How many syllables does babbling have?
DOYLE60
How many syllables does "babbling" and other such words have? Is it
pronounced "bab-bling" (two syllables) like my dictionaries have? Is it
acceptable to pronounce it "bab-ble-ling" (three syllables)?
The first way has "-bling" which is normal for an English speaker. But
what about the word "rattling?" If this word has two syllables, than the
speaker must pronounce "-tling." The "tl" consonant combination is odd.
Riddling!
Doyle60
Avi Jacobson
DOYLE60 wrote:
>
> How many syllables does "babbling" and other such words have? Is it
> pronounced "bab-bling" (two syllables) like my dictionaries have? Is it
> acceptable to pronounce it "bab-ble-ling" (three syllables)?
Not in standard US or British English pronunciation. The "syllabic l"
(actually schwa-l) pronunciation is prevalent in some dialects (Don't we
just love The Nanny Named Fran), but definitely non-standard.
>
> The first way has "-bling" which is normal for an English speaker. But
> what about the word "rattling?" If this word has two syllables, than the
> speaker must pronounce "-tling." The "tl" consonant combination is odd.
Odd? A VERY quick search of about 200 random text files on our local
network produced the following:
motley
outline
recently
slightly
constantly
efficiently
subsequently
frequently
jointly
distinctly
Atlantic
>
>
> Riddling!
Or a troll?
--
Avi Jacobson, email: avi_...@netvision.net.il | When an idea is
Home Page (Israel): | wanting, a word
http://www.netvision.net.il/php/avi_jaco | can always be found
Mirror Home Page (U.S.): | to take its place.
http://www.geocities.com/Paris/4034 | -- Goethe
Daniel Luecking
Avi Jacobson <avi_...@netvision.net.il> writes:
>DOYLE60 wrote:
>>
>> How many syllables does "babbling" and other such words have? Is it
>> pronounced "bab-bling" (two syllables) like my dictionaries have? Is it
>> acceptable to pronounce it "bab-ble-ling" (three syllables)?
<reply snipped>
>>
>> The first way has "-bling" which is normal for an English speaker. But
>> what about the word "rattling?" If this word has two syllables, than the
>> speaker must pronounce "-tling." The "tl" consonant combination is odd.
>Odd? A VERY quick search of about 200 random text files on our local
>network produced the following:
>motley
>outline
>recently
>slightly
>constantly
>efficiently
>subsequently
>frequently
>jointly
>distinctly
>Atlantic
All of which would place the "t" and following "l" in separate
syllables: mot-ley. I have heard the pronunciation ratt-ling, but I
seems to be not very common. It is also not the same as pronouncing
rat + tling, with "tling" a single syllable. (The dictionary does
give rat-tling as the division into syllables, but I think this must
be for hyphenation in writing.)
I would say /'r& *l- IN/ or /'ra t@l IN/ (the latter, e.g., in song
where the middle syllable needed a little more stress). But I would
almost always say /b& blIN/ and /mat li/
Dan
--
luec...@comp.uark.edu | Mathematics is not science, it's not engin-
Department of Math. Sci. | eering, and it's certainly not psychology.
University of Arkansas | It is an exquisitely pure art form that may
Fayetteville, AR 72101 | occasionally be useful.........Boris Beizer
Fred Galvin
On Wed, 2 Oct 1996, Avi Jacobson wrote:
> DOYLE60 wrote:
> >
> > How many syllables does "babbling" and other such words have? Is it
> > pronounced "bab-bling" (two syllables) like my dictionaries have? Is it
> > acceptable to pronounce it "bab-ble-ling" (three syllables)?
>
> Not in standard US or British English pronunciation. The "syllabic l"
> (actually schwa-l) pronunciation is prevalent in some dialects (Don't we
> just love The Nanny Named Fran), but definitely non-standard.
That's too bad. If words like "babbling" and "rattling" are supposed to be
onomatopoetic, they are *more* onomatopoetic in the 3-syllable version,
which seems to be a good enough reason to pronounce the extra syllable. Of
course this doesn't apply to words like "troubling", and a 3-syllable
pronunciation of "doubling" would ruin the familiar old riddle, "Why is
Ireland the richest country in Europe?"
