Dans un courrier dat=E9 du 05/07/99 06:41:52 , Ray a =E9crit :
> >but maybe Jennifer read rick
> >Morneau's page and thinks of focus as the "swapping axis" of agent and
> >patient ?
> =20
> Ach y fi! "swapping axis"? No wonder Jennifer's confused.
> =20
apparently Jennifer didn't read that page. it's not a confusing page.
quite to the contrary. did you read it ?
> putting aside the fact that middle voice is intransitive
> =20
> Not as I understand 'middle voice' - and I first met this in Greek 46 yea=
rs
> ago.
i wrote "middle voice" but was thinking of medio-passive or
unergative only as Sally and Lars corrected=20
not greek middle voice generally which i departed 15 years
ago upon my baccalaur=E9at after 5 years of sheer pleasure
and no claim for learned fluency, i admit.
> >when "focus" is the prize :
> >
> >"middle" =3D to be given/awarded as prize to
> >"active" =3D to give prize
> >"passive" =3D to be given a prize
> =20
> All these, meseems, imply a 'dative', 'indirect object' or 'benefactor' o=
r
> whatever you want to call the person who gets the prize.
> =20
exactly what i explained in my posts precedent.
i'm trying to figure out how to make any topicized case a subject
as Jennifer said she wants to. so i try making voices from cases
of ditransitive verbs. one stringing from the "direct" object
(wallet stolen, awarded prize)
and another from "indirect" object (owner stolen, awarded prizee).
then 2 "active" forms pointing at each.
this is what japanese does with some verbs. i think it is workable
although it implies various cases in IE.
> I believe it's not
> unknown elsewhere, but it's not found in most European langs.
which implies a final dismissal ?
> =20
> It might be a good idea to have different terms to distinguish the first
> passive from the second passive. But the scheme above seems to me
> unsatisfactory on two counts:
> (a) it seems grossly anglocentric to label the peculiar English
> construction as _the_ passive and to re-assign another name to the passiv=
e
> that most other western langs have.
i am not english. i never said the first passive prevails.
i have a passive to make each case into a voice.
i just don't know another name than "passif oblique".
and since the mediostuff is the "base" of the verb string
the same problem you point at applies to the 2 active voices too.
my japanese teachers used to refer to "factitif" and "faux factitif".
> (b) the use of "middle" is different from the centuries old use of the
> term. This could cause confusion :)
> =20
i hope Sally's medio-passive and Lars's unergative please you.
> >when "focus" is the prizee :
> >
> >"middle" =3D to win a prize
> >"active" =3D to appoint as prizee
> >"passive" =3D to be won as prize
> =20
> Ah, the first might well be 'middle' in Greek since winning prizes is
> something the subject ("prizee") is interested in, i.e. the 'indirect
> reflexive' meaning - "I'll win me a prize". This terminology looks
> standard & familiar.
> =20
hence the temptative voice is valid. phew.
i can see you understand my examples and what i suggest
however wrong my terminology is.
> I think, Mathias, you've probably, as we say, hit the nail on the head. =
I
> can well understand Jennifer's confusion. I hope our posts are helping
> her and not merely compounding the confusion
i understood that Jennifer wants to make any case a "subject"
provided it is a "topic" and conversely. i was suggesting a way to
do that with simple examples. if you make the topicized case
into a voice, then it becomes a subject.
brother-BEN to-prize =3D brother to-BEN-prize.
making this suggestion may not be so wrong and confusing.
i don't think sticking to IE grammar and terminology helps much anyway.
> :=3D(
> =20
:-)
get out of IE now and then and breathe out : ahhhhhhh... hhhhhhhha.
lush plants, golden beaches...
OK. you're right and i'm wrong in your books.
i'm just having cannibalistic fun because i'm fed up with
natlangs' restricted range of voices.
free case voicing and voice casing.
> Ray.
> =20
mathias