andthereisnoreasontoassumethathistoricaldevelopmentsinthisfragmentofthegrammarofEnglishshouldhavecometoahaltinthetwentiethcentury.Manyinterestingquestionsarisewhichmightwellbeworthexploring.Forexample
wemightaskwhethernon-Ãniterelativeclausesarespreading
possiblyattheexpenseofÃnitealternatives
asthiswouldbeanexpecteddevelopmentinviewofageneraltendencyfornon-ÃniteclausestobecomemoreimportantintherecenthistoryofEnglish(see
e.g.
Chapterï¹ofthepresentbookandMairï²ï°ï°ï¶b:ï±ï±ï¹Ãï±ï´ï°).OrwemightlookatthestatisticalorsemanticrelationshipsbetweenactiveandpassiveinÃnitivesinexamplessuchas(ï±e)and(ï±f)above.However
mostdiscussionsonrecentchangesintheuseofrelativeclausesinEnglishwillinstantlyhomeinononeissue
namelythechoicebetweenwhoandwhomasarelativepronouninobjectfunction.Similarvariabilitybetweenthetwoformsis
ofcourse
foundinindependentanddependentinterrogativeclauses(cf.
e.g.
Who(m)didyouask?;IdidnÃtknowwho(m)toask)
sothatÃunlessindicatedotherwiseÃthefollowingcommentsonwhoandwhomcanbetakentorefertobothtypesofconstructions.Usually
theissueisframedaroundthequestionofwhetherEnglishislosingatraditionallyÃcorrectÃform
whom
andwhethertheresultinglossofdistinctionbetweenthesubjectandobjectusesofthisrelativepronounshouldbeseenasadesirablesimpliÃcationÃtheminorityviewÃorasasignofpossibledecayinthelanguage.Atthisstage
wedonotwanttoanticipatetheresultsofadetailedinves-tigationoftheuseofrelativeclausesinpresent-dayEnglish
whichwillbeofferedinChapterï±ï°(sectionï±ï°.ïµ)ofthepresentbook.However
weï±Whenquotingexamplesfromstandardcorporaordigitaldatabases
theusualconventionsarefollowed.Inthisparticularexample
whichisfromtheF-LOB(FreiburgÃLancasterÃOslo/Bergen)CorpusofwrittenBritishEnglish
ÃBÃreferstothetextualcategory
inthiscaseÃPress/EditorialÃandÃï°ï¶Ãisthenumberoftheï²
ï°ï°ï°wordtextsamplethequoteistakenfrom.Readersunfamiliarwithcorpus-linguisticconventionsand/orthecorporausedforthepresentstudyarereferredtosectionï±.ï²belowandChapterï²formoreinformation.
Menu
