On the teevee the other day, JD and I heard a segment about how Nicolas Sarkozy, right-wing presidential candidate, got a past participle wrong: He said conduise instead of conduite for 'driven'.
In some ways this is like Dan Quayle's "potatoes" gaffe. But that was written, and this is spoken. We don't really get worked up about parts of verbs in English; when we disagree, we just throw up our hands and say that everything's correct. Dived, dove. Whatever. Do you find anything funny about "Honey, I Shrunk The Kids?" Me neither, but if you think about it, shrank is traditionally the past tense of shrink. Nonetheless, shrunk sounds pretty fine there.
Here's a trick from my historical linguistics professor in college: What's the past participle of strive? I have strived? I have striven? I have... strove? Honestly, we just don't care.
Tuesday, January 30, 2007
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1 comment:
I always disliked "Honey I Shrunk the Kids"--the participle, not the movie (which I never saw :). Shrink, Shrank, Shrunk, people. Or as the narrator of "How the Grinch Stole Christmas" would say,
Stink....
Stank....
Stunk....!
Your friend,
The Grammar Geek
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