Search found 207 matches

by merijn
Sat May 24, 2014 1:09 pm
Forum: Languages & Linguistics
Topic: reflexive verb marking (current: ergative subjects in Hindi)
Replies: 27
Views: 6107

Re: reflexive verb marking origins

Bantu languages have a reflexive object marker (-zi- in Zulu). It is in the same position as other object markers and there is some additional evidence for it being an object marker synchronically. For instance, the presence of an object marker has influence over the form of the imperative, if there...
by merijn
Wed Jan 01, 2014 11:45 am
Forum: Languages & Linguistics
Topic: whenever and wherever in other languages
Replies: 37
Views: 9780

Re: whenever and wherever in other languages

In Zulu you use noma which means "even though" and "or", followed by a wh-question, so your sentence would be (be aware I am not a native speaker, so this may be wrong, especially the placement of njalo "always" and the translation of English breakfast) noma e-ya-phi, uyadla isidlo sasekuseni sesiNg...
by merijn
Sun Dec 01, 2013 10:23 am
Forum: Languages & Linguistics
Topic: Unintelligible dialects of your language - post examples ITT
Replies: 39
Views: 9209

Re: Unintelligible dialects of your language - post examples

Your last fragment is from a satirical show, and is entirely not serious.
by merijn
Wed Nov 20, 2013 6:39 pm
Forum: Languages & Linguistics
Topic: What case is used for...
Replies: 30
Views: 5608

Re: What case is used for...

So if you want to say "I was killed by a man" you say ngi-bulewe y-indoda 1sg-kill.perfect.passive cop-man. So, literally, "I-was-killed is-man" (or perhaps "I-was-killed it's-man"?). I love this. Yes, yindoda can be used on its own and then it means "it's a man" or "he is a man" or "she is a man" ...
by merijn
Wed Nov 20, 2013 3:43 pm
Forum: Languages & Linguistics
Topic: What case is used for...
Replies: 30
Views: 5608

Re: What case is used for...

I think this is pretty rare, perhaps even non-existent outside Zulu and its closest relatives, but Zulu uses the copular form for agents of passives. In Zulu, if you want to use a noun phrase in copular sentences it preceded by a morpheme called the copular particle, that varies with amongst others ...
by merijn
Thu Oct 31, 2013 7:42 am
Forum: Languages & Linguistics
Topic: Some questions about Dutch
Replies: 11
Views: 3831

Re: Some questions about Dutch

"U is" is archaic and not in common use anymore. "Jij heeft" is incorrect, and as far as I know incorrect for any variant of Dutch. As for "u hebt"/"u heeft", I don't perceive a difference, and both members of the pair sound equally well. There has been some research on this difference, where IIRC t...
by merijn
Wed Oct 09, 2013 10:28 am
Forum: Languages & Linguistics
Topic: Personal pronouns genesis
Replies: 36
Views: 7912

Re: Personal pronouns genesis

In Dutch (and in English?) there is similarly a tendency amongst some people to use "je" to describe actions done by the speaker. "Je" means "you" but like in English it often has a more general meaning, akin to "one". For Dutch people who don't know what I am talking about, this is an example that ...
by merijn
Sun Sep 22, 2013 10:29 am
Forum: Languages & Linguistics
Topic: Non-IE auxiliary verbs
Replies: 33
Views: 6780

Re: Non-IE auxiliary verbs

There are two common ways in which verbs that are originally existential verbs can become auxiliaries. They involve the extension from existential verbs (There is a cat) to locative copula (there is a cat in the garden => a cat is in the garden) to eventually be a copula for other categories such as...
by merijn
Thu Sep 19, 2013 5:26 pm
Forum: Languages & Linguistics
Topic: PIE and PU heteroclitics
Replies: 30
Views: 6696

Re: PIE and PU heteroclitics

Actually I was mainly comparing word-initial vs. word-final. The medial situation seems to be indeed variable. (And at the risk of YAEPT, weren't there some AmEng dialects with n-flapping, [n] → [ɾ̃] / V_V? Or am I thinking of [nt]?) Sorry to sidetrack, but what does YAEPT stand for? Google seems t...
by merijn
Wed Sep 11, 2013 12:00 pm
Forum: Languages & Linguistics
Topic: RIP Ivan Sag
Replies: 2
Views: 1601

RIP Ivan Sag

Ivan Sag passed away today. He was amongst others the co-author of the introduction to HPSG that I had to read in college, and in general he was a very important guy in HPSG. The last couple of years he tried to combine HPSG with construction grammar. As I am far from an expert on both HPSG and cons...
by merijn
Sat Aug 10, 2013 6:43 am
Forum: Languages & Linguistics
Topic: Mass Noun Crosslinguistic Usage
Replies: 13
Views: 3194

Re: Mass Noun Crosslinguistic Usage

Of course Chinese, Korean, Japanese, and some other languages in Asia have extensive counter word systems, which kind of goes in the opposite direction, since it is essentially treating the majority of nouns as uncountable/mass nouns . So you get two sheets of paper, two small objects of paperclip,...
by merijn
Wed Jul 31, 2013 7:58 pm
Forum: Languages & Linguistics
Topic: Non-finite clauses in highly-inflected languages
Replies: 6
Views: 2390

Re: Non-finite clauses in highly-inflected languages

OK I'll bite. My specialist language is Zulu. I am not fluent in it (to my great shame), and this is not an area I have actively investigated. Zulu is not an extreme when it comes to rich morphology, but still it is much more inflected than about any West-European language. Zulu has an infinitive, w...
by merijn
Tue Jul 30, 2013 10:48 am
Forum: Languages & Linguistics
Topic: Fluid Noun Class Categories
Replies: 8
Views: 2397

