Re: OT: ago

On Tue, 24 Jan 2006 08:44:47 +0000, R A Brown <ray@...>
wrote:

>Harold Ensle wrote:
>[snip]
>>>With respect, you did not. It is true that you first used the simple
>>>subject line 'ago', but the thread about 'ago' had started some time
>>>before. Previously the subject line was 'THEORY ago (was: Most common
>>>irregular verbs?)'.
>
>...and at one stage we had just plain "THEORY ago".
>>
>> YES I did start this thread..which has the simple subject line 'ago'.
>> The fact that the subject is virtually identical to another thread
>> does not make it part of the other thread.
>
>I think that is a moot point. How different is "THEORY ago" from just
>plain "ago"? OK - maybe I should have said: "While you may have begun a
>new thread, it was certainly not a new topic." It is evident from other
>replies that I was not the only one assuming you were basically
>continuing the 'ago' topic. But I really do not think this is worth
>exchanging emails about.
Probably not...though I should mention here that I was not trying to
single you out. My interruption merely followed your post. After
reviewing the original thread, there was a discontinuity by a single
poster (who probably simply misplaced his reply due to the other
similar titles) and all posts that followed were consistent from
that post on. It mas my fault to generalize the problem the way I did.

>[snip]
>> I did read relevant posts to see if someone had identical
>> comments as my own. If someone had made the same comments I would
>> not have needed to make them myself. I did see that people were
>> "uncomfortable" with the adjective classification, but I didn't
>> see my particular arguments being made.
>
>Eh? But it began when some stated that 'ago' was a postposition!
Well....here is where it is odd, because in my initial post I
claimed that it was an adverb! So I still do not think that
you read the initial post of this thread.....which doing so
is completely your choice of course. However, if you make the
claim that I am rehashing old arguments, it would be more
credible if you knew what my arguments actually were.

>After Charlie had given us the references from the AHD & the Columbia
>Guide, others not merely said they were uncomfortable, but argued for
>its being a postposition. I also said that while I understood that
>analysis, I considered it an adverb; I wrote on 17th Jan.:
>{quote}
>Presumably everyone agrees that the phrase "an hour ago" _functions_ as
>an adverb. If we take 'ago' as a postposition, we then have a
>'postpositional phrase' (NP+postposition) similar in use to the familiar
>prepositional phrases such as: 'within an hour', 'after an hour' etc.
>
>If it is taken as an adverb, we then have an adverbial phrase where the
>head 'ago' is the head and 'an hour' is a "measurement of time",
>modifying the head of the phrase. It can be argued that the second
>analysis is better in that 'long ago' can be analyzed in the same way.
>{/quote}
Ay Caramba! Yes I missed this particular post. So yes I guess I stated
the same thing you did. I even held your position for exactly the same
reason you state here. HOWEVER....I would recommend that you read the
exchange between Herman and I again as you may also want to switch
over to the postposition camp.

>> I also disputed The Colombia
>> Guide's adverb classification in their particular context which
>> I also did not see done before.
>
>adjective classification,
No I meant their adverb classification. They were clearly implying
that "ago" was modifying "long" instead of the other way around.
This switching of modifiers is what I assumed caused them to give
the word type as both adjective and adverb.

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