Re: Deutche... Gender-Switch in Israeli Hebrew et al.

En réponse à Emily Zilch :


>The author continues by noting that this pattern is apparent
>cross-linguistically (mentioning Mandarin, Spanish & Swahili) but the
>*inverse* is prohibited or is solely insulting and demeaning. There are
>languages where both kinds of crossing are present, with mixed
>meanings: Amharic, Brazilian Portuguese, Hindi, Lakhota, Rumanian,
>Serbian, Grebo, Polish...
In Dutch, a way of handling possession by people (which is not considered 
"standard" but present in many dialects) is to put the possessive adjective 
(usually in shortened form) between the noun of the possessor and the 
possessed thing. Example:
- Jan z'n horloge: Jan's watch (z'n is a shortened form of zijn)
- Barbara d'r rok: Barbara's skirt (d'r is a shortened form of haar)
As you see, the possessive adjectives agree in gender with the possessor, 
like in English.
The strange thing is that in certain groups, it is common to switch the 
possessive adjective's gender, and say things like "Jan d'r horloge" and 
"Barbara z'n rok". The exchange is always symmetrical though (you don't see 
people using only z'n or only d'r. It's always a full exchange).
______________________________________________________________________
En réponse à Douglas Koller, Latin & French :


>Mandarin? Mandarin doesn't have grammatical gender. Perhaps the
>author meant Japanese? It was mentioned on this list maaaaaaany many
>moons ago that high school girls may use the very butch-sounding
>first person pronoun "ore" and other types of masculine-sounding
>speech in informal conversation amongst themselves. Personally, I
>never heard it, but then, I didn't hang with high school girls.
I often hear "boku" in songs sung by women. Even when the song writer is a 
woman too...

Christophe Grandsire.

http://rainbow.conlang.free.fr

You need a straight mind to invent a twisted conlang. 

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