atw: OT: Re: Re: Thanx all: The Queen's English?
- From: "Ian Gabriel" <ian.gabriel@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: <austechwriter@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Mon, 21 May 2007 18:25:24 +0200
And this odd wording appears in the Australian passport:
"The Governor-General of the Commonwealth of Australia,
being the representative in Australia of Her Majesty Queen
Elizabeth the Second, requests all those whom it may concern
to allow the bearer, an Australian Citizen, to pass freely
without let or hindrance and to afford him or her every
assistance and protection of which he or she may stand in need."
A 59 word sentence from the bureaucracy which means that the immigration
officers in Britain, who are probably employees of the Queen, should
probably carry your bags for you when you arrive in the "mother country".
However, even when you have lived there for 20 years, they usually run an
interrogation process to confirm your direct descendancy from the convicts
and that you might steal loaves of bread while you are in the country.
Completely off topic now, but I'm also worried about the use of "whom" as
the subject of a defining clause. However, my Collins book on English usage
states: "Whom is a formal word which is sometimes used instead of 'who'.
Whom can only be the object of a verb or preposition."
I know that English grammar is more French than German, but this seems to me
to be a derivative of the German usage where "who" is used for the the
nominative pronoun (German wer) and the accusative pronoun (German wen) and
"whom" is used for the dative (German wem). The genitive "whose" is easy, it
is vaguely similar to the German "wessen".
So I don't know why Collins uses vague descriptions like "formal" and
"sometimes" when there should be clear grammatical rules in English. But of
course the "formal" option wins here, so you can forget any other reasons!
Ian Gabriel
(now living in Germany to argue with different immigration officers)
----- Original Message -----
From: "Stuart Burnfield" <slb@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: <austechwriter@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Monday, May 21, 2007 7:19 AM
Subject: atw: Re: Thanx all: The Queen's English?
This odd wording appears in British passports:
"Her Brittanic Majesty's Secretary of State requests and requires
in the Name of Her Majesty all those whom it may concern to allow
the bearer to pass freely without let or hindrance, and to afford
the bearer such assistance and protection as may be necessary."
If it's not too late you could work something like this into the intro:
"Her Brittanic Majesty's Secretary of Documentation requests and
requires in the Name of Her Majesty all those whom it may concern
to take part in a Transportees versus Rest of the Empire polo
match..."
> I'm seeking approval from those involved...
You're a) having a polo match at work, and b) you have to seek approval
for the wording of the invitation? Can I assume you're working for a
government department, Deb?
Stuart
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