Date:  Thu, 17 Mar 1994 18:37:45 EST

From:  Michael Montgomery <N270053[AT SYMBOL GOES HERE]UNIVSCVM.CSD.SCAROLINA.EDU>

Subject: New Genitive Pronoun?



I would like to raise a query and propose a dissent to Larry Horn's

characterization of the genitive relative pronoun _thats_ being a new or

emerging form. The form as cited by Wayne Glowka is striking to many of

us because it appears in writing, and it may be a form that isn't noticed

by many until it does appear there. I have heard the form infrequently,

but once a year or so, over at least the past decade, and my suspicion

is that either it has been in vernacular English for quite sometime or

that it crops up sporadically by analogy to _whose_. I don't think it

is by any means new, and the discussion a couple of years ago on the

Linguist List, when people in disparate locations attested it, is consis-

tent with this contention. From time to time I notice a form or usage

that seems entirely novel to me, only to discover that it is common in

the speech around me (and sometimes that I use it myself!). We must

be very careful in assuming something is new by virtue of our paying

notice to it for the first time. There is such a thing as an "observer's

illusion" as well as the better-known "observer's paradox." Are there

other examples of this phenomenon that come to mind of ADSers?



Wonder if DARE has any citations?



Peace, Michael Montgomery