Re: DoSpu'?

["Mark E. Shoulson" <mark@kli.org>]

>From: "Angela Anuszewski" <aanusze1@rochester.rr.com>
>Date: Sun, 26 Sep 1999 18:38:32 -0400
>Importance: Normal
>
>Hi, I was discussing this off list, but I thought I'd bring it up here.
>
>If my target just so happens to be a human, and I happened to want to do a
>"scattered all about" plural, would I have to use DoSmey and rely on
>context, or does DoSpu' work at all similarly? (I don't want to be making up
>grammar here...)

Well, considering that {-mey} is correct and conveys "scattered all about"
both for irregular plurals (like {ray'}) and for speaking persons, {DoSmey}
would certainly be correct for "(human) targets scattered all about".  I
tend to think that {DoSpu'} would actually be incorrect (or at least
*highly* marked) under just about all circumstances.  After all, if it's so
important that they're people that you worry about relying on context, why
are you calling them "targets" and not "people"?  Obviously, their
relevance to the sentence at hand is as targets, and that's what they
should be called.

~mark