Re: Passive Causatives

   Date:         Sun, 24 Jan 1999 11:00:31 -0000
   From: Rhialto <rhialto@...>

   king  loi  tabe jaan a skana - I force eat jon fish - I force john to eat a
   fish
   king sloi  tabe jaan a skana - I am-forced eat jon fish - I am forced to eat
   jon by a fish
   king  loi stabe jaan a skana - I force eaten jon fish - I force jon to be
   eaten by a fish
   king sloi stabe jaan a skana - I am-forced eaten jon fish - I am forced by
   jon to be eaten by a fish

This really seems to be about argument order. (Whether you keep the
order of nouns and permute who does what, or keep the meaning and
permute the nouns, the combinations are the same).

Did you notice that you let the choice of _who_ forces or is forced by
'I' be determined by proximity? Logically, there are two combinations
        1) A forces B, so that B eats C (A stuffs C down B's mouth)
        2) A forces B, so that C eats B (A pushes B into C's basin)
The semantics are a bit dodgy here. I think it would work better with
'B hits C (with a car)': A can make B swerve into C or push C in front
of B's car.

If you want to be able to express both of those with A, B and C coming
in any order in the sentence, you have to have 12 combinations of verb
forms, noun cases, prepositions or whatever. Just putting the two
verbs into a passive form only gives you 4 combinations, so it's no
wonder that one of them is ambiguous.

(Actually, with 'force' as the first verb, you can never get C in the
initial position --- unless you allow a third verb form that marks for
'dative subject').

Lars Mathiesen (U of Copenhagen CS Dep) <thorinn@...> (Humour NOT marked)