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Accusative marker

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alexptrans
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 Message 17 of 22
12 October 2006 at 7:33am | IP Logged 
Zorndyke wrote:

I know such a language: Persian ;-)


I didn't know that. So what you're saying is that in Persian the accusative marker is only used with definite nouns?
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Zorndyke
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 Message 18 of 22
12 October 2006 at 7:41am | IP Logged 
Quote:

I didn't know that. So what you're saying is that in Persian the accusative marker is only used with definite nouns?

Exactly. The -râ particle indicates a determined accusative object.

And when you take a look at Alijsh´s posts you will find that his examples containing this accusative marker are always determined ones.

Another example would be:

"Man yak ketâb dâshtam" (indefinite)
"I had a book"

whereas:

"ketab-râ dashtam" (definite)
"I had the book"

Both nouns are accusatives, but just the second one uses -râ, because it is a determined accusative object.

Edited by Zorndyke on 12 October 2006 at 7:44am

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alexptrans
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 Message 19 of 22
12 October 2006 at 8:01am | IP Logged 
That's very interesting, thanks!

Now that I think about it, Russian also has a similar phenomenon where the case markers for definite/indefinite direct objects can differ, albeit only in negation. So maybe there are even more languages that make this distinction.
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Chung
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 Message 20 of 22
25 August 2012 at 9:51am | IP Logged 
Zorndyke wrote:
Quote:

What is interesting is that this accusative marker is only used with definite nouns, for example:

[...]

I wonder if any other language makes such a distinction between definite/indefinite accusatives.

I know such a language: Persian ;-)


Declension in Mongolian, Turkic and in a few Uralic languages typically marks definiteness or "specificness" in direct objects subject to certain conditions.

Mongolian direct objects that are personal pronouns, proper names, definite noun phrases must take on a distinct "accusative" suffix while other nouns that could be construed as definite direct objects either take on this suffix optionally or do not take it on at all and so retain the appearance of being in nominative.

Би ном уншина. "I read a book."; Би нөгөө номыг уншина. "I read the book." (Mongolian - ном is nominative singular and doubles as the form for a book as an indefinite/unspecified direct object)

E.g. in Turkic:

Mən qəzet oxuyuram. "I'm reading a newspaper"; Mən qəzeti oxuyuram/ "I'm reading the newspaper" (Azeri - qəzet is nominative singular and doubles as the form for a newspaper as an indefinite/unspecified direct object)

Ben gazete okuyorum. "I'm reading a newspaper"; Ben gazeteyi okuyorum "I'm reading the newspaper" (Turkish - gazete is nominative singular and doubles as the form for a newspaper as an indefinite/unspecified direct object)

Men gazeta o'qiyapman. "I'm reading a newspaper"; Men gazetani o'qiyapman. "I'm reading the newspaper" (Uzbek - gazeta is nominative singular and doubles as the form for a newspaper as an indefinite/unspecified direct object)

E.g. in Uralic:

(Мон) ловнан книга. "I read a book"; (Мон) ловнан книганть "I read the book" (Erzya - книга is nominative singular and doubles as the form for a book as an indefinite/unspecified direct object)

Мон книга лыӟӥсько "I'm reading a book"; Мон книгаез лыӟӥсько "I'm reading the book" (Udmurt - книга is nominative singular and doubles as the form for a book as an indefinite/unspecified direct object)

For a technical slideshow on marking definiteness in Finno-Ugric and Turkic direct objects, see here.

Edited by Chung on 25 August 2012 at 10:03am

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LaughingChimp
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 Message 21 of 22
25 August 2012 at 11:15am | IP Logged 
Alijsh wrote:
In Persian, instead of declension found in German and Russian, the accusative is indicated by a marker (râ) coming after noun phrase (nominal group) e.g. dar râ beband (close the door)


How do you distinguish a marker from declension?
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Aquila123
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 Message 22 of 22
14 October 2012 at 6:01pm | IP Logged 
It occurs ferquently that object markers are limited to certain circumstances, typically definite nouns, animate nouns or singular number.

Idoeuropan languages had traditionally a distinct accusative only for animate nouns, which still can be seen to some extend in Slavonic, German, Islandic and Greek.

In Spanish the preposition "a" is used as an object marker for humans.




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