Part IV, Number Three
IV.F.3.7 PRE-MODIFIERS and POST-MODIFIERS
IV.133 In comparison to the DETERMINERS reviewed so far, MODIFIERS constitute a whole set of diverse or complex WORD-CLASSES and PATTERNS. Several often can appear within a single sequence; sometimes the mutual order is more fixed, other times more flexible; some usually go before the HEAD NOUN, some, after it; and both kinds are often used with the same NOUN.
IV.134 As the terms indicate, the PRE-MODIFIERS appear before the NOUN they help to determine, stabilize, specify, and so on, whilst the POST-MODIFIERS appear after it. Where a choice between those two is available, it can be resolved by a STYLISTIC FACTOR I call BALANCE (cf. IV.82). Thus, [458] and [458a] differ in BALANCE well enough, but [459] is decidedly better in BALANCE than [459a]
[458] Father Félix DeBerey was a well-known, witty, jovial, and eccentric personage (Picturesque Quebec)
[458a] Father Félix DeBerey was a personage well-known for wit, joviality, and eccentricity.
[459] Madame Beck appeared a personage of a figure rather short and stout, yet still graceful (Vilette)
[459a] ??Madame Beck appeared a rather short and stout yet still graceful-figured personage.
IV.135 BALANCE can also influence the length of NOUN PHRASES. The more typical PATTERNS have a DETERMINER, just one or two PRE-MODIFIERS, and the HEAD NOUN.
[460] The Court airs itself daily in the new glass coaches (London Pride)
[461] Tweedledum said Tweedledee had spoiled his nice new rattle. (Alice)
[462] When the Trunchbull sat down on the Golden Syrup, the squelch was beautiful. And when she jumped up again, the chair stuck to the seat of those awful green breeches she wears and came up with her (Matilda)
QUANTIFIERS and ENUMERATORS do not seem to affect BALANCE.
[463] Suddenly, “Le Style Anglais” was what every young Parisienne girl wanted. (Life by Design)
[464] The Deputy Governor chuckles over the policy which gives to many old French territorial divisions, right English names (Picturesque Quebec)
[465] Far into the distance stretch two large marshy plains. (Mouthful of Rocks)
[466] A depressed mum has vanished with her three mischievous sons after saying she could not cope with long school holidays. (Mirror).
Three PRE-MODIFIERS seem to me most BALANCED when they are mutually COMPATIBLE.
[467] Without your cheerful, creative and energetic contribution, Jubilee Year would have remained plans on paper. (church magazine)BNC
[468] Now, a huge, awkward, overgrown affair changes a caress into an assault. (Early Days of Upper Canada)
The BALANCE would be seriously uneven if we replaced “cheerful” with “cheerless” in [467], or “overgrown” with “undersized” in [468].
IV.136 The mutual ordering of multiple PRE-MODIFIERS seems at least partly steered by delicate parameters rather like those we have seen for DETERMINERS. The ATTRIBUTION PRE-MODIFIERS are more cognitively oriented, and mostly represent inherent traits, features and so on, that would ordinarily result from perception, investigation, and the like (V.63f). These may be ordered by increasing stability, as when the more variable age is followed by the more inherent substance:
[469] The house took its name from the two old brick kilns (C.S. Lewis)
[470] In 1937, three new marble altars dedicated to the Sacred Heart, Our Lady and St Patrick were placed in the church. (Leeds Diocesan Catholic Voice)
Body size seems a less inherent ATTRIBUTE than age; and quality less so than substance:
[471] There were fat old ladies, in fine silk dresses; and slim young ladies, in gauzy muslin frocks. (Warden)
[472] He is a broad-faced, bull-necked, young butcher (David Copperfield)
And “English faces” will be forever England, but, Lord knows, rarely enough “euphoric” [473]; and “French boys” may bask in the glory of their grande nation without being at all “discreet” [474].
[473] To be deprived of the euphoric English faces after only a few minutes of joy and achievement at the first back-to-back Grand Slam in almost 70 years was an insult. (Rugby World)
[474] They talked in low voices, pausing when the waiter put food before them, as if it could not be shared, even by a discreet French boy (Stone Cold)
Similarly, the specificity of ATTRIBUTES tends to increase. Many “women” and “men” are “tall”, but only some are “rangy”, “handsome” or “courteous”.
