[Lexicog] Re: lexical entries as singulars or plurals

[Fritz Goerling]

Hi Bill,

"man" (written lower case in German) is, in fact, the indefinite usage,
comparable to "one/person"
in English. "Mann", written with a capital letter, like any other German
noun, means "man" (male).
German indefinite "man" could be replaced by plural "Leute" in certain
contexts. It is often used
in a moralizing context "man tut das nicht ..."  (one does not do that ...).
Feminists have tried
to replace this indefinite "man" (which sounds like "Mann")  by "frau"
(woman). Just doesn't
work in German. It only makes one/people laugh.

Fritz



  Granting the availability of mensch as a gender-neutral term,
  am I wrong in thinking that, in the indefinite usage, mann and
  leute are a singular/plural pair? I'm thing of usages like:

        Was mann sagt ...  "What a person/one says..."
        Was leute sagen .. "What people say..."


  --
  Bill Poser, Linguistics, University of Pennsylvania
  http://www.ling.upenn.edu/~wjposer/ billposer at alum.mit.edu


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