Re: On prescriptions and misunderstanding: was can/may
| From: | Mark J. Reed <markjreed@...> |
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| Date: | Wednesday, December 29, 2004, 17:50 |
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On Wed, Dec 29, 2004 at 05:25:36PM +0000, Chris Bates wrote:
> "If you was...." (ie frequent elimination of the subjunctive)
Minor point: saying "if I was" is elimination of the subjunctive, but
saying "if you was" goes beyond that, since "were" is also the normal
indicative form for the subject "you". Many dialects do have a
universal "was" (e.g. "we was", "they was"), but I wouldn't consider
that to be related to the subjunctive drop, which is far more
widespread.
-Marcos
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