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central.cis.upenn.edu>reply to bill bennett: i don't know the facts of british english, nor do i know your theory of language behavior, but, in american english, sentences like: > That is the linguist whom we think seems obscure. occur in the self-conscious discourse of those english speakers whose native dialect does not mark the case distinction in wh-words, which includes the vast majority of americans, at least. i believe the sentences can be 'accounted for' without recourse to 'clause', 'government', or 'case', in any deep sense. the generalization seems to be: when nervous about your english, use 'whom' unless it immediately precedes a finite verb. this also gives us: Just whom do you think you are? this is akin to another self-conscious pattern that says something like 'be uncomfortable about 'me' unless it immediately follows a verb or preposition', which gives us things like 'he was staying with john and myself/i', 'between you and i,...' fascinating tho they may be, i think these things tell us mainly about why we shouldn't consider conscious introspection as having anything to do with the underlying (unconscious) intuitions that are to be accounted for by a theory of linguistic competence, since these speakers' 'real' grammar does not appear to need 'rules' of this type at all.Mail to author|Respond to list|Read more issues|LINGUIST home page|Top of issue
umaxc.weeg.uiowa.edu>Such structures in which "to be" can be inserted are often permissible only in British Enlish. The one cited below sounds perfectly native to my American ears though possibly somewhat bookish. > > That is the linguist whom we think seems obscure.Mail to author|Respond to list|Read more issues|LINGUIST home page|Top of issue