Huddleston & Pullum (2002) の誤り: Whoever’s idea it was to go on the first date.

youtu.be

Interviewer: Who pays on the first date?

50 Cent: Whoever’s idea it was to go on the date.

この文の非常に面白いところは、Huddleston & Pullum (2002) の p. 1075 の脚注に対する反例になっているということです。ただし free choice construction とは、主節の主語の指示対象に選ぶ自由がある融合関係詞のことです。

The genitive forms whosever and (informal) whoever’s are possible but rare in the free choice construction. Thus Take whosever/whoever’s you like could serve as a response to the question Whose bicycle shall I take? The genitives are not admissible outside the free choice construction — cf. *They want to question whosever/whoever’s dog was barking throughout the night or *Whosever/Whoever’s car is blocking my driveway must move it immediately. The close grammatical association between the genitive determiner and the following head noun seems to suggest the anomalous meanings where it is the dog they want to question and the car that must move itself.

他にもいくつかの用例が見つかるので挙げておきましょう。

  • God, I just feel awful for whoever’s car that was. (Arrested Development, Season 2, Episode 9, Burning Love)
  • Whoever’s idea it was to have me share a room with you to help me with my recovery is a complete idiot. (Hawaii Five-0, Season 6, Episode 25, O Ke Ali’I Wale No Ka’u Makemake)
  • Whoever’s idea to serve rice and beans with Bright around ought to be shot. (Everwood, Season 4, Episode 5, Connect Four)

さらに詳しい考察は

  1. Whoever’s « Literal-Minded
  2. Whoever’s Team We Like « Literal-Minded

の二つをご覧ください。こういうブログは十数年したら消えてしまうことが多いので、用例だけは引用してしまうことにしましょう。

  • I’d be whoever’s girlfriend had the dope.
  • Ronnie is whoever’s agent he needs to be.
  • Now take the dead battery and put it in whoever’s car you got the good one out of.
  • It happened on the second month of his presidency. He went on for 94 more months with whoever’s blood was in him.
  • ...playing strip poker in whoever’s house had no parents in it on rainy days
  • whoever’s brain is highest in coherence dominates. do you believe this? whosoever’s brain is highest in chaos will dominate if brains are like crowds, or greed,
  • it feels like they are living the life of whoever’s brain was recorded.
  • Whoever’s pitch is chosen will earn a major promotion.
  • Or we’ll each pick a [Jeopardy!] contestant at the beginning and whoever’s contestant wins doesn’t have to do dishes.
  • But they knew that whoever’s DNA this was would be the killer.
  • Whoever’s shack this is, is a Tupac Shakur freak.
  • then match up the plaster casts with whosever shoes they are, and that way you could catch him
  • Whosever pole lands the straightest and farthest wins.
  • I mean we want to have whoever’s team we like to win so that we can get lucky later.
  • The picture itself wasn’t scary but it would strike fear in whoever saw it’s hearts.
  • When we did have the odd beer thrown up on stage I just wish I could go to whoever did it’s place of work, if he actually had a job, and tip it over his head and think, ‘what do you reckon? Is it funny?’
  • Dirt Clod, just lay off if you dont like it dont buy it, its whoever buys it’s deal
  • Well sure, but then it’s still your (or whoever bought it’s) land, so you just turf them off.
  • You just closed your eyes and guessed the amount of cash you put into whoever you bought it from’s hand?
  • Yeah like /u/cmedrano said you’d just need to add your vehicle to whoever you bought it from’s account.
  • They’ll be signed on to the alliance in a day, and then we can track down whoever you saw’s planet.
  • Whoever you saw’s gembox spawned in the 2 hours they were able to spawn.
  • There is an upper management level above customer service, whoever you talked to’s boss would be in that level, but they don’t generally speak directly to customers.

よく見てみると、面白いコメントもあります。

I think Puddleston is right to rule out whosever, but wrong to rule out whoever’s. But I’m sure your input wouldn’t surprise at least Pullum too much: his paper “The Truth about English Grammar” is all about the extreme lack of patterning in English wh-words.