Bob Cunningham
Avi Jacobson <avi_...@netvision.net.il> wrote:
>DOYLE60 wrote:
>>
>> How many syllables does "babbling" and other such words have? Is it
>> pronounced "bab-bling" (two syllables) like my dictionaries have? Is it
>> acceptable to pronounce it "bab-ble-ling" (three syllables)?
>
>Not in standard US or British English pronunciation. The "syllabic l"
>(actually schwa-l) pronunciation is prevalent in some dialects [...], but
>definitely non-standard.
>
I don't think that's true (that it's nonstandard).
_Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary_ (MWCD)* shows the
pronunciation of "babbling" as /'b&b (@) lIN/ ("BAB (uh) ling"). That
means that they consider the pronunciations with and without the schwa
(two and three syllables) equally acceptable.
I pronounce "babbling" with three syllables and don't feel that I
am speaking in a nonstandard manner when I do.
>>
>> The first way has "-bling" which is normal for an English speaker. But
>> what about the word "rattling?" If this word has two syllables, than the
>> speaker must pronounce "-tling." The "tl" consonant combination is odd.
The speaker doesn't need to pronounce "tling" as a syllable. The
two syllables are "rat" and "ling" (See MWCD).
>Odd? A VERY quick search of about 200 random text files on our local
>network produced the following:
>
>motley
>outline
>recently
>slightly
>constantly
>efficiently
>subsequently
>frequently
>jointly
>distinctly
>Atlantic
None of those words requires the pronunciation of a syllable
beginning with the consonant cluster "tl". For example, in "motley" the
two syllables are "mot" and "ley"; in "Atlantic" the syllables are "At",
"lan", and "tic" (/'mAt li:/ and /@t 'l&n tIk/ (MWCD)).
* In referring to _Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary_ it's not
necessary to refer to an edition number, because only one edition of
_Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary_ has been published. It's
the tenth edition of the "Collegiate" series, but none of the first
nine had the name "Merriam-Webster's" in the title. The "10" in the
form "MWCD10" that I, and others, have used in the past (and that is
in the a.u.e. FAQ) is superfluous.
(Posted)
Chris G. Perrott
3
Mike Barnes
The dancing digits of DOYLE60 <doy...@aol.com> created this
pronouncement in alt.usage.english...
>How many syllables does "babbling" and other such words have? Is it
>pronounced "bab-bling" (two syllables) like my dictionaries have? Is it
>acceptable to pronounce it "bab-ble-ling" (three syllables)?
Let's step back a bit. How many syllables does "babble" have? My ears
tell me two; if it was spelt "babbel" the sound would be the same. Add
one syllable for "ing" (the way I pronounce it) and that makes it three.
Of course it would be possible to do it as two syllables, but I don't,
and I don't know anyone else who does. Similarly I don't know anyone
else who pronounces "rattling" and "Gatling [gun]" similarly.
Of course, I'm no expert on such things, and don't know the exact
definition of a "syllable"; there is obvious scope for semi-syllables.
Regards, Mike.
--
Mike Barnes, Stockport, England.
This week's hot tips for the lottery: 12, 14, 23, 32, 38, 34.
Steve MacGregor
DOYLE60 <doy...@aol.com> wrote in article
<52q1kb$n...@newsbf02.news.aol.com>...
<<How many syllables does "babbling" and other such words have? Is it
pronounced "bab-bling" (two syllables) like my dictionaries have? Is
it acceptable to pronounce it "bab-ble-ling" (three syllables)?>>
Since there are only two vowels written, I pronounce only two. The
same with rattling "RATT-ling".
--
-- __Q Stefano MAC:GREGOR Mi dankas al miaj bonsxancigaj
-- -`\<, (s-ro) \ma-GREG-ar\ steloj, ke mi ne estas
-- (*)/ (*) Fenikso, Arizono, Usono supersticxulo.
