27 may 2004

Language Log: Illustrating obligatory transitivity

Linguist Geoff Pullum believes that the verb "have" is one of the few verbs that are always transitive in the oligatory sense: that the object needs to be expressed (cannot be implicit). (Another one he gives is "keep.") I guess he's never heard the Billie Holiday song "God Bless the Child," which opens with the lines: "Them that's got shall have. / Them that's not shall lose. / So the Bible says / And it still is news."

I still haven't come up with a counter example for "keep."

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