Re: "to be" and not to be in the world's languages

Taliesin wrote:

> There's a guy in Oslo (Pål Kristian Eriksen) who's just finished/gotten
> his doctorate in typological linguistics. His dissertation is on "to
> be": which languages have a separate word for it, which languages don't,
> and why.
>
> Unfortunately, his uni the University of Oslo isn't too fond of the
> riffraff (that is: anyone not at the university of Oslo) paving on their
> precious dissertations[*] so I don't know if there exists an electronic
> copy at all
Probably waiting for all those offers from publishers to start rolling
in.........Maybe someone could hack into Mr. Eriksen's computer and lift his
copy---but it would be wrong.

(Snip some summary)
The reason why "to
> be" is needed is because you can't add a particle/word meaning "not"
> directly to a noun used as a predicate, you need a buffer-word of some
> sort, hence "to be".
Immediate counter-ex (perhaps he knows it)-- Indonesian/Malay uses a
different word to negate noun predicates--

Ali sakit 'Ali is sick' > Ali tidak sakit 'Ali is not sick'
Ali bisa berenang Ali can swim > Ali tidak bisa... '...can't...'

Ali dokter 'Ali is a doctor'> Ali bukan dokter '..is not a doctor'

Siapa dokter? Who's a doctor?  Bukan Ali 'not Ali/Ali isn't', or Bukan saya
'Not I'.

Ia beli moto, bukan mobil 'he bought a motorcycle, not a car'

But other languages in the family don't seem to have a problem negating
nouns with a single negator.

(Isn't it possible to call/write the dept. and ask for a copy? That works
over here; you have to pay of course. Sometimes too, the author has extra
copies s/he is willing to give out.)

>
> [*] <rant>In general, publicizing things beyond the minimum necessary to
> get a PhD seems to be beyond the pale, or maybe there are too few
> journals?
One naturally wants one's intellectual child to be publicized; sometimes it
happens by word of mouth, sometimes by actual publication. But many diss.
are written, few are chosen (and some are unreadable in any case :-( )
Over here-- I _think_ they still do this -- almost all Univ. sent
diss.copies to University Microfilms Inc. (formerly a subsidiary of Xerox
Corp), from whom a printed copy could be ordered. Plus, a copy is supposed
to be kept in the Univ.library.

SIL is pretty good about publishing their members' output (sometimes even
B.A. and M.A. theses)-- some not as deserving as others.

The n hundreth higher education reform might change things but
> I don't think the old prof.s really want to have to write something once
> a year that may be read by potential riffraff...
It's one of the advantages of being an old prof.-- you can pick your topic
and write long or short as you will.  It's the young ones clambering up the
ladder who have to publish short and often, to fill up the bibliog. on their
Curriculum Vitae, so they can become an old prof. rather than a cab
driver...or a retired something-or-other.......

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