LL-L: "Morphology" LOWLANDS-L, 12.JAN.2001 (09) [E]

[Lowlands-L]

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 L O W L A N D S - L * 12.JAN.2001 (09) * ISSN 189-5582 * LCSN 96-4226
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From: Barbara Rentsch-Buschkoetter [rentschbuschkoetter at web.de]
Subject: Morphology

Dear John,
Of course you are right that I mixed up "pronoun" with "preposition",
but at 3 o'clock in the morning such things happen.
Nevertheless
1.    There is no hint of having datives and accusatives in English. The
object form of "me, him, her, etc." in prepositional constructions like
for me -  german: für mich (acc)
to me -   german: mir / zu mir (dat)
from me -  german: von mir (dat)
with me -  german: mit mir (dat)
of me    -  german: von mir (dat)
against me - german: gegen mich (acc)

2.    You are talking about the genitive in English and ask, if I'm
confusing "Case" with "form". You surely refer to the "genetive s".That
may be interpreted as a relict from Latin assimilations, where the
genitive endings are mostly with *s in the singular forms of masculine
and neutral nouns, but why is the "s" in the "Saxon genitive" seperated
by an apostroph? In the working dialect of the industrial area of the
Ruhrgebiet (Dortmund, Bochum, etc.) people don't use a genitive, they
day "mein Bruder sein Fahrrad" = "my brother his bike". Is it possible
that the old "Saxon genitive" is a short form of "his"?

3.    "mine, his, hers, ours, yours and theirs" are no cases, but forms
of the possessive pronouns. They obey to the same syntactical rule as
adjectives when they are used in a syntactical unit of a sentence which
is repeated without repeating the noun that should go with them. With
adjectives that in this case have the function of an attribute you
substitute the noun by the dummy-word "one / ones". The possessive
pronouns have also attributive function and are also combined with "one"
in the 1st person sg. and with "ones" in the other persons:
my + one = mine
his + ones = his
her + ones = hers
our + one = ours
your + ones = yours
their + ones = theirs

So I think, personal pronouns have 2 cases in English and Low German:
subject case and object case.
Possessive pronouns have
in English 2 forms depending from being followed by a noun or not:
This is my book - this book is mine
in Low German 2 cases depending from being part of the subject or the
object:
Mien Brooer kümmt (My brother comes) - Ick roop mienen brooer (I call my
brother)

Barbara

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From: R. F. Hahn [sassisch at yahoo.com]
Subject: Administrativa

Dear Lowlanders,

We keep saying that in English, Low Saxon (Low German) and other Lowlands
languages there is only an objective case, as opposed to specific dative and
accusative cases, as in German, Slavic, Latin, etc.  I am not all that sure
that it is accurate to say that there is "no dative" and "no accusative."

It is certainly true to say that there is only one objective case as far as
*morphology* is concerned.  However, I would like to propose that there *is* a
dative case and there *is* an accusative case in the Lowlands languages.  It
is only that these are not *morphologically marked*.  In other words, there
are no specific dative and accusative forms of nouns, pronouns, articles and
adjectives.  However, I feel that *syntactic marking* still applies.  Wherever
both appear in a sentence, the dative case phrase (describing the beneficiary
or recipient of the action) must always precede the accusative case phrase
(describing the object that undergoes the action).  For example
(*=ungrammatical):

                (subject-verb-{dat.obj.}[1]-{acc.obj.)[2])

English:        I wrote {my mother}[1] {a letter}[2].
                *I wrote {a letter}[2] {my mother}[1].
Low Saxon:      Ick schreev' {mien Moder}[1] {een Breev}[2].
                *Ick schreev {een Breev}[2] {mien Moder}[1].
German:         Ich schrieb {meiner Mutter}[1] {einen Brief}[2].
                *Ich schrieb {einen Brief}[2] {meiner Mutter}[1].

What above is the dative case phrase can switch places with the accusative
case phrase only if it is changed into an adverbial phrase, in which case
there must be a preposition, and in German the accusative is used:

                (subject-verb-{acc.obj.)[2]-{prep.acc.obj.}[1])

English:        I wrote {a letter}[2] {to my mother}[1].
Low Saxon:      Ick schreev' {een Breev}[2] {an mien Moder}[1].
German:         Ich schrieb {einen Brief}[2] {an meine Mutter}[1].

In languages that have consistent morphological marking, such as Latin and,
outside Indo-European, Uralic and Altaic, syntactic marking tends to be less
rigid because the cases are clearly marked and no confusion can arise.
Syntactic flexibility is utilized especially in poetic styles (which also
applies to German to some extent).

I think there is a general rule here:
"The less morphological marking the more syntactic marking"

In other words, syntactic case marking takes over where morphological case
marking disappears.  This is why English syntax is less flexible that German,
Latin or Russian syntax.

Any comments?

Regards,
Reinhard/Ron

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