Re: deeply embedded VSO nightmare

> This is fine:
>
>     tuar-o   va tath-an   daip-oth-an        fid-íal  aldove-n.
>     see-PRES I  woman-ACC walk-PRES=PART-ACC fast-ADV home-ACC
>     I see a woman walking quickly home.
>
> But this:
>
>     ler-o   na  tath  daip-oth       fid-íal  aldove-n
>     go-PRES the woman walk-PRES=PART fast-ADV home-ACC
>
> could be either "the woman walking quickly is going home" or "the
> woman walking quickly home is going."  Granted the second
> interpretation sounds a bit odd, but it's an example of the
> ambiguities I've run into: which verb does 'aldoven' go with when the
> meaning doesn't make it entirely clear.

> I've not studied any strongly VSO languages enough to really grok how
> this sort of situation is disambiguated.  Some sort of word shuffle
> seems in order, but I thought I'd check to see if any real linguists
> :) had insight into how this sort of thing is usually handled.

I'm not sure if what my language Silindion does it *correct*, but it too is a VSO language.

The sentence you  used are:

Tilisi lierne i hwasca sicietma ivannanya

Til-i-si     lier-ne    i   hwasc-(n)a  sicie-tma
go-PRES-1sts. woman-ACC DEF. walk-GER.  fast-ADV
ivan-(n)na-nya
home-ALL-3rdsPOSS

"I see a woman walking quickly home"

where the definite article "i" is here used to indicate a participle construction.

i hwasca sicietma, ya-r      i  lier  ivannanya
   DITTO           go-3rds. DEF woman  DITTO


Here the only difference is the place of the words:

"The woman walking quickly is going home"

The last sentence is thus:

i hwasca sicietma ivannanya, yar i lier.

Where the entire complement is brought to the front. Although it may not be strictly
VSO, it certainly works out fine...

Elliott

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