Annals of animals which get ‘who’

In a local newspaper some time ago I read about ‘dormice . . . who nest in shrubs and hedgerows’. The grammar of this phrase struck me enough to write a brief post on the different kinds of antecedent for which we use the relative pronouns who, that, and which.

When referring to animals we usually use that or which, reserving who for people, or entities that comprise people. But who may also be used for animate entities with personality or the implication thereof, and this includes non-human animals – even dormice, I was pleased to see.

As the table below shows, who is especially likely to be used with pets, companion animals, or domesticated or very familiar animals. If the creature has been personalized with a name or by establishing its sex, there’s a good chance it will warrant who.

I read a couple of nice examples recently in Claire Keegan’s short story ‘Men and Women’, from her debut collection Antarctica:

She watched the sudden, fast shadows of swallows who flew past her window in fleeting pairs, subtracting light from her room, and marvelled how living things could suspend themselves in mid-air.

I sit by the window and keep an eye on the sheep who stare, bewildered, from the car.

And two more in Luis Bunuel’s autobiography My Last Breath, translated by Abigail Israel:

At one time or another, we had monkeys, parakeets, falcons, frogs and toads, grass snakes, and a large African lizard who the cook killed with a poker in a moment of terror.

Luis also had a hatbox filled with tiny gray mice whom he allowed us to look at once a day

The second of these is from an article by Bunuel’s sister Conchita that was published in the French magazine Positif and reproduced in My Last Breath. Both pronoun choices can presumably be attributed to the translator. The inconsistency in selecting whom is a little curious too.

For a more thorough treatment of attitudes to the use of who with animals, see Gaëtanelle Gilquin and George M. Jacobs’ paper ‘Elephants Who Marry Mice are Very Unusual: The Use of the Relative Pronoun Who with Nonhuman Animals’. It opens with an interesting story about Jane Goodall’s research in Tanzania:

When Goodall submitted her first scientific paper for publication, it was returned to her by the editor to be amended. In every place where she had written (he) or (she) to refer to chimpanzees, the words had been replaced with (it). Similarly, every (who) had been replaced with (which). In an effort to rescue the chimpanzees from “thing-ness” and restore them to “being-ness,” Goodall stubbornly changed the words back.

Gilquin and Jacobs review dictionaries, grammars, style guides and the British National Corpus to examine attitudes towards the usage and to analyse its different motivations and contexts. This table is from their survey of the BNC and shows the degree of familiarity, intelligence, and perhaps other characteristics likely to earn an animal the privilege.

Update:

I’ve since come across many interesting examples of this broad phenomenon, including a dog being called a ‘person’, and who being applied to a tree, which may warrant another post on the topic.

Update to the update:

It took me 10 years, but here’s the post: ‘A list of animals who’.

#anaphora #animals #grammar #JaneGoodall #language #LuisBuñuel #nature #pronouns #relativePronouns #that #usage #which #who

And all this time the side doors unlocked

Romanticism 101
Dean Young

#Poetry #DeanYoung #Romanticism #Repetition #Anaphora #Texas #Rockabilly

https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poetrymagazine/poems/57049/romanticism-101

Word Search Puzzle 918

Word List : #preciso #proser #knarl #anaphora #lorius #darting #hortulan #awakens #babajaga #furor #dozent #frettier #dauted #abbey #tobymen #huffily #binous #ollav

http://karafinance.com/2024/02/28/word-search-puzzle-918/

We know this might have been a better prompt for Groundhog Day at the beginning of the month, but your fourth and final lycial challenge for FAWM 2024 is: ANAPHORA (or REPETITION).

Repeat a word or phrase at the start of successive lines (or song parts) for emphasis. Examples: "Ain't Got No" (Hair), "Ima Be" (Black Eyed Peas), "Suddenly I See" (KT Tunstall), "Add It Up" (Violent Femmes)

Happy fawming!

#fawm #fawm2024 #lyrics #lyricchallenge #anaphora #repetition