[475] Next to him [was] his wife, a tall rangy woman (Guardian)
[476] Edward Maufe was a tall, handsome and courteous man (English Country House)
IV.137 Some sequences of ATTRIBUTION PRE-MODIFIERS seem flexible enough to be interchanged, though I have so far managed to find fairly few, viz.:
[477] A stark, void entrance-hall struck a chill to the hearts of the girls (Women in Love) [or: stark, void entrance-hall]
[478] Turning on Otto his drooping, delicate features, he added: “You see, I am dead, too.” (Father Brown) [or: delicate, drooping features]
But more often here, we might detect some inclinations of BALANCE. END BALANCE favours putting the longest MODIFIER last [479], especially if it is a MULTI-WORD UNIT [480]. PROSODY may be influential as well, since English does not particularly favour two STRESSES in a row, as there might be if a MODIFIER of one SYLLABLE came just before a NOUN of one SYLLABLE too.
[479] Jourdain must have been a shrewd, observant man (Picturesque Quebec) [better than: ?observant shrewd man]
[480] his friend is a tall, prim, sedate-looking man (Slaveholder’s Daughter) [better than: ?sedate-looking, prim man]
Some sequences of long MODIFIERS hinge upon the total effect rather than the mutual ordering, which may carry no special significance.
[480a] the damp, sandy-haired, saucer-eyed, red-fisted Mr Slope was powerful only over the female breast. (Barchester)
[480b] The instruments glowed orange in front of the delicious, straight-armed, black-skirted, Doc-shoed, crop-blonde, purse-lipped Verity; my angelic bird of paradise, driving like a bat out of hell. (Crow Road)
{IV.137a PRE-MODIFIERS by function often resemble DEPENDENT CLAUSES by form but without being complete (cf. IV. 144; VI.82, 110), a NON-FINITE VERB sharing the SUBJECT of the INDEPENDENT CLAUSE:
[480c] Though ridIculed by his critics, the Provisional Constitution he wrote at the home of Frederick Douglass in 1858 gives real insight into Brown's radical-democratic egalitarian outlook. (Confederate Heritage Month)
[480d] Running slap into the rotund Natal umpire Wilf Diedricks, [Jaques] Kallis was run out by an Ealham throw. (CricInfo)www
When the SUBJECT is not logically not shared, a "dangling" MODIFIER may be diagnosed as an "error", even though the meaning is normally plain.
[480e] One leg was shorter than the rest, but a shell put under restored the level. When fixed, she rubbed the table down with some sweet-smelling herbs. (Bullfinch)
[480f] Shot in the streets and alleys of Rome, [Vittorio] De Sica uses the real-life environment of contemporary life to frame his moving drama (The Bicycle Thief)www
V.138 END BALANCE can also favour a MODIFIER that we can reasonably judge more relevant, important, or striking than the rest.
[484] Vsevolod was a lover of peace, and yet devastation and carnage were spread everywhere before his eyes, [...] mainly caused by the ambition of ambitious, energetic, unprincipled princes, struggling for the supremacy (Empire of Russia)
[485] I suspect the shrewd, sagacious, energetic Yorkshiremen would hold such “foreigners” in no small contempt. (Life of Charlotte Brontë)
In the broader contexts where I found these samples, those “princes” in [484] appeared inhumanly “unprincipled” in marring the latter 11th century with gory “years of war and woe”. And the “Yorkshiremen” in Hawood [485] proved more “energetic” than “sagacious” in 1819 when, disapproving of a curate newly appointed from outside (hence a “foreigner”), they “threw him down on the ground in the churchyard where the soot-bag had been emptied” and “threatened to stone him”.
IV.138 FRONT BALANCE can favour ATTRIBUTE PRE-MODIFIERS which are less specific but strategically prepare a for sequence of ones that are more so, as when a “walrus” is first called “big” and “ugly” before telling us how richly merited it [486]. Or, after an “English girl of the highest type is” proclaimed the “best”, her claims to that title are recited [487].
