Re: Relative clauses

OK, once again for linguistic wannabes like me:

Patrick Littell wrote:

 > Not the subject of the relative clause; the subject of the
 > main clause.  That is, in Malagasy the external head of
 > the relative clause is always the relative clause's
 > subject.  In our hypothetical language here, the question
 > is the opposite: what role does the internal head play in
 > the main clause?  We could adopt the inverse of the
 > Malagasy strategy and require that the relative clauses'
 > internal head can only be understood as the main clause's
 > subject.  In other words, require that only the main
 > clause's subject can be expressed as a IHRC.
 >
 > So, if only one participant per clause can be realized as
 > a subject, and only main clause subjects can be heads of
 > IHRCs, each main clause may have only one IHRC.
 > Incidentally, this is a "funny", non-natlangy thing to do;
 > the role that the head plays in the main clause is rarely
 > if ever a factor in whether or not relativization is
 > possible.  Afaict the only languages that care are the
 > equi-type ones.

Malagasy: (S is the subject, s is dropped)

  S V O [s V O]
   \_____^

where the subject of both clauses is the subject of the main
clause. Does that mean if you want to refer the relative
clause to an object, you must make it a subject with the
help of voices and such (passive, applicative)?

And what you suggest (to?) Henrik is:

  [S V O] s V O
   \______^

where the subject of the relative clause is the same as the
subject of the main clause only that it is inside the
relative clause.

Did I understand this correctly? Then it would be clear why
each main clause can only have one relative clause: A
sentence cannot have more than one subject if I understood
that correctly.

 > Since we're on the topic of relative clauses, do your
 > languages indicate the difference between restrictive and
 > non-restrictive relative clauses (and adjectives)?

In Ayeri, it's not clear yet, but instinctively, I'd use
relative clauses like in German, which does not denote
restrictiveness. It's one of the yet unwritten rules
(because I haven't thought about that yet). I have to add
an explanation to the grammar/course, also about how A.
handles gerunds. The Daléian grammar doesn't say anything
about this topic, too. But on the other hand, the Daléian
grammar is not very detailed.

Yours,
Carsten

--
"Miranayam cepauarà naranoaris."
(Calvin nay Hobbes)

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