Definition:
The case or function of a pronoun when it is the direct or indirect object of a verb or verbal, the object of a preposition, the subject of an infinitive, or an appositive to an object. The objective (or accusative) forms of English pronouns are me, us, you, him, her, it, them, whom and whomever. See also:
Examples and Observations:
- "To know her was to love her."
(Samuel Rogers) - "That which does not kill us makes us stronger."
(Friedrich Nietzsche) - "The strongest influences in my life and my work are always whomever I love. Whomever I love and am with most of the time, or whomever I remember most vividly. I think that's true of everyone, don't you?"
(Tennessee Williams) - "Give my regards to Broadway,
Remember me to Herald Square . . .."
(George M. Cohan) - "When she asked him about birth control, he sat down beside her and talked for half an hour about what a great woman Margaret Sanger was and how birth control was the greatest single blessing to mankind since the invention of fire."
(John Dos Passos) - "In Present-day English the contrast between nominative [subjective] and accusative [objective] is found with only a handful of pronouns. At earlier stages of the language the contrast applied to the whole class of nouns but the inflectional distinction has been lost except for these few pronouns."
(Rodney Huddleston and Geoffrey K. Pullum, The Cambridge Grammar of the English Language. Cambridge Univ. Press, 2002) - "The man for whom time stretches out painfully is one waiting in vain, disappointed at not finding tomorrow already continuing yesterday."
(Theodor Adorno) - "And I think both the left and the right should celebrate people who have different opinions, and disagree with them, and argue with them, and differ with them, but don't just try to shut them up."
(Roger Ebert)
Pronunciation: ob-JEK-tiv case
Also Known As: accusative case
