Re: Probability of Article Replacement?
| From: | Stephen Mulraney <ataltanie@...> |
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| Date: | Thursday, February 27, 2003, 2:17 |
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On Wed, 26 Feb 2003 09:36:14 +0000
Peter Bleackley <Peter.Bleackley@...> wrote:
> Staving Joe:
>
>
> >Essential? Articles serve no essential purpose in a language. They clarify,
> >but a distinction is not neccesary.
>
> Are there any languages that mark a definite/indefinite distinction by
> means other than articles? I've considered using inflections or word order
> to mark it in various conlangs. I suppose there's the wa/ga distinction in
> Japanese, but that's restricting a particular grammatical role (the topic)
> to definite things, rather than marking definitiveness as such.
>
> Pete Bleackley
>
In Mandarin Chinese, although there's no article, definiteness is
indicated by preceeding the verb, which seems a bit odd initially,
but it all makes a strange kind of sense. To wit, quoting from Li &
Thompson(*): [Interlinears edited a bit for clarity. Don't worry about
the 'le' particles (ha! if only!)]
"... definitiveness is partially signalled by preverbal position for
topics, subjects and objects. Since topics ... may not be indefinite,
they are always preverbal, but subjects and objects may appear on either
side of the verb. Looking at subjects first, we find that presentative
sentences (see chapter 17) allow postverbal subjects, as in 16b:
16a. ren2 lai2 le
person come PERF/CRS
The person(s) has/have come.
16b. lai2 - le ren2 le
come - PERF person CRS
_A person/some people_ have come.
... Roughly the same is true of objects...
17a. wo3 zai4 mai3 shu1 le
I DURATIVE buy book CRS
I am buying _a_ book.
17b. wo3 ba3 shu1 mai3 le
I BA book buy PERF/CRS
I bought _the book_.
17c. shu1 wo3 mai3 le
book I buy PERF/CVS
_The book_, I bought it (topic/contrastive).
17d. wo3 shu1 mai3 le
I book muy PERF/CVS
I bought _the book_ (contrastive).
..."
This is amazing stuff, no? I feel drunk on syntax!
s.
(*) p.20, Li & Thompson, Mandarin Chinese: A functional reference grammar.
An excellent and endlessly fascinating book
----
In 1869 the waffle iron was invented for people who had wrinkled waffles.
Stephen Mulraney :: ataltane at ataltane.net :: ataltane.net
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