Preposition stranding

Preposition stranding, sometimes called P-stranding, is the syntactic construction in which a preposition with an object occurs somewhere other than immediately adjacent to its object; for example, at the end of a sentence. The preposition is then described as stranded, hanging, or dangling. This kind of construction is found mainly in English and in some other Germanic languages or dialects. Preposition stranding is also found in languages outside the Germanic family, such as Vata and Gbadi (two languages in the Niger–Congo family), and certain dialects of French spoken in North America. Preposition stranding, sometimes called P-stranding, is the syntactic construction in which a preposition with an object occurs somewhere other than immediately adjacent to its object; for example, at the end of a sentence. The preposition is then described as stranded, hanging, or dangling. This kind of construction is found mainly in English and in some other Germanic languages or dialects. Preposition stranding is also found in languages outside the Germanic family, such as Vata and Gbadi (two languages in the Niger–Congo family), and certain dialects of French spoken in North America. In English, preposition stranding is found, for instance, in open interrogatives, wh relatives, and passive constructions sometimes known as prepositional passives or pseudopassives. Overzealous avoidance of stranded prepositions leads to unnatural-sounding sentences, especially when the preposition is part of an idiomatic phrasal verb, such as the following, apocryphally attributed to Winston Churchill. Note the verb is the phrasal verb 'put up with', split to humorous effect: