1a. I don’t like your going out looking like that.

1b. I don’t like you going out looking like that.

The answer, as so often, is that it all depends. We first have to understand that the -ing form of the verb can function both as a verb and a noun. Arriving functions as a verb in Arriving home late, he offered his apologies. It functions as a noun in Arriving at your destination is often a disappointment. We next have to understand that the possessive determiners (that’s my, your, his, hers, its, our, their) must be followed by a noun and not a verb. So, too, must nouns which show possession by using the apostrophe. The opposite is also true: any word that is preceded by either of these must be a noun.

In sentence 1a, going is preceded by your, so the -ing form of the verb must here be functioning as a noun, and going out is the object of the verb don’t like. How are we to analyse sentence 1b? If it read simply I don’t like you we would have a perfectly formed sentence. The addition of going out looking like that makes no difference to the basic structure: it gives us more information about what aspect of the person addressed it is that the speaker doesn’t like. It’s rather as if the speaker were saying I don’t like the ‘going out looking like that’ you’.

The difference between the two constructions can perhaps be better illustrated with the sentences:

2a. My wife doesn’t like my cooking.

2b. My wife doesn’t like me cooking.

Most of us would understand 2a  as meaning that the way the husband cooked in general was not to the wife’s taste, rather than that she didn’t like it whenever her husband usurped her chosen place in the kitchen. That is the sense that 2b conveys. Together, the sentences resolve uncertainty about the matter. They show that ‘when the possessive alternative is used, it focuses attention on the action described in the ‘-ing’ clause. In contrast [the other] form puts more emphasis on the person doing the action’ (‘Longman Student Grammar of Spoken and Written English’).

It is perhaps worth adding that in both 2a and 2b cooking forms the object of each sentence. It is in such a position that the role of the -ing form is most susceptible to a choice between noun and verb. Of the following pair, where cooking forms the subject, 3b would be found only in those non-standard dialects where me is used as a possessive determiner:

3a. My cooking doesn’t please everyone.

3b. Me cooking doesn’t please everyone.

As Pam Peters reports in the ‘Cambridge Guide to English Usage’, ‘Webster’s English Usage’ (1989) shows that the construction without the possessive has been in use for centuries. Opposition to it, like the irrational opposition to other quite normal usages, began in the 18th century. Database evidence, again reported by Peters, shows that both constructions are current in American, British, Australian and Canadian English. Analyses in ‘The Comprehensive Grammar of the English Language’ (1985) show both constructions to be grammatical. Insistence on the construction with the possessive alone seems to be yet another linguistic fetish which has no basis in the way English is used.

(This post arose out of a discussion on Facebook, and I am grateful to the participants who prompted it.)

David Crystal has now posted on this topic here

The mistaken plural referenda was presumably formed by analogy with words like memoranda and agenda. The difference is that those act as gerundives in English which has no comparable native form, and have their origins in the meaning ‘things requiring to be remembered’ and ‘things requiring to be acted upon’. Conceivably, referenda could mean ‘things requiring to be referred’, but that is not the sense in which it is used. If it were to be so used, we should then need a further plural, referendas, in the way we have to make a second plural agendas from the already plural agenda.

It is perhaps worth adding as a footnote that the unrelated, and quite unnecessary, re is not short for ‘referring to’. Re is the ablative singular of the Latin noun res, The full expression is in re, meaning ‘in the matter (of)’, and perhaps still favoured by lawyers.

My question, is why, given the etymological background, is it standee and not stander? Stander was in the language long before standee and remains current in stander-by.

There are many varieties of spoken English and there is no reason to suppose that one variety is linguistically superior to any other. At the same time, we do well to use a spoken language that is tolerably close to that of the people with whom we expect to spend most of our lives. For the middle-class, that means adopting the dialect known as Standard English. It can be spoken in any accent, but is often associated with the accent of educated people living in London and the south-east of England. But it’s no more and no less correct than Midlands, Liverpool, Tyneside, Indian, Australian or Caribbean English.

Written language derives from speech, but we have to make a deliberate attempt to learn it. Some fail to do so, even when they speak their native language fluently. We have to encode our thoughts as arbitrary marks on paper or the screen and interpret similar marks produced by others. Like speech, different kinds of written language suit different circumstances. An email or text message in a variety of language that many of us would not understand is perfectly appropriate between people who do understand such language. The question of whether or not it is correct simply does not arise. However, such language in, say, a job application or a Times leader would be unacceptable, and consequently ineffective, if it was incomprehensible to its readers, or if it simply antagonized them. That seems to me a more important consideration than whether or not it conforms to someone’s idea of correctness.

Those who commit words to print should consider what they are trying to express, who their readers are, and whether the chosen language will succeed in conveying the message clearly without hesitation, repetition or deviation. And it is helpful if, in writing which is destined to be read by a large number of people whose linguistic backgrounds we cannot know, we agree on certain conventions. These conventions include punctuation, spelling, and choice of vocabulary and structures. In speech we generally know personally our audiences. In writing, too, we will sometimes know our readers and we can adapt our language accordingly. Quite often, we will not. In those cases, a certain commonality is required to avoid chaos.

When I read a sentence I ask not so much, ‘Is it correct?’ but, ‘Do I want to read any more of this stuff?’ ‘Getting it right’ means successfully using language to achieve the purpose intended, not necessarily complying with a set of rules. Achieving the purpose intended includes producing a sympathetic response in our readers. Placing the emphasis on effectiveness rather than correctness seems to me more likely to produce the desired result. The alternative seems to suppose that once you have complied with the rules laid down by this or that authority you have done all you need to. That is far from the truth.

So far, so good. But there seem to be certain contexts in which the construction decides the matter for us. In a relative clause introduced by the relative pronoun which we might say:

1a. The committee which is responsible for the decision is not responsible for implementing it.

