That is he
That is he
That is him
That is Fred
I have just seen "that is he" on a English grammar website. I was wondering if it is correct. The example is with a person who has taken the phone. And someone asks who is it.
Thank you.
8 Answers
I agree with Nizhoni: It may be correct to say "that is he," but it's not common usage and it sounds strange.
It's more common to say:
That's him
That's Fred
It's him
It's Fred
I think it is correct but not common usage. More formal.
That is he.
Is entirely correct and is what I would normally say. Of course, on occasion, if I feel it necessary/advisable to "blend in" with the unwashed masses/high school dropouts/semi-literates, I may intentionally use English that "is ugly to my ears" (for protective coloration).
I can understand why some people choose to bow to popular pressure and use ungrammatical constructions but it is a sad commentary on the U.S. educational system when people label as "weird" or "foreign sounding" what is, in fact, the grammatical construction.
Renaerules is absolutely correct, and there is a way to know if your word order in theses cases is correct, which is called "Inversion." Example: You knock on someone's door and you hear, "Who is it?" Do you say, "It is me," or, "It is I?"
"It" is the pronoun representing the subject, "Me" or "I."
Invert the pronoun with the subject and say to yourself, "Me is it" and "I am it."
Obviously, "Me" cannot be the subject because "Me" cannot do anything; it's only an object. So, "I" is the subject because "I" can do something.
Now revert back and voilá: "It is I."
Professor Henry Higgins once said when lamenting about the Enlish not speaking correctly, "Why can't the English learn to set a good example for people whose English is painful to your ears. The Scotts and the Irish leave you close to tears. There even are places when English completely disappears. In America, they haven't used it for years."
According to strict grammar rules "That is he" is correct, and "That is him" is incorrect (I could give the grammar rule concerning this, but I don't want to bore anyone). Common usage is something different, however, at least in the US. "That is him" is typically used.
When someone calls me on the phone and asks for Calvo, my usual response is "this is him". If the caller asks to speak to Mr Viejo I'll probably reply "this is he", because the "Mr" implies a little more formality. I'll be a little more formal in my response.
If he said "This is he" he's playing with the language. It's meant to be a sort of joke. It's not grammatically correct, rather some bore trying to be funny/sarcastic. It's more likely to be used in this way in the UK than the 'states. It's an affectation.
It goes back to a rhetorical anachronism used as cod=imitation Shakespeare in music hall where the audience understood that it was an incorrect application of old shakespearian terms which sounds right but isn't. A sort of double-double take where everyone knows it's wrong and the character is trying and failing to seem sophisticated. These kind of malapropisms were popular in late Victorian music hall.
In America music hall became vaudeville.
Nila, this grammar example is perfect because it is an example of one of the most common errors in English grammar. Native speakers make the error so much that the "wrong choice" sounds "right".
When the subject of the sentence, he/she must be used. English speakers misuse this so often that it sounds stilted to them.
Examples:
She has time. = "she" is the subject
Time is her friend = "time" is the subject
Is Jeff talking? That is he. He is talking. = "Jeff" and "he" are the subjects
Talking is hard for him. = "talking" is the subject
Well, at least I know that it is possible to hear that. But personally I don't think to use it. 