[486] He landed close to old Sea Vitch -- the big, ugly, bloated, pimpled, fat-necked, long-tusked walrus of the North Pacific (Jungle Book)
[487] An English girl of the highest type is the best, the most beautiful, the bravest, and the brightest creature that Heaven has conferred upon this world (Flowers of Progress).
IV.139 The EVALUATION PRE-MODIFIERS are more socially oriented than ATTRIBUTION PRE-MODIFIERS, mostly representing ATTITUDES that would ordinarily stem from evaluation, emotion, and the like (V.64).
[488] Boy’s life in The Bar [began] to be our revenge on that poor boy in that terrible, bitter, unhappy scene in that famous film. (Ready to Catch Him)
[489] “It ain’t o’ no use, sir” said Sam. “He’s a malicious, bad-disposed, vorldly-minded, spiteful, windictive creetur” (Pickwick)
When lacking such inherent traits as size, age, or substance, the total effect may again outweigh the mutual order. Such applies grossly when the values seem groundless:
[490] This Kit is a double-faced, white-livered, sneaking spy (Curiosity Shop)
[491] you sniffling, psalm-singing, yaller-faced, pigeon-toed hippercrit, you! (Danny’s Own Story)
Still, some sequences suggest END BALANCE, with the most intense coming last:
[492] what was done in France was a wild attempt to methodize anarchy -- a foul, impious, monstrous thing (Burke’s Design)
[493] we had a very fine view of the Peak Telde of Tenerife, lifting its venerable and majestic head above the neighbouring hills. (David Collins)
Others suggest FRONT BALANCE, as when “wenches” were literally dubbed “monstrous” for being “monsters” [494], or when “brutality” has been paraded in the random, cold-blooded murder of a police constable [495].
[494] “Oh, they are monstrous, madde, merrie, wenches, and they are monsters.” “They call them Sea-maides, or Mermaides, singing sweetelye, but none dares trust them”. (Everie Woman in Her Humor)
[495] Police officers face a fundamentally more brutal, wicked, perverse and godless generation. (Keith Cotgrave)
IV.140 Generally, ATTRIBUTIONS go before EVALUATIONS [496-97], but some seem to stick close to their HEAD NOUNS [498-99].
[496] I saw him by the side of his fellow-passenger and townsman, a fat, coarse, vulgar, pretending fellow (Before the Mast)
[497] She was a slim, attractive woman in her late twenties (Truth of Stone)
[498] Beside her stood the nurse, a fat, brown, high-beaked old crone, (Doomswoman)
[499] I chanced upon a book the hero of which was a debonnaire young buck (Idle Fellow)
When the same form can be either, its relative position may identify it, e.g., “bloody” for actual bloodshed (cognitive meaning) [500] or else for annoyance (social meaning) [501].
[500] John Major goes to Bosnia and hands our troops cassettes of ABBA’S greatest hits. At least the poor bloody infantry in the trenches during the First World War didn’t have to put up with that. (Today)
[Upper right: opening lines from two ABBA songs]
[501] Then they give somebody like her, that single parent girl Vera, a bloody big double house (conversation)BNC
Admittedly, the distinction between the two classes of PRE-MODIFIERS, like so such in English GRAMMAR, is not clear-cut. MODIFIERS of size, for example, can be treated as values for social effects arising from intense emotions, e.g. “little” suggesting “insignificant” [502], and “big” suggesting “brutal” [503].
[502] The mariner was suddenly very red indeed; he clenched his hands “You little pot-bellied, leathery-faced son of an old boot!” (Invisible Man)
[503] And then she went for him, her voice trembling, her eyes staring with sudden hate, “You big, filthy-minded shit!” (Isvik)
IV.141 Occasionally PRE-MODIFIERS have no DETERMINER at all, as if not directly agreeing with a NOUN PHRASE but still having the HEAD NOUN as its implied SUBJECT and with it forming a NON-FINITE CLAUSE (cf. IV.183; VI.66 , VI.E.2).
[504] Surprised, terrified, and breathless, the Villain was by no means an equal Antagonist. (The Monk)
[505] His quick ear had caught a faint but unfamiliar sound. Running to the window Tarzan looked toward the harbor (Tarzan of the Apes)
The examples I could find (these searches being leaky and bulky anyway) were not numerous, and limited to literary or narrative discourse. Cognitively, they tended to signify transient states, such as a person’s emotions or actions at that point in time.