Re: Fluid Noun Class Categories

I think there are a group of related phenomena, that are a bit mixed up in this thread. 1. A noun has can appear in multiple noun classes, and it has (if applicable) the noun class morphology of the noun class it appears in: 1a. A noun appears in multiple noun classes, and the meaning of a certain n...
by merijn
Thu Jul 25, 2013 8:38 am
Forum: Languages & Linguistics
Topic: Hunter-gatherer languages
Replies: 25
Views: 6784

Re: Hunter-gatherer languages

I vaguely recall reading a paper (I think written or co-written by Johanna Nichols) that argued that different types of society had different grammatical features. It didn't say anything Wholfian, though, but claimed (and this is all from memory, it could be all different than I remember) that 1) la...
by merijn
Wed Jan 30, 2013 10:23 am
Forum: Languages & Linguistics
Topic: question about renaissance Latin compound orthography
Replies: 1
Views: 1226

question about renaissance Latin compound orthography

I recently started doing an external PhD (a PhD that you don't get payed for) at the University of Leiden, whose Latin name is Academia Lugduno Batava. This Latin name has always puzzled me, and yesterday, while I could do something useful with my time, I spent some time searching for what exactly t...
by merijn
Tue Jan 29, 2013 8:48 am
Forum: Languages & Linguistics
Topic: Looking for a source on implosives
Replies: 14
Views: 3899

Re: Looking for a source on implosives

Resurrecting this since why not. Any examples you guys know of of languages with a single implosive stop? Swahili. Xhosa . Several Mayan languages. Are you sure? I am quite sure Zulu has two implosives. The uncontroversial one is the bilabial one represented orthographically by a <b>. The other one...
by merijn
Mon Jan 28, 2013 5:51 pm
Forum: Languages & Linguistics
Topic: Looking for a source on implosives
Replies: 14
Views: 3899

Re: Looking for a source on implosives

Resurrecting this since why not. Any examples you guys know of of languages with a single implosive stop? Swahili. Xhosa . Several Mayan languages. Are you sure? I am quite sure Zulu has two implosives. The uncontroversial one is the bilabial one represented orthographically by a <b>. The other one...
by merijn
Wed Jan 16, 2013 2:11 pm
Forum: Languages & Linguistics
Topic: Most beautiful/ugliest languages
Replies: 119
Views: 26632

Re: Most beautiful/ugliest languages

And χeDutch is just χrediculous! I know that you know, but there are millions of Dutch speakers who manage to avoid the [χ] entirely ;) I don't allow them to come anywhere near me unless I'm imitating a Hollander. (I like [χ], but the majority of Dutch accents that have a [χ] are pretty ugly, and [...
by merijn
Mon Dec 24, 2012 7:58 am
Forum: Languages & Linguistics
Topic: English swearwords in other languages
Replies: 75
Views: 14573

Re: English swearwords in other languages

A radio station held an election here in the Netherlands who had the most unfortunate name. The winner was a woman named "Fokje Modder".
by merijn
Sun Dec 02, 2012 11:17 am
Forum: Languages & Linguistics
Topic: English as a North Germanic language?
Replies: 31
Views: 8189

Re: English as a North Germanic language?

I read Emond's paper. He says that Midlle English is an amalgam of Old English and Old Norse, where in the lexicon (in both the functional and the lexical categories) and the morphology old English dominates but Old Norse still has a large presence, but in the syntax it is more like Old Norse. I got...
by merijn
Thu Nov 29, 2012 11:17 am
Forum: None of the above
Topic: Linguistic Quackery Thread, take 2
Replies: 812
Views: 202754

Re: Linguistic Quackery Thread, take 2

The propositions are the things you have to defend during the defense of your PhD thesis. It is quite common, at least in the Netherlands, to have "joke" propositions that are unrelated, or only indirectly related, to the dissertation. Nobody takes them seriously, it just a way of making things a bi...
by merijn
Mon Nov 26, 2012 1:38 pm
Forum: Languages & Linguistics
Topic: Synthesis and Isolation
Replies: 25
Views: 5497

Re: Synthesis and Isolation

3) What does one call the meanings indicated by something like "-o" in Spanish "amo"?, (Where it marks 3 different things: the 1st person, singular, present.) I'd just call it a bound morpheme that indicates three things. Morphemes with multiple meanings aren't uncommon enough to warrant their own ...
by merijn
Tue Nov 20, 2012 7:28 am
Forum: Languages & Linguistics
Topic: Very quick question about IE mediopassive cause I am lazy
Replies: 11
Views: 2736

Very quick question about IE mediopassive cause I am lazy

A very quick question because I am too lazy to look at all IE languages on wikipedia: Is there besides Modern Greek a modern Indo-European language that still has reflexes of PIE medio-passive endings? I was wondering how well we could reconstruct PIE if we only had modern languages, and it occurred...
by merijn
Tue Oct 09, 2012 10:08 am
Forum: Languages & Linguistics
Topic: Gender of loanwords
Replies: 45
Views: 8897

Re: Gender of loanwords

In Dutch I have been told (I am a native speaker of Dutch, but these are things you are not aware of as native speakers) that the default noun-class for loans from English is the common gender, but if there is a word that is close semantically to an existing word that is neuter, it is neuter. So it ...
by merijn
Wed Aug 22, 2012 5:46 pm
Forum: Languages & Linguistics
Topic: Così fan tutte and Italian 3rd pers plural mark -no
Replies: 1
Views: 1106

Così fan tutte and Italian 3rd pers plural mark -no

I have two related questions about Italian. 1. In the name of the opera the form "fan" is used, but it is "fanno" in standard Italian, right? So is "fan" poetic Italian or dialectic and is the drop of the -o also allowed in those dialects/registers with other 3rd person plural forms? 2. The Italian ...