Re: Mandarin Relative Clauses?

H. S. Teoh wrote:

>Hmm. I don't know what the "formal" analysis is, but in my mind, the above
>examples differ in that "hong" is an attributive modifier to "putaojiu",
>while "hao de" is a *predicative* modifier. (I'm borrowing this analysis
>from classical Greek; I'm not sure how else to explain it.)
I don't have the notes anymore, but I attended a talk about 6 months ago
that addressed this exact problem, and concluded that adjectives and
relative clauses were distinct structures. I'm not sure of the evidence,
but here is something you could try that should be revealing. Translate the
following sentences:

I have a red and white car.
I have a car which I painted and which I crashed.

If you can conjoin adjectives in the same way as relative clauses, then you
learn nothing. But if they behave differently (eg one can conjoin the other
can't) then it is unlikely that they are the same type of structure. Now,
if they do behave the same, try conjoining an adjective with a relative
clause. This cannot be simulated in English, but something like:

I have a red and which I crashed car.

If you can conjoin them, they are almost certainly the same structural
thing, but if you cannot, then they probably are not the same thing.




===============================
Marcus Smith
AIM:  Anaakoot
"When you lose a language, it's like
dropping a bomb on a museum."
   -- Kenneth Hale
===============================