To resurrect an old argument, I would contend that "whom" never
successfully gained a place in English as a relative pronoun. It does
work as a question word, although that's fading as well. But by the
time wh-words quit making the transition from indefinite pronouns and
question words to relative pronouns, sometime around the beginnings of
Early Modern English in the sixteenth c., whom had not yet made the
switch. If I remember right, who was the last of the question words to
become a relative pronoun. All of this happened, by the way, under the
influence of Latin, where question words and pronouns are identical,
except for nominative singular forms. The rules for whom in relatives
got codified in the 18th c. as a way of imposing order on some variation
in wh-word usage, but they do not reflect usage at the time. Rather,
they react to it.
Herb
-----Original Message-----
From: Assembly for the Teaching of English Grammar
[mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Johanna Rubba
Sent: Friday, October 29, 2004 12:24 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: urgent whom question
"Return without delay to become who you truly are."
"Who" is the subject complement of the clause "you truly are (subj.
compl.) The conservative view is that this position requires subjective
case: "I am looking for an honest person, and you truly are she". Thus
the pronoun should be "who" acc. to traditional rules.
"Who" is also correct in the currently evolving new rules for
"who/whom", in which "whom" is ceasing to be used, is used rather
randomly because the user has not internalized the older rules, or is
used only in fixed expressions such as "to whom it may concern".
Just to demonstrate how confused current speakers of English are on the
"whom" question, here's a quote from a Ph.D. English lit. professor
writing in an administrative capacity: "the plan is
to have her serve in this capacity through the first year of the new
CLA dean's "reign," whomever that may be." "Should" be "whoever that may
be."
There is probably no way to resurrect "whom" at this point. It carries
no essential information; we should let it go. It will be fun convincing
standards authorities of that.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Johanna Rubba Associate Professor, Linguistics
English Department, California Polytechnic State University
One Grand Avenue * San Luis Obispo, CA 93407
Tel. (805)-756-2184 * Fax: (805)-756-6374 * Dept. Phone. 756-2596
* E-mail: [log in to unmask] * Home page:
http://www.cla.calpoly.edu/~jrubba
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