Date: Sun, 28 Dec 1997 17:20:47 -0500

From: Ron Butters RonButters[AT SYMBOL GOES HERE]AOL.COM

Subject: WEIRD EXISTENTIAL . . . is is . . . ?



Mary Bucholtz writes:



Might this be related to the structure

"The thing is is that..."? The

reduplicated "is" isn't a speech error,

and it's obligatory for those who use it.



Interesting suggestion, the psychosocial history of which might be something

like the following:



S' = "The thing is + S"

S' = "The thing is + is that + S"

S' = Is that + S"



If so, that means my real estate guy may be in the vanguard of a syntactic

change?