A question of tense

[SimonDoom]

I'm going to crack this thread open one more time, which I hope will not reopen any further floodgates, because a few minutes ago I revisited something I wrote here earlier and discovered it to be not fully correct: the meaning and usage of a word SimonDoom cited: antecedent.

I'm quite familiar with the uses of "antecedent" as a synonym for preceding and ancestor, and in mathematics, but when referring to pronouns or more generally anaphora or proforms, while an antecedent usually precedes that anaphor it isn't actually required to -- it can also follow (making it technically a postcedent) or be implied from general knowledge. Thus, my counterexample citing seven celebrated novels that begin with pronouns isn't fully valid.

This was news to me, and I thank you, SimonDoom, for pointing me in its general direction; I learned something valuable, something I'm always thankful for. I also apologize for stating that "now you're either making stuff up or willfully ignoring such rules as there are in the English language" even though I believe I was correct about everything else I wrote, including the reference that pronoun/proform antecedents are not actually required (for a variety of reasons).

That said, I still maintain that my use of the anaphor "It" as the first word of the second sentence in the paragraph I requested help on in this thread is perfectly valid: anaphora / proforms are not limited to a single-word antecedent, they can also be a phrase, clause, or even a full sentence. In my case, it's pretty clear that "It" referred to the immediately preceding coordinate clause. Some might disagree and of course are welcome to, because:



Regards,
-MɛtaBob

See next message.

 

[SimonDoom]

I'm going to crack this thread open one more time, which I hope will not reopen any further floodgates, because a few minutes ago I revisited something I wrote here earlier and discovered it to be not fully correct: the meaning and usage of a word SimonDoom cited: antecedent.

I'm quite familiar with the uses of "antecedent" as a synonym for preceding and ancestor, and in mathematics, but when referring to pronouns or more generally anaphora or proforms, while an antecedent usually precedes that anaphor it isn't actually required to -- it can also follow (making it technically a postcedent) or be implied from general knowledge. Thus, my counterexample citing seven celebrated novels that begin with pronouns isn't fully valid.

This was news to me, and I thank you, SimonDoom, for pointing me in its general direction; I learned something valuable, something I'm always thankful for. I also apologize for stating that "now you're either making stuff up or willfully ignoring such rules as there are in the English language" even though I believe I was correct about everything else I wrote, including the reference that pronoun/proform antecedents are not actually required (for a variety of reasons).

That said, I still maintain that my use of the anaphor "It" as the first word of the second sentence in the paragraph I requested help on in this thread is perfectly valid: anaphora / proforms are not limited to a single-word antecedent, they can also be a phrase, clause, or even a full sentence. In my case, it's pretty clear that "It" referred to the immediately preceding coordinate clause. Some might disagree and of course are welcome to, because:



Regards,
-MɛtaBob

I appreciate your post. You were right to point out that the "rule" requiring an antecedent noun is not quite as hard and fast as I'd suggested. That's true with most grammar and style rules. I was overstating things.

I'll note, though, that the one example of "it" in your list of examples is part of an idiom: "it is cold." "It" is better seen as part of an idiom than as a true pronoun in this example.

The other examples you gave are personal pronouns. "They" can be used sometimes even if the noun to which it corresponds doesn't come first. Sometimes "they" may be deliberately vague, i.e., "They can put a man on the moon, but they can't . . . ."

I still think your use of "it" could be improved. In this case it is vague, and several readers have commented on that. You could insert "Her caress" in place of "it" and it would be clearer. Or you could say something like "She caressed me for a while . . . "

 

[MetaBob]

As a matter of basic grammar, it's not sufficient to say that "it" refers to a paragraph, or to a sentence, or to something happening in a previous sentence. That's not good grammar. Others, not just I, have told you this, and you don't want to listen. You still have not explained what "it" is. Any professional editor would tell you this. ...

If you have a style guide or source that supports this usage, go ahead and cite it.

Leaving aside the question of an antecedent noun, which I believe we agree now is not always required based on textbook advice plus some relevant counterexamples that I provided, I want to provide an example of what you explicitly requested in the post you've now withdrawn (which now reads "See next message") for specific supporting examples of published fiction that include the same sort of use of "It" without a sole antecedent (or postcedent) noun. Fortunately, you made a slightly less specific request for such an example earlier:

I still think your use of "it" could be improved. In this case it is vague, and several readers have commented on that. You could insert "Her caress" in place of "it" and it would be clearer. Or you could say something like "She caressed me for a while . . . "

Last night I was re-reading the last couple hundred pages of Stephen King's "The Stand" for completely unrelated reasons, and last hour I wondered if there might have been an example there of what you've said unequivocally is unacceptable grammar but which I maintain is perfectly legitimate. So I opened up that book and there it was, on the very first page I opened (p571 in this edition). I imagine there are many more in this book, and others:

Fran looked at him, troubled. Really for the first time she understood that this expedition might end with Harold in jail. They were going to sneak into his house without a warrant or anything and poke around.

