Are these questions grammatically acceptable?

Question

I have seen questions like

"He went through all that just to go to Columbia?"
or
"That's the Ferrari?"

and I would like to know if they are grammatically acceptable.
Can you use questions like that in regular speech?
Can you even start a question with "you" or "that"?

David Schwartz · Accepted Answer

These questions are grammatically correct. In written English, there is nothing wrong with indicating an interrogative solely by putting a question mark at the end. In spoken English, intonation is used for this purpose. There is no requirement that the interrogative mood be clearly expressed in the words used.

You can certainly start a question with "you" or "that". The easiest way is by eliding a word like "do", "did", "are", "is", or "can":

Omitting "do": You really expect to make out in that sardine can?
Omitting "did/does": That help?
Omitting "is": That what you were looking for?
Omitting "are": You sure?

Kris · Answer

Spoken language and literature alike have a license with grammar.

Sentence structures can be manipulated, words and phrases elided, all in an attempt to convey the right emotion.

That's the Ferrari? means quite a different thing from the "grammatically correct" Is that a Ferrari?

The latter is essentially a request for information: Yes, or No.

The former, loaded, possibly implies "You call that a Ferrari?" or even, "I don't call that sort of thing a Ferrari" depending on the contextual emotion.

Similarly, it is very difficult to create the kind of "effect" that the sentence

He went through all that just to go to Columbia?

evokes in the listener. Note that this sentence is not a question. It's an exclamation, like Really?, implying something like

"I don't see how going through all that is justified just to go to Columbia, period."

Are these questions grammatically acceptable?

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