English as she is spoke.
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I think it's the pluperfect, which basically means an event that occurred before a previous event (if that even makes sense). For example, yesterday I went to the bank (an event in the past) but the bank had closed (this happened before the previous past event). Spanish has the same form (and probably other languages, but it's the only language I know apart from English). This is about the only thing from two years of studying Latin that I remember!
Never heard of 'pluperfect', only past perfect. German has this case as well, called 'Plusquamperfekt', which I believe is the same as Latin. The way I learned it at school is that apart from the example you gave you also use past perfect to describe a span of time that started at some point in the past until a later point, also in the past. Example: "He had worn a hat until the wind blew it off." While the term 'until' in this example clarifies the chronological order semantically, past perfect is required to correctly express this grammatically.
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PHS241 wrote:
the town where we live, Crawley
Ugh! Where my ex-wife lives.
I must get a clever new signature for 2011.
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They should know how to speak English in Crawley as it's in England. But as it's next to Gatwick I'm sure there are some immigrants there who don't. I too only live a few miles from Crawley but may have to move if they read this message.
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You are of course right in that gotten has dropped out of English usage by the English. However, I do take exception with your definition of the word "pure". Given that English is derived from German, Dutch, French, Latin, Celtic, Indian, Chinese and the languages of just about every other people with whom we have had contact (Including the Americans), English (In all its forms) is about as "pure" as very gritty mud! You never now, we might get around to using gotten again. Keith
kstraw wrote:
we might get around to using gotten again.
You will. You just haven't gotten around to it yet.
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kstraw wrote:
we might get around to using gotten again.
You will. You just haven't gotten around to it yet.
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I know it's in the nature of all languages to contain difficult phrasing that's hard to explain but I recently came across the use of "had had". I used it during the day sometime and it puzzled me why and when I mentioned it to my wife she also said she'd used it when writing to a medical case file. Her use described a patient "she had had an injection..." Why "she had had an..." and not "she had an injection..." Both forms, I think are correct, but how would you try to explain "had had" to someone learning english? It's almost like words ending in -ough. Through is "-oo", bough is "-ow", thorough is "-urrer", rough is "-uff", cough is "-off", dough is "-o". To quote: "Beware of beard, a terrible word, it looks like heard, but sounds like weird." I'm still surprised that english is almost the universally dominant language in the world but gaw'd 'elp those poor souls that try to learn it. :)
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Hans - This thread is "English as she is spoke" NOT "American as she is spoke". No such word as "gotten" in English. Controversial or what :-D ? Keith
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You are of course right in that gotten has dropped out of English usage by the English. However, I do take exception with your definition of the word "pure". Given that English is derived from German, Dutch, French, Latin, Celtic, Indian, Chinese and the languages of just about every other people with whom we have had contact (Including the Americans), English (In all its forms) is about as "pure" as very gritty mud! You never now, we might get around to using gotten again. Keith
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I know it's in the nature of all languages to contain difficult phrasing that's hard to explain but I recently came across the use of "had had". I used it during the day sometime and it puzzled me why and when I mentioned it to my wife she also said she'd used it when writing to a medical case file. Her use described a patient "she had had an injection..." Why "she had had an..." and not "she had an injection..." Both forms, I think are correct, but how would you try to explain "had had" to someone learning english? It's almost like words ending in -ough. Through is "-oo", bough is "-ow", thorough is "-urrer", rough is "-uff", cough is "-off", dough is "-o". To quote: "Beware of beard, a terrible word, it looks like heard, but sounds like weird." I'm still surprised that english is almost the universally dominant language in the world but gaw'd 'elp those poor souls that try to learn it. :)
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"Gotten", see following link... http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/gotten[^]
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I think it's the pluperfect, which basically means an event that occurred before a previous event (if that even makes sense). For example, yesterday I went to the bank (an event in the past) but the bank had closed (this happened before the previous past event). Spanish has the same form (and probably other languages, but it's the only language I know apart from English). This is about the only thing from two years of studying Latin that I remember!
