Re: THEORY: Adpositional Heads

On Wed, 10 Sep 2003 12:57:21 -0700, JS Bangs <jaspax@...>
wrote:

>The actual linguistic trend is the opposite--"plain" NP's are
>reinterpreted as some other kind of phrase!
>
>Vaguely speaking, the theory goes like this: There are a variety of heads
>that indicate "case", where "case" is interpreted broadly to mean
>"function in the sentence". Some of these heads are manifest as overt
>words: adpositions. Others are phonologically obscured and incorporated
>with the words they govern: case endings. Functionally, the two are the
>same.
>
>(Of course it's more complicated than that, but syntax is not my forte so
>I don't want to launch into a full description here.)
I see what you're saying!  It seems that those linguists are approaching
language from a "functional" perspective -- they are describing it in terms
of interacting functions.  On the other hand, I am approaching language
from an "object-oriented" perspective -- I'm describing it in terms of
interacting objects.

- Rob