Subject and Object Pronouns
I saw these two sentences on the newspaper:
1. There is no objection to his becoming the boss - "to him" sounds more natural to me but I don't know if "his" or "him" should be used?
2. There is no objection in respect of we completing this task - again, "us completing" sounds more natural but I really don't know whether "we" or "us" should be used?
Will be appreicated if somebody can tell me the rules.
Tks,
Peter
Top answer
[1] There is no objection to [ him / he / his becoming the boss ] . The rule is that non-finite gerund-participial clauses as complement to a preposition can take either accusative or genitive case pronouns as subject, but not nominative case. Which means that both accusative "him" and genitive "his" are fine as subject of the bracketed clause.
- [1] There is no objection to [ him / he / his becoming the boss ] .
- The rule is that non-finite gerund-participial clauses as complement to a preposition can take either accusative or genitive case pronouns as subject, but not nominative case.
- Which means that both accusative "him" and genitive "his" are fine as subject of the bracketed clause.
- Generally, there's little to choose between accusative and genitive, though the latter is considered characteristic of fairly formal style.
- [2] There is no objection in respect of us / we / our completing this task.
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[1] There is no objection to [him/he/his becoming the boss].
The rule is that non-finite gerund-participial clauses as complement to a preposition can take either accusative or genitive case pronouns as subject, but not nominative case.
Which means that both accusative "him" and genitive "his" are fine as subject of the bracketed
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