------------ <http://www.indirect.com/www/stevemac/ttt-hejm.htm> ---
Bob Cunningham
Mike Barnes <mi...@exodus.co.uk> wrote:
>The dancing digits of DOYLE60 <doy...@aol.com> created this
>pronouncement in alt.usage.english...
>>How many syllables does "babbling" and other such words have? Is it
>>pronounced "bab-bling" (two syllables) like my dictionaries have? Is it
>>acceptable to pronounce it "bab-ble-ling" (three syllables)?
>
>Let's step back a bit. How many syllables does "babble" have? My ears
>tell me two; if it was spelt "babbel" the sound would be the same. Add
>one syllable for "ing" (the way I pronounce it) and that makes it three.
Note, though, that at least one dictionary (_The Random House
Dictionary of the English Language_ Second Edition Unabridged) has
"babble" pronounced /'b&b @l/ ("BAB uhl") and "babbling" pronounced
/'b&b lIN/ ("BAB ling").
_Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary_ has "babble"
unconditionally as /'b& b@l/ ("BA buhl"), but "babbling" as optionally
/'b& b@l IN/ or /'b& blIN/ ("BA buhl ing" or "BA bling").
Modern British dictionaries aren't good about giving the
pronunciations of derivative formations, so I don't get any clue from
any of them as to the pronunciation of "babbling". The old OED has
"babble" pronounced /'b&bl-/ ("BAb'l") and "babbling" pronounced
/'b&blIN/ ("BAbling") (British dictionaries don't show syllabification),
but that information was probably put to bed well over a century ago.
Anyway, it appears that it's not safe to try to deduce the
pronunciation of "babbling" from that of "babble".
John M. Lawler
Mike Barnes <news-r...@exodus.co.uk> writes:
>DOYLE60 <doy...@aol.com> writes:
>>How many syllables does "babbling" and other such words have? Is it
>>pronounced "bab-bling" (two syllables) like my dictionaries have? Is it
>>acceptable to pronounce it "bab-ble-ling" (three syllables)?
>Let's step back a bit. How many syllables does "babble" have? My ears
>tell me two; if it was spelt "babbel" the sound would be the same. Add
>one syllable for "ing" (the way I pronounce it) and that makes it three.
>Of course it would be possible to do it as two syllables, but I don't,
>and I don't know anyone else who does. Similarly I don't know anyone
>else who pronounces "rattling" and "Gatling [gun]" similarly.
>Of course, I'm no expert on such things, and don't know the exact
>definition of a "syllable"; there is obvious scope for semi-syllables.
There is indeed, and you're also right that the matter at issue is what
counts as a "syllable". Asking people for answers to how many syllables a
word has, in their own (unheard) speech, without being very clear about
what's meant by "syllable", is not unlike calling somebody up on the phone
and asking them to tell you how much money you have in your wallet.
Without specifying what country's money you're talking about.
Syllables are composed from consonants and vowels, but they're an
independent unit, best thought of as composed simply of a beginning,
middle, and end (called, respectively: "syllable onset", "syllable
nucleus", and "syllable coda"; you can drop the "syllable" if you
get tired of saying it). The prototype syllable has a consonantal
onset and a vocalic nucleus, and is divided into "open" or "closed"
depending on whether there's a coda: "too" is open, "toot" closed.
In the case of "babble", we have either two open syllables: /bae/ and
/b@l/, or one closed syllable plus a bare nucleus: /baeb/ and /@l/. It's
the nature of the nucleus that causes the problem. It's often represented
as a vowel (usually phonemic schwa, which rarely clarifies the issue for
laymen) followed by a consonant /l/. The problem is that, while that's
close enough for government work or phonemic transcription, it's a bad
representation of the phonetics. "Syllabic L", like "syllabic R", isn't
*either* a phonetic vowel *or* a phonetic consonant; it's a semivowel, a
resonant consonant articulation (technically, a "voiced lateral resonant")
that can be a syllable nucleus all by itself.
[If this reminds you vaguely of electron sharing in chemical compounds,
you're not alone. Many kinds of linguistic theories have similar
properties, and even acknowledge the analogy overtly, as Maxwell
did for the analogy between electromagnetism and hydrodynamics.
