Re: NYT dangling infinitive

On Thu, 28 Sep 2006 22:59:57 +0000 (UTC), Arnold Zwicky
<zwicky@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in
<news:efhk5d$bdq$1@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> in sci.lang:

In article <1oh5s6pgscn7g$.tk3ckcx1jkxd.dlg@xxxxxxxxxx>,
Brian M. Scott <b.scott@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

>On Thu, 28 Sep 2006 07:13:36 GMT, Ron Hardin
><rhhardin@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in
><news:451B761A.5B9F@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx> in sci.lang:

>> The NYT editors write

>> Those men could have been tried and convicted long ago, but
>> President Bush chose not to.

>> Must have been a rewrite. [...]

>Where have you been? It's a very common construction.

well, Verb Phrase Ellisis leaving infinitival "to" as a remainder
("stranding" it) is indeed very common, but what ron is objecting to
here is a special case of VPE stranding "to", in which the omitted VP
is active voice, but the antecedent is passive.

I know what he's objecting to; my impression is that even
this type is common enough to be fairly unremarkable.

VPE requires a linguistic antecedent -- it's not enough
that the appropriate verbal semantics be "in the air" --
but it doesn't require that the omitted VP match the
antecedent perfectly. the omitted VP will always be a
bare-form VP, but the antecedent can be a different
non-finite form, or finite:

1. [-ing-form antecedent] Stanford University and the city of Palo
Alto are opening up their joint meetings to the public for the first
time in three decades "because there's no reason not to,"...

2. [finite antecedent] Mercedes ranks high for
dependability but not as high as it used to.

the omitted VP can have an extraction site in it:

3. Doesn't DOMA say the Feds don't have to pay attention
to any state marriage laws they don't want to [pay
attention to ___]?

the omitted VP can have a generic NP where the antecedent has a
specific:

4. The jury convicted her not because of anything Larry Stewart said,
but for the reason juries are supposed to [convict people]...

as far as i know, these (and some other) mismatches between the
omitted VP and its antecedent are ok for everybody.

In an informal register, and even then (3), (4), and perhaps
(1) if the second part weren't a quotation make me itch just
a bit.

[...]

Brian
.

Quantcast