"yes the king of the beavers / you cannot deceive us / and you can't fool owls"

[larryhammer]

So there's this the odd linguistic feature of English pronouns in compound subjects where they switch between nominative and objective forms depending on the order. That is, "Me and Julio were down by the schoolyard" sounds entirely correct even though technically it should be "I and Julio" -- which actually sounds so stiff it feels actively wrong -- but in the reverse form, it's "Julio and I were down by the schoolyard" that sounds correct ("Julio and me" sounds acceptable as a colloquialism but to be avoided when speaking in formal registers).

Does anyone know the name for this?

---L.

Subject quote from "Owls," Weebl.

Comments

[thistleingrey.livejournal.com]

+1 re: the order (ETA that is, I was taught it thus). "Me and Julio" sounds flat wrong to me, though I know people say it.