co-possession (fwd)

[Edith A Moravcsik]

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I am posting Dr. Bhat's comments on LINGTYP since he has given me
permission to do so.

Edith Moravcsik
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---------- Forwarded message ---------
Date: Sat, 20 Mar 1999 06:37:30 +0500
From: "D. N. S. Bhat" <dnsbhat at bgl.vsnl.net.in>
To: edith at convex.csd.uwm.edu
Subject: co-possession

Dear Prof. Moravcsik,

I noticed an interesting point about co-possession in Kannada but since I
have seen only two or three of the communications on this topic on
LINGTYPE, I was not sure whether this would be interesting to all the
members. Hence I am sending this only to you.

Kannada has only one possessive form, namely the genitive, derived by
adding the suffix /a/ to the noun. Generally the use of two different
possessive forms in a noun phrase implies hierarchic possession.

However, the notion of co-possession can be expressed in Kannada by
repeating the first posessor as in the second phrase (1b) given below:

(1a)	nann-a  maney-a    bha:ga
	my-Gen  house-Gen  part
	'part of my house (hierarchic possession)'

(1b)	nann-a maney-a   nann-a bha:ga
	my-Gen house-Gen my-Gen part
	'my part of my house (co-possession)'

The English translation that I have given for the second sentence, I think,
indicates a similar usage, but through a combination of two different types
of possessive forms. Perhaps you have already discussed this type of
construction occurring in some other language.

	Another construction used for denoting co-possession is the use of /mattu/
'and'. But it is different from the above one in that the heirachic
possession is also expressed in the former case but not in the latter
(following) case.

(2)	idu  nann-a mattu avan-a   a:phi:su
	this my-Gen and    his-Gen office
	'?This is my and his (joint) office'

(1b), given earlier, implies that the house is mine (in addition to
indicating that a specific part of it is mine) but (2) does not provide the
former implication. That is, it does not relate he and me. You can also
combine the two types of usages as in the following:

(3)	namm-a  maney-a   nann-a mattu avan-a  bha:ga
	our-Gen house-Gen my-Gen and   his-Gen part
	'?My and his joint part of our house'

(There is another construction in Kannada, which however, is not related to
the notion of co-possession, namely the use of reduplication for denoting
the meaning 'respectively': avar-a-var-a         manege ho:daru
		   their-Gen-their-Gen home    went
		   'They went to their respective houses')

With best wishes

D.N.S.Bhat