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Re: Conlang-to-body-shape connections

From:Christian Thalmann <cinga@...>
Date:Wednesday, March 26, 2003, 13:24
--- In conlang@yahoogroups.com, Christophe Grandsire
<christophe.grandsire@F...> wrote:

> An example is the > sentence "he kicked the woman and ran away". In English, it means
obviously
> that a man kicked a woman, and then ran away. The unexpressed subject of
the
> intransitive verb is taken to be the subject of the transitive verb. The > language is thus syntactically accusative, since it maps subjects of > intransitive verbs with *subjects* of intransitive verbs. But there are > languages where this same sentence (once translated :)) ) would mean: he
kicked
> the woman, and *the woman* ran away. In that case, the unexpressed subject
of
> the intransitive verb is taken to be the *object* of the transitive verb
(David
> Bell's Amman-Iar does exactly that).
Wow, this is scary. One of the first sample sentences I wrote for Oro Mpaa was |Ttou tovea mbao iop.| [to'duvia bau'jup] {man kick dog run} "The man kicks the dog, who in turn runs." Object promotion like this only happens in a serial clause as above. If it were split into two clauses: |Ttou tovea mbao, iop.|, the *subject* of the first clause would be inherited by the second one: "The man kicks the dog, and runs." So the syntax seems to include both accusative and ergative aspects. The total lack of declination, even in pronouns, doesn't help the decision.
> So how does Oro Mpaa behave in that respect?
Judge for yourself: http://www.cinga.ch/langmaking/orompaa.html (Warning: Amateur linguist at work. Expect misused expressions and incomplete descriptions. View at your own risk.) -- Christian Thalmann -- +++ GMX - Mail, Messaging & more http://www.gmx.net +++ Bitte lächeln! Fotogalerie online mit GMX ohne eigene Homepage!

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Christophe Grandsire <christophe.grandsire@...>