Question:
Could anyone solve mid-aged Japanese ESL learner's problem?
I'm afraid this can be nonsense for native speakers. However, I'm puzzled
about usage of wards "so" and "niether", in sense of "also" especially
structure.
The examples, one dictionary shows, are following:
"So am I."
"Neither can I."
These sentences seem to me curious. And I'm confused.
How can such a word order come? I have no idiea what is the subject.
"I am so." or "So I am." can ease me.
Or, that kind of stuff?
Answer:
What an interesting question. I think it must be one more of those
idioms that native speakers accept without thinking.
It works with other verbs:
So will I.
So does he.
But it doesn't work with, say, adjectives or nouns:
*Tired am I.
*President is he.
I notice that this construction emphasizes the last word. "So does HE."
"I voted for Al Gore."
"So did *I*."
The implication is "you are not the only one."
My guess is that you've studied enough English to know that we use
inverted word order for a few special purposes, mostly poetical and
archaic. Probably this is some surviving remnant from an earlier age.
You don't ask what it means, so I assume that is not the problem.
I wonder if this is one of those word-order questions John Lawler
addresses at his website.
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