{"id":453588,"date":"2010-03-20T14:09:12","date_gmt":"2010-03-20T18:09:12","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu\/nll\/?p=2198"},"modified":"2010-03-20T14:09:12","modified_gmt":"2010-03-20T18:09:12","slug":"firemen-dental-practice-and-danglers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/453588","title":{"rendered":"Firemen, dental practice, and danglers"},"content":{"rendered":"

Said the story in the Ottawa Citizen<\/I><\/A>: <\/p>\n

\n

The woman was trapped in her car unconscious for about 20 minutes while firefighters performed an extraction, he said. <\/FONT><\/P><\/BLOCKQUOTE> <\/p>\n

And alert Language Log reader Diane commented: “I had no idea our firefighters were also trained at dentistry!” She also asked me whether the misleading phrase an extraction<\/I> was a dangler (an analog of the dangling modifier that prescriptivists warn against).
\n<\/span>
\nIt isn’t, despite the fact that we are not directly given a logical subject for the implicit reference to extracting. An extraction<\/I> is a noun phrase (NP) functioning as direct object of the verb performed<\/I>, and a direct object never<\/B> needs a predicand (or “logical subject”, i.e., an NP it can act as a predicate of). It’s only predicative adjuncts that can be danglers. <\/p>\n

It is possible, though, for a predicative adjunct to consist of nothing but an NP. That occurs in A skilled fireman, Dan didn’t take long to get the woman out of the vehicle<\/I>, where Dan<\/I> is the predicand so we understand that Dan is being described as a skilled fireman. But such an NP can also be a dangler, as in ??<\/SUP>A skilled fireman, things didn’t take long<\/I>, which sounds deeply weird because you aren’t told who<\/B> is a skilled fireman. <\/p>\n

Diane is of course quite right that the sentence in the Citizen<\/I> sounds extremely silly. I actually think it’s a case of nerdview<\/A>: perform an extraction<\/I> must be how fire station record books and regulation manuals would refer to getting trapped women out of crushed vehicles. A reporter with sense would have translated the nerviewese and said “The woman was trapped in her car unconscious for about 20 minutes while firefighters got her out.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Said the story in the Ottawa Citizen: The woman was trapped in her car unconscious for about 20 minutes while firefighters performed an extraction, he said. And alert Language Log reader Diane commented: “I had no idea our firefighters were also trained at dentistry!” She also asked me whether the misleading phrase an extraction was […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4148,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-453588","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/453588","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4148"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=453588"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/453588\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=453588"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=453588"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=453588"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}