A Question About Quantifier Shift for "each of you" to "you each"

I understand from reading similar posts on this topic that if I want to write a sentence using "each of you," I should follow this with a singular verb. So, for example, "Each of you has given your all this year" is correct, and "Each of you have given your all this year" is incorrect.

If I'm right on this point, could someone explain how the quantifier shift would work if I wanted to rewrite the sentence beginning "You each"?

To my ear, "You each have given your all this year" sounds correct, and "You each has given your all this year" sounds horrible and wrong.

But is it wrong? If so, why is it wrong?

Solution 1:

The fact that you can't always tell whether the subject of a sentence is singular or plural isn't your fault. It's English itself that doesn't make this clear. In a noun phrase of the form "each of [NP Noun ... ]", you could count either the "each" as the head of the entire noun phrase, or you could consider "each" to be a quantifier/determiner/article element and take the noun after the "of" to be the head.

If "each" is quantifier, then the grammatical number of the following head noun, which will be plural when there is an "of", will determine the number of the entire subject, and we'll get "Each of you have left". But if "each" is taken to be the head noun or pronoun of the subject noun phrase, since it appears to be singular, the entire subject will be considered singular. Then we'll get "Each of you has left".

The fact that "each" is subject to a transformation called Quantifier Float, which gives "You have each left", is sometimes taken as evidence that it should be "Each of you have left", the reasoning being that if "each" is a quantifier, it can't also be a noun or pronoun, so the plural "you" must be the real head noun. But that's not very good reasoning. Just because when "each" was converted into an adverb, the "you" graduated to become subject, that doesn't mean "you" was subject before the "each" was moved. It doesn't follow.

So there is no real answer to the question of how the verb should agree except to appeal to people's opinions. Take a vote, consult an authority, toss a coin. Whatever.

Above, I said 'the "you" graduated to become subject' in "You have each left". So it must be the head, because it's the only noun there in the subject. In "You each have left", I think we can also conclude that "you" is head of the subject, either because the "each" is an adverb and not within the subject, or if it is, it would have to be an adjective modifying "you" (English does not permit NP containing just two Ns). So, assuming that the verb will agree in number with the head of its subject noun phrase, we would expect the verb to agree with logically plural "you" when "each" has been floated.

Solution 2:

I am going to take a stab at it. I don't think the matter is entirely opinion, but "what sounds right" is certainly personal. To answer the question, though, I will use equal parts grammar and instinct. One problem is that English words don't, on their own, contain as much information as words in other languages, so it can be difficult to parse the relationships among them, and sometimes the "rules" are (or appear to be) arbitrary.

In "Each of you has given your all" the subject of "has" is "each", a third person singular pronoun. This is a possessive with an objective relationship, like "fear of death" (though you wouldn't write death's fear to convey that same meaning any more than you would write you's each, but it at least makes the grammatical point clear to think of it that way in your head).

In "You each have given your all" the subject of "have" is "you", a second person singular pronoun, whereas "each" in this case modifies you as an adverb, which clarifies that "you" isn't singular or, at least, places some emphasis (redundant, depending on the context) on the individual achievement of each member of the group if "you" in this case is second person plural.

Ambiguity sets in, however, if you think "each" in the second case might be an indirect object, which would then be equivalent to "You have given your all to each (one)." Likewise, you could rewrite your example: "You have given, each (of you), your all." Neither may be likely, but they're not impossible, and it's just to illustrate how word order has something to do with how you parse these phrases. Some sentences are more correct-looking than others, or more common, but others are deliberately rhetorical if not archaic ("wrong" is probably too judgmental unless the meaning is unclear or not intentionally ambiguous or elliptical, as often occurs in poetry, for example).

I think the simplest explanation, though, is the subject-verb one. Each is third person singular, you is second person (s. or p. doesn't matter):

I have

you have

he/she/it has

Solution 3:

In the statements starting with "Each of you", the subject is "Each", making it a pronoun, and singular.

In statements starting with "You each", the subject is no longer "Each", but instead the subject is "You", making "each" an adjective. And "you" is plural. So, it makes sense to say "You have" and not "You has".

As if that wasn't fun enough, there is a second adjective use case. When the noun follows the word "each", the noun it is modifying must always be singular. Such as "Each dog".

edit

Upon further thinking... in the statement "each of you" could be a pronoun or adjective. As in. "Each had a great idea" (the pronoun) or "Each person has a great idea" (the adjective)