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Article: Look homeward, adposition.(THE HOME FORUM)
- Article from:
- The Christian Science Monitor
- Article date:
- January 12, 2007
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 2007 The Christian Science Publishing Society. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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Byline: Ruth Walker
A preposition is a word you are not supposed to end a sentence with. The nyah-nyah literalist's case for following this rule is etymological: "Preposition" gets its name from being placed (positioned) before (pre). The book is on the shelf. "On" is placed before "the shelf."
There are a few cases where another rule prevails, as in: Charlie couldn't get to work on time, all his efforts notwithstanding. "Notwithstanding" is identified in my dictionary as prep. But there's a view among some grammarians that this is an example of a postposition, like a preposition but appearing after its object.
Come to find out there's even an ...