tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Thu Oct 08 13:41:28 2009
[Date Prev][Date Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next]
Re: The meaning of -moH
Terrence Donnelly wrote:
> --- On Thu, 10/8/09, David Trimboli <[email protected]> wrote:
>> Overall, I agree with the point: there is some evidence that
>> syntactic differences exist among verbs, though the evidence is not
>> conclusive, or even necessarily convincing. If true, verbs may
>> fall into one of three classes: verbs of action that can take
>> objects; verbs of action that cannot take objects; and verbs of
>> quality, which cannot take objects.
>
> Really, just two classes: one in which the subject performs the
> action on an object, and one in which the subject experiences the
> action or the quality of the verb.
No, those are semantic roles. The syntactic classes are defined by the
verbs' relationships with other words, not by any meaning inherent in
the verbs. The difference between "performer" (agent or force) and
"experiencer" (patient, theme, or experiencer) is a semantic difference.
Syntactically, <subject> always does <verb>, regardless of whether the
subject is performing <verb> or experiencing <verb>.
--
SuStel
tlhIngan Hol MUSH
http://trimboli.name/mush
![[KLI Member]](/pics/KLImemberbutton.gif "[KLI Member]"){kind=small}
![[Hol po'wI']](/pics/level3_big.png "[Hol po'wI']"){kind=small}