Re: punctuation [OT]

On Wed, 27 Feb 2008 15:08:08 +0000, Rob Kemp wrote:

Will Kemp wrote:

I think that's rather spurious logic, really. Women owned a lot of
things - their heads, hands and feet, for a start. I think it's more
likely that "Mrs X'r hair" just didn't survive - as "Mrs X's hair" is
easier to say, and it's not a big sound shift from the "'r" suffix.
Language generally evolves along the line of least resistance, with no
real regard to logic.

It doesn't seem at all unlikely that there was that intermediate stage,
where people said "Mrs X'r hair", but it was never recorded - and a
combination of laziness and women's lower importance in society saw it
disappear relatively quickly, in favour of the masculine suffix.

Aaaaaaaaargh! I had two teachers at school (English teachers, that is)
(i.e. teachers of English) (at secondary school) who both tried to feed
us that explanation for the possessive. I laughed at it then and I'm
laughing at it now. (Even they never went so far as to postulate the
feminine form 'r though.)

To think that my own flesh and blood is propagating this heresy! The
shame.

That's a bit melodramatic! Have you been watching Eastenders again?

There are, after all, plenty of examples of where the masculine form
predominates, or has predominated. A good example is the use of the
word "man" to mean "people". It's quite easy to imagine that "Mrs X his
hair" would sound quite acceptable. Or at least the contraction of it.

As someone on this thread has already pointed out, the 's suffix derives
(with full provenance) from the Old English suffix 'es', which was (one
form of) the possessive singular case. Masculine, feminine and bloody
neuter too.

Prove it!

I believe the professionals are still debating this issue.
.

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