"Oh, bad," she said.

"Not too good, is it?" he agreed. "You want to call it off?"

She thought for a long time and then shook her head.

"Good. I think we ought to know, one way or the other."

"Are you sure they're both gone?"

"Yes. I saw Harold driving one of the Burial Committee trucks early this morning. And all the people who were on the Power Committee were invited over for the tryout."

"You sure she went?"

"It would look damn funny if she didn't, wouldn't it?"

Please note again that my use of "It" ("It went on for a minute or two") is not as a pronoun even though this is the most common usage of the word "it". Note also that this is not the only use of "it" in this excerpt that conforms with my usage. I've already provided specifics:

... anaphora / proforms are not limited to a single-word antecedent, they can also be a phrase, clause, or even a full sentence. In my case, it's pretty clear that "It" referred to the immediately preceding coordinate clause.

This is easy enough to verify:

In grammar, an antecedent is an expression (word, phrase, clause, sentence, etc.) that gives its meaning to a proform (pronoun, pro-verb, pro-adverb, etc.). ... The linguistic term that is closely related to antecedent and proform is anaphora.
...
Definitions of "antecedent" along these lines can be found, for instance, in Crystal (1999:20) and Radford (2004:322)
...
Crystal, D. 1997. A dictionary of linguistics and phonetics. 4th edition. Cambridge, MA: Blackwell Publishers.
Radford, A. 2004. English syntax: An introduction. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.

At this point, having provided copious examples of requested support for my position, I'm going to ask for specific refutations of precisely the sort of usage I maintain is valid, not just unsupported assertions of "bad grammar." It's easy enough to find people (even grammarians, even instructors) who will state unequivocally that using "It" is invalid except as a pronoun with a specific antecedent, whether implicit, idiomatic, or explicit, but I think I've made a pretty good case, with significant support beyond "several people have commented," that this is untrue.

Regards,
-MɛtaBob

 

[TarnishedPenny]

OK, ‘nother question for the experts here.

Two people kiss. Is it:

...tongues teased each other’s mouth.​

or

...tongues teased each other’s mouths.​

Please.

Oh, a follow-up question, seeing as I am obviously grammatically concussed. Where would you put the question mark on the first question?

Thanks.

 

[NotWise]

OK, ‘nother question for the experts here.

I think you're leading idealistic grammarians down a briar-infested path.

 

[ElectricBlue]

OK, ‘nother question for the experts here.

Two people kiss. Is it:

...tongues teased each other’s mouth.​

or

...tongues teased each other’s mouths.​

Please.

Unless they are aliens, they each have only one mouth, so I'd say the first one. But I'll defer to someone who has read a book of rules .

 

[MetaBob]

Two people kiss. Is it:

...tongues teased each other’s mouth.​

or

...tongues teased each other’s mouths.​

At least one source (citing The Chicago Manual of Style as its own source) states:

Note that not all grammarians or style guides agree on this point. As a general rule of thumb, a plural noun is considered more common, while a singular noun is considered more logical.

Which would mean this is correct:
"... tongues teased each other's mouth."

I've asked myself similar questions in my own writing multiple times, apparently getting it wrong more than once, so this is a relevant question for me and I thank you for raising it.

Where would you put the question mark on the first question?

I would do it this way:

Two people kiss. Is it?:

I'm curious what others here might say about this. Meanwhile, I'm going to go fix sentences in three of my chapters.

 

[TarnishedPenny]

No briars intended, I assure you, NW. I was quietly feeding my muse when I stopped, looked at the screen and scratched my head in growing confusion.

And, EB, I see your logic, but there are two of them (human, to keep it simple). So, two people, each with a tongue and each with a mouth...

My head hurts. I need Miss Hardacre, my Grade 8 grammar DI, to rule on this, but I’m not sure she would have known what a kiss was in the first place.

 

[ElectricBlue]

No briars intended, I assure you, NW. I was quietly feeding my muse when I stopped, looked at the screen and scratched my head in growing confusion.

And, EB, I see your logic, but there are two of them (human, to keep it simple). So, two people, each with a tongue and each with a mouth...

My head hurts. I need Miss Hardacre, my Grade 8 grammar DI, to rule on this, but I’m not sure she would have known what a kiss was in the first place.

Yes, but each has only one mouth. My approach is to change to a singular pronoun to see what works - too lazy to look it up in a book - so:

My mouth, or my mouths? I only have one mouth, so singular, surely?

I am one other, you are the other other, but we're still only got one mouth each. It's not like we're looking into each other's eyes.

We can always ask Brian.

Wait, I read that bit wrong, didn't I? Didn't eye?

 

[TarnishedPenny]

My head still hurts, but maybe less so now. I can see why not all grammarians agree.

My thanks to all for your insight.

(Or is that insights? Collective singular or multiple individual? )

 

[KeithD]

"mouth," because "each," a singular adjective pronoun, is the controlling antecedent here. If it had been "all" rather than "each," it would be "mouths." A stickier question would be whether it's "other's" or "others'." But "other's" is the more common usage.

