Talk:Preposition
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Search of vs. search for
Hi, I need to know why the sentence "I'm in search of the truth" and "I'm searching for the truth" are apparently correct with regard to the prepositions 'of' and 'for' whereas you apparently cannot say "I'm in search for the truth" and "I'm searching of the truth." Both 'of' and 'for' are the prepositions that cause my problem. --Mubstar 01:48, 30 May 2005 (UTC)
- In search of is a fixed expression, a holdover from back when the noun search regularly used the preposition of. Ruakh 17:11, 1 Jun 2005 (UTC)
Churchill on those who oppose ending sentences with prepositions
I (mis?)remembered Winston Churchill saying "There are some things up with which we will not put" but can find no verification of it. I'm not sure whether that would be mocking or apocryphal. Koyaanis Qatsi
- Hi, new to the wikipedia thing I only looked here some time after I added the quote which you mentioned. I don't have a definitive attribution, but feel fairly confident about it. I think I will change the entry to indicate uncertainity.
vanden 23:46, 3 Nov 2003 (UTC)
- Your memory is pretty good. There's an oft-told story that, after someone complained that Churchill had ended a sentence with a preposition, he replied, "that is the sort of arrant pedantry up with which I will not put." --Christofurio 21:32, Nov 11, 2004 (UTC)
More discussion/analysis needed in article
This needs some more discussion/analysis of prepositions in general, rather than just lengthy analysis of whether one can properly end a sentence with a preposition in English.
obJoke:
Texan: So, where ya from?
Briton: *sniff* I am from a place where one does not end one's sentences with prepositions.
Texan: Ok... Where ya from, jackass?
Kwertii 16:28, 27 Feb 2004 (UTC)
- Along with some rearrangements, I have replaced the long example with smaller ones, and also added some information on prepositional phrases. Ziziphus 09:45, 8 Jun 2004 (UTC)
Is with A with B grammatical?
One thing I've been wondering is whether it's grammatical to use the same preposition twice in the same clause with different meanings. For example, "He argued with me with an angry expression". Is that allowable? Any grammarians care to explain this in the article? --Shibboleth 01:59, 29 Jul 2004 (UTC)
- It looks and sounds odd, but I don't think there's anything wrong with it. In the first part of the sentence, with is used as a function word. In the second part, with is signifying possession - the man has an angry expression.
- It's grammatical. It does look a little unusual, but I wouldn't have any problem with it. "With" in English has a whole bunch of meanings; the first one here is an adversative or comitative, the second, an expression of circumstance. There's yet another meaning of "with": an expression of instrumentality. He argued with me with persuasion with an angry look on his face looks and sounds really bizarre, but it's grammatical.thefamouseccles
- I've been thinking that this article needs an overhaul. Perhaps dividing it into sections for different types of prepositions (temporal, spatial, introductory) would be better, as well as providing some clearer examples and explanations of the sentence structure. --Ziziphus 12:55, 30 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Separable Prefix Verbs != verb + preposition
I am not a native or fluent German speaker, but my understanding from my studies is that the separable prefix from a separable prefix verb is not a preposition but a different grammatical concept that does not exist in English. True, the separable prefix communicates some of the same information as a preposition, and it may very well be that the practice of placing prepositions at the end of a sentence derives from the separable prefix . . . BUT, the prefix (despite is separated status) is considered in German grammer to be part of the verb, not a separate word, and as far as I can remember never introduces a prepositional clause.
Notice that in the example, "Die Frau kommt um 7 Uhr in Köln an," the two prepositional clauses "um 7 Uhr" and "in Köln" already have leading prepositions.
kommen = to come ankommen = to arrive, but also "to attain" or "to catch on," according to my dictionary. It seems pretty clear to me that "an" modifies "kommen" exclusively. This is why it's called a separable prefix, it's a prefix (not a word) that can separate. -- 70.144.144.248 19:25, 4 Apr 2005 (UTC)
- This is a largely formal distinction; best seen with a transitive separable verb:
Er kommt das Ziel an translates English He gets to the goal. It is easier for the German to treat this as compound verb + object; for the English-speaker to treat it as verb + prepositional phrase; but the two are equivalent, and I believe cognate. Septentrionalis 17:47, 27 Apr 2005 (UTC)