IV.142 POST-MODIFIERS are more diversified. In the English of Shakespeare and, to a lesser extent, Milton -- and perhaps under their mighty influence, in later English -- some single items were apparently thought sonorous and elegant. They were mostly items of Latin or French origins, languages where POST-MODIFIERS are the norm: I do not find much old English stock so placed, such as *“bed downy”, or *“dungeon awful”.
[506] The sword, the mace, the crown imperial,
[...] Not all these, laid in bed majestical,
Can sleep so soundly as the wretched slave (Henry V)
[507] A dungeon horrible, on all sides round,
As one great furnace flamed; yet from those flames
No light; but rather darkness visible
Served only to discover sights of woe (Paradise Lost)
But in later English, they may sound portentous or facetious:
[508] My informant deponeth not beyond the fact unadorned (Ridgeway)
[509] The constant smiles on that remarkable face gave way to soberness profound. (Brook Farm)
IV.143 However, sequences of three or more whose items could singly be PRE-MODIFIERS can appear together as POST-MODIFIERS to sustain the BALANCE (cf. IV.82):
[510] If you had examined the various hounds -- the great Lancashire dogs, tall, shaggy, and heavy -- [...] you would not have wondered that money was scarce (Lancashire Witches)
[511] It is not surprising that a woman, young, beautiful and vivacious, [...] should have sought solace in the friendship of others. (Empire of Russia)
[512] That citizen known, honored, distinguished, has been presented to this Convention for the second place in the gift of the American people. (Horace Maynard)
[513] Modigliani was the most unpleasant man I knew. Proud, angry, insensitive, wicked and rather stupid, sardonic and narcissistic. (Max Jacob)
Placed at some distance from the SUBJECT, such MODIFIERS can, like those ahead of the SUBJECT in [504-05], signify transient states:
[514] “Only one club”, mutters the pursy rector, who sits there red-faced, silent, impervious, careful.
[515] Hermione looked down at her, gratified, reflecting, and strangely absent (Women in Love)
IV.144 But the most vital function is to accommodate PATTERNS too elaborated to be other than POST-MODIFIERS, e.g., an INFINITIVE [516-17], a COMPARISON [518-19], or a NON-FINITE CLAUSE [520-21] (cf. IV.137a).
[516] Billy Jack, quick to take her meaning, eagerly insisted that help he must have (Glengarry Schooldays)
[517] An able-bodied young man like David Crockett, strong, athletic, willing to work, could, in the humblest cabin, find employment (David Crockett)
[518] William Joyce promised a systematic cruelty or slaughter as precise, impersonal and ineluctable as a quadratic equation. (Hitler’s Englishman)
[519] Far away they see a maiden, misty as the autumn rains (Flint and Feather)
[520] Drug companies are pouring millions of dollars into close races, giving some Republicans a financial edge. (Wall Street Journal)
[521] When a woman was caught replacing high price tags with those displaying cheaper rates, she fled the premises, leaving her husband in a tight spot. (Khaleej Times)
Some influence of END BALANCE might be detected in [517] where being “willing to work” is most relevant to “finding employment” for Davy Crockett; and in [518] where being “ineluctable” is the worst menace of any “slaughter” plotted by Lord Haw-Haw.
IV.145 POST-MODIFIERS can also exploit PROSODIC factors contributing to BALANCE (Part VI). They are likely to get STRONG STRESS (shown again with a raised Mark !), whilst the NOUN gets WEAK STRESS (shown with a lowered and inverted mark ¡) [522-23]. If the same items were PRE-MODIFIERS, the WEIGHT would be just the reverse.
[522] he was a ¡man of !hon·our and she was a ¡girl of !beau·ty; (Egoist) [versus: an ¡hon·oured !man and a ¡beau·ti·ful !girl]
[523] just north of the bridge is the oldest church in New York state. [...] ¡men of !note are buried here (See America First) [versus: ¡not·ed !men]
IV.146 APPOSITIVES are a curious puzzle in the GRAMMAR of English: NOUN PHRASES both floating and attached, specifying or being specified.
