Arnold Zwicky's Blog

So begins Psalm 118:24, in the KJV; the verse in full:

24 This is the day which the Lord hath made; we will rejoice and be glad in it.

Two things: one, the way in which the restrictive relative clause (with non-human antecedent) is marked — here with the relativizer which rather than that, or, unmarked, with no relativizer (in a so-called zero relative); two, the framing of the new day, in which we are exhorted to rejoice, as a gift of God (versus viewing it simply as the welcome granting of another day of life).

I take this up because the late Ann Daingerfield Zwicky was accustomed to greeting the new day by reciting the whole verse, made personal by a shift from 1pl to 1sg, but also with the morphology and syntax altered to fit her own dialect and style — with has instead of the archaic form hath; and with the which relative replaced by the shorter zero relative:

(ADZ) This is the day the Lord has made; I will rejoice and be glad in it

but maintaining her Episcopalian / Anglican creedal commitments; from the Book of Common Prayer (1662):

I believe in God the Father Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth, and in Jesus Christ his only Son our Lord …

I admired her custom, followed her on the grammar and style, but altered the text to suit me as a non-believer:

(AMZ) This is the day I have been given; I will rejoice and be glad in it

In recent years, when I had to adapt to the very real possibility that each day would be my last, this compact morning formula of gratitude, joy, and intention became something of an outpouring of delight in life, however fragile — and has remained so, even now that the death sentence has been, remarkably, moved into the indefinite future. (That can always be snatched away; in any case, given a lifetime of near-death experiences, I never imagined that I would reach 70, much less 84 (which is coming in a month), so I’m grateful for each day I’ve been spared, whatever the predictions are.) I live each day as if it was my last — which is, by the way, an attitude that tends to make me intolerant of pointless procedures and pettifogging.

Syntax, style, and usage. Going for a zero relative allowed Ann (and me) to finesse the which vs. that question. The KJV has restrictive relativizer which — entirely standard for the period, though that has been an alternative throughout most of the history of English. Restrictive which continues in use, including in some notable quotations, as in US President Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s address to Congress on Pearl Harbor Day, December 7th, 1941:

a date [usually quoted as day] which will live in infamy

The facts of actual usage here, from MWDEU p. 895:

We conclude that at the end of the 20th century, the usage of which and that — at least in prose — has pretty much settled down. You can use either which or that to introduce a restrictive clause [with non-human antecedent] … Formality does not seem to be much of a consideration in the choice

Now for some background, with what I view as a truly sad chapter in intellectual history. From my posting on Language Log on 3/10/08, “To Henry Fowler on the occasion of his 150th birthday”:

Almost all the prescriptions of so-called “prescriptive grammar” began life as PROSCRIPTIONS: someone deemed a usage to be socially deficient in some way (non-standard, informal, spoken rather than written, innovative, restricted to some social group or geographical region) and proposed that this usage should be banned, either in general (as just flat “incorrect”) or at least in the formal written standard language.

… Fowler’s Rule, in particular the part in which Fowler suggests using that as the relativizer for restrictive relative clauses, isn’t like this at all. Both which and that were entirely standard as restrictive relativizers in Fowler’s day, as they still are. Fowler was suggesting that that should be used rather than which as a matter of neatness in patterning, not because of any perceived social deficiency (non-standardness, informality, conversational tone, whatever) in which. The result of following Fowler’s Rule consistently (as some style sheets now demand) is a contraction in the expressive capabilities of the established formal general standard written language. That’s why here at Language Log Plaza we object to the enforcement of Fowler’s Rule: don’t mess with our choices!

And then it gets still more complex. From my 11/23/11 posting “Punctuating relatives”:

The beginning of the Wikipedia entry on hair:

Hair is a filamentous biomaterial, that grows from follicles found in the dermis.

… by Fowler’s time, non-restrictive non-human relatives in standard English used which and not that. Fowler suggested that things might be better if restrictive non-human relatives in standard English were similarly uniquely marked [AZ: thereby creating a legion of “which hunters”, seeking to root out every example of restrictive which]. Nobody was suggesting messing with the non-restrictives, which had been fixed (in standard English) for some time. The restrictives were the problem.

The usual formulations of the “rule” nevertheless do mention non-restrictives, because that in non-restrictives occurs with some frequency in non-standard English [as in the Wikipedia example]. So half of the “rule” is actually a description of the standard language. But putting the two clauses together has led some people to a misunderstanding of writers (like me) who reject Fowler’s Rule for restrictives: if we say that one half of the rule is nonsense, why believe the second half? (Bob Lieblich has reported to me people who have reasoned this way, so that they find no problem with non-restrictive that and believe that Language Log postings on Fowler’s Rule support their position.)

Here we weep.

Syntactic footnote. Ann and I were both fond of zero relatives (as in our versions of the Psalm verse above), as the sparest choice available, but they can introduce processing difficulties (having an explicit marker of subordination can aid the reader or hearer) and are in any case not available for relativized subjects:

The idea which / that / *∅  amuses you so much appalls me

versus non-subjects:

The idea which / that / ∅  you’re so amused by appalls me

 

This entry was posted on August 6, 2024 at 12:02 pm and is filed under Language and religion, My life, Relativization, Syntax, Usage advice. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.