 

[SimonDoom]

OK, ‘nother question for the experts here.

Two people kiss. Is it:

...tongues teased each other’s mouth.​

or

...tongues teased each other’s mouths.​

Please.

Oh, a follow-up question, seeing as I am obviously grammatically concussed. Where would you put the question mark on the first question?

Thanks.

"Other" is a singular pronoun, so it should be "mouth," because one person can't have more than one mouth. But the plural seems to be a popular convention in this case.

 

[ElectricBlue]

"Other" is a singular pronoun, so it should be "mouth," because one person can't have more than one mouth. But the plural seems to be a popular convention in this case.

Bloody hell! A convention, or a rule, or guidance? There's not much authoritative about any of this, by the sounds of it. I think I'll continue to follow Humpty Dumpty's advice:

'When I use a word,’ Humpty Dumpty said in rather a scornful tone, ‘it means just what I choose it to mean — neither more nor less.’

’The question is,’ said Alice, ‘whether you can make words mean so many different things.’

’The question is,’ said Humpty Dumpty, ‘which is to be master — that’s all.'

Carry on .

 

[SimonDoom]

OK, ‘nother question for the experts here.

Two people kiss. Is it:

...tongues teased each other’s mouth.​

or

...tongues teased each other’s mouths.​

Please.

Oh, a follow-up question, seeing as I am obviously grammatically concussed. Where would you put the question mark on the first question?

Thanks.

I think the question mark would go at the end of each question or at the end of the whole thing. Eliminate the periods after "mouth/mouths."

Is it:

"tongues teased each other's mouth"?

or

"tongues teased each other's mouths"?


Or you could write it this way, making it one sentence, which might not be as visually clear but would be grammatically more correct:

Is it "tongues teased each other's mouth" or "tongues teased each other's mouths"?

The question mark would go outside the quotation mark since the question concerns quoted material.

Following up again re mouth/mouths: The logical "right" answer is the one EB and KeithD gave. I hunted around for an answer, though, and there seems to be recognition of the fact that it's commonly written "mouths" and that this might be acceptable as a matter of convention, although that doesn't make any sense to me. "Mouth" is definitely grammatically acceptable. But it doesn't quite sound right to me.

It probably would be more common to use the plural in a situation where the noun could be either singular or plural. For example:

We respected each other's political views.

Each person could have one view, or many views, and in this case writing "views" would be more common.

 

[SimonDoom]

Please note again that my use of "It" ("It went on for a minute or two") is not as a pronoun even though this is the most common usage of the word "it". Note also that this is not the only use of "it" in this excerpt that conforms with my usage. I've already provided specifics:

I don't want to have to dig up grammar guides at this point, because my book shelf is disorganized and I can't find it, and my Chicago Manual online subscription ran out. So I'll put aside the issue whether it's "bad grammar" (although I think it is) and focus just on clarity. A few comments on your comments:

1. The Stephen King passage is dialogue, not narrative. People speak ungrammatically, so ungrammatical usage in dialogue doesn't justify ungrammatical usage in narrative.

2. I disagree that "it" is not a pronoun in your passage. I think it obviously is. It's not an idiomatic usage like "it's cold." When you say "It went on" you are saying "[some process] went on."

3. The question here is, exactly what is this "some process"? I don't know.

4. The test of clarity is what would you put in "it"'s place? There is no word or group of words or phrase in the preceding sentence that one could plug in place of "it" and make sense of the sentence. Therefore, it's unclear, and you'd be better off replacing it with a noun or noun phrase (e.g., "her caress").

Once again, you've had 7 or 8 writers here tell you the sentence is not clear. Ipso facto, it's not clear. When most of the people have responded to your passage by telling you it's not clear and that they don't understand it, you can't respond by saying "yes it is and yes you do."

 

[TarnishedPenny]

Great explanations and thanks. I love you guys!

There does seem to be a choice and, if there is a perfectly correct answer, it would be found well into into angels-and-pinhead territory. I think I will go with 'mouth', singular. Thanks again.



.
Oh, and Rueben?

Hah. But then my mind starts wondering, why is 'tongues' multiple...

Clearly, sir, because two people are kissing. Unless one of them has had an unfortunate accident, it has to be plural.


.
And Simon?

We respected each other's political views.

Each person could have one view, or many views, and in this case writing "views" would be more common.

Accepting what you are saying, I would note that an individual can have many political views; in that example, it makes sense. One person cannot however have more than one mouth or one tongue. (Plot bunny there, to be sure.)

 

[MetaBob]

A stickier question would be whether it's "other's" or "others'." But "other's" is the more common usage.

Actually, this question has a much more unambiguous answer, if you follow the reference I provided earlier:

each other is treated as a singular pronoun and emphasizes two or more separate people. Each other’s is always correct, and each others’ is never correct. Think of it this way: You would say We talked to each other for hours. You would never say We talked to each others for hours.

Again, the linked source cites The Chicago Manual of Style as its own source.