[Multilingual Monday] Animate vs. Inanimate
One of the things I find interesting about languages (right, because there's only one!!) is the unique ways languages handle issues of living beings versus inanimate objects. English, of course, has the pronoun "it" and it clearly is used for non-living things -- a table, a chair, a car. However, there's exceptions to this rule -- cars or boats might be "she", and I know people who refer to animals as "it" even though they're living creatures with gender. Many languages don't possess a "neutral" pronoun and, even if they do, an inanimate object may possess "masculine" or "feminine" grammatical gender (which is what happens in Russian).
Georgian doesn't have gendered third personal pronouns or nouns with gender as in Russian, Spanish, etc. The "inanimate" vs. "animate" comes in the verb equivalent of "to have", where the verbs are completely different depending upon what is owned. Compare მას აქვს ბინა, mas ak’vs bin, "(S)he has an apartment", vs. მას ჰყავს ძაღლი, mas hqavs dzaghli, "(S)he has a dog." The verbs აქვს and ჰყავს are entirely different verbs and cannot be interchanged. It's one of the few times I see this distinction made in Georgian and I wonder if, in older Georgian, it had existed more and that this was a "relic" from that period. I need to research this!
I can't ignore this topic without talking about Amerind languages!! In many verbs in Cherokee (my experience with Amerind languages, but examining Navajo briefly showed me that it happens there too), there is a distinction between inanimate and animate in several cases, and even then differentiate between different states of inanimate objects -- ᎠᎩᎧᎭ, agikaha, "I have (something animate, like a cat)" vs. ᎠqᎤᎥᏯ, aquvya, "I have (something long)" or ᎠᎩᏁᎠ, aginea, "I have (something liquid)". Another distinction comes with people -- you can't say you have a wife, a husband, a mom, etc., as you don't OWN people in the Cherokee mindset, so these relations become verbs -- ᎠᎩᏙᏓ, agidoda, "my father", for example, is literally "he is a father to me," and is a verb. Other verbs may make an animate/inanimate differentiation: ᎦᏥᎪᏘᎠ, gatsigotia, "I see them (animate)" vs. ᏕᏥᎪᏘᎠ, detsigotia, "I see them (inanimate)". Whether or not the distinction is made, depends upon the verb and is further complication to the Cherokee verb system.
Have something I didn't cover here? Of course you do -- I only covered three languages! Now give me some other uniqueness about animate vs. inanimate differentiation!
Georgian doesn't have gendered third personal pronouns or nouns with gender as in Russian, Spanish, etc. The "inanimate" vs. "animate" comes in the verb equivalent of "to have", where the verbs are completely different depending upon what is owned. Compare მას აქვს ბინა, mas ak’vs bin, "(S)he has an apartment", vs. მას ჰყავს ძაღლი, mas hqavs dzaghli, "(S)he has a dog." The verbs აქვს and ჰყავს are entirely different verbs and cannot be interchanged. It's one of the few times I see this distinction made in Georgian and I wonder if, in older Georgian, it had existed more and that this was a "relic" from that period. I need to research this!
I can't ignore this topic without talking about Amerind languages!! In many verbs in Cherokee (my experience with Amerind languages, but examining Navajo briefly showed me that it happens there too), there is a distinction between inanimate and animate in several cases, and even then differentiate between different states of inanimate objects -- ᎠᎩᎧᎭ, agikaha, "I have (something animate, like a cat)" vs. ᎠqᎤᎥᏯ, aquvya, "I have (something long)" or ᎠᎩᏁᎠ, aginea, "I have (something liquid)". Another distinction comes with people -- you can't say you have a wife, a husband, a mom, etc., as you don't OWN people in the Cherokee mindset, so these relations become verbs -- ᎠᎩᏙᏓ, agidoda, "my father", for example, is literally "he is a father to me," and is a verb. Other verbs may make an animate/inanimate differentiation: ᎦᏥᎪᏘᎠ, gatsigotia, "I see them (animate)" vs. ᏕᏥᎪᏘᎠ, detsigotia, "I see them (inanimate)". Whether or not the distinction is made, depends upon the verb and is further complication to the Cherokee verb system.
Have something I didn't cover here? Of course you do -- I only covered three languages! Now give me some other uniqueness about animate vs. inanimate differentiation!