Implementing Change: Day 2

Mar 17, 2004 00:26


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atomistictheist March 17 2004, 05:33:23 UTC
Hey, somebody's gotta cover the subordinnate clauses. Thanks for picking up the torch for the rest of us.

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luciblue March 17 2004, 18:11:34 UTC
jesus CHRIST, you dont understand how much i LOVE THAT BRIDGE.
i truly do and i thank god everyday that i have cousins in the bay area so can ride over that beautiful structure much as possible.
*thea

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redundantagain March 18 2004, 00:28:26 UTC
Come and visit; it's been in the high 80's every day for the past week or so. I imagine NYC weather is still dreary.

Where do your cousins live/go to school?

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luciblue March 18 2004, 16:46:14 UTC
my aunt lives in the bay area near china town [she lives in that creepy part that was made to look like malibu...its called Sunset], and my cousins live in Tiburon across the bridge. i dont know where they go to school, though. i'll find out one day.
*thea

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stephanus March 17 2004, 20:26:09 UTC
Great photos! They're all so...perspective-oriented. Yesterday's peacock, too, was mad cool.

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stephanus March 17 2004, 21:19:39 UTC
Déjeuner du Matin

He put the coffee
In the cup
He put the milk
In the cup of coffee
He put the sugar
In the milky coffee
With the little spoon
He stirred
He drank the milky coffee
And he put down the cup
Without to look at me
He lit
A cigarette
He made rings
With the smoke
He put the ash
In the ashtray
Without to speak to me
Without to look at me
He stood up
He put
His hat on his head
He put
His raincoat on
Because it was raining
And he left
In the rain
Without a word
Without to look at me
And as for me I clasped
My head in my hand
And I wept.

-Prévert

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L. "Sine me rogato abierunt"? anonymous March 18 2004, 00:24:27 UTC
'Without me [having been] asked they departed'.

Hmmm... ancient languages like Greek and Latin would be more exciting, I think. Funky interlocking word orders, among other rhetorical devices.

Some languages simply lack the verbal noun (Latin infinitive is a fossilized dative form). And your example might be better rendered in Latin and Ancient Greek with ablative and genitive absolutes respectively. Or more straightforwardly with accusative + participle.

Might be worthwhile to check Bernard Comrie, Language Universals and Linguistic Typology (Chicago: U. of Chicago Press, 19892), esp. p.203ff. re: non-finite subordination, and ch.7 on relative clauses.

There's also Bernard Comrie, ed., The World's Major Languages (New York/Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1990), with short syntactic (inter alia) descriptions of every "big" language from every family.

BTW, great pictures, esp. "gifuto shoppu"!

--Angelo

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Re: L. "Sine me rogato abierunt"? redundantagain March 18 2004, 00:54:35 UTC
Thanks for the recommendations; I'm going tomorrow to see if SFSU's library has those books. The second one sounds especially helpful, since my advisor for this dealie wants me to focus on the "social and geographical pressures involved in the diffusion of linguistic innovation"... the only distinction I can think of is Balkan language construction (more like Greek) versus all the other languages that use the infinitive style of French and German. I had to fight to get this topic approved and now, ironically, have come to my senses and realize that it is, at best, a cure for insomnia. I want to switch to a topic within the English language like presence/absence of non-prevocalic /r/ in different parts of England, but I don't know yet if that's possible. I'm so ready for summer.

Have you disallowed comments on your journal? I'm sorry about your unpleasant driving experience on your way to Berkeley. If you're back in the area and have more free time, I'd love to get together.

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Re: L. "Sine me rogato abierunt"? anonymous March 19 2004, 01:35:17 UTC
Hmmm... you might be barking up the wrong tree re: "social and geographical pressures involved in the diffusion of linguistic innovation" :: areal syntactic features of Balkan. I could be wrong, of course. In any case, the topic is huge. You might want to check out J. K. Chambers et al., eds., The Handbook of Language Variation and Change (Blackwell, 2004). I would have gone for /r/ insertion--even /l/--in English dialects. Good luck all the same!

Yeah, I took the comments out. Only you were using it! And I didn't like the service. Thanks for your sympathetic words re: Berkeley.

--Angelo

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