[Magdalen] Grammar Nightmare.

[Scott Knitter]

It's a case marker, fully standard and required in German but seems like a bit of a remnant in English...although I do use it unless it seems precious (Whom ya gonna call? Grammar busters!).

In German, "wer" is "who," and it must change to "wen" for a direct object (accusative case) or "wem" for an indirect object (dative case). German's four cases are alive and allow for lots of flexibility in the order of phrases in a sentence...you can twist a sentence around any which way for shades of emphasis or dramatic or comedic timing, and it still makes sense because you have the case markers to guide you as you read or listen.

English is slightly less flexible that way, but omitting the case marker doesn't generally lead to a lot of confusion. The common case errors like "Him and me are going fishing" still get their meaning across albeit with an air of rusticity. :)

Sent from my iPad

> On Jul 8, 2015, at 9:16 PM, James Oppenheimer-Crawford <oppenheimerjw at gmail.com> wrote:
> 
> I think it's fair to say that two things have nailed the coffin on this
> who/whom trivia.
> 
> 1. You can barely tell the two apart in a sentence.
> 
> 2. Using the incorrect form makes absolutely no difference in the meaning
> or clarity of the sentence.
> 
> Pointless.