Example 14-144

It’s a whole lot of people got fire insurance.
It’s
expl
a
a
whole
whole
lot
lot
of
of
people
people
got
got
fire
fire
insurance.
insurance
There are a whole lot of people who have fire insurance.
Comment:
Expletive it constructions are argued to be a focused construction or cleft in works such as Tottie & Harvie (2000).
Type:
naturalistic spoken
Source:
Green 2002: 90