My girlfriends arguement is that personalities are characteristics that belong to "persons" or people, and not animals.
My arguement is that saying an animal has a personality is simply using personification.
So who's correct?
2007-07-02 12:41:51 · 3 answers · asked by Researching1234 1 in Society & Culture ➔ Languages
Sure it's grammatically correct. "Colorless green ideas sleep furiously" is grammatically correct, even if it doesn't make sense. So it's not a question of grammar, but of semantics.
In my opinion, there's no reason you can't say that an animal has a personality. Indeed, it's a kind of personification. Humans tend to see many different non-human things in terms of thinking of them as humans metaphorically, and animals are just one of them. You could talk about the personality of a company, a language, a culture, etc. also.
2007-07-02 12:47:32 · answer #1 · answered by Sextus Marius 3 · 1⤊ 0⤋
The sentence is 100% grammatically correct. As Adam said (although with an incorrect version of the quote): "Colorless green ideas furiously sleep" is 100% grammatically correct. Your discussion with your girlfriend has NOTHING to do with grammar.
2007-07-02 14:16:15 · answer #2 · answered by Taivo 7 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Grammatically, it is correct. Your question is not about grammar, however.
She is wrong. Animals do have personalities, and even for those who do not believe this there is nothing wrong with using personification.
2007-07-02 12:47:51 · answer #3 · answered by Fred 7 · 1⤊ 0⤋