one of ...

[Norm Ryder]

An apology, guys. If this last post of mine sounds as though I was completely unaware of most of what's gone before, you're right. I don't know what button I failed to press, but somehow I thought I was coming in somewhere on page two; and I found pp. 3-5 only when I came back into the site after class. Probably the fault of just looking for a 'quickie' on the net before I left this morning. Pleased, though, to follow the much more thorough and interesting discussion that I'd missed earlier.

I guess the following example is really at the other end of the spectrum from Harzer's initial one; but I've been hearing increasingly - also on radio and telly - the use of "is" after "There ..." before a plural complement; such as, "There's three more cases of high tackling coming before the tribunal tonight".

Again, is this happening only in Australia? Or has it been common in other regional varieties from time immemorial?

I fancy, though, that change like this will accelerate as radio and television promote more presenters (and writers) who have never heard of the concepts of subject (or 'head-noun') and verb, let alone that these should agree in 'number'.

Thanks again Harzer and all for helping revise my "Language Change" unit! Keep it rolling.

Norm

[Harzer]

Spot on, Norm. What I have said so far is only a small part of the whole story.

I hear "there + is" all the time when the "postponed topic" is plural, which leads me to think that (a) it is a further illustration of the "rule" that I have proposed and (b) that "there" is therefore being treated as a singular pronoun, which deserves a !?!?!?

Have just seen your other post in which you ask about my familiarity with string theory etc. I have to disappoint you. I have no real formal background in Linguistics as such, apart from a couple of semesters at Melbourne Uni, in their (excellent) post-grad programme, in 1994. I have to confess to not even possessing a grammar of English, let alone theoretical studies of esoterica like string theory. I am simply trying to work on observational data passed through the lens of introspection.

Your diary idea is a good one - I did it for a while in the early nineties and was surprised at the regularity with which "new grammar" was being recorded; and continue to be surprised at its persistence 10 - 12 years later. I speak "Educated Australian" myself, which doesn't stop me from appreciating the degree of disparity out there, which makes my dialect a relatively effete one these days.

I would be interested in your reaction to the debate between me and Stephen the sentence about the origins of the English language. I can't believe that anyone can question the verb form here, unless of course the phrase "the origins of the English lanuage" is clothed in quotation marks,

Cheers,

Harzer

Harzer

[Harzer]

Just found on Fodors Travel Forum (Europe) in the topic called Top Ten Tips for Flight Attendants:

"I don't think carrying some cans of soda are going to misbalance the plane."

Harzer's Rule is alive and well at 30000 feet!.

Harzer

[Stephen Jones]

But appzrently suffering from jet lag as soda is singular

[fluffyhamster]

http://www.dtaylor6.fsnet.co.uk/concord7.htm

[Andrew Patterson]

http://www.hf.uio.no/iba/nettkurs/trans ... eg226.html

Describes the same thing (notional concord) but gives examples too.

[fluffyhamster]

Andy, there are over 50 examples, a "small corpus", at the end of that link!

[Andrew Patterson]

It's a difficult layout to follow, though. OK, everything is there but you have to scroll down to the end every time you want to see an example of what they're talking about.

[fluffyhamster]

Ah, right, I kind of guessed that was what you meant ('alongside' the explanations) - the link you gave is nice and clear for sure!