The reason we aren't supposed to split infinitives in English is only due to the fact that in Latin, you cannot split an infinitive and some people at some point decided this should be unnecessarily imposed on our own language. Of course people do this all the time ("To bodly go where no man has gone before" is a famous example) but we are told not to. Why must we keep up this archaic and unnecessary tradition?
2006-12-13 08:44:01 · 7 answers · asked by Anonymous in Society & Culture ➔ Languages
Why did Yahoo suggest I file this under their "military" category?
2006-12-13 08:44:26 · update #1
Oh God no! I typed too fast and wrote bodly instead of boldly! Out of the thousands upon thousands of words I write everyday there was ONE ERROR! I shall now perform ritualistic suici...shut the f*ck up.
2006-12-13 09:41:48 · update #2
Split infinitives are not bad. They've been a part of English for a long time - long before grammarians sat down and made a rule against it.
The rule was created by people who thought that Latin was a perfect language and that English should be like Latin. Infinitives in Latin are not split, so English ones shouldn' t be either, they thought. But guess what? It's impossible to split a Latin infinitive because it is one word! In English, they are two words.
So boldy go and split infinitives!
2006-12-13 11:28:46 · answer #1 · answered by ako lang 3 · 1⤊ 0⤋
In English, an infinitive comprises the word TO plus the verb. TO SWIM is an infinitive. A split infinitive contains a modifier between TO and the verb: TO HAPPILY SWIM It's bad grammar (not grammer) because old-fashioned grammarians say it is. It's really old-fashioned to continue calling it bad grammar. It is (or should be) perfectly acceptable.
2016-05-23 20:29:49 · answer #2 · answered by ? 4 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Oh guardian of the language, how much I would like to back you!!!
But then I unfortunately read your sentence: ("To bodly go where no man has gone before" is a famous example), and I wonder what ”bodly” means!!!
2006-12-13 09:16:05 · answer #3 · answered by saehli 6 · 0⤊ 1⤋
Personally, I cannot tolerate incorrect grammar/spelling. I grew up speaking correctly and if I didn't, I was corrected.
If our children are not corrected either at home or in school, how will they succeed in the workplace. This includes proofreading and using the correct antonyms, homonymns or synonymns. Also included is the correct use of apostrophes, changing "Y" to "I" to pluralize a word.
It is not archaic to teach a child the right information at any time.
2006-12-13 09:11:02 · answer #4 · answered by kidlet_animal_luv 4 · 0⤊ 1⤋
Under military because you used the words archaic and tradition.
Split all the infinitives you can before it is too late.
The language police are on vacation.
2006-12-13 08:55:53 · answer #5 · answered by MЯ BAIT™ 6 · 1⤊ 1⤋
I'll test my water pipe and ponder this for you
2006-12-13 08:56:10 · answer #6 · answered by Anonymous · 1⤊ 1⤋
because language has rules and we must abide by them....
or suffer the consequences, missy!
2006-12-13 08:52:39 · answer #7 · answered by Zippy 7 · 0⤊ 2⤋