The first two paragraphs (in English) were very confusing to me:

http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,1895,1886627,00.asp

I has initially reading the first sentence of the second paragraph as being in the vocative case ("That's right, Big Company, listen to what I have to say...").

I think it was the comma that misled me; it should be an item of punctuation that implies a longer pause--like an em-dash or a colon. The second sentence of the second paragraph doesn't help, since it's addressing an unknown entity--it could be Intel, it could be the reader.

Anyway, it occured to me that this problem wouldn't happen in Irish. The first sentence of the second paragraph would be "Eist, a Intel." if it were the writer addressing the company directly. And if it weren't addressing Intel (which it isn't) then there would be no 'a', right?

Just found that interesting.

And while we're at it, why not anaphoric pronouns, too? Old Irish had them, but they dropped off by the side of the road to Modern Irish, faraor. "Cad is anaphoric pronoun ann?" a deir tú. Well, I have a good friend, educated and literate. But as one of his stories progresses there reaches a point when you want to shout "Pronoun reference?!?" Which of the several 'he's who have already appeared on the narrative stage is he talking about now? If only we had anaphoric pronouns!

What did anaphoric pronouncs look like, Dennis? Can we have a peek?

Ní hansa.

in fer-sa (= an fear seo) = this man

in fer-side = the man most recently mentioned

a ben (= a bhean) = his wife

a ben-side = the wife of the one just mentioned

as·beir = he/she says

as·beir-side = the one just previously mentioned says

There are other forms, ach is leor seo mar shampla.

And their going into the cainúint I'm making up...

I really like that idea, Dennis. I write quite a lot. It's often a royal pain to keep all of the pronoun references resolved properly. But then, it sounds very stiff to keep using direct noun references... so, one has to contort sentences to force things to work out understandably...

Who do we talk to about adding this anaphoric pronoun concept to English??? :-)

(Message edited by Chris_C on November 16, 2005)

quote:

Who do we talk to about adding this anaphoric pronoun concept to English??? :-)

L'Académie Anglaise, ar ndóigh. ;-)