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This is NOT using sleep as the subject of the verb deprive. Sleep-deprived is an adjective.



I never said it was the subject of a verb. I said it was a noun being used adverbially.

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I am always surprised when I see the lengths to which descriptivists will go to say that something that is so plainly wrong might possibly be correct.

TEd



Nobody ever said it was easy being a descriptivist. We have to look at actual usage and work out the rules our own se'ves. We don't get no book with no easily memorized rules that we proceed to apply willy-nilly to any usage that happens to set our poor teeth on edge. And we don't have to say that it is correct; the fact of its being used and understood is proof enough. What we go to great lengths to show is how it came to be.