Was taught in grammar school that this was taboo (1950's, South Africa). Today the split infinitive seems to be the standard in the USA.
Changing standard? It's always even that way in the US? What is the standard in England today?
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Would you mind adding examples to your question? – jera Jan 08 '16 at 12:59
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4See related threads, Are split infinitives grammatically incorrect, or are they valid constructs?, Is using split infinitive allowed in formal English?, Split infinitives—did Old English have them?, – Kyle Jan 08 '16 at 13:01
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and Why is the usage of split infinitives so controversial?. – Kyle Jan 08 '16 at 13:03
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Infinitives in Old English were single words so the issue did not arise. – mikeagg Jan 08 '16 at 13:29
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@mikeagg Got a reference for that? This page indicates that Old English had tō infinitives. – curiousdannii Jan 08 '16 at 14:21
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I suspect many school shibboleths originated as good writing advice: splitting an infinitive can lead to ambiguity; the active voice can be stronger than the passive voice; a sentence can be better worded when it does not start with a conjunction. It may be the case particularly with unskilled or novice writers. But that never made all instances substandard; George Eliot ends sentences with prepositions, Shakespeare used the singular they, and so on. – choster Jan 08 '16 at 16:00
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Split infinitives are rather like parallel fifths in composing - a matter of aesthetics. – Dan Jan 08 '16 at 14:01
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I'm voting to close this question as off-topic because it's so old it makes the pyramids look brand new. – michael_timofeev Jan 08 '16 at 16:33
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Many argue that there may be changing standards in regard to split infinitives. Standards in the UK and USA may be changing at different rates. Yet Michael votes "to close this question". Makes no sense to me – Alan Pinshaw Jan 09 '16 at 13:56
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@curiousdannii I was wrong there. I misunderstood what Tom Chivers was saying in his excellent article on split infinitives. – mikeagg Jan 11 '16 at 08:25
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In fact, there was never a time that split infinitives were not used. But some pedants invented the rule anyway, reasoning that English grammar should be more like that ideal of ideals, Latin grammar. (In Latin, an infinitive is a single word, so of course one cannot split it.)
GEdgar
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Language evolves. There used to be a rule against it, but now we're allowed to boldly go where no one has gone before.
Matt
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