Re: Stupid question...

At 4/7/01 03:08 AM -0400, you wrote:
>     Only one person needs to answer this if you know the answer.  I took a
>midterm today for linguistics, and they were asking for the thematic roles of
>things, and I just don't know the names beyond "agent" and "patient" and
>"topic" and "experiencer", and I'm not sure if some of those overlap...  But
>anyway, two questions: (1) What's the thematic role of "me" in the sentence
>"He gave me some roses";
goal

>  and (2) What's the role of the word "what" in "What
>did you stir the flour with?"  For the second one I said "instrumental", but
>that's a case, and I don't know if it's a theme,
You got it right - it's a thematic role, too.

>  or whatever.  Damn labels.
>
>-David


Marcus Smith

"Sit down before fact as a little child,
be prepared to give up every preconceived notion,
follow humbly wherever and to whatsoever abysses Nature leads,
or you shall learn nothing."
                -- Thomas Huxley