Re: No more plural? No, more plural!

Hi!

Remi Villatel <maxilys@...> writes:
>...
> /The teachers gave one book to the students./
>
> How many books were given? Well, it depends on what the two "the" represent.
>...
Well, I'd probably understand this as a single book in total.  Anyway,
I'd try to disambiguate this instead of saying it that way.  E.g.:

  - The teachers gave one single book to the students.
  - Each teacher gave a book to the students.

And also:
  - The teachers gave one single book to each student.
  - Each teacher gave a book to each student.

> That's why I decided to split the plural and the dual of Shaquelingua
> in two. Now, Shaquelingua has a collective plural and a distributive
> plural --as well as collective and distributive dual.
>
> Collective plural represents "all of the".
> Distributive plural represents "each/every of the"
Yeah, that's a bit neater! In Qthyn|gai, I have 'number stacking',
e.g., in analogy to 'case stacking', number endings may be stacked.
There are many atomic number endings, including explicit 'collective',
'distributive'.

Further, Qthyn|gai has number endings for 'expected amount',
'unexpected amount', 'known amount', 'unknown amount', 'explicitly
unmentioned amount', 'regularly distributed', 'irregularly
distributive', '1', '2', '3', 'not 1 (=general plural)', '0',
'absof*inglutely none', 'all', 'absof*inglutely all', 'many', 'quite
many', 'very many', 'some', 'few', 'not so few'.  I think that's about
it... :-)))

I had trouble coming up with Latin names for them.  I have normal ones
'paucal', 'oligal', 'plural' but also 'latoligal' and 'tenuplural' and
'superomnial' and 'subnullar'. :-)))

The list is here:
    http://www.theiling.de/conlang/s7/s_05.html#06_01

> /The:COLL teachers gave one book to the:COLL students./
Yeah, this is the same principle in Qthyn|gai.

> Only one book is given in this case.
>
> /The:DSTR teachers gave one book to the:COLL students./
Same.  Both would be underspecified for the exact number.  The dual
you mention would be a stacked number:

   learn.cause.person.DUAL.COLL   = (group of) two teachers
   learn.cause.person.DUAL.DISTR  = (each of) two teachers

>...
> One funny thing arising from my system is that the english expression
> "all of the" must sometimes be translated into a distributive plural.
>
> /The:DSTR shaquean couples usually have 2:COLL children./
> = All the shaquean couples usually have 2 children.
Hmm??  They never bear single children? :-))  Otherwise just after the
birth of one, there would be couples with only one child.

Ok, ok, you said 'usually'. :-)))

>...
> The usual questions: Wat d'ya think? ANADEW?
>...
Probably. :-)  At least in parts.  Although I don't know whether there
are languages that distinguish all four of dual collective, dual
distributive, plural collective and plural distributive.

**Henrik

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