Both/all grammar question

[puiwaihin]

[quote=“Peter-Paul”]My dear, dear puiwaihin

Thanks for including that reference site. But do read it fully.[/quote]
Good idea. I was rushing out the door as I posted and hadn’t done a thorough job going through it.

But I’m afraid you may be a little misled about the level of intimacy in our relationship…

[quote]In your last posting, you state:

The purpose of an appositive is to clarify or give further information. “both” does not do this, but rather specifies quanitity.

But that seems illogical to me: isn’t “specifying quantity” giving further information? Further, again, from that same web page: “Like relative clauses, appositives can be defining or non-defining.”[/quote]
I still see a clear difference between “George W. Bush the president” and “they both”, but it seems I’m wrong here.

Just to show my thinking on this, “both” as a determiner would not be an appositive (which must be a noun or pronoun). In “both the men” it is a determiner. It modifies rather than redefines. In “the men both” I feel it does the same thing, but it obviously fails the test for being a determiner. It’s still providing the same information, but I guess it can also be seen as a pronoun redefining the noun. I still have some misgivings, but that’s why I asked the question in the first place.

[quote]You also state that (in referring to “both”):

Classifying it as a conjunction seems to be in line with more traditional, Latin-based classifications of grammar. Classifying it as a determiner seems to be a product of modern linguistics.

I’d refer you to that same website that you cited, in a section called “Correlative Conjunctions”

[quote]The most commonly used correlative conjunctions are both … and, either … or and neither … nor.

---

both … and He is both intelligent and good-natured.
[/quote][/quote]
True. But that leaves us with the question, when is it a conjunction and when is it a determiner? I think I have a handle on it, but there is room for ambiguity-- which may be why I thought I was strictly dealing with a determiner and didn’t remember correlating conjunctions.

Some examples below to help me clear things up:

Both men and women are happy- correlating conjunction
Both the men and women are happy- determiner
Both the men and the women are happy- correlating conjunction
Both men and both women are happy- determiner

Looking at the examples I just made, it seems clear that in the example I gave with the Weasleys you were totally right about it being a correlating conjunction. Since ‘George’ and ‘Fred’ are proper nouns there can be no ambiguity. For it to have been a determiner as I had thought it would have to have been “both Georges and Freds are Weasleys”- meaning there were two kids named George Weasly and two kids named Fred Weasley.

Thanks for pointing me in the right direction, even if I only came to it by trying to prove something that turned out to be wrong. :bravo:

[bob]

edit please

[puiwaihin]

[quote=“bob”]Puiwaihin will probably correct me but I think this little convo demonstrates why so many people abandon the cognitive approach. It is a case of throwing out the baby with the bath water though. There are areas of grammar that are amenable to analysis and explanation and other areas that are not.

A conversation like this one would be absolutely useless to 99.9% of ESL students and 100% of EFL students.[/quote]
No, you’re quite right that this discussion wouldn’t do much for helping students learn to speak proper English, or even understand English.

But when the word “both” comes up in a sentence and someone asks what part of speech it is, I prefer to be prepared. They don’t have to learn all the complexities of the grammar, but at least I can say, “I don’t think you really want to ask that.” rather than, “I don’t think I want you to ask that.”

[bob]

And here I thought it was pure masochism that drove us!