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I thought I knew it all when it comes to I and me, but on this one I did a double take.

On a photograph caption, a facebook post, my friend wrote "my son and I at the party". It didn't have a verb, and it didn't need one, it was just a description. If it had been "my son and I ARE at the party" I would be happy with I not me, but why am I not happy when the sentence doesn't have that verb?

I also posted a photo of my son and me, and I wrote simply "my son and me having fun" - not "my son and me ARE having fun", which I know would definitely be me not I ! (right?)

If the sons weren't in the photo, I would have thought it would be "Me at the party" and "me having fun".

I'd love to know the rule to be able to explain this!

Thank you :-)

As a note, we're all British.

Katie
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  • My son and I having fun. is right for a photo caption. British or not, it's the same thing. The answer to this question depends on whether you are looking to be U or non-U. – Lambie Oct 25 '21 at 14:23
  • My son and I having fun. is right for a photo caption. Really? So I having fun would be right if my son were not in the photo? I suppose this marks me out as so non-U I don't know how U speak or write English! – High Performance Mark Oct 25 '21 at 15:20
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    Does this answer your question? Photo caption – me or I? (actually closed as a duplicate of [Should I put myself last? "me and my friends" vs. "my friends and me" or "my friends and I"])(https://english.stackexchange.com/questions/1133/should-i-put-myself-last-me-and-my-friends-vs-my-friends-and-me-or-my-fri) – Edwin Ashworth Oct 25 '21 at 15:21
  • @Lambie Thanks for the reminder, I should expand my answer to address commonality of usage and why the friend used "I." – Andy Bonner Oct 25 '21 at 15:25
  • @EdwinAshworth Wow. Yes, this is a carbon copy of that question. Though I feel that the "source question" ("Should I put myself last...") got co-opted away from its original point about pronoun order. (Also, I don't much care for the answers to the closed question, all of which talk about usage in full sentences...) Hrm. – Andy Bonner Oct 25 '21 at 15:32
  • @HighPerformanceMark The OP said that both of them are in the picture. Captions used shortened forms. My son and I [are] having fun [in that photograph]. "My son and me [are having] fun [in that photograph]. I'll leave you to guess the registers. {The OP said she is British. I reckon she knows what I meant]. – Lambie Oct 25 '21 at 15:54
  • This is not a duplicate. The other question does not contain a verb phrase. – Lambie Oct 25 '21 at 15:56
  • @Lambie The answers are the same: None of 'My son and I/me' // 'I/Me and my son' // 'My son and I/me at the seaside' // 'My son and I/me watching dolphins' // 'My son and I/me seated on a bench' are sentential, and the grammar must be chosen by idiomaticity and perhaps a component of likely full sentences ('This picture shows my son and me seated on a bench' ? // ''My son and I were seated on a bench when this picture was taken'?) Unless it sounds awful, the objective choice is the default. – Edwin Ashworth Oct 25 '21 at 16:20
  • @EdwinAshworth I disagree and have shown why. "My son and I are having fun in the picture" is simply not: "My son and me are having fun in the picture". The difference is register. Why do I have to repeat that? Why isn't that obvious? How are either of those not idiomatic or "sentential"? Emily hasn't been seen for week. "I've been to see the Queen, she says my hands are perfectly clean". Maybe Emily should ask the Queen about register. – Lambie Oct 25 '21 at 16:27
  • @Lambie 'My son and I/me are having fun in the picture' are simply two reasonable guess at an original sentence. 'This is my son and me having fun' is by no means impossible. //// 'My son and I photographed at the party' would sound hypercorrective rather than formal to my ears. – Edwin Ashworth Oct 25 '21 at 16:40
  • @EdwinAshworth There's nothing like making a point three times: This is my son and I [verb] is not: This is my son and me [verb]. The difference is register. – Lambie Oct 25 '21 at 16:53

2 Answers2

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How about: forget all the qualifiers, what if you just take a self-portrait and title it "I"? What about "Me"? (What about I, Robot? I, Claudius?) I think, the latter usage aside, the point is that a work of visual art in particular is understood to be quite literally an object (an "art object"), and the pronoun should be accusative (me). I would suggest that the implied sentence is "This is a picture of ___." (In a bit of a syntactical nightmare, we call the thing objectified "the subject," but ignore that. :-) )

Andy Bonner
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  • Updated to highlight that it should be "me." (So... what about "I, Robot"? Maybe I should post that as its own question. I feel like it gets to be its own exception because... because... darn, I really don't have a good justification for why.) – Andy Bonner Oct 25 '21 at 15:00
  • (Oh, and—oh rats—"I and the Village." – Andy Bonner Oct 25 '21 at 15:32
  • Chagall titled it in English being Russian/French? – Mitch Oct 25 '21 at 15:37
  • @Mitch Ha! It looks like it's "Moi et le village"! Meaning that when they established an official English title they were afflicted with the "But 'me and ___' doesn't sound right" bug. And maybe that's enough to explain Claudius and the robots too. At least Paul Simon got it right, "seeing me and Julio down by the schoolyard." – Andy Bonner Oct 25 '21 at 15:47
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    OMG, in Spanish it's "viéndonos a mí y a Julio" but for other verbs it is 'yo': "gustando Julio y yo" – Mitch Oct 25 '21 at 16:45
  • @Mitch Of course, reflexive verbs are a whole 'nuther ball game... – Andy Bonner Oct 25 '21 at 17:09
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Thank you for your answers everyone... I feel somewhat reassured, I think.

I'm not sure I follow everything though, and I'm not sure everyone agrees. I'm still not sure that if I were showing my snaps to the Queen, I'd say "my son and I". I have always tried to follow the rule, of take out the second person, which someone referenced here today so I'm relieved to read that, which would leave a caption of "me at the party / me having fun".

I do think that still sounds OK. If it does sound a little stilted I think it's because if it were just me, I'd caption it just "at the party", or I'd say "this is me having fun"

I think the formal way would be to omit the person and say "this was at the state opening ball" or do the full sentence "this is Lord Farnham and his lady friend at the midsummer ball.

The Queen is so refined, that even if she were bored solid by my snaps, she'd have a nice comment I'm sure!

Katie
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  • By the way I think I was wondering if my friend was hyper correcting or if she was actually correct. I didn't want to think she was wrong if she wasn't. I kind of think she was now :-/ – Katie Oct 25 '21 at 15:52
  • You need to put comments under your question. Of course, you can also answer a question but that is not what this is. If you get my point. :). This is me = another ball of wax. But captions don't use: This is Lord x and Y at A. Drop the "This is". – Lambie Oct 25 '21 at 16:57