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<p>Dear Matthew,</p>
<p>Great question! Three interrelated comments:</p>
<p>(1) I would expand on the question by asking, in addition,
whether any language makes the corresponding distinction also for
the singular possessee, eg. for 'their drum', between (i) a total
of one shared drum, and (ii) one drum per person<br>
<br>
(2) If you permit periphrasis involving an overt numeral, then I
suspect many languages with distributive numerals might be able to
make the following distinctions, which I represent below
schematically (since I don't currently have access to speakers of
any such languages):</p>
<p>(1) THEIR ONE DRUM<br>
(perhaps vague between one drum per person and one drum in
total)<br>
<br>
(2) THEIR ONE-DISTR DRUM<br>
(forcing the one drum per person interpretation)</p>
<p>... and analogously for higher numerals.</p>
<p>(3) Alternatively, in a language with distributive marking on
verbs and a 'have' verb, you would probably be able to get
distinctions in the domain of predicative possession such as the
following:</p>
<p>(3) THEY HAVE DRUM-SG<br>
(perhaps vague between one drum per person and one drum in
total)</p>
<p>(4) THEY HAVE-DISTR DRUM-SG<br>
(forcing the one drum per person interpretation)<br>
</p>
<p>(5) THEY HAVE DRUM-PL<br>
(perhaps vague between plurality of drums per person and
plurality of drums in total)</p>
<p>(6) THEY HAVE-DISTR DRUM-PL<br>
(forcing the plurality of drums per person interpretation)<br>
<br>
Now if such a language also had internally headed-relative
clauses, then (3) - (6) might also be interpretable attributively,
thereby bringing us closer to what you are looking for.</p>
<p>Sorry I can't be more specific in terms of actual real-language
examples. I suspect the distinction you ask about it quite rare,
but I wouldn't be ready to give up on the quest quite yet.</p>
<p>Best,</p>
<p>David<br>
</p>
<p> </p>
<div class="moz-cite-prefix">On 26/05/2021 18:31, Matthew Baerman
wrote:<br>
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<p class="MsoNormal">Dear LingTyp readers<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">A question for your expertise.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Possession marking systems (possessive
pronouns, possessive classifiers, possessed noun marking and
the like) can potentially distinguish the number of both
possessor and possessed item. For example, in Nuer (Western
Nilotic) we have:<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">bul-dɛ ‘her/his drum’<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">bul-diɛn ‘their drum’<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">buɔ̱l-kɛ ‘her/his drums’<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">buɔ̱l-kiɛn ‘their drums’<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">An expression like ‘their drums’ does not
indicate how the possession is distributed. That is, it would
be enough if each person had just one drum, but it would also
be ok if each person had multiple drums.
<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I am not aware of *any* language that makes
a systematic distinction here – this is as fine-grained as it
ever gets, once everbody’s plural. No language I know of has
dedicated expressions equivalent to ‘their drums (but only one
drum per person)’ or ‘their drums (each person has more than
one drum)’. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Are any of you aware of languages that do
make such a distinction?<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Thanks!<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Matthew<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Matthew Baerman<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Surrey Morphology Group<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">School of Literature and Languages<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">University of Surrey<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Guildford, Surrey <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">GU2 7XH<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">United Kingdom<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
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<pre class="moz-signature" cols="72">--
David Gil
Senior Scientist (Associate)
Department of Linguistic and Cultural Evolution
Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History
Kahlaische Strasse 10, 07745 Jena, Germany
Email: <a class="moz-txt-link-abbreviated" href="mailto:gil@shh.mpg.de">gil@shh.mpg.de</a>
Mobile Phone (Israel): +972-526117713
Mobile Phone (Indonesia): +62-81344082091</pre>
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