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

Adrian Morgan wrote:

> Thomas R. Wier wrote, quoting Padraic Brown:
>
> > > I'd call our cases nominative, genitive and dative/accusative.
> >
> > I wouldn't -- why make distinctions that aren't really there? Most
> > modern grammars of English use Subjective and Objective today, since
> > the objects of pronouns are never distinguished from the objects of
> > prepositions.
>
> I'd appreciate more info on this: What principles govern whether a
> conlang's system is best described as nominative/accusative or as
> subjective/objective?
Well, the actual name you use is almost immaterial, in a sense.  The
question is:  what are the functions of the case?  In the system described
by Nik for English, there was one case for NPs in S and A roles, a second
for Patient and Goal, and a third for Possession and Measurement
(the <'s> case).  My objection was twofold:

(1)  There is virtually no distinction in English morphology between patient
and goal (none that I know of), and yet the nomenclature clearly implies
that there is some serious distinction made between those two roles, which
by chance just happen to have the same form all the time.
(2) Furthermore, the "dative/accusative" case is also the default case
for prepositions in virtually all dialects of English, and yet *that*, which
is a rather important feature of English morphology, is *not* mentioned
in the nomenclature.  By the logic of the term, "dative/accusative/relative"
should be just as legitimate, but clearly no one suggests that we use that.

There is, however, a term that is commonly used for all of these functions:
objective.  Hence, I thought it would be best to go along with the growing
number of linguists who use "subjective" and "objective" for the subject
and agent roles, and the above roles, respectively.  Aside from this, the
genitive is really not much of a case, as it is in Latin:

   (a)  Iulii        Caesaris     bellum
        Julius.GENsg Caesar.GENsg war
   (b)  Julius Caesar's         war
        Julius Caesar-GENClitic war

The <'s> governs the entire NP, not just the N.

> My documentation chooses "nominative" simply because I figure this is
> less confusing for a general audience. "Nominative" and "subjective" mean
> roughly the same thing anyway, the former is more widely taught to
> nonlinguists so there's a jargon factor,
I see nothing wrong with this, as long as you specify what thematic roles
each of your cases carries.  My question was directed solely at the
bifurcated case name, which was, I thought, misleading.

> and the words "subjective" and
> "objective" both mean something totally different outside of linguistics!
That's true, but many studies use general words in a very specific,
technical sense within their particular areas.  For biologists, "evolution"
has a very specific meaning, above and beyond that used by everyone
else. But within the context of biological discussion, there is generally
speaking no chance of confusion about the meaning of that word.

> Is this a respectable decision, or am I misleading the reader?
No, I would say you aren't misleading, based on what you have described here.

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Tom Wier   |     "Cogito ergo sum, sed credo ergo ero."
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