He's back!

[Lynne Murphy]

--On Thursday, August 31, 2006 11:46 am -0400 "Baker, John"
<JMB at STRADLEY.COM> wrote:

> we see the claim that there are no words for "yes" or "no" in
> Irish.  Is this really true?


If it's like Scots Gaelic (which one presumes it is), then yes, it is
true--and I don't think it's all that rare in the world's languages.  You
answer a question by saying "it is" or "it isn't" or otherwise echoing the
verb of the question.  Chinese does this as well, doesn't it?

Lynne

Dr M Lynne Murphy
Senior Lecturer in Linguistics and English Language
Arts B133
University of Sussex
Brighton BN1 9QN

phone: +44-(0)1273-678844
http://separatedbyacommonlanguage.blogspot.com

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