Timeline for Can I omit "about" in these sentences?
Current License: CC BY-SA 4.0
8 events
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| Jun 14, 2018 at 15:39 | comment | added | FumbleFingers | Well, as best I can recall (it was half a century ago now) my degree in English (and linguistics) never actually covered "grammar" (= syntax) at the level you're thinking of. But if I could be bothered to find the irrefutable written evidence, I could be pretty sure of finding examples from all of our most highly-respected writers using the forms I'm defending here, which you have been erroneously taught are somehow syntactically "defective". | |
| Jun 14, 2018 at 15:32 | comment | added | Jawel7 | I spent a huge amount of time on that and know what I am saying right now. I wish you to be right but all you are doing is just being driven by the effect of spoken English to wrong ideas which can't be proved. Sorry for that. | |
| Jun 14, 2018 at 15:26 | comment | added | FumbleFingers | Wow! I suppose you really believe what you're saying, but you're completely mistaken. Especially about the "not in linguistics" bit - you should know that although there are still plenty of prescriptive / pedagogic grammarians screwing up people's ideas of how language works, linguists aren't interested in telling people what they should say (according to half-baked rules). They note what people do say / write, then figure out ways to describe the general principles we observe when generating utterances. | |
| Jun 14, 2018 at 15:14 | comment | added | Jawel7 | No way :) They have the same structure.. Both of them are grammatically wrong. You can't attach "a noun" to "a wh-clause" without any preposition.. They are just acceptable in spoken English, but not in linguistics. | |
| Jun 14, 2018 at 15:08 | comment | added | FumbleFingers | You need to seriously rethink what you understand by "grammatically correct". Your example My idea what I want to have for dinner is really amazing isn't at all idiomatic without a preposition such as of or for after idea, but this in no way implies that He has no idea what he wants is in any way "defective". | |
| Jun 14, 2018 at 14:56 | comment | added | Jawel7 | In spoken English, many English grammar rules are ignored, however, it doesn't mean that we can say they are grammatically correct. If that sentence is grammatically correct, the following sentence must be grammatically correct as well. My idea what I want to have for dinner is really amazing. Can you think that the subject is grammatically OK? :) | |
| Jun 14, 2018 at 14:50 | comment | added | FumbleFingers | I have no idea why you think this sentence is "technically" incorrect. It's just English, and there's no reason to suggest the validity of the construction varies according to whether it's spoken or written, formal or informal, etc. | |
| Jun 14, 2018 at 14:37 | history | answered | Jawel7 | CC BY-SA 4.0 |