[524] Eliot Spitzer, the iron-jawed state attorney general who rescued himself from political oblivion to take on the icons of Wall Street, is in a race for the New York governor's mansion that's turned into a cakewalk. (Michael Gormley)
[525] Vice President Dick Cheney shot an acquaintance, 78-year-old Republican lawyer Harry Whittington, while quail hunting in south Texas. Whittington was hit with birdshot in the face, neck and chest (BonitaNews)WWW
[526] As his Ph.D. dissertation last year, Frick submitted a blank piece of paper (his only UHK thesis product), calling it an example of his “quantum arcology”, which focuses on nonverbal creativity (South China Morning Post)
[527] Marcius, King of the British, grandson of Cymbeline, first surrounded Chester with a wall, a mysterious person who must be classed with Leon Gawr, a mighty strong giant who founded Chester (Vanishing England)
They are like STATEMENTS, yet are not so much stated as validated by juxtaposition. They are “packaged together” with what they depend on and their mutual identity is taken as given.
IV.F.4 PRO-NOUNS and PRO-NOMINALS
IV.147 Though all four MAJOR WORD-CLASSES have corresponding PRO-FORMS among the MINOR WORD-CLASSES, most grammar-books feature only the PRO-NOUNS, a term I write with a hyphen so that the matching PRO-VERBS will not look like folksy “proverbs” (cf. §). PRO-NOMINALS are alternative forms, mostly also serving as DETERMINERS in NOUN PHRASES, when used by themselves in functions corresponding to PRO-NOUNS.
IV.148 PRO-NOUNS are rarely conspicuous or stressed, yet they are omnipresent and indispensable, performing a deal of “grammatical work” in the texture of English. Although technically the NOUN is singled out for substitution, the PRO-NOUN can carry the whole AGENT [528], EVENT [529], or MEDIUM [530].
[528] All the children in the hall were watching tensely, waiting for something to happen. They felt certain it must. (Matilda)
[529] The desired outcome is delayed. Does that mean that one day it will happen? (Big Glass)
[530] A beautiful woman with long, black hair noticed they were there. She smiled (Hermetech)
When a PRO-NOUN makes up an entire utterance, the context determines and specifies who or what is meant.
[531] I saw the chucker-out standing over us. “Who’s mekin’ all this racket?” he bawled in a thunderous voice. “Me”, I called out. (Where There’s Life)
[532] “And who is the new chief?” asked the Doctor. “You are”, said Polynesia quietly. “I!” gasped the Doctor. “Bother it, I don’t want to be a king!” (Dolittle)
[533] Seeing the dark, moving figure, he opened the door wide; then she turned up her white, haggard face to his. “You!” He recoiled as if stunned. (Things Being Equal)
[534] “How about your son, Walter; do you not love him?” “Him!” she exclaimed, passionately; “never!” (Mainwaring)
IV.149 Already by Shakespeare’s time, they rarely appeared, in the SUBJECT form of the THIRD PERSON SINGULAR, with an ARTICLE [535], a POSSESSIVE [536], a QUANTIFIER [537], or a PRE-MODIFIER [538-39].
[535] I could make him swear the shes of Italy should not betray mine interest and his honour (Cymbeline)
[536] Sooth, when I was young and handed love as you do, I was wont to load my she with knacks [playthings] (Winter’s Tale)
[537] Such mortal drugs I have; but Mantua’s law is death to any he that utters them. (Romeo)
[538] Lady, you are the cruellest she alive, if you will lead these graces to the grave, and leave the world no copy. (Twelfth Night)
[539] Good man, sit down. Now let me see the proudest he that dares most but wag his finger at thee. (Henry VIII)
In recent usage, the effect with an ARTICLE sounds to me too weighty [540], though less so if the one PRO-NOUN is understood as pointing to another [541-42].