But I digress.]
The resonant consonants, R's and L's and M's and N's and NG's and like
that, can all be syllables by themselves, without benefit of vowel
accompaniment. That's just a fact about the way we produce the chest
pulses that we hear (and count, and time) as individual syllables; it's a
fact about the physiology of the human vocal tract, and about the
processing of human speech by the aural centers in the brain. Nothing to
do with English per se, though every language does vary in how syllables
are treated.
English in particular, however, *does* exaggerate, rather strongly, the
difference between stressed and unstressed syllables, due to its
stress-timed nature. English only pays full attention to stressed
syllables, which are usually not at the end of a word. So unstressed
syllables, especially at the end of a word, most especially when they're
bare syllabic resonants, a marginal kind of syllable to start with, get
*really* whittled down in English. To such an extent, in fact, that there
is a large group (about 2000 or so; I have a database you can download if
you're really *that* interested) of what I would call "one-and-a-half
syllable words" in English, and "babble" is among them.
The question with "babbling", then, is how one adds numbers like this.
"-ing", the verbal inflection, is another syllabic resonant, whose nasal
famously assimilates to neighboring consonants, and sometimes changes into
a simple nasalized vowel. This is another half-syllable. But do two
half-syllables count as one whole?
Sometimes they do, it appears. Some people pronounce it as /bae blIng/;
in this case, the syllabic L is converted to a plain consonant, which can
form the onset to a syllable. I usually do, myself, at least in the
phrase "babbling brook". Unless I want to emphasize the onomatopoeic
aspects of the description, in which case I'm wont to say /bae b@l Ing/,
with three distinct nuclei.
One can also split the syllable along different lines and say it as /baeb
@ lIng/ or /baeb @l Ing/ or various other combinations. These look
different in phonemic transcription, but aren't much different in reality,
because the reality of syllables is the peak at the nucleus, and all that
matters is how many peaks there are. And, naturally, how high the peaks
need to get for us to notice them.
Of course, "half" is not a really exact measure. But then, this wasn't a
notably exact question to start with. No doubt we could measure some
complex of stress, length, and vocalic density and come up with a fuzzy
syllable-count. Or perhaps we could talk about quarks, leptons, and spin,
and wind up with Schroedinger's syllable. Syllables, after all, have some
count properties and some mass properties, just like quantum electrons.
There are more of these analogies (linguists argue about them all the
time), but I'll spare you.
-John Lawler http://www.ling.lsa.umich.edu/jlawler U Michigan Linguistics
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
"Language is the most massive and inclusive art we know, a - Edward Sapir
mountainous and anonymous work of unconscious generations." Language (1921)
David Combs
In article <535m7v$d...@lastactionhero.rs.itd.umich.edu>,
John M. Lawler <jla...@gorf.rs.itd.umich.edu> wrote:
>Mike Barnes <news-r...@exodus.co.uk> writes:
>>DOYLE60 <doy...@aol.com> writes:
>
>>>How many syllables does "babbling" and other such words have? Is it
>stress-timed nature. English only pays full attention to stressed
>syllables, which are usually not at the end of a word. So unstressed
Wouldn't it be easier to parse if the "only" was moved way to
the right, where it "belongs"?:
English pays full attention to ONLY stressed syl...
Hope this helps.
David Combs
Geoff Butler
Thanks, John, for taking the time and effort of post this sort of stuff.
I must say that I appreciate it greatly. I can even claim that I often
understand most of it, which is not always the case in discussions of
linquistics and the like.
-ler
John M. Lawler
David Combs <dkc...@netcom.com> writes:
>John Lawler <jla...@umich.edu> writes:
>> English only pays full attention to stressed syllables, which are
>> usually not at the end of a word.
> Wouldn't it be easier to parse if the "only" was moved way to
> the right, where it "belongs"?:
> English pays full attention to ONLY stressed syl...
Maybe it would be easier for some kinds of software to parse,
but it wouldn't sound as good. If that were what I'd intended
to say, I would have moved the ONLY to before the "to", not
after it:
English pays full attention ONLY to stressed syl...
