Re: Article wierdness

On Sep 11, 2004, at 5:09 PM, Philippe Caquant wrote:
> I guess that usually, when a Frenchman is told to
> "lever la main", he raises the most usual one
> (statistically, the right one).  Maybe the left-handed
> people will raise their left hand, I have done no
> particular study on that topic.  But to me the English
> way sounds rather odd: raise "your" hand ? Why, of
> course, I won't raise my neighbour's one...
Maybe it has to do with the sometimes reciprocal nature of plurals in
English, for instance take the following equivalent expressions:

1a. Me and him are friends.
1b. I'm friends with him.  (sic, no "*"!)


-Stephen (Steg)
  "god, we elect you
   direct election is wrong
   god, we are zealous for you
   death to zealots"
      ~ from 'bumpersticker poetry' by david grossman