Ron,

That's an intriguing set of sentences.  Several of them (3, 6, 8, 13,
14, 16, 18) reflect the historic weakening of /v/ that's been going on
since late Old English.  "Lord," for example, was in Middle English
"hlavord", from OE "hlafweard".  I have long suspected that the
widespread use of "seen" as a preterit is not a case of the past
participle substituting for the strong preterit but rather represents
the loss of post-vocalic /v/.  "I've seen him" becomes "I seen him" by
loss of "'ve".  However, in the other sentences the contracted "'ve"
form is grammatically impossible.  Rather, I suspect, again, that the
loss of /v/ forms has generalized from that bit of phonological
weakening to the general loss of perfect aspect forms.  Correlated with
this is contemporary change in the use of the past perfect to mean not
an action prior to a past action but rather simply an action or event
farther back in the past, so that among many younger speakers today the
simple past is a recent past form and the past perfect a remote past
form.

This has nothing to do with your question of what's formally correct of
course.  At my age I tend to lament the loss of the perfect, although
there's nothing much I can do about it, and the change does appear to be
showing up more and more in edited writing.

Herb


The following are examples of English which have appeared in the media.
I
would be interested in the reaction of members to them.   What I'd like
to
know is the following:  If you saw these in a student's essay, which
ones
(if any) would you correct and how would you do so?

I will give a summary of the responses, provide the source of the
examples 
and offer some comments on the relevance of the issues involved.

Hint:   There are no right or wrong answers though your answers have
some 
relevance for TESOL. (Teaching English to speakers of other languages)

1.   No soccer team ever drew crowds like these.

2.   I swear I was not in this hotel more than three times in my life.

3.   I lectured on the subject a number of times in the past ten years.

4.   Did you ever read Blake?

5.   Gatting already indicated that he would not be available.

6.    I never acted a part in my life.

7.    I was married twice.

8.    Peter, you lost weight.  (Said by someone to Peter on seeing him
after
a short separation).

9.   Your father couldn't make it.  He went to the border.

10.  Within the past hour, all the prisoners gave themselves up.  (A
breaking-news announcement on TV)

11.  In the past few years, Iran captured many soldiers.

12.   The air-traffic control chaos of the last month has led to a 28%
increase.

13.  I played Australia five times in the last few years.

14.  We built several new prisons already.

15.  Hitler changed the rules; the phony war is over.

16. Did you have breakfast.  (said in a restaurant at 9 am)

17.  We beat them twice so far.

18.  I thank you kindly, Mister, but I had enough.

19.  It started a campaign in the diet industry we never saw before.

20.   I always knew you were a good speaker.

Ron Sheen

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