Sunday, May 26, 2013

Detail #39: A pronominal distinction

In some languages, have two sets of third person pronouns. One set starting in one consonant, and the other set in some other. Preferrably, set II would be more "strong"-sounding, if some such sound symbolism is present in the language. These pronouns also serve as definite articles, deictic pronouns and determiners.

Set I appears everywhere else, set II appears when:

  • the pronoun refers to the topic of the same sentence
  • the pronoun is in apposition with adjectives or another pronoun (serving a similar function as 'the' in the other or the red one in English)
  • the pronoun can be construed to answer which one out of several options is specified.
  • the pronoun is contrasted with some other NP or pronoun - they arrived, no one else did. If contrasted with another pronoun, the one to whom the contrast is considered a merit will be marked with set II.
  • possibly other similar usages, but I am at a loss to come up with anything right now.
Finally, the pronouns of set II also work as relativizers: the man, his wife is beautiful, is worried about her fidelity. (A biblical proverb, iirc). 

No comments:

Post a Comment