LEND ME YOUR EAR: PURISTS MAY DISLIKE ELLIPSIS, BUT IT IS ACCEPTABLE

A lady of my acquaintance questioned my use of "overview" in the title of a recent column. An overview may be a summary, a survey, or a review. I used it to refer to material discussed in earlier columns, though it carries an extra syllable and is less familiar than "review." Sometimes an extra syllable makes for better rhythm.

Other times, an ellipsis is preferable. The first thing we learned about a sentence was that it must have a subject and predicate, but this was among the many rules we had to unlearn later. Sentence fragments have always been acceptable. Note the following examples:

Subject omitted: (You) Come home straight from school.

Predicate omitted: Who is playing the piano? Joyce (is playing).

Subject and predicate omitted: What did you contribute to the church sale? (I contributed) Clothes.

We have read of purists who refuse to accept ellipsis, but I think this breed exists only in outdated textbooks.

However, we all know critics who delight in the passing of the distinction between "who" and "whom" and even try to help erase it. Allow me to point out that few grammarians are going along with them. Nor will an ellipsis solve the problem created by TCI in the appeal to viewers who may be using cable without paying for it. The plea, which we hear almost every time we tune in on CNN, ends with: "We will not prosecute those are willing to pay for the service."

Perhaps the writer or speaker doesn't know whether to say "who are willing" or "whom are willing," and believes no one will notice the omission. Of course it would be simpler just to omit "are" and make it "those willing." But the company touting cable as a painless tool of education appears not to have thought of this.

The confusion over whether to use who or whom lies in sentences containing subordinate clauses. Take, "Guess who is coming to see us today." The subject of the main clause is you, understood. Who is the subject of "is coming." Too often, the writer or speaker will think who is the object of guess, and so chooses whom.

Now change the sentence to "Guess whom I saw at the store." This time, whom is the object of saw. File these examples where you can find them again, and spare yourself grief the next time you need to make the choice.

Another mistake we have not succeeded in stamping out despite all efforts is in the use of possessives with gerunds. Gerunds are verbal nouns, the ing forms of verbs also known as participial pronouns because a gerund is a pronoun used as a noun.

A noun or pronoun introducing a gerund is properly construed in the possessive case: "His parents disapproved his returning to college" not him returning; "The children's father considered their walking to school good exercise" not them walking.

Seldom do we hear or read a news article or editorial that is free of this solecism. On a documentary featuring the strange habits of the porcupine, a guest asked the narrator: "How do you explain them not having quills around the nose?" The correct word was their, the possessive. On a political newscast, a networker stated: "Japan approves of us joining forces with them in trade exchanges." The pronoun required was the possessive, our. Likewise, the possessive of I is my, not me; of you is your, not you.

My protests against "where it's at" began long before this column saw the light of day. In recent years, however, the expression has become so firmly entrenched in the language that often, even English teachers use it as if it were standard form. Let me repeat that this artless phrase has never been accepted by experts, nor even by grownups of previous generations. When I was a child (I was never a "kid"), if I asked where something or someone was at, any adult within earshot would reply, "Just before the at!" or "Just behind the at!" depending upon how the respondent's parents had phrased it.

Only a few days ago, an elegantly-garbed newcomer to the TV circuit appeared as guest hostess of a talk show. The first words I caught from this budding starlet were: "If you're not where you're at, you're doomed."

Few of my generation ever considered where we were at, but most of us eventually discovered where we were. Perhaps one day some ambitious young scholar will write a Ph.D dissertation on the long-forgotten niceties of the English language, and rediscover what we oldsters learned at our mothers' knees or from our grade-school-educated neighbors. We can dream, can't we?