[540] With my own two eyes I saw the miracle: Saw her -- the girl who had just had all the concentrated passion of the Her of the world -- turn and follow you. (Visioning)
[541] “It is His will that we cleave to our station”. [...] The He in question was an amorphous blend of the remote Godfather of All and the dynastic Imperial Commander (Space Marine)
[542] “How dare you -- standing for the You of the world -- dampen the splendid ardor of my hate?” “Perhaps if the Me of the world were known a little more intimately it would be less hated.” (Visioning)
However, a few commonplace ADJECTIVES can easily PRE-MODIFY OBJECT forms with no ARTICLE, viz.:
[543] “How’s school?” “It’s the holidays.” “Of course it is! Silly me!” (Classic English Crime)
[544] “I barked my shin and took a tumble in a nettle bed.” “Poor you”. (Tortoise by Candlelight)
[545] When we went there there was only two roads [...] like liquid mud, poor old us (Nottinghamshire Oral History)BNC
Such ADJECTIVES are mostly PEJORATIVE EVALUATIONS; “poor” in [544-45] could not mean “without funds”.
IV.150 PRO-NOUNS can have POST-MODIFIERS as PREPOSITIONAL PHRASES [546]; and the effect may sound weighty [547] or ironic [548-49]:
[546] God grant that we of the clergy may remember this during the coming war (Alexandria)
[547] Where is she of the yellow locks and blue eyes? (Mohicans)
[548] I remembered, later, how she of the sour visage had dilated upon the subject of the sunrise over the water (O’Hara)
[549] War-Minister Narbonne, he of the rose-coloured Reports, solicits recruitments, equipments, money, always money (French Revolution)
IV.151 Alone among the WORD-CLASSES of English, the PRO-NOUNS preserve formal distinctions among some of those so-called CASES whose marble stature in the “declensions” of Latin has put successive generations of sweating English schoolchildren through their paces: SUBJECT FORM (“Nominative”), POSSESSIVE (“Genitive”), INDIRECT OBJECT FORM (“Dative”), and OBJECT FORM (“Accusative”). Moreover, the THIRD PERSON SINGULAR preserves formal distinctions between three GENDERS: MASCULINE, FEMININE, and NEUTER, of which but few traces remain among English NOUNS (cf. IV.56). The “standard” forms look reassuringly tidy:
Yet it seems to me a general principle of language that greater elaboration encourages greater variation, especially when, as with PRO-NOUNS, the linguistic, cognitive, and social implications can be delicate. Grammar teachers who accordingly seek to “standardise” the forms and uses are unwittingly working against the grain, as attested by much data for English usage outide the classroom.
IV.152 In theory, the uses of PRO-NOUNS clearly distinguish the PARTICIPANTS: speakers or writers by FIRST PERSON, audiences by SECOND PERSON and everybody or everything else by THIRD PERSON. Yet the practice is no means so clear. Either SECOND or THIRD may indicate indeterminate people, notably with VERBS like “think” [550] or “say” [551].
[550] To listen to many authorities on nutrition, you might think that eating is an exact science. (Walking Diet)
[551] They say the Lion and the Lizard keep the Courts where Jamshyd gloried and drank deep (Rubaiyat)
The FIRST PERSON PLURAL may be deployed by a single user for either power [552] or solidarity [553].
[552] We were not born to sue, but to command (Richard II)
[553] I like the expression “we” rather than “I”. I never feel that my interests and actions can be independent of the dear ones with whom I am surrounded. (Susan B. Anthony)
To say the least, then, authentic data reveal a far more complicated picture than the “standard” chart.
