Re: cases (nom/acc vs sub/obj)

> Date:         Thu, 14 Sep 2000 00:23:46 -0400
> From:         John Cowan <cowan@...>
> On Thu, 14 Sep 2000, Lars Henrik Mathiesen wrote:
>
> > I'd better explain. The subject is defined (at least in some theories)
> > as the noun phrase in the sentence that can co-ordinate, like in
> >
> >         I-NOM brushed my teeth-ACC and combed my hair-ACC
Note that this is the unmarked way of saying it. Repeating the subject
after and will draw notice to that repetition.

> But what about:
>
>         John-NOM tied and George-NOM cut the rope-ACC.
>
> I admit this isn't quite as perspicuous as the preceding example,
> but it sure doesn't seem ungrammaticaly to me.
But it's highly marked and non-colloquial.

English is a whore. As long as you know what is meant, almost any word
order can seem 'not ungrammatical.' Cf. poets.

Anyway, the unmarked way to express your example is

         John-NOM tied the rope-ACC and George-NOM cut it-ACC.

Someone with a theory of grammar they believe in can now explain how
moving the sentence with the anaphoric pronoun to before its referent
can legitimize its suppression.

My unfounded opinion is that abuses like that were invented by lawyers
for their own sordid purpose of impenetrability, and that readers of
English have simply been inured to their wrongness by long exposure.

It's the same way with reflexive constructions. The difference between
languages with ergative as subject and with absolutive as subject is
whether they say

        The man-ERG cut himself-ABS with a knife

or

        Himself-ERG cut the man-ABS with a knife

Again, the first looks normal (because the syntax is the same), but
the other one looks reasonable --- which only goes to show that you
can't really reason about languages using English examples.

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