The "to" is semantically null, marking the NP following it
as the "payee" in the metaphor theme ATTENTION IS MONEY,
the "object" of "pay attention" in this mapping. And since
I wanted to focus on the first word in the NP ("stressed"),
thus identifying "unstressed" as the "other" which is presupposed
by "only", I didn't want to put two focus words -- both stressed,
as a matter of fact, and relevantly so -- one after the other.
Putting it before the "to" doesn't affect the unambiguous identification
of the scope of ONLY, and it does provide an unstressed syllable between
the two focus words, which gives us time for us to catch our mental breath
and get ready for the next stress group.
However, that wasn't all I intended to say, so I didn't move it there.
I put it up front, right between "English" (a metaphorical person in this
sentence) and "pays attention to" (a (secondary) metaphorical commercial
transaction of this metaphorical person) precisely because it was
potentially ambiguous. I wanted to put some focus on the metaphorical
(and therefore false, and potentially misleading) nature of the subject
and predicate, and putting "only" there seemed to me at the time to beg
precisely the questions I wanted it to, and to call attention (if anybody
was listening for a call) to the general lack of precision in the bald and
vastly overgeneralized (but relevant, in my opinion) statement I was
making.
The fact that you seem to have caught this indicates that I was right, in
some sense, and that's nice. However, the fact that you seem to believe
that easy parsing is the sine qua non of English correctness, while a
welcome change on the usual catechism of the Fowler crowd, is equally
misguided, in my opinion.
Syntax, and parsing it, is basically traffic rules and obeying them, and
is about as important. And is honored as much in the breach as in the
observance, also like traffic rules. Further, everybody lives in their own
syntactic state, with its own rules, some of which are vastly different
from those in neighboring states. In this analogy, I am the Chief Justice
of my own Syntactic Supreme Court. Of course, so are you, but only in
your own court. I have a regular docket of cases being argued, and
welcome interesting ones; but I'm a stickler for accuracy.
And there are far better things humans have to do with their language
besides making it easier for software to parse. Let the software improve
instead. Another century of progress in computing like the past 25 years
and we may be ready for some real parsing of real language. In the
meantime, we'll just have to get used to reality.
-John Lawler http://www.ling.lsa.umich.edu/jlawler/ U Michigan Linguistics
DOYLE60
In response to John Lawler s 3 page essay, Talk About Babbling!, I have
the following points:
1) For the sake of argument, let s call anything that can be considered a
half syllable (or less) a whole syllable. If you consider the word
"babble" to be one and a half syllables, you are complicating the issue.
But I do agree that there are certain ways to say babbling in three
syllables where the middle syllable is questionable.
2) I have a better analogy than the one you gave about the vagueness of
the word syllable. It s like someone asking "how many vehicles are in the
parking lot?" And the other notices that there are two motorbikes. Do
they make up one car? What about the truck? Hmm? In my opinion the
motorbikes and the truck count as a vehicle each.
3) I like how you just answered the technical side of the question
without getting into the proper way to pronounce the word. It is nice to
get this point of view for a change.
4) Does anyone know how many syllables (vehicles) Bush used for the word
"gentler" in "a kinder, gentler nation."?
5) I have noticed for the first time that dictionaries do not split words
up for line breaks in the same place that the syllables are broken up for
pronunciation.
6) My personal belief is that most people pronounce these -ing words with
three syllables and the dictionaries are avoiding the issue. It is a
scandal!
Doyle60
Avi Jacobson
DOYLE60 wrote:
>
> In response to John Lawler s 3 page essay, Talk About Babbling!, I have
> the following points:
>
> 1) For the sake of argument, let s call anything that can be considered a
> half syllable (or less) a whole syllable. If you consider the word
> "babble" to be one and a half syllables, you are complicating the issue.
Grammar and all subsets thereof (whether prescriptive or descriptive)
are based on man-made models which include their own concepts and
definitions. It is perfectly legitimate for one to build a descriptive
grammar of English pronunciation which includes the notion of a
"half-syllable", just as it is perfectly legitimate not to. The
question is one of "descriptive adequacy", i.e.: which model more
exhaustively and more elegantly describes the pronunciation of English.
