the entire subject NP:

(48) a. th&t;wrImust write helter-skelter

(1832 Gaskell, Letters2 p. 2{c.\l Sep.))

B. **He in the corner there<is the one you need to see.

C. I, and not I, | And the lis the Giver of life

(1875 Lewis Morris, 'Evensong' (Works, 1890) 121 [fespersen])

D. 'Suppose we girls take a turn,' said Jane, laughing.

(1902 Nesbit, 5 Children ii.43)

(49) a. that poor (old) me must write helter-skelter

B. ?Him in the corner there is the one you need to see.

C. The miserabee little me to be taken up and loved after tearing

Myself to pieces! (1879 Meredith, Egoist xiviii.606 [Jespersen])

D. Us girls can always take a joke.

Pages: 1 2

• Standard English was clearly conceived of as a male norm by both H. C. Wyld and Daniel Jones

In commenting on the characteristics of what he called 'Received Standard', Wyld (1934: 614) noted that it was heard most consistently at its best among officers of the British Regular Army. 'The utterance of these men is at once clear-cut and precise, yet free from affectation; at once downright and

• Predicative

It is conventional to distinguish predicatives from objects: (382) Jim turned out a good teacher. (383) Jim turned out the disruptive pupils. Obvious differences between them include those shown in table 3.9. Example (382) illustrates a subject predicative, co-referential with the subject NP. The rivalry of different case forms in pronouns acting as

• The noun phrase

The noun phrase (NP) is the syntactic unit which typically functions as subject or object of a clause or object of a preposition. A pronoun or proper noun usually constitutes a complete noun phrase in itself - he, ,hem, James, Amsterdam - with occasional exceptions like poor old her, you

• Reflexive pronouns

EtymologicaUy, reflexive pronouns are compounds of a personal pronoun (genitive for first and second person, mostly objective for third person) and a form of self. Even if we neglect dialects with forms like meself hisself hissen, etc, containing a different selection of elements from the rather arbitrary standard set, there

• Gerunds

I shall use the term gerund for a nominal - ing form with verbal properties. I discuss them here because gerundial constructions tend to bear closest resemblance to nonfinite nominal clauses, even though combinations of preposition and gerundial construction can dso approach (non-fimte) adverbia causes, as Rissanen points out (CHELILI,