English - 'a whole nother'

[Cainntear]

Well yes, but I think it is the defender doing that. As if without this etymology it is just another linguistic fail. Rather than celebrating vernaculars on their own terms.

Exactly. The defender is trying to make justifications for why they're superior rather than simply accepting that no-one is superior.

[AvidLearner#]

Hello to all!

1. I found a whole other universe.
2. I found a whole 'nother universe.

Are #1 and #2 both correct, and do they both mean that I found an entirely separate universe?

3. After donning the gloves, remove any powder by thoroughly wiping them with a sterile wet sponge, a sterile wet towel, or another effective method.

4. After donning the gloves, remove any powder by thoroughly wiping them with a sterile wet sponge, sterile wet towel, or other effective method.

Are #3 and #4 both correct? I've bolded the parts where the two versions differ.

Thanks in advance.

[Le Baron]

#2 is informal speech.

#3 and #4 are both 'correct', but 4 is what you would likely read in instructions, whereas 3 is what you would probably hear someone say. Or perhaps 'some other' effective method'.

[AvidLearner#]

Thanks for the response, Le Baron.

#2 is informal speech.

I heard #2 in a song, and the way it was constructed seemed weird to me. I completely forgot about it, but then I saw this thread, and it reminded me of the construction.

#3 and #4 are both 'correct', but 4 is what you would likely read in instructions, whereas 3 is what you would probably hear someone say. Or perhaps 'some other' effective method'.

You're right. Version #4 is what was written on the envelope in which the gloves were sealed. Version #3 was what immediately came to mind as an alternative to #4.

In Russian, "other" and "another" translate to the same word, which is why I was confused.

[Dragon27]

Not even this:

Yes, I read that, I just didn't quite get the claim itself (that the word "nother" in "a whole nother" etymologically developed from a separate word "nother", that, presumably, had a different etymological origin?).

edit:
I think I get it now - you say that the phrase "a whole nother" appeared independently as an insertion of "whole" in "another", and the word "nother" that split off from "another" had its own separate history.

[Cainntear]

1. I found a whole other universe.
2. I found a whole 'nother universe.

I personally don't think 1 is likely. It might seem to follow the rules, but I don't feel it would be likely to ever be said, because using other as an adjective feels kind of... non-specific...? It kind of loses force, and w doesn't clarify what you are saying. It just feels like maybe "new" or "different" expresses more meaning -- "other" just doesn't feel like it is clear on the distinctive nature of this universe. "A whole nother" kind of has a lot of emotional force, and that to me intuitively feels like the same force of fan-fucking-tastic (I always was in the side of the tmesis explanation in theory, but now I can now argue why I think that's true!) It's the expression of emotional force and surprise that conveys the different-ness of it rather than the words used -- "a whole nother" derives its meaning for this, and not the constituent words.

[księżycowy]

I'd personally say that #1 would be natural. There are many times I've both said and heard "a whole other X". And out of the proposed options, I'd prefer it to #2, as it seems more neutral.

I think I'd broadly agree with Cainntear about the emotional impact of "nother". It would strike me as emphatic for sure, in addition to being slangy.

[Cainntear]

I'd personally say that #1 would be natural. There are many times I've both said and heard "a whole other X". And out of the proposed options, I'd prefer it to #2, as it seems more neutral.

I think I'd broadly agree with Cainntear about the emotional impact of "nother". It would strike me as emphatic for sure, in addition to being slangy.

What I should have said in my previous post is that I suspect purple who would say "a whole nother" are likely to make an attempted correction when writing.and therefore write "a whole other" where they would say "a while nother" normally.

To me, this is similar to how someone who says "I should've" will attempt to make their writing more formal by eliminating the contraction, but ends up writing "*should of" instead of "should have".

The question of when it becomes "real" language rather than a hypercorrection* is really pretty subjective, but my understanding is that linguists looking to prove out disprove "a whole other" would be looking for it in a corpus of casual spoken speech. If it's rare, it's probably a conscious hypercorrection of "a while nother"; if it's common, it's real language (regardless of whether or not it stated it as a hypercorrection).

* a hypercorrection is when someone tries to correct something that isn't wrong because they're trained to expect an error.

Eg
A: Who did you meet?
B:...whom, you mean.
A: Who did you get that from?
B: whom!!
A: *Whom told you that?

B attempted to correct, assuming that three archaic rule was more correct than modern Modern English. A ikebana the correction as whom being correct everywhere, and attempted to correct their own "who told you that" without considering the subject/object distinction because most speakers don't think about that now...