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•starts waving my hand faster•

is it idiomatic to use third person singular form when there is first person determiner, my?

I've often seen these constructions in text messages like

•waves hello•

•gives shy look•

but starts waving my hand has first person determiner so I was wondering if it's alright?

Similar question- When -s is used with third person singular. What's its use in this context?

SamBC
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    No - it's not idiomatic. Note that examples like waves hello or gives shy look are reduced versions of full sentences from which the verb subject has been "deleted". In standard imperatives such as Come here! the implied subject is you. In your (non-standard, deliberately "quirky") examples the implied subject is he. Which is incompatible with a first person possessive determiner. You'd have to say starts waving his hand faster - or more naturally, simply discard the awkward determiner: starts waving hand faster. – FumbleFingers Apr 17 '19 at 13:04
  • No. In text messages people often talk in Astericks as if they were scripts. And they deliberately leave out the subject and use third person. For example I sent hi to my friend. He replied, •waves hello• See. He was the one who waved hello not some third person. –  Apr 17 '19 at 13:14
  • I know the grammar rules which is why I chose the tag informal language –  Apr 17 '19 at 13:15
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    I know the grammar rules too! The usage you're asking about is deliberately quirky / facetious (imitating stage directions, sports commentary, etc.). To repeat - syntactically, the missing but implied subject is always *he* - so if you're going to attach a possessive / reflexive element, it has to be compatible: Rolls on the floor laughing his* ass off, for example. This style is often imitated by non-native speakers, so you might occasionally see Rolls on the floor laughing my ass off*, but more often than not that would be from an nns or a "not-very-careful" native speaker. – FumbleFingers Apr 17 '19 at 13:22
  • https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=asterisk+action&=true –  Apr 17 '19 at 13:25
  • What are you trying to tell me? I'm a competent native speaker telling you what's "natural" for Anglophones. Are you trying to argue with me? – FumbleFingers Apr 17 '19 at 13:28
  • No. I'm just trying to prove my point. The missing subject can't be he. When the person you're talking to is the one who is doing it. Did you even bother to look at my example? –  Apr 17 '19 at 13:30
  • You don't really have a point! You are simply mistaken! – FumbleFingers Apr 17 '19 at 13:30
  • how about leaving out the determiner? then it wouldn't lead to ambiguity. –  Apr 17 '19 at 13:32
  • - that's what I suggested in my first comment! But idiomatically that doesn't really work with . – FumbleFingers Apr 17 '19 at 13:35
  • but why would someone say •laughs his ass off• I'd rather drop the astericks and say •laugh my ass off• –  Apr 17 '19 at 13:39
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    Note that this is nothing to do with "ambiguity". It's obvious who the unspecified subject is (the speaker / writer). All we're concerned with here is how far you can stretch the rules of standard grammar before they "break" (become completely unacceptable, even in informal contexts). Mixing a first person determiner with a syntactically implied third person subject is beyond the pale for the average Anglophone. – FumbleFingers Apr 17 '19 at 13:41
  • ...also note that it's not idiomatic in such contexts to say *Laugh my ass off, whether or not you explicitly precede it by the first person singular pronoun. But you will sometimes encounter the continuous verb form with a deleted subject: Laughing my ass off, which is perfectly acceptable so far as basic syntactic agreement* is concerned. – FumbleFingers Apr 17 '19 at 13:44
  • so even if the speaker uses the 3rd person determiner here . it's clear that it's the speaker doing it not some third person unless he explicitly mentions it. –  Apr 17 '19 at 13:46
  • @fumblefingers ? –  Apr 17 '19 at 13:59
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    It's always contextually clear that any text presented as per the first word in this comment *refers to the speaker/writer* (there is never any ambiguity on that point). We're not talking about making the meaning clear - we're simply talking about how far you can break the basic rules of English in an informal jocular usage like that. And as a rule of thumb, you can't break them so far as to create an overt clash between implied subject *he* and possessive determiner *my*. – FumbleFingers Apr 17 '19 at 14:06
  • yes. even I was dubious about this clash of he with my. which is why I asked the question. Thank you very much :) and sorry for the argument xD –  Apr 17 '19 at 14:11
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    You're welcome. I hope things are clearer to you now. SamBC's answer below is perfectly accurate, except that it's more a matter of opinion whether anyone particularly "cares" (or even notices) such clashes in informal contexts. Perhaps some people would be more "forgiving, tolerant" than me. – FumbleFingers Apr 17 '19 at 14:12
  • Yes there are xD. –  Apr 17 '19 at 14:23

1 Answers1

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In these third person actions, however delimited, if one is being consistent one would keep it in the third person.

However, the whole practice of such actions, in asterisks or whatever, is non-standard and very informal, so trying to apply rigorous rules to it is somewhat pointless.

I, personally, would consider your first example wrong. It should be his (or her) hand, or just lose the determiner because it's already clipped speech - starts waving hand. But in that sort of informal milieu, who cares?

SamBC
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