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<p>Dear Christian:</p>
<p>Names of months are discussed clearly and extensively in Willy
Van Langendonck's <i>Theory and Typology of Proper Names</i>
(2007, Mouton de Gruyter). Van Langendonck crucially distinguishes
between proper names and proprial lemmas (= lexical items
typically used as proper names). He defines proper names as
follows (2007:88):</p>
<p><img src="cid:part1.IcLR0YSJ.XRPoaBzJ@cnrs.fr" alt="" width="598"
height="162"></p>
<p>The semantic and pragmatic parts of his definition are universal,
but the formal part is more language-specific. Therefore a further
distinction between the universal category of proper names and
language-specific word classes of Proper Names is useful. <br>
</p>
<p>The criterion of ability to appear in close appositional
constructions works well for Indo-European languages. It is
naturally applied to names of months (<i>the month of June</i>),
but not to <i>morning</i> or <i>midnight</i> (??<i>the time of
the day morning</i>).</p>
<p>Van Langendonck (2007: 225-232) provides a detailed discussion of
different kinds of temporal names, which also discusses the names
of the days of the week. From a semantic-pragmatic point of view,
they are proper names, as they denote unique entities in the basic
level category <i>day</i>. When used as proper names, they do not
take an article, as is typical for Proper Names in English. In
contrast, they can't be used is close appositional constructions
like <i>?the day Monday</i>. This may have a simple formal
explanation in the presence of the noun for the basic level
category term <i>day </i>in the day names themselves, but it
could also suggest that names of days are less typical proper
names than names of months, and that therefore they have fewer of
the formal characteristics of English Proper Names.<br>
</p>
<p>I attach a short paper on names in the Bantu language Kirundi
where Van Langendonck's approach is applied, with the additional
distinction between the universal category of proper names and the
language specific notion of Proper Names. Names of months are
discussed too. (Van de Velde, Mark (2009). Agreement as a
grammatical criterion for proper name status in Kirundi. In: <i>Onoma</i>
44: 219-241. (written in 2011, appeared in January 2012)).</p>
<p>All the best,</p>
<p>Mark</p>
<p></p>
<div class="moz-cite-prefix">On 25/06/2024 09:13, Christian Lehmann
via Lingtyp wrote:<br>
</div>
<blockquote type="cite"
cite="mid:3a5ac96f-752e-4d0b-8213-98555af46ebf@Uni-Erfurt.De">
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If one searches the web with the question "Are nouns denoting days
of the week proper names?", some pages know that the answer is
'yes'. However, their argument is circular: Since English
orthography requires the capitalization of such nouns, they are
categorized as proper names; and since they are proper names, they
are to be capitalized.<br>
<br>
I use the following definitions: A common noun is a noun which
designates an entity by subsuming it under a notion. A proper noun
or name is a noun that refers to an entity without subsuming it
under a notion. Consequently, a common noun can be defined; a
proper noun cannot (over and beyond the onomastic category that it
belongs to, like anthroponym or toponym).<br>
<br>
Now an entity like Tuesday can easily be defined as the second day
of the week; and likewise an entity like February. By this
criterion, such entities appear to be notions, and the nouns
designating them consequently common nouns.<br>
<br>
If such nouns are proper nouns, then why are nouns like <i>midnight</i>
and <i>morning</i> not?<br>
<br>
What do the semanticists say? And are there
structural/distributional properties distinguishing proper and
common nouns which decide the alternative for designations of
months and days? Are there nouns taking an intermediate position
between common and proper?<br>
-- <br>
<div class="moz-signature">
<p style="font-size:90%">Prof. em. Dr. Christian Lehmann<br>
Rudolfstr. 4<br>
99092 Erfurt<br>
<span style="font-variant:small-caps">Deutschland</span></p>
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