Re: Possessive and Genitive

En réponse à John Cowan :


>But it's also typical for genitive forms to be used in non-possessive
>ways, as in the objective genitive and subjective genitive that
>you and I discussed here some time back:
Actually, if you want to be correct, you have to say that possessive forms 
are often used in non-possessive ways (what you described can be done in 
French with the possessive adjectives which are certainly not genitives). 
The fact that the genitive is often used like that says nothing.

My point is that the term "genitive" refers strictly to a noun case, while 
the  term "possessive" refers to a syntactic function, which can be 
rendered through a genitive case in languages that have one, but also 
through plenty of other possible forms (adjectives, prepositional phrases, 
construct states constructions, etc...) which cannot be called "genitive". 
As such, the term "genitive" is more restrictive than the term 
"possessive", and that's the only thing I'm saying.

Christophe Grandsire.

http://rainbow.conlang.free.fr

You need a straight mind to invent a twisted conlang. 

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