# EN: Do you mind me/my smoking



## balibamba

Hi everyone!
I'm studying the possessive ING form such as

Do you mind *my* smoking?

And I have a doubt
Could you help me?

I'm wondering if in this sentence we say *my* because to mind is a verb of thinking and so we can use both me and my in the sentence
or because the origin form of the sentence was "do you mind if I smoke?", I mean maybe it's the part of the sentence *if I smoke* that causes the possessive my

Thanks a lot!
Bye


----------



## cropje_jnr

There's a bit of a discussion on this here.

Basically you will commonly here all three of these:

_Do you mind my smoking?_
_Do you mind me smoking?_
_Do you mind if I smoke?_

Personally I would go for the latter in this situation, although I can't really explain why it sound better.

I don't think it's useful to search a clear grammatical explanation for choosing "my" or "me" in your construction - both feature in contemporary English and are chosen more or less on account of personal preference and tone ("my" often sounds slightly more formal).


----------



## geostan

While you hear both, and _me_ more frequently, grammatically _my_ is the correct form since an adjective is required to modify the gerund.


----------



## bloomiegirl

geostan said:


> While you hear both, and _me_ more frequently, grammatically _my_ is the correct form since an adjective is required to modify the gerund.


I agree completely and my ears hurt when I hear "me"+gerund used instead.


----------



## Todessprache

Le gerunde en francais? Comment dit on cela?


----------



## bloomiegirl

Je crois que c'est le gérondif en français.


----------



## Todessprache

bloomiegirl said:


> Je crois que c'est plutôt le en français.


 
Can't be because the gerund and the gerundive are separate grammatical entities. 

They stem from the Latin: gerundium and gerundivum. We don't have a gerundive in English; dixit urbem delendam esse: he said that the city must be destroyed. Maybe the French term it differently?


----------



## bloomiegirl

Todessprache said:


> Can't be because the gerund and the gerundive are separate grammatical entities.
> 
> They stem from the Latin: gerundium and gerundivum. We don't have a gerundive in English; dixit urbem delendam esse: he said that the city must be destroyed. Maybe the French term it differently?


Oh, but I wasn't referring to the Latin gerundive. I thought we were discussing the gerund as used in English (see definition 2 here). And I thought you were asking for the French term for that. 

I don't know the French term for the Latin gerundive, but you might open a thread in the French-English Vocabulary forum for it. (You're right, it is quite different from what is being discussed in this thread.)


----------



## Thomas1

Todessprache said:


> Le gerunde en francais? Comment dit on cela?


Je pense que «gerund» en français peut s'apeller "nom verbal".


As for the original question, I would opt for "my" if it appeared on a test.


----------



## sound shift

"Do you mind if I smoke?" - The question seeks permission. The person asking the question will only light a cigarette if permission (in the shape of "No, I don't mind" or "Go ahead" or similar) is given.

"Do you mind me/my smoking?" - The question is asked when the speaker is already smoking. It means "Do you dislike the fact that I am smoking now?"


----------



## josepeluco

geostan said:


> While you hear both, and _me_ more frequently, grammatically _my_ is the correct form since an adjective is required to modify the gerund.


 
Actually, both are correct.

In the case of "Do you mind me smoking?", "smoking" acts a participial adjective. It's just like saying "he saw me running down the street." "Running" is an adjective to modify "me" just as "smoking" is here. In "Do you mind my smoking?", it acts as a gerund.

I guess a really weird (and wrong) way to word it would be "Do you mind 'the smoking me'?" ... sounds very natural that way, doesn't it?


----------



## Thomas1

josepeluco said:


> Actually, both are correct.
> 
> In the case of "Do you mind me smoking?", "smoking" acts a participial adjective. It's just like saying "he saw me running down the street." "Running" is an adjective to modify "me" just as "smoking" is here. In "Do you mind my smoking?", it acts as a gerund.
> 
> I guess a really weird (and wrong) way to word it would be "Do you mind 'the smoking me'?" ... sounds very natural that way, doesn't it?


According to what you've written, the grammatical object would shift a bit and in turn the meaning may too:
Do you mind me smoking?
the object is me and smoking is an attendant activity. The person may mind that you smoke, but may not mind  that other people smoke at all.
Do you mind my smoking?
the object is smoking and my signals who's the performer.
It is rather clear that in most cases we mind smoking not a person.


----------



## bloomiegirl

Thomas1 said:


> [...]
> Do you mind me smoking?
> the object is me and smoking is an attendant activity. The person may mind that you smoke, but may not mind  that other people smoke at all. [...]


 Bingo. This is a grammar forum, where these distinctions matter.


----------



## geostan

bloomiegirl said:


> Je crois que c'est le gérondif en français.



Il ne faut pas confondre le gérondif français et le gerund anglais. Celui-ci partage les valeurs d'un verbe et d'un nom. Celui-là a une fonction adverbiale. Le gerund peut correspondre à un nom ou à un infinitif en français.


----------



## geostan

josepeluco said:


> Actually, both are correct.
> 
> In the case of "Do you mind me smoking?", "smoking" acts a participial adjective. It's just like saying "he saw me running down the street." "Running" is an adjective to modify "me" just as "smoking" is here. In "Do you mind my smoking?", it acts as a gerund.
> 
> I guess a really weird (and wrong) way to word it would be "Do you mind 'the smoking me'?" ... sounds very natural that way, doesn't it?



No, both are used, but both are not correct. 

_He saw me running down the street is correct_, but you cannot say _He saw my running down the street.

_It depends on the first verb. With verbs like seeing and hearing, the pronoun object followed by a form in ...ing (adjectival, participial) is normal. The same cannot be said of all verbs, even though it is commonly heard with other verbs.


----------



## bloomiegirl

geostan said:


> Il ne faut pas confondre le gérondif français et le gerund anglais. Celui-ci partage les valeurs d'un verbe et d'un nom. Celui-là a une fonction adverbiale. Le gerund peut correspondre à un nom ou à un infinitif en français.


Je crois qu'il est difficile de les confondre si on lit la définition dans le lien que j'ai fourni et que vous avez cité. En tout cas, "_gerund_" n'existe pas dans le TLFi. Mais on le trouve traduit par "gérondif" dans le dico WR et dans sensagent et dans le Collins Robert French Unabridged Dictionary (8th edition). Pourtant, nous nous écartons du sujet de ce fil, ce qui est un point de grammaire anglaise.


----------



## geostan

bloomiegirl said:


> Je crois qu'il est difficile de les confondre si on lit la définition dans le lien que j'ai fourni et que vous avez cité. En tout cas, "_gerund_" n'existe pas dans le TLFi. Mais on le trouve traduit par "gérondif" dans le dico WR et dans sensagent et dans le Collins Robert French Unabridged Dictionary (8th edition). Pourtant, nous nous écartons du sujet de ce fil, ce qui est un point de grammaire anglaise.



Le mot _gerund_ n'est pas dans le TLF parce que ce n'est pas français. Je l'ai écrit parce qu'on ne peut pas le dire autrement. C'est précisément pour cette raison que l'on confond les deux concepts. Malgré les sources que vous citez, on ne peut pas traduire _gerund_ par _gérondif_. Ce ne sont pas du tout la même chose.


----------

