[citation needed]
I can't find anything on this. It sounds like a stylistic rule that people have misinterpreted to be a syntactical rule, like ending sentences with prepositions.

umm.. it's possible. I just seem to remember that being a rule. Don't have a proof.

Here's a reference, that partially agrees with me. Says that "I" always comes last, but doesn't say anything about "me" so maybe "me and Bob " can be correct, but "I and Bob" is definitely wrong.

[quote=above link]In a compound subject in which one of the pronouns is “I,” I always comes last.[/quote]

Yeah... "I and Bob" is actually wrong as a description of any register of English. The default first person singular pronoun is "me," unless case is assigned to it by being in a special syntactic relationship with some other element of the sentence. The only way it gets assigned nominative case is by being right next to the verb assigning case, which is why "Bob and I danced" works whereas "I and Bob danced" does not. It also explains why "Me and Bob danced" is grammatical (i.e. used by native English speakers)--even though it's denigrated stylistically in educated formal English--whereas "Bob and me danced" is awful.

(This also serves as an interesting counter-example to Chomskyan tree-branching models of syntax, which insist that both noun phrases in "X and Y did Z" ought to stand in the same syntactic relationship to the verb... although clearly they don't in this case.)

An interesting counterpoint to consider, though, is which of the following options actually sound grammatical:


"I just got done talking to Mary. Us and John are going to see Avatar tonight."

"I just got done talking to Mary. We and John are going to see..."

"I just got done talking to Mary. John and we are going to see..."

"I just got done talking to Mary. John and us are going to see..."


To my ear, the one that formal English ought to insist on ("John and we") actually sounds by far the worst.

That's poor sentence structure. Instead use something less awkward. "I just got done talking to Mary. She, John, and I are going to see Avatar tonight." or "She and I are going to see Avatar with John tonight."

Also, you're wrong about "Bob and me danced." That's NOT correct, because you are trying to use an objective pronoun when you should be using a subjective pronoun.

Where's Chewie when you need him?

"Awkward" is a stylistic judgment, not a grammatical one. Of course I'd never write a sentence like that in a formal context, but it's an interesting thought experiment in armchair linguistics (which, to be honest, is what most linguistics is, unless you're in computational or neuro-).

And, actually, I was asserting that 'Me and Bob...' is grammatical, not 'Bob and me'. I mean "grammatical" in the sense that linguists mean (see prescriptivism vs. descriptivism). Anybody who's made it through 2nd grade knows that "Me and Bob..." is frowned on by the arbiters of the English language, but that doesn't have anything to do with grammar per se.

This blog is a goldmine.

True. I'm just commenting that one would be unlikely to use the examples you provided in any context due to the "awkwardness" regardless of the grammatical correctness.

Oh, excuse me for misunderstanding. However, it is incorrect either way. In "Me and Bob danced" or "Bob and me danced", "Bob and me" or "Me and Bob" is the subject, but "me" is the objective form of the pronoun "I", so cannot be used in a subject. Thus, substitution must be made; "Bob and I danced." or "I and Bob danced." Now we're working with the correct form of the pronoun. But, as we already established, the pronoun "I" cannot come before a proper noun, so "I and Bob danced" is out of the picture, leaving "Bob and I danced" as the ONLY available CORRECT answer.

Ok. I'll rephrase: When you say "correct," I ask "Correct by what standard?"

How about correct means, you don't look like an idiot?

Good question. Obviously there are institutions that print publications with grammar "rules" (MLA for example), but where do they get the rules from? I guess ultimately what's right is up to whoever has the means to make their opinion heard.

http://ezinearticles.com/?Who-Decides-Who-Makes-English-Grammar-Rules?&id=3882964

Right... so when you say "This is correct," you mean "I do it because other people tell me to." That's fine--I write the way people expect me to, as well, when my livelihood's on the line--but let's not confuse arbitrary convention (restricted to particular social situations) with an actual description of how the language works. Many people, for example, say "ain't." You can say, "That word isn't correct English".... which is true, insofar as you mean "That word isn't approved by most stylistic authorities." You can't say, "That word isn't correct English" in the sense that "That word isn't part of the English language," because people's usage proves you wrong on that point day after day.

So if we're going to accept that "correct" is really just a euphemism for "authority-approved," then we can stop offering linguistic-y justifications for what is correct, and accept that "correct" just means "follows the arbitrary rule." I'm sure some authority somewhere was that "I" can't precede proper nouns in conjunction, but let's not fool ourselves that that has anything to do with linguistics (i.e. 'grammar').

You guys must be awesome fun at parties

lol.

Anyway, I'm totally with you Vorn. Thus my earlier examples about using "alot" instead of "a lot" and typing without capitalization. Often times rules exist to be broken when it comes to creative writing. In fact, I wrote a poem in college called "Odd Shaped Tears" where I actually italicized the first letter of each line... Why? Because I felt like it was appropriate for the poem.

But,, I believe that a good writer knows what the rules are and breaks them deliberately to achieve a specific effect. If they do it out of ignorance, then they don't belong in the writing community.

Sure; I can agree with that.

grammer r good?

All of the sentences that featured "Bob and me" sounded awkward and wrong in my head.
Not that it irks me like "alot" or anything like that.

Do you mean "orphan", as one who has lost their parents, or "often" frequently?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ovLS9mEA7IM#t=00m16s ?