But we do not say:

1b. *The committee which are responsible for the decision are not responsible for implementing it.

If, as we certainly can, we introduce the relative clause with who, the situation is reversed. We can say:

2a. The committee who are responsible for the decision are not responsible for implementing it.

But we do not say:

2b. *The committee who is responsible for the decision is not responsible for implementing it.

The inconsistency arises not only from the ambiguous grammatical number of committee, but also from whether it is perceived as animate or inanimate. Which can refer only to an inanimate antecedent and it is as such that we perceive committee when we consider it as a singular noun. If we consider it as a plural, in other words as a group of individuals, which is no longer appropriate. Equally, who must refer back to an animate antecedent. When we say who are, we are doing just that. If we say who is, we are not. There is a pleasing symmetry about the arrangement.

When English became the expression of an emerging national consciousness in the fourteenth century, it did so in different guises. Largely by chance, Chaucer wrote, and Caxton later printed, in the dialect of London and the East Midlands, thus helping create the conditions in which it would become Standard English. Other dialects had just as great a capacity for literary expression. They failed to make the grade, not because they were linguistically inferior, but because they were spoken in the wrong place. The standard we use, and which many revere, is thus no more ‘correct English’ than any other variety, then or since. All had, and continue to have, all that is linguistically necessary for the development of successful communication at any level.

Many English speakers might dispute this conclusion, claiming that non-standard forms such as ‘we was’, ‘she don’t’ and ‘hisself’ cannot possibly be grammatical, and that the only ‘correct’ English is Standard English. A standard certainly has advantages. It can be understood by all and does not necessarily represent the interests of any one constituency. It is unrivalled in writing and is established as the variety used in areas such as education, publishing, government and the law. It is codified, and provides a model for foreign learners. All literate English speakers can read and understand it. By contrast, non-standard dialects may have only limited intelligibility and many regional and social dialects have, rightly or wrongly, negative associations. In many professions, those who seek success must abandon their non-standard dialects, no matter how they choose to speak in private. If Standard English is just one of many varieties of the language, then it is at least a useful one. However, those who claim Standard English as the only acceptable variety rarely do so on such pragmatic grounds. They feel there is something intrinsically wrong about regularizing the verb forms of ‘be’ in the present and past tense, for example. They ignore the fact that ‘be’ has a long history of variability and the forms used in modern Standard English are arbitrary. In short, they prefer to say, often with little justification, how they think English should be used rather how it is used.

If written Standard English has undisputed prominence, the question of spoken English, is rather more complex. Spoken Standard English, like its written equivalent, has the advantage of being widely understood, but unlike the written form, there are alternatives to it, and most speakers prefer them: Standard English is the native speech of a minority. Non-standard dialects when spoken give their speakers a sense of identity and solidarity, and a feeling that their speech is ‘natural’, as indeed it is. But speech adds to grammar and vocabulary the dimension of accent, the way the language is pronounced, and it is accent that very often seems to be at the heart of a dialect.

Accent may not be a defining feature of Standard English, but while Standard English is sometimes found spoken with an accent other than Received Pronunciation (RP), RP is seldom used for any dialect other than Standard English. Although spoken Standard English is in principle free of political or social bias, in practice it can create a social distance, particularly when spoken with RP. There are signs that RP itself, if not the Standard English which it often delivers, is no longer universally welcome and that the more demotic Estuary English accent is replacing it. Nevertheless, RP remains for the moment a badge of privilege and, by extension, so, in its spoken form, does the variety of English with which it is closely associated.

All dialects are linguistically equal, but Standard English, as the dialect used in writing and formal speech, is more likely to be perceived as authoritative. Those forms of speech which most closely approximate Standard English in their grammar and vocabulary have a correspondingly high status and the further a form of speech departs from it, the lower its status. Although Standard English can be spoken with any accent, when spoken, as it frequently is, with RP, the combination gives it a status no other dialect can match, but, with social rather than linguistic foundations, its status may prove to be fragile.

For the sources on which this post draws, see here.

The ways in which the bits of a sentence fit together around the verb are called valency patterns. There’s rather more to it, but this will serve as an introduction to the notifications I receive from the excellent Amazon telling me that my order ‘has despatched’. ‘What has it despatched?’ the language mavens might ask in their customary haughty tone.  See, the OED records ‘despatch’ as an intransitive verb in only two or three obscure cases and they do not include ‘leave the Amazon warehouse’. This is a very recent example of the way in which the grammar of a language can change. It will, I suspect, be many years before this intransitive use of ‘despatch’ gains universal acceptance. Not only is the use intransitive, but the action has passed from the despatcher to the thing despatched. Something similar, however, has happened with another verb, ‘board’. It is normally used transitively, although there can be intransitive use as well in a sentence such as ‘We boarded two hours late’. But every time we fly we witness the inanimate doing what the inanimate has not previously done, and doing so intransitively. ‘Flight ZZ123’ we are told ‘ is now boarding at gate number 7’.

As well as expressing time, the English verb can express the way in which the speaker or writer regards the sense of the verb in time. This feature is known as aspect. The English verb can express progressive and perfect aspect. Regular verbs express progressive aspect by taking the basic form of the verb, adding -ing to it and combining it with an appropriate form of the verb be. He walks becomes he is walking. Similarly, the perfect aspect is expressed by taking the basic form of the verb, adding -ed and combining it with an appropriate form of the verb have. He walks becomes he has walked.

Such constructions are customarily thought of as being made up of forms of the main verb, with be and have performing the role of auxiliary verbs. I propose an alternative view. He is walking, I suggest, is a sentence in which is is the main verb and walking its complement, and he has walked is a sentence in which have is the main verb and walked its object.