threat

[Peter Trudgill]

Still extremely current, Paul!

Peter



At 14:32 +0100 11/1/10, Paul Hopper wrote:
>Dik,
>
>Is the Dutch threat construction accompanied by a special intonation, like
>the English "_I'll_ teach him, etc."?
>
>My mother used to say things like "I'll give you throw the paper"
>(scolding the newspaper boy, who has thrown the paper onto the porch
>instead of walking up the steps with it). This could be older British
>English, as I haven't heard anyone say it for many years -- I don't know
>if it's still current. The use of 'give' recalls the Russian dative in
>Alexander's examples.
>
>- Paul
>
>
>On Mon, January 11, 2010 07:50, Bakker, D. wrote:
>>  Dear Alexander,
>>
>>
>>  Dutch does not have, I think, such a direct version of a change of
>>  semantic roles, making it a threat. A construction that I can think of will
>>  leave the threatened individual in the original agent position, but will
>>  turn it into a non-final construction as the argument of the verb leren
>>  to teach', in future tense, and typically with the speaker as the agent:
>>
>>  (about the cat of the neighbours);
>>
>>
>>  Hij loopt in mijn tuin
>>  It walks in my garden
>>
>>
>>  Ik zal hem leren in mijn tuin te lopen!
>>  I will teach it to walk in my garden
>>
>>
>>  Or the filler of the agent role of 'to teach' may
>>  be the demonstrative dat 'that', which then refers to the kind of
>>  punishment considered by the speaker for the wrongdoing:
>>
>>  Ik zal de tuinslang op hem zetten. Dat zal hem leren
>>  in mijn tuin te lopen. I will turn the hose on it. That will teach it to
>>  walk in my garden.
>>
>>  Best,
>>
>>
>>  Dik
>>
>>
>>  Dik Bakker
>>  Dept. of General Linguistics
>>  Universities of Amsterdam & Lancaster
>>  tel (+44) 1524 64975 & (+31) 20 5253864
>>  http://home.medewerker.uva.nl/d.bakker/
>>
>>
>>  Societas Linguistica Europaea
>>  Secretary/Treasurer
>>  http://www.societaslinguistica.eu/
>>
>>
>>
>
>
>Paul J. Hopper
>Department of English
>Carnegie Mellon University
>Pittsburgh, PA 15213


-- 
__________________________________________

Peter Trudgill  FBA
Adjunct Prof. of Sociolinguistics, Agder Univ., N
Adjunct Prof., RCLT, La Trobe Univ., AU
Prof. Emeritus of Eng. Linguistics, Fribourg Univ, CH
Hon. Prof. of Sociolinguistics, UEA, Norwich, UK
Book about CRETE:
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http://www.hellenicbookservice.com/
http://www.sfakia-crete.com/sfakia-crete/sfakia-crete-books.html
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