Official committee reports in English of the Canadian
House of Commons all contain the phrase "Your Committee
has the honour to present its Xth Report". That should of
course be "the honour of presenting."
I have read recently that "I have the honor to report
that..." is incorrect and that one should say "I have
the honor of reporting that...":
But why? It is the more difficult for me to understand
because in my naytive Russian the infinitive version is
only natural.
In my experience, formal speeches often begin with
phrases like:
I have the honour of reporting that [blah blah]
I have the honour of presenting [blah blah]
or
It is my honour to report that [blah blah]
I am honoured to present [blah blah]
If the authors of these reports made an error by trying
to put two grammatical constructions together, I don't
see it as particularly serious...
but I wonder who is so sure they're right (or wants us
to think they are) that they find it necessary to add
"of course" to lend weight to their argument.
WRT politics it behooves us to be on the
alert for slanted writing, and WRT this excerpt I notice
that the author hasn't specified what his or her
objection is to the wording in the committee reports or
why it "should" be xxx rather than yyy.
Possibly because all those verbs are descriptive, stating
ability or permission to report (picture theory of
language, Wittgenstein's TLP), while "honor" is part of the
sentence that is Speech Act per se ?
Yes, I have the courage to share my thoughts in the E_T
echo when I see that somebody out there wants to learn
more about my native language.
If the authors of these reports made an error by trying
to put two grammatical constructions together, I don't
see it as particularly serious...
I wonder why it is an error.
A good old prescriptivist explanation would satisfy me,
for prescriptivists consider language an embodiment of
logical rules,
whereas descriptivist think rules are but crude
formulations for fuzzy volatile tendencies in language.
When aksked about the difference of "honor" from "right",
"courage", "permission", and "privilege", he replied:
Possibly because all those verbs are descriptive, stating
ability or permission to report (picture theory of
language, Wittgenstein's TLP), while "honor" is part of the
sentence that is Speech Act per se ?
Yes, I have the courage to share my thoughts in the E_T
echo when I see that somebody out there wants to learn
more about my native language.
And I thank you therefor. Observe it cannot be "the
courage of sharing", for courage is a prerequisite for
the ability to share.
I have read recently that "I have the honor to report
that..." is incorrect and that one should say "I have
the honor of reporting that...":
Official committee reports in English of the Canadian
House of Commons all contain the phrase "Your Committee
has the honour to present its Xth Report". That should
of course be "the honour of presenting."
But why? It is the more difficult for me to understand
because in my naytive Russian the infinitive version is
only natural.
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