Craig,

Most linguistically flavored grammars use "determiner" as the word
category and don't distinguish form and function clearly. It might help
to distinguish, as CGEL does, "determiner" (function) from from
"determinative" (word category). Yes, something can be both a pronoun
and a determiner--the genitive pronouns being the obvious case. But we
have to be careful about over-generalizing. The case is fuzzier for
demonstratives.

 Bring me George's ball
 Bring me his ball

Here, both "his" and "George's" have the determiner function. Neither is
a determinative, though. The first is a genitive NP, and the second is a
true pronoun, since it clearly replaces the NP 'George's'

 Bring me the ball.
 Bring me that ball.

Again, "the" and "that" are both determiners in function. Here, both are
determinatives as well. (The articles, of course, are the prototypical
determinatives.) Notice, however, that "that" really isn't a pronoun at
all. What noun phrase does it take as an antecedent? None. It doesn't
indicate deixis or anaphora in its own right, it specifies deixis and/or
anaphora for the head noun. In short, the traditional grammatical label
of "demonstrative pronoun" is a misnomer.

So we could say that the demonstratives be either determinative or
pronoun, and only call them pronouns when they head the NP by
themselves. Of course CGEL goes on to argue that demonstratives are
never actually pronouns, and when they function as heads of an NP, we
actually have a "fused head" construction. But I won't get into that
argument.

Karl Hagen
Department of English
Mount St. Mary's College

Craig Hancock wrote:

> Karl,
>    I want to say amen to the first part of this post.  Too often, we
> get students ready to face the world of stuffy elitists and become
> stuffy elitists in the process (or at least indistinguishable from
> them.)  I think it helps for the student to know that the sentence
> might be thought of as "incorrect" or "nonstandard" (as subordinate
> clause), but could very well be effective in its rhetorical context.
> Even with the most basic of students, effectiveness is worth talking
> about and flexibility is worth encouraging.  If we give them
> opportunities to write for each other, we can even ask about their own
> evolving standards.
>     Words, as I see it,  can be both pronouns and determiners.  In
> /get me that ball,/ "that" is a demonstrative pronoun in a determiner
> role.  In /bring me his ball,/ I would describe /his/ as a possessive
> pronoun acting as determiner.  /A /and /the/ are articles that act as
> determiners with meanings often recoverable in context..  And so on.
>  My sense of it is that a word can't be a determiner outside of actual
> use.  Determiners help us restrict the range of meanings of the head
> noun (not just /car/, but /a car,/ /the car/, /this car/, /his car/,
> /the first car,/ /my brother's car,/ /any car/, and so on.)  In /which
> car do you want/, the /which/ acts rhetorically to focus attention on
> the information sought (the determiner role.)  In other words, I am
> asking you to narrow down the range of meaning of "car" so that I can
> identify the entity wanted.  /Which/, in the determiner slot, lets me
> focus my information request.
>     I know they can't be thought of as fully separate categories, but
> we are confusing word class (pronoun) with particular (determiner)
> function.
>     After following this fine and interesting talk, I think I would
> side with you, that "which" is a relative pronoun, but with the added
> sense that it can sometimes act like a demonstrative pronoun in having
> whole clauses as its antecedent and therefore can have to feel of
> heading an independent clause.
>    Just because pronouns can be subjects of independent clauses
> doesn't mean that their meaning isn't highly dependent on context.  A
> sentence is not a complete thought in any effective writing, but a
> move in a series of related moves. These fragments are starting to
> look to me like very reasonable options.
>
> Craig
>

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