A Word for You and I

 

A Word for You and I

After reading my January posting a faithful reader noted her irritation when people say something like this: “She said hello to you and I.” I share her pain.

We need “…to you and me.” Because the to is a preposition, we need the objective pronoun. You wouldn’t say, “She said hello to I.”

But her grumble got me thinking: Does it matter if someone says to you and I? You and I know exactly what they mean. Oops: I’ve used the plural they as the pronoun for the singular someone. Does that matter?

I’m not hung up on, nor do I understand, the intricacies of English grammar. Who truly cares about the past pluperfect, modal auxiliary verbs, or interrogative marsupials?

In my book on words, Meet the Dog that Didn’t Sh*t, I noted that English is a dynamic language, with rules and usage perpetually in flux. But while English speakers are continuously reshaping parts of the language I’m convinced that we need some rules and some standards. They may change over time but they are the rules and standards that we happen to have right now. For me, a good rule of thumb is, “Would I correct my children’s speech or writing on this point?”

Linguist David Crystal makes this point about applying grammatical rules with flexibility: “Competent writers know they have the ability to switch into and out of standard English,” what we might define as “good” English, what we’d expect to see in a well-edited book. But he adds that much of our usage is informal: “Every sentence we speak or write involves a choice. We hope we have made the right choices—that we have chosen language which is both meaningful and acceptable to our listeners and readers.”

I’d say that’s good advice for you and I.

[300 words]