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#20344 02/28/01 01:29 PM
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Double contractions like this don't occur in standard print. I do sometimes use it.

My rule of thumb is to do it if it's needed to show what I say. Written "I have" is pronounced as two distinct words: I don't read it as "I've". Nor do I read "do not" as "don't".

But given written "I'd have", I'd pronounce it as "I'd've", not (normally) with a distinct "have". So there's no need to supply the second contraction in writing, when the standard form "I'd have" is pronounced in the way you want.

That said, I've noticed my use of "I'd've" is increasing, when I'm writing more colloquially.

In the same way, I might write "Elizabeth'll do it", where in serious print you only get pronoun + contraction.


#20345 02/28/01 02:47 PM
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In formal writing, I do not use contractions at all.


#20346 02/28/01 02:53 PM
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In formal writing, I do not use contractions at all.

...whereas in formal contracts, most lawyers do not use writing at all (or not as we understand it, Jim!)


#20347 02/28/01 02:59 PM
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Oh they write all right. They write and write and write and write until the whole point is lost in a jumble of words so obscure that it is quite unintelligible to the average human being.


#20348 02/28/01 03:03 PM
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quite unintelligible to the average human being...

...requiring another lawyer to translate it for you... [$$$$$]


#20349 02/28/01 03:04 PM
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Well, if we just wrote it in plain English so everyone could understand it, we'd write ourselves right out of our jobs, now, wouldn't we? We're not as dumb as we look!


#20350 02/28/01 03:09 PM
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No wonder medical malpractice is such a killer in the States - just imagine all those doctors talking one language to all those lawyers talking another - and neither speaking English! hey, we need some Esperanto around here


#20351 02/28/01 05:21 PM
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I'm kinda partial to y'all'll


#20352 02/28/01 05:46 PM
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formal writing
I tend to agree, sort of. I view written English as different from spoken English, more formal. Hence, I use few contractions in writing, which means that my style, as people are always telling me, is stiff, pedantic, pretentious, elegant, old-fashioned, (choose one or more), depending on who is doing the telling. However, I have developed a new, freer style more like spoken English for e-mail and chat-room purposes, which I feel are supposed to be a sort of written conversation.


#20353 02/28/01 06:27 PM
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Or Y'all'll've


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