What if you’re a pirate?
The arguments from ambiguity are always a little silly. What exactly is the ambiguity that the native speakers of “Who is you?” might suffer when they hear that construction? And how does the grammar you advocate as replacement remove the possibility of ambiguity?
A sentence can be perfectly grammatical and still ambiguous (“I saw her duck”), or thoroughly unambiguous despite being ungrammatical (“Please, bathroom where to the can find I would like some?”). The two are orthogonal matters.
I would submit that your second example is extremely ambiguous.
Also, I’m not talking about the native speakers of “Who is you?”. I know the Amish understand one another perfectly. I’m talking about everyone else.
Quite possibly, yes.
A “sizeable minority”, though, might include the majority of speakers in just one area, or from just one culture of speakers, in which case it would be more precise to label the usage as a regional or dialectical variation. For example, AAVE has conjugations of “to be” that are actually subtler and convey more meaning than standard English, but despite that linguistic sophistication, there’s no one who really considers these forms “acceptable” for the evening news.
But if your sizeable minority is a significant section of a nation’s population while also covering most or all of the geographical region of that nation, then there is no reason left not to consider it an acceptable alternative, at least in certain contexts. It might be standard informal English. What’s more, your hypothetical itself leaves open the possibility for more grammatical meaning to be conveyed. Your conjugation of “is” might become a special exception to normal conjugation rules when asking who someone is in the second-person. “Are” could possibly continue to be used with “you” if the speaker is not inquiring into the identity of the person they’re talking with. When you start thinking about it, who knows what sorts of interesting semiotic developments might come from that strange conjugation? But the underlying point stands: If enough English speakers say it, then it’s English. Simple as that.
There is simply no other way to determine the correctness conditions of a language. Otherwise you’re stuck with the ludicrous position that the English language is something different than how English speakers speak. And as soon as you allow that gap, then you’ve left the realm of reality and are stuck with various prescriptivist schools bickering with each other about what’s “correct” with no objective way to determine who’s right and who’s wrong. In such an insane environment, I could quite easily claim that “correct” English is what Chaucer spoke, and so no living English speaker speaks English correctly.
Such a conclusion would be, quite frankly, stupid. Our language has rules, as is clear from any objective study. The rules of our language can change, as is also clear from study. So English is just fine, even though it isn’t the way it was centuries ago, and English will be just fine in the future, even though it won’t be the way it is today. “Who is you?” might eventually become a real English sentence, and gathering a sizeable minority of speakers would be an essential step in the process, though there are, of course, a few other considerations.
To return to the fighting ignorant’s question again: Both options are correct, and I highly recommend that you refer to the Merriam-Webster Dictionary of English Usage’s entry “Possessive with Gerund” to see a thorough analysis of both the construction and its history, including an overview of the long contentious commentary about it.
I find it strange that some people think both sentences sound wrong. A native speaker’s best tool is usually their own ear, so recasting is a perfectly appropriate option, but it simply isn’t necessarily. Both are correct. RealityChuck’s post, though, is well worth a second read for anyone interested in teasing out the difference in emphasis.
On preview I see that the time I was distracted by a student was enough for the real expert to step in. I’m not wasting this post, though. Y’all are gonna hafta page down if you want to avoid it.
No, as was said, the code does not have to be enforced. This can probably best be seen by the fact that those rules which are most ardently and passionately defended are mostly made up nonsense.
Now you’re stretching. Dude wants to take a piss, needs to know where. Probably drunk, definitely not a native speaker.
If it helps, imagine him holding his crotch with his hands and crossing his legs together while standing. No ambiguity there at all.
Well, if you say so, but I think you can accept that we could make an example to fit the bill. How about “Where the is bathroom? Pee have to I”. Short, simple, ungrammatical, and I, at least, would have no trouble achieving confidence in what a speaker who says this is trying to communicate. (I’d have had no trouble with the previous version, as well, but maybe I just have great people skills…)
Well, if you want to argue that the constructions of Dialect X do not conform to the rules of Dialect Y, go right ahead. But this is as significant an observation as that Frenchmen don’t speak proper Chinese.
If people are allowed to say “Aren’t I?” they should be allowed to say “Is you?”.
Certainly not; it was quite good. I should say, though, that I’m no more of an expert than you; I’m not a professional linguist or anything, just someone with strong interest in the area.