Re: THEORY: Re : THEORY: Natural language change (was Re: Charlie and I)

Nik Taylor wrote:

> > "the guy who i usedta date his sister comma is angry now"
>
> Why do you have that "comma" there?
To indicate a change in tone ... how else can I mark that in text?
From "i" through "sister" is lower in pitch than the rest.
Anyway, one needs to mark the end of the clause somehow.

> > This is illegal in American, we use something more complicated.
>
> We do?  Do you mean "the guy whose sister I used to date"?  I wouldn't
> say that above form is completely illegal, I hear similar forms from
> time to time, but it does sound rather clumsy.
I think the higher-prestige form uses "whose";
the lowest-prestige form uses some *horrible* genitive
as described elsewhere (I shudder).

I could write it more simply with parens or just commas as
"The guy (I used to date his sister) is angry now."
In fact, I do exactly this in speech, using a lowered tone.
No "who/that" relative pronoun at all.