Although my original impulse was to jump in with the horribly
narrow-reminded response "There is no such thing as a half-syllable,
period!" (Thank God I didn't do that), I must admit that there are
grammatical models in common use in other language where precisely such
a notion exists (in the prescriptive grammar of Classical Hebrew, for
example, which is actually based on a fairly descriptive model of how
the language was pronounced in Tiberias around the 4th century A.D.).
In all fairness, though, I have never heard this concept used in a
grammatical model of English, and I do not believe it reflects the
phonological intuitions of most English speakers.
> But I do agree that there are certain ways to say babbling in three
> syllables where the middle syllable is questionable.
I would say this differently: The word may be pronounced in three
syllables, but this pronunciation (common as it may be) is not
considered standard -- at least not by my dictionary (Random House
College Dictionary Revised Edition), which does not even list it.
>
> 2) I have a better analogy than the one you gave about the vagueness of
> the word syllable. It s like someone asking "how many vehicles are in the
> parking lot?" And the other notices that there are two motorbikes. Do
> they make up one car? What about the truck? Hmm? In my opinion the
> motorbikes and the truck count as a vehicle each.
Here, there is less room for speculation. In the context of the road,
it is the law -- another man-made model which determines what
constitutes a single vehicle and what does not. Though I once held a
Pennsylvania driver's license (it must have expired by now; I haven't
renewed it since 1976), I don't know what Pennsylvania or any other US
law has to say about this. In Israel, however, a motorcycle with a side
car is considered a single vehicle. If you detach the sidecar and
attach, say, pedals and a bike chain, it becomes a separate vehicle. If
a tractor tows a trailer, that is one vehicle. If it tows a car, that
is two. A bicycle is a vehicle, a skateboard is not -- even if it is
motorized. Of course, in the same way that a grammar could allow for
"half a syllable", a rode code could allow for half a vehicle.
> 4) Does anyone know how many syllables (vehicles) Bush used for the word
> "gentler" in "a kinder, gentler nation."?
I seem to recall three: ['dZEn t@ l@r] .
>
> 5) I have noticed for the first time that dictionaries do not split words
> up for line breaks in the same place that the syllables are broken up for
> pronunciation.
Correct. And many dictionaries (including the above-cited)
differentiate between the notion of "syllable" in the phonological sense
("a segment of speech typically produced with a single pulse of air
pressure...") and in the orthographic sense ("(in writing systems) a
character or a set of characters representing more or less exactly such
an element of speech"). "More or less exactly" is crucial here, since
the rules of syllabification followed by dictionaries are orthographic
in nature and are based more on the characters involved than on actual
current pronunciation.
> 6) My personal belief is that most people pronounce these -ing words with
> three syllables and the dictionaries are avoiding the issue. It is a
> scandal!
Dictionaries distinguish between "standard" and "non-standard"
pronunciations. Can a pronunciation adopted by the clear majority be
labeled "non-standard"? Apparently so. My dictionary defines
"standard" in the grammatical sense as "conforming in pronunciation,
grammar, vocabulary, etc., to the usage that is generally considered to
be correct or preferred". That looks to me like the cat guarding the
cream, and a perfect example of waffling if I ever saw one: "Generally
considered" by whom? The general population, or the guys who wrote the
dictionary? "Preferred" by the general population or by the people
doing the considering? And does the definition mean "{considered to be
correct} or {preferred}" or "considered to be {correct} or {preferred}"?
--
Peter Wright
"It was a beautiful summer's day"
OK.
"It was a bitterly cold winter's night"
OK.
"It was a fresh crisp autumn's morning"
No? Why not?
--
Peter Wright
Edgmond, Shropshire
Paul Bogrow
>No? Why not?
Your example is extreme because, in this case, the 'm' in 'autumn' wants
to combine with the 'm' in 'morning', thus evicting the 's'. However, my
explanation certainly does not account for the general case.
