Is the phrase “friend of mine” grammatically correct?
I started to wonder about this a few years ago, and now I wince whenever I hear this phrase. Why not just say “I went with a friend to the store”? What subtlety or nuance is added by saying “I went with a friend of mine etc.”?
It is certainly common, but is it correct?
I’m not 100% certain, but I think it’s correct unless there’s another pronoun form that’s more appropriate in the circumstances.
As far as what subtlety or nuance is added… well, ‘friend of mine’ answers the possible question, “Whose friend was he or she?” Obviously, that the speaker was referring to a friend of their own is the more obvious choice, but it could be talking about ‘a friend of yours’, ‘a friend of Jim’s,’ or ‘a friend of my dad’s.’
just mentioning ‘a friend’ is grammatically correct as well, but it gives slightly less information. Hope that helps.
Yes. It’s correct. Sometimes it’s necessary, and sometimes it’s not.
“My sister knows a lot of people. I met a friend of hers at the mall.”
Sometimes it’s just way to empasize the strength of the friendship.
“A friend came over to visit last night.”
vs.
“A friend of mine came over to visit last night.”
The second sentence expresses the friendship more.
If I say you’re a friend of mine, that means you’re connected. If I say you’re a friend of ours, that means you’re a made guy.
The OP is describing something referred to in linguistic circles as double genetive. Here is what I consider a good explanation of it (load the page and then search for double genetive):
[ul][li](HTML page) Rumjanceva_Kalnina_English Grammar_1[/li](PDF page) Rumjanceva_Kalnina_English Grammar_1[/ul]
As Paul Brians put it in Common Errors in English Usage, it also prevents someone from assuming that you only have one friend:
“I went to the store with my friend” versus “I went to the store with a friend of mine.”
I suppose I can see the fine point being made, but is that usually a problem in practice? Does “I have an appointment with my teacher tomorrow” suggest by default that I have only one teacher? Does “My finger hurts” imply I have only one finger? I’d be better advised to say “A finger of mine hurts” instead?
For “my house”, yes, you’d assume exactly one house until there’s a reason to believe otherwise, because few people have two or more. But I’d hope people wouldn’t assume the same thing for “my friend”. And if they did — well then, what’s wrong? Is it my breath? My underarms?
I’m sorry, I didn’t make that quite clear. Brians was mostly joking when he said that.
Thank you all for your responses. It is clear that it *is * correct, which is very good to know. For some reason the phrase still goes through me like a knife, however…
I know that contemporary advice on technical writing stresses the use of short, declarative sentences. I don’t always agree with or adhere to that philosophy. I consider it to be the “Hollywood” approach to writing; it assumes the lowest common denominator of intelligence and attention span with respect to one’s intended audience. Nevertheless, it seems to be the current thought with today’s readers.
And so it is curious to me that a longer phrase is more popular (at least it seems that way to me) than the shorter and almost equally descriptive phrase. The slight nuances that you have mentioned do make a case for both phrases, but I suspect “friend of mine” will be used even when “my friend” is more apt.
My error here was in thinking that the word “mine” was a carryover from a more archaic meaning or use of the word (“mother mine”, “enemy mine”), or else in connection with the word “own” (“a place of mine own”), and therefore was not appropriate in current writing and speech.
thanks to all,
plynck
Nuances of the language change over time. In German, “mein Freund” connotates something different from “mir Freund”, since German doesn’t distinguish between friend and boy/girlfriend.