Is "I appreciate your taking the time to do this" grammatically correct?

Is "I appreciate your taking the time to do this" grammatically correct?

TLDR: Yes, it is correct, and it is acceptable usage in today's standard English.

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WARNING: A long post.

Grammar Girl (aka Mignon Fogarty) is wrong on this topic, as seen in links to some of her articles that were linked to in this thread.

Link #1: In this article of hers:

• https://www.quickanddirtytips.com/education/grammar/should-it-be-you-or-your-gerunds

Dottie asked which sentence is correct:

• We appreciate you contacting the office.

• We appreciate your contacting the office.

Both are correct, but they have slightly different meanings. If you appreciate that someone contacted the office (the act of contacting), use "your." It's roughly equivalent to "We appreciate that you contacted the office." If you appreciate the person who contacted the office, use "you."

No. They both have the same verbal interpretation. (See H&P's CGEL page 1232 [31])

Consider:

1. We appreciate that bully getting fired (by you).
2. We appreciate you firing that bully.

Both #1 and #2 have the same meaning, which is the verbal interpretation that describes the situation of a firing. As seen in #1, it should be obvious that we don't appreciate the bully.

Also, here's an active voice example:

• "We appreciate [the bully losing his position of authority]."

where obviously we don't appreciate that bully.

And here are some examples that have dummy subjects:

• "We appreciate there being free pizza at the meeting."

• "We appreciate it being so cool inside on this hot summer day."

where obviously we can't appreciate a "there" or an "it".

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Link #2: And in this article of hers:

• https://www.quickanddirtytips.com/education/grammar/do-i-hate-your-singing-or-you-singing

You wouldn’t (or at least shouldn’t) say, “That baby crying is getting on my nerves,” for although the baby may be irritating you, the real source of your nervous irritation is the crying itself and, therefore, the subject of the sentence.

No. She is wrong here.

And,

Let’s take another example, because this is a tricky grammatical issue. That’s why it’s so common to hear it said the wrong way—to the point that the wrong way sounds right and the right way sounds wrong. Hold steady, and do it the right way. Be brave.

That right there is just laughable, except people believe it.

And,

“I appreciate you filling in for me, Myrtle,” would be the common, though incorrect, way of acknowledging the kindness. Though you might appreciate Myrtle for filling in for you –— and you certainly could express it that way — you really appreciate the “filling in” itself. Therefore, because it’s Myrtle’s filling in that’s the object of the verb “appreciate,” you would say,

• I appreciate your filling in for me, Myrtle.

More nonsense. We native English speakers say it that way, and it is a "correct" way. (See H&P's CGEL page 1232 [31])

Similarly, you might say,

• I love that tenor’s singing.

Much clearer this time, because the object of your affection is the singing, not the tenor himself. Whose singing do you love? The tenor’s. Maybe you’ve met this fellow, and he’s an insufferable lout, but his mellifluous crooning makes you weak in the knees. “I can’t stand that tenor, but I adore his singing.” Starting to make a bit more sense now?

It is still ambiguous: it could be a noun phrase or a clause. (See H&P's CGEL page 1192 mid and footnote 11)

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Remember that the “–ing” form is a noun.

no. no. no.

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Answer: The OP's title example:

• "I appreciate [your taking the time to do this]."

The difference in meaning of sentences structured like yours will depend on whether the complement (e.g. "you/your taking the time to do this") is a noun phrase or a clause.

From H&P's CGEL page 1192 mid:

Note then that while Kim didn't like his singing is ambiguous according as singing is a noun or a verb, Kim didn't like him singing is unambiguous, with singing necessarily a verb. (fn11)

and,

footnote 11: In the noun interpretation we are concerned with the manner of his singing (cf. Kim didn't like his singing of this difficult aria), whereas in the verbal interpretation it is a matter of the activity or fact of his singing (cf. Kim didn't like him singing obscene songs).

In your example, the complement is a clause; and it is a catenative complement where the intervening noun phrase ("your" or "you") is not an object of the matrix verb "appreciate", but rather, that noun phrase is the subject of the -ing clause (i.e. the catenative complement). And so, that catenative complement will only have the verbal interpretation (cf. "I appreciate [that you are taking the time to do this]"). (See H&P's CGEL page 1232 [31])

Thus, both "your" and "you" is acceptable in your example, for either can be the subject of the -ing clause:

1. "I appreciate [your taking the time to do this]."
2. "I appreciate [you taking the time to do this]."

Both versions (#1 and #2) have the same meaning -- the same verbal interpretation.

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Aside: Interestingly, Grammar Girl uses the singing example as a name of one of her article's files! :D

Aside2: I think this is the second time I've commented on this topic within the last couple of months. ... Since this topic is coming up a lot, and since it seems that much of the info easily available on the internet is wrong (e.g. Grammar Girl), maybe this topic ought to be added to the link on the sidebar, u/jack_fucking_gladney ?

Grammar Note: These examples superficially have a type of form that can be divided into three main types depending on the internal complement or complements to the matrix verb: 1 - genitive noun-phrase, 2 - catenative complements, 3 - other (e.g. "It was a pain [walking three miles to school each and every school day]"). The catenative complements subtype, when it has the form of "NP + -ing-clause", has syntactically three main types depending on the syntactic and semantic properties of the NP. The syntactic and semantic properties of that intervening NP depends on the specific matrix verb. [Unfortunately for GG, she chose matrix verbs (e.g. "appreciate") that didn't work for her explanations. That is, her description (which involves catenative constructions) required the intervening NP to be a semantic argument of the matrix (which entails that the NP be an object of the matrix), but that NP is actually the subject of the subordinate clause, which means that it cannot be an object of the matrix, which entails that it cannot be a semantic argument of the matrix. (See H&P's CGEL page 1205 [18.iii]), where the matrix verb "resent" is in the same subclass as GG's "appreciate".]

EDITED: formatting, editing, added "Grammar Note", clarified and added info, added examples.

I suspect you're specifically wondering whether it should be " I appreciate you taking the time to do this" instead. Both forms appear in native English too frequently to call incorrect. The possessive form is more formal (and the favourite of prescriptivists). Grammar girl discusses it here, showing that in some cases the two constructions have slightly different meanings (due to the ambiguity between the gerund and the participle): https://www.quickanddirtytips.com/education/grammar/do-i-hate-your-singing-or-you-singing.

Yeah, there's no problems with it. Your acts as the possessive pronoun for taking the time do this. Grammar Girl has a short post on it: Should it be "You" or "Your" with Gerunds?

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