appositive relative clauses

[Wolfgang Schulze]

Dear Nigel,
you're probably right when asking

> Is there an issue of terminology here? 

Besides the type of apposition you have described by saying

> appositive
> relatives to be those which accompany but do not restrict the meaning 
> of a
> definite head  or a proper noun - e.g. 'My brother, who is an 
> engineer' in the
> circumstance in which I only have one brother and the NP is therefore 
> already
> unqiely referring without the relative. 

we have another type that combines a (more) general (sometimes generic) 
referential term with a more specific term that may be a somehow 
referentialized adjective or verb. This would be the type of Arabic

al-mad:inatu l-kabi:ratu
the city the big (one)
'the big city'

Here the verbal-adjectival term kabi:r is referentialized by the article 
and follows the nominal referent (the city the bog one). I know of quite 
a number of languages for which I have observed the tendency to 
referentialize adjectival attributes when following the noun, confer Udi 
(East Caucasian):

bez nana
my mother

but

nana bez-i
mother my(*-one), lit.: 'mother [the] mine one'

In this sense, the term appositive relative clause seems appropriate, 
although the RelClause lacks an overt referential marker. This would be 
present, if the head is definite, Arabic alladhi: etc., e.g.

ar-razhulu 'lladhi: dhabaha
the man the=who went
'the man who went'

Just as the article is missing with indefinite heads, the  appostive 
relative clause has a 'referential gap':

ra'itu razhulan dhahaba
I=saw [a=]man [a=who=]he=went
'I saw a man who went....

But maybe it would be better to find another term in case a splitting 
argumentation ist favored against a lumping one. Personally, I would 
prefer the latter...

Best wishes,
Wolfgang

-- 

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Prof. Dr. Wolfgang 
Schulze                                                                    

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