Re: Def. of Case WAS: Cases, again

Hi!

Matthew Kehrt <mkehrt@...> writes:
> English, we have words that take semantic roles based on word order, such
> as direct and indirect objects and subjects.  Other, more inflectional
> languages mark these semantic roles with actual changes to the words
> taking these roles.  Which is the case, this specific set of marked words,
> or the semantic role?
The distinctions made for marking are called case.  It is purely
syntactical.  And semantics roles are just called 'semantic
roles'. :-)

For a given language, you can usually give a mapping from case to
semantic roles and vice versa.  This mapping usually gives several
semantic roles for a case and also several cases for the role:

E.g. German (not even nearly complete):

case            role

nominative      agent, patient, ...
accusative      patient, (spatial) destination (allative/illative), ...
dative          benefactive, locative (adessive/inessive)...
...

'Direct object' is another syntactical term, usually for the second
argument of a transitive verb.  In German, this means the argument
that is assigned the accusative case.

Languages often use terms like 'locative', 'adessive' for a case if
that seems sensible for the usage of the case, while languages that do
not have such a case, like German or Latin, use such a term for a
semantical role only.

Further, the assignment of case can often be changed by the voice (or
the trigger if the language works like that), e.g. when using German's
passive voice, the direct object becomes the subject (just like in
English) and, therefore, the semantic role assigned the accusative
case in active voice will be assigned the nominative in passive voice:
the role does not change, just the case (and the degree of focus).

Active voice:
   Ich schlage den Mann.
   I   hit     the man.

   ich:      subject,  case= nom, role= agent
   den Mann: dir.obj., case= acc, role= patient

Passive voice:
   Der Mann wird geschlagen.
   The man  is   hit.

   Der Mann: subject, case= nom, role= patient

> That is, were I to have the sentence, "I hit the man", could "man"
> be considered to be accusative, or is it merely the direct object of
> the verb?
The latter, I think, since English does not have an accusative case
(at least not very overtly).

> (Obviously, in the sentence "I hit him", "him" is in the accusative
> as well as being the direct object.
Maybe for pronouns, case names are used, but as you write, the term
'objective form' seems to be used instead.

Let's wait for answers of people who know the terms in English
better. :-)

**Henrik