That's really a very good question.
Truly Donovan
Peter Wright wrote:
>
> "It was a beautiful summer's day"
>
> OK.
>
> "It was a bitterly cold winter's night"
>
> OK.
>
>
> No? Why not?
What is the authority for saying you can't do this? (Whether you would
want to is another matter altogether.)
--
Truly Donovan
"Industrial-strength SGML," Prentice Hall 1996
ISBN 0-13-216243-1
http://www.prenhall.com
Avi Jacobson
Truly Donovan wrote:
>
> Peter Wright wrote:
> >
> > "It was a beautiful summer's day"
> >
> > OK.
> >
> > "It was a bitterly cold winter's night"
> >
> > OK.
> >
> > "It was a fresh crisp autumn's morning"
> >
> > No? Why not?
>
> What is the authority for saying you can't do this? (Whether you would
> want to is another matter altogether.)
"Can't"? Hmmm, Truly -- tricky question! I am reminded of the bastard
client who refused to pay the contractually-agreed sum for a job
properly done. When I told him, "You can't just sign a contract and
then renege on it", he replied, "That's a strange use of the word
'can't'. Clearly, I have proven that I can."
The question is whether "autumn's morning" is grammatical in the
descriptive sense -- i.e., whether it would push a native speaker's
"Huh?" button.
I believe "winter's {noun}" and "summer's {noun}" are fossilized
remnants of a usage of the English genetive which is no longer
recursive. Why yesteryear but not yestermonth? Why "I like vegetables,
be they fresh or frozen", but not "I love to feed cats, eat they fresh
or canned food"?
Regards,
Avi
Polar
1.
>
"Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?
Thou art more lovely and more temperate:
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May
And summer's lease hath all too short a date."
2.
"The Winter's Tale".
And probably lots more.
Is the Bard really considered "fossilized"?"
Polar
Polar
Polarm
Steve MacGregor
Peter Wright wrote:
> "It was a beautiful summer's day"
>
> OK.
>
> "It was a bitterly cold winter's night"
>
> OK.
>
> "It was a fresh crisp autumn's morning"
>
> No? Why not?
Well, first of all, you should not ask "why not?" until someone
=else= has answered "no".
Joseph C Fineman
Avi Jacobson <avi_...@netvision.net.il> writes:
>I believe "winter's {noun}" and "summer's {noun}" are fossilized
>remnants of a usage of the English genetive which is no longer
>recursive.
Preserved in the clear amber of Shakespeare:
A Winter's Tale
Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?
For me, at any rate, there has to be a touch of poesy in the situation
for the possessive to sound natural. I might say
a pleasant way to spend a summer's day
the last of the winter's snow
but surely not
the aerodynamics of a summer's thunderstorm
--
Joe Fineman j...@world.std.com
495 Pleasant St., #1 (617) 324-6899
Malden, MA 02148
Gareth Williams
Thus spake s.m...@ix.netcom.com (Polar) :
+On Sat, 12 Oct 1996 11:33:00 +0300, Avi Jacobson
+<avi_...@netvision.net.il> wrote:
+>The question is whether "autumn's morning" is grammatical in the
+>descriptive sense -- i.e., whether it would push a native speaker's
+>"Huh?" button.
If by native you mean an English person, yes it does: winter and
summer with optional 's ; spring and autumn not.
I reacted with the UK equivalent of a 'huh' to 'an autumn's morning'
+>I believe "winter's {noun}" and "summer's {noun}" are fossilized
+>remnants of a usage of the English genetive which is no longer
+>recursive. Why yesteryear but not yestermonth? Why "I like vegetables,
+>be they fresh or frozen", but not "I love to feed cats, eat they fresh
+>or canned food"?
+"Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?
+"The Winter's Tale".
+
+And probably lots more.
+
+Is the Bard really considered "fossilized"?"
+
+Polar
Yes: clearly his texts are not evolving. He created or recorded a
number of phrases that survive in current speech as cliches with the
majority of people not realising where they came from.
