Herb,
I understand that "that" has a different origin from the wh-relative pronouns, and I understand that there are restrictions on "that" which are not placed on wh-relative pronouns (e.g., "that" doesn't occur after prepositions, and "that" occurs only in restrictive relatives). Nevertheless, it's hard for me to get around my intuition that "that" is acting as a pronoun. For me, in "the dog who barked" and "the dog that barked," "who" and "that" don't feel different, and both seem to function as the verb's subject.
Also, if "that" is a conjunction and cannot fill a subject or object slot, and if "who" is a pronoun and can fill those slots, why are "that" and "who" mutually exclusive in a relative clause? Why can't we get "the dog that who barked"? Are there any other instances in the grammar where words of different grammatical categories and functions occur mutually exclusively in the same position?
Finally, don't lots of children say things like "the boy that's mother drove him"?
Dick
________________________________________
From: Assembly for the Teaching of English Grammar [[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of STAHLKE, HERBERT F [[log in to unmask]]
Sent: Sunday, January 18, 2009 1:56 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: Pedants that or who?
Dick,
I'm saying that the verb has a zero subject. Many speakers find such sentences acceptable in speech, as in "There's the guy met me at the airport." Whether one accepts such a spoken sentence or not, it does have a zero subject. So in that-relatives, the co-indexed noun in the RC deletes. In those cases where deletion is prevented by other factors, as with possessives or fronted PPs that-relatives aren't allowed and wh-rels get used. For many speakers those positions that don't allow deletion show up with resumptive pronouns, as in "The guy that I talked to his brother yesterday lives in Indianapolis."
Herb
Herbert F. W. Stahlke, Ph.D.
Emeritus Professor of English
Ball State University
Muncie, IN 47306
[log in to unmask]
________________________________________
From: Assembly for the Teaching of English Grammar [[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Veit, Richard [[log in to unmask]]
Sent: January 18, 2009 10:50 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: Pedants that or who?
Herb,
I know you have made this case, but I'd like to hear more. In "the dog who barked," who is a pronoun and the subject of the relative clause. Are you saying that, in "the dog that barked," the verb barked has no subject? Or are you saying that a conjunction can be the subject? Or something else entirely?
Dick
________________________________________
From: Assembly for the Teaching of English Grammar [[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of STAHLKE, HERBERT F [[log in to unmask]]
Sent: Saturday, January 17, 2009 4:11 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: Pedants that or who?
We've discussed that vs. who at great length on this list, and I've made the argument, based on grammarians like Jespersen and Huddleston&Pullum, that the claim of a distinction of humanness is false. Relative-that is not a pronoun; it's a subordinating conjunction, the same as it is with noun clauses. Because it isn't a pronoun, it can't agree grammatically. Conjunctions in English don't. "Who," on the other hand, is a pronoun with human reference. The "that" form goes back to Old English. The "wh-" forms in their modern form arise in Middle English after the 13th c.
Herb
Herbert F. W. Stahlke, Ph.D.
Emeritus Professor of English
Ball State University
Muncie, IN 47306
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