conundrum
Paul B. Gallagher
paulbg at PBG-TRANSLATIONS.COM
Fri May 4 12:48:55 UTC 2012
John Dunn wrote:
> I am puzzled by this for two reasons. The first is that I would have
> thought that any noun indicating a substance or object capable of
> being manufactured could be used adjectivally before the word
> factory, e.g.: tractor factory, helicopter factory, sausage factory,
> and hence confectionery factory, pasta factory.
Agreed. But nouns cannot be used with "one" the way adjectives can:
We built a big, expensive, pasta factory.
We built a big one, an expensive one, and a *pasta one.
Nor can they be used in this sense as complements:
We built a big, expensive, pasta factory.
The factory was big, expensive, and *pasta.
> The second is that when they [are] used as nouns, neither soccer nor
> confectionery is capable of being qualified by an indefinite article,
> and therefore it is surprising that decoding problems arise with
> either sentence; the indefinite article must here qualify a later
> noun.
For "soccer," I agree, "a soccer" is bad. But for "confectionery," only
MW's first definition is uncountable; the other two ("sweet foods," "a
confectioner's shop") are definitely countable.
And what's more, a shop is also buildable; some might say that an
elaborate confection is "built" as well. ;-) So if we say "to build a
confectionery and a pasta factory," the reading "to build a
confectioner's shop and a pasta factory" is perfectly plausible on both
syntactic and semantic grounds.
Of course, I don't know which of these definitions exist in British
usage; I only know the American definitions in MW.
--
War doesn't determine who's right, just who's left.
--
Paul B. Gallagher
pbg translations, inc.
"Russian Translations That Read Like Originals"
http://pbg-translations.com
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