IV.153 Some issues seem pervasive for nearly all PERSONS. Such is true for the variations of POSSESSIVE PRO-NOUNS determining a NOUN. I find “me” for “my”, “you” and “yo” for “your”, “us” for “our”, “he” for “his”, and “they” for “their”, typically in pop song lyrics:
[554] Me mum and me dad are separated, like, and me dad reads The Sun. (NME)
[555] I remember this song Shaddup You Face by Joe Dolce, spawning the annoying catch-phase as a response to almost anything. (Fast-Rewind)WWW
[556] Momma told me watch yo friends, they can be enemiez (Bone Thugs N Harmony)
[557] I’m not fond of Carlisle. We took us caravan up that way a few years ago (conversation)BNC
[558] Dude, he face is alright, if you just glance at him you can tell right away its Sheva, its no that bad. (SoccerGaming)WWW
[559] let the racism go and let the prejudice slide, cuz if we wanna make a difference then we'll have to unite, and we wont stop till we have ‘em puttin’ they feet in they mouths (Philly Boy)WWW
Older data carry “mine” and “thine” before WORDS beginning with a VOWEL, and “my” and “thy” before a CONSONANT. Compare:
[560] Mine eyes were not in fault, for she was beautiful; mine ears, that heard her flattery; nor my heart that thought her like her seeming. (Cymbeline)
[561] Thine eye begins to speak, set thy tongue there (Henry IV)
The set of POSSESSIVES with an “-n” ENDING determining a NOUN turned out larger than I had expected:
[562] You sorry scutter [ugly gutter person], out with yourn ignert Bro [brother], dabblin in sin! (Sadie Jay’s Way)WWW
[563] I had an affair with hisn best mate a while ago when I was a stupid, stupid thing (bipolaraware)WWW
[564] He’s a makin sho’ [sure] that Sadie Jay gits hern way! (Sadie Jay’s Way)WWW
[565] They stand in ourn way. The NIMBYs [from “Not In My Back Yard”] just want a quiet life (Faulty Towers Hotel)WWW
[566] Otley took the points in theirn opening day clash with Bardsey (This Is Bradford)WWW
IV.153 Pervasive too are the variations among the POSSESSIVE PRO-NOMINALS, i.e., PRO-NOUNS that do not determine a NOUN. Standard English carefully keeps them audibly and visually distinct from the POSSESSIVE DETERMINERS:
[567] Keener and more knowledgeable minds than mine or yours will some day bring him back to us again. (The Return)
[568] Then, unvexedly, the gentle voice of the speaker, were it his or hers, would resume. (Certain Hour)
[569] Through no fault of ours or theirs, our parents begin the programming process as their views of life (Truth Campaign)WWW
But regional usages ending in “-n” or even “-sn” were better attested than were the matching DETERMINERS shown in [562-66]:
[570] You’ve got the hull house fer a week, an’ o’ course all th’ money that’s tooken in is your’n. (Bargain Day at Tutt House)
[571] Then he busted out, and had another of them forty-rod laughs of hisn (Tom Sawyer, Detective)
[572] I seen the lady when she was a-writin’ of her letter, and when she went out, there war’n’t nothin’ left on the table but a hangkerchuf, and that war’n’t hern. (Gala-Days)
[573] We both get a kick out of the reaction when some urbanite type pleads “Has anybody got a knife?” and Maw whips out hers’n (Country Living)WWW
[574] But, Huck, dese kings o’ ourn is reglar rapscallions (Huckleberry Finn)
[575] My English version works better for us laymen who don’t speak no other languages and don’t speak ours’n too good neither (Melodramatic)WWW
[576] Don’t you kinder think it real smart now for us to be a wearin’ out shoe-leather when we’ve a heap o’ mules bustin’ theirselves in that shanty o’ theirn agin the house for want of work? (Picked Up at Sea)WWW
[577] French bakers are in a hurry because theirsn is a tough market where one can only charge so much (ForumsEGullet)WWW
A plausible account might be that the “-n” was contracted from the PRO-NOMINAL “one”; later, the same forms might have migrated to occasional duty as DETERMINERS without with any sense of submerged redundancy. Or again, the “-n” may have been contracted from the POSSESSIVE “own”.
IV.154 Perhaps the greatest instability has emerged among the REFLEXIVE PRO-NOUNS or PRO-NOMINALS -- either term could plausibly be applied -- because they are marked once for GENDER and twice for NUMBER, which is unique in the GRAMMAR. They vacillate between POSSESSIVE and OBJECT forms, or between SINGULAR and PLURAL; and they have a whole set of Scottish English forms ending simply in “l”. The variations I found included:
[578] I like to think of myselves as a catalyst for innovation (Ecademy)WWW
[579] “WeeI”, says I, “I’ll awa but, an gie mysel a clean up, an be wi ye in a meenit”. (These Degenerate Days)WWW
[580] I seen my baby girl -- like more us than us is ourself. (Celie in The Color Purple)
[581] An thou would keep thy heads and purses, do get thyselfs a means of protection (Olympia Times)WWW