Re: THEORY: more questions

Mark J. Reed wrote:
> "Throw the dog a bone."                         IO = dog, DO = bone
> "You can't teach an old dog new tricks."        IO = dog, DO = tricks
>
> "He gave her the assignment!"                   IO = her,  DO = assignment
> "Tell me a story, Daddy."                       IO = me,  DO = story
>
> In fact, I don't really consider it an indirect object at all if it *is*
> marked with a preposition; in that case, it is simply the object of
> the preposition.   This is mostly a personal quirk of mine, though,
> and not the way English grammarians tend to analyse things. :)
>
Until Chomsky came along, it was, IIRC.  The idea of a "transformation"
shifting the DO into a prep.phrase makes clear the identical meanings of
"he gave me the book = he gave the book to me", or "Percy gave Mary the book
= Percy gave the book to Mary"

The problem arises when both IO and DO are pronouns, in which case the IO
must be moved to a prep.phrase in normal, non-demanding usage:
"give it to me!"  To my view, "give me it!" is much more forceful (and
better in fast speech, gimme it!).  Note that only "it" causes a problem;
"give me thát!" is a reasonably polite way of expressing a choice, "gíve me
that" is more of a demand.

In declarative sentences, the DO must also be moved, if both objects are
pronouns. "He gave it to me" (?*he gave me it, ?*he told me it, etc. are
odd, though they probably occur by inadvertence).  (ObConlang!!) If Engl.
distinguished dative and acc by endings, like Kash, or by required position,
like Spanish, there would be no problem--
Kash:  (yu) me yavele 'he gave it to me' (Acc-Dat-Verb, also their position
is fixed, a mirror image of post verbal Verb- dat- acc when both objects are
nouns.
Spanish:  me lo dió (dat-acc-verb),  *lo me dió

Since in modern times we no longer give, buy or sell human beings, sentences
like "he gave him to her", "he sold her to him" etc. while grammatical, are
odd. And "...gave her him" or "...sold him her" are flat out *, no?

Except in a marriage ceremony, perhaps:  I give her[i.e my daughter] to you.
Or jocular: A: "may I borrow your cleaning-woman?" B: "Sure, I'll lend her
to you."

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