[Grammar] Unheard of for

[Maybo]

It’s hardly unheard of for women to have sensitive national security posts: Condoleezza Rice served as George W. Bush’s National Security Adviser, and Frances Townsend was his top homeland security aide. Janet Napolitano runs Obama’s Department of Homeland Security.

I don't understand the structure "of " followed by "for"

Source : http://swampland.time.com/2013/04/04/national-securitys-alpha-women/

 

[Skrej]

What is your source? It seems to be a dated document from the middle of the Obama era, as the last sentence should use 'ran' if it was written anytime after the last quarter of 2013.

Regarding your question, you're not parsing the sentence correctly. The first chunk is 'unheard of', followed by the preposition 'for'. 'Unheard of' means something is rare (and thus you never hear of it happening). Negating it means that while it's not necessarily commonplace, it does still happen from time to time.

 

[andrewg927]

It's the phrase "unheard of". They go together.

Cross-posted with Skrej.

 

[andrewg927]

It’s hardly unheard of for women to have sensitive national security posts

By the way, not anymore.

 

[Maybo]

I still don't understand even if the phrase "unheard of" go together can be followed by "for". Is "for women " a noun phrase?

What would be the difference if it was written as "It’s hardly unheard of women to have sensitive national security posts"

 

[andrewg927]

Think of this sentence "It's common for women to have....". I replaced the phrase with "common". Is it clearer now?

 

[Maybo]

Think of this sentence "It's common for women to have....". I replaced the phrase with "common". Is it clearer now?

Oh! "Unheard of" is adjective! Thanks:lol:

 

[Tdol]

(unheard of) for women