singular for plural

[Paul Roser]

I wonder if these phenomena have any relation to something that I
frequently notice in conversations between parents:

when a child does something good, a parent will often refer to the
child as "my son/daughter", but when the child misbehaves, the parent
then refers to "your son/daughter".

Has anyone encountered this in other languages?

Paul

> I have been frequently struck by English speakers using the first
> person singular pronoun when they mean themselves and their families;
> such as "Last year I went to Spain for a vacation." (when the whole
> family went) or "I have a beautiful house." (in reference to the
> family residence). I have noticed this only in male speech so far and
> not outside the US.
>
> Edith Moravcsik
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: Suzanne Kemmer <kemmer at RICE.EDU>
> To: <LINGTYP at LISTSERV.LINGUISTLIST.ORG>
> Sent: Thursday, April 17, 2003 5:35 PM
> Subject: Re: Summary: number in personal pronouns
>
>
> Even the most reasonable functional features are not always
> perfectly general.
>
> I have always wondered why, in 19th century British fiction,
> one sibling speaking to another will regularly refer to "my father"
> or "my mother" (in cases where they
> both have the same set of parents, and are not
> step-siblings).  Same with cousins, who refer in talking
> to each other to "my aunt"
> and "my uncle" even though both interlocutors have the
> same relationship to the person spoken of.
> It certainly sounds odd from the standpoint of
> my own intuitions. It sounds to modern ears like the speaker wants to
> exclude the sibling/cousin they are talking to from the
> relationship. But there is nothing in the context
> to suggest this; it seems to have been a normal
> mode of reference.
>
> Suzanne
>
>
> On Thursday, April 17, 2003, at 12:53  PM, Bertinetto wrote:
> Relating to the recent message by:
>
> From: Henning Kloeter <h.kloeter at let.leidenuniv.nl>
> Subject: Re: summary
>
> specifically where it says:
>
> M. Daniel notes parallels in Russian, mentioning that "when you speak
> to your wife, saying 'my son' or 'your.sg sun' sounds either funny or
> offending. When talking to another possessor of the same item you
> obligatorily have to mention the same possessive relation connects
> the addressee to the possessed item, so that possession becomes
> obligatorily first person plural."
>
> Isn't it a general feature? This is certainly true in Italian.
> If I said "my" (referring to something that is common property) while
> talking to another owner of the same object, I would definitely sound
> arrogant. This obviously extends to human beings, such as children.
> One could say "my son" speaking to her/his mother (although this is
> not the usual way to refer to him within the family), but certainly
> not while speaking to her husband or his wife. I always took it for
> granted that the same happens in any language.
> Was I wrong?
> Best
>
> Pier Marco Bertinetto
> Scuola Normale Superiore, Pisa
>

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