FWIW. On searching my CD Shakespeare, I found 7 uses of 'a summer's
X', 3 uses of 'a winter's X' and none for 'a spring's X' or 'an
autumn's X'. It would not surprise me at all if that were the reason
that I find 'an autumn's day' to be an oddity.
Incidentally, Shakespeare never wrote 'a winter's day' : that was Paul
Simon.
regards
Gareth Williams <g...@fmode.demon.co.uk>
The Chocolate Lady (Davida Chazan)
> a pleasant way to spend a summer's day
> the last of the winter's snow
>but surely not
> the aerodynamics of a summer's thunderstorm
Why not? I would. However, what about:
The grass was silver with the first of the autumn's frosts.
The street was littered with the last of the fall's leaves.
A pleasant way to spend the summer's day.
****
De chocolate non est disputandum!
****
Jim Austin
In article <Dz8E1...@world.std.com>, j...@world.std.com says...
>
>For me, at any rate, there has to be a touch of poesy in the situation
>
> a pleasant way to spend a summer's day
> the last of the winter's snow
>
>but surely not
>
> the aerodynamics of a summer's thunderstorm
I think it's helpful to ask why. The possessive implies ownership. If
the summer or winter owns the day, there is a bit of personification
about--ownership, I think, is a human concept, attributed to deities in
some situations. If you believe that seasons are gods and own things,
then the possessive is appropriate, even in non-poetic (poesic?) writing.
More likely, though, the suggestion that a season can own a day, and the
implied personification/deification of the season, is meant poetically;
hence, this would only be appropriate in poetic writing where this
personification/deification is intended.
As to why Shakespeare attributed possession only to winter and summer:
perhaps only these seasons were deities, while autumn and spring were just
transitional seasons between? Anyone out there know what mythology
Shakespeare might have utilized?
jca
Gareth Williams
Thus spake dav...@jdc.org.il (The Chocolate Lady (Davida Chazan)) :
+I say, wasn't that j...@world.std.com (Joseph C Fineman) who wrote:
+> I might say
+> a pleasant way to spend a summer's day
+> the last of the winter's snow
+>but surely not
+> the aerodynamics of a summer's thunderstorm
+
+Why not? I would. However, what about:
+ The grass was silver with the first of the autumn's frosts.
ok
+ The street was littered with the last of the fall's leaves.
ok
+ A pleasant way to spend the summer's day.
nok - the summer has more than one day (even in the UK).
These use the definite article in which context the possessive feels
much more natural.
The original poster was talking about the indefinite:
'an autmn frost' v. 'an autumn's frost'
'a summer's day' v. 'a spring's day'
The terrible thing is that having written out several examples, they
are starting to sound familiar - such is the growth (or decay) of
language.
regards
gareth williams
A spring's day
--------------
I uncoiled myself, sprang out of bed and bounced down the stairs...
Bob Cunningham
aus...@mail.biddeford.com (Jim Austin) wrote:
>In article <Dz8E1...@world.std.com>, j...@world.std.com says...
[...]
>>but surely not
>>
>> the aerodynamics of a summer's thunderstorm
>
>I think it's helpful to ask why. The possessive implies ownership.
But the genitive case more often than not doesn't imply possession.
> If
>the summer or winter owns the day, there is a bit of personification
>about--ownership, I think, is a human concept, attributed to deities in
>some situations. If you believe that seasons are gods and own things,
>then the possessive is appropriate, even in non-poetic (poesic?) writing.
The word "summer's" is in the genitive case, but that doesn't imply
that "summer" owns something. I read of one grammarian who set out to
analyze the use of the genitive case and to define all the different
ways it can be used. He finally threw up his hands and said that the
genitive case can be used to express *any* relationship between two
substantives.
From _A Dictionary of Contemporary American Usage_ by Bergen &
Cornelia Evans:
It is a serious mistake to dismiss the genitive as
the "possessive" case, because more than half the
time it represents some other relation.
As I understand what the Evanses say about the genitive, I believe
they would classify "a summer's thunderstorm" as the "classifying or
descriptive genitive". Other examples of this use of the genitive are
"the room's furnishings", "the airplane's speed", and "