Have you had yet? Did you have yet?

Kev_2012

Hey guys,

I'm Irish so a native English speaker and my English has been totally corrupted by living in North America for a while. Having said that, a friend of mine asked me an English grammar question and I simply hadn't a clue.

The question is, which one is correct?

"Have you had anything to eat yet?"

OR

"Did you have anything to eat yet?"

I would definitely say the second one, but I have absolutely no idea which is grammatically the correct option! Anyone care to shed some light on it?

Speedwell

Both absolutely correct. Just different verbs. The answer to the first is, "Yes, I have". The answer to the second is, "Yes, I did".

Kev_2012

Yeah I thought the same! But apparently, the teacher said that "Have you had anything to eat yet?" is the correct one because of the "yet" at the end. I'm lost

Speedwell

Your teacher is expressing a preference for historical British English usage, based on a usage of "yet" for unfinished time. It is not uncommon for teachers to adhere to a peculiarly neoclassical understanding of grammar. This reliance on Latin as the standard for English is not only silly but also itself outdated. But do what your teacher says while you are in your teacher's class.

Possibly helpful:

This is from Lynne Guist's Separated by a Common Language:

'There is nothing unAmerican about the present perfect. We can and do use it in the ways that the British do. We just aren't restricted to it. There is something unBritish about using the preterit with certain temporal adverbs in particular and perhaps also more generally to refer to recent-and-still-relevant events. The difference between Did you eat yet? and Have you eaten already? is, in AmE, mostly a difference of formality, possibly also of emphasis. '

She quotes two sources as giving a ratio of present perfect in BrE in relation to AmE as 4:3 and 1.7:1. In one study 'Virginia Gathercole (1986) looked at Scottish and American adults' use of present perfect in speaking with young children and the acquisition of the present perfect by the children. She concluded that "Scottish adults use the present perfect construction in their speech to children much more frequently than American adults do" and "Scottish children use the present perfect construction in their speech long before their American counterparts." '

Mearings

The Scottish joke: You will have had your supper?

Future perfect.