"The major problem is simply one of grammar, and the main work to consult in this matter is Dr. Dan Streetmentioner's Time Traveler's Handbook of 1001 Tense Formations. It will tell you, for instance, how to describe something that was about to happen to you in the past before you avoided it by time-jumping forward two days in order to avoid it. The event will be described differently according to whether you are talking about it from the standpoint of your own natural time, from a time in the further future, or a time in the further past and is further complicated by the possibility of conducting conversations while you are actually traveling from one time to another with the intention of becoming your own mother or father. Most readers get as far as the Future Semi-conditionally Modified Sub-inverted Plagal Past Subjunctive Intentional before giving up; and in fact in later additions of the book all pages beyond this point have been left blank to save on printing costs. The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy skips lightly over this tangle of academic abstraction, pausing only to note that the term "Future Perfect" has been abandoned since it was discovered not to be." - The Restaurant at the End of the Universe, Douglas Adams
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Yep. And it's possible to have even more "hads" in a sentence. :)
There is water at the bottom of the ocean. My Mu[sic] My Films My Windows Programs, etc.
Many many years ago I came across the following, the task being to punctuate it correctly: John where James had had had had had had had had had had had the teachers approval Eleven hads and yes it DOES make sense. I don't know if there's a way of manipulating a longer string of "had"s but it must be pretty gruesome....! Answer (scroll down to view:) John, where James had had "had" had had "had had". "Had had" had had the teacher's approval.
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You are of course right in that gotten has dropped out of English usage by the English. However, I do take exception with your definition of the word "pure". Given that English is derived from German, Dutch, French, Latin, Celtic, Indian, Chinese and the languages of just about every other people with whom we have had contact (Including the Americans), English (In all its forms) is about as "pure" as very gritty mud! You never now, we might get around to using gotten again. Keith
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John and Jane wrote a sentence each; John wrote "my cat had its dinner"; Jane wrote "my cat had had its dinner". So, Jane, where John had had "had", had had "had had". Tough, I thought, though thorough and not rough, I coughed. There are plenty more. Modern English has its roots in many other cultures, largely as a result of the English/British penchant (from the French) for exploring the world. Also the reason why it is spoken so widely; not forgetting the fact that the British are notoriously bad at learning other languages.
I must get a clever new signature for 2011.
Richard MacCutchan wrote:
not forgetting the fact that the British are notoriously bad at learning other languages.
I don't think it's a case of being bad at learning other languages; I think it's more a case of WHICH one do we learn, there's that many!
I'm too lazy to Google it for you.
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I know it's in the nature of all languages to contain difficult phrasing that's hard to explain but I recently came across the use of "had had". I used it during the day sometime and it puzzled me why and when I mentioned it to my wife she also said she'd used it when writing to a medical case file. Her use described a patient "she had had an injection..." Why "she had had an..." and not "she had an injection..." Both forms, I think are correct, but how would you try to explain "had had" to someone learning english? It's almost like words ending in -ough. Through is "-oo", bough is "-ow", thorough is "-urrer", rough is "-uff", cough is "-off", dough is "-o". To quote: "Beware of beard, a terrible word, it looks like heard, but sounds like weird." I'm still surprised that english is almost the universally dominant language in the world but gaw'd 'elp those poor souls that try to learn it. :)
PHS241 wrote:
Both forms, I think are correct
Yes, but they mean different things.
PHS241 wrote:
but how would you try to explain "had had" to someone learning english?
Like this: "had" refers to a specific time in the past. (e.g. She had an injection on January 3rd.) "had had" refers to an unspecified time BEFORE a specific time in the past. (e.g. By January 3rd, she already had had an injection.)
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And your point is? The American dictionary that you quote confirms that we can no longer claim much of what we owned 300 years ago. That part of the American continent now called the United States of America being a case in point! Keith
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My point was clear, the poster said "gotten" was not a word, the dictionary says it is. Period.
At no point in my post did I state that "gotten" is not a word(Full stop) It is a word(Full stop) It is an American English word(Comma) not an English English word(Full stop) It used to be an English English word (hyphen) 300 years ago(Full stop) It would be interesting to learn if the word form appeared in the first English dictionaries(Comma) which were produced for the first time at about that time(Full stop) Pedants rule OK(Exclamation mark)
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I've always thought that the second 'had' refers to some action; in your example, "she had received an injection...". Other words (in other contexts) could be 'gotten', 'experienced', 'undergone', etc.
Best wishes, Hans
Great explanation. Simple. I knew it made sense and I was trying to verbalize it but I just couldn't write an answer that wouldn't confuse him further.
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Hans - This thread is "English as she is spoke" NOT "American as she is spoke". No such word as "gotten" in English. Controversial or what :-D ? Keith
There's no such language as "American"--it is a dialect of English. So, therefore, "gotten", though crude, is "English". ;)
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Great explanation. Simple. I knew it made sense and I was trying to verbalize it but I just couldn't write an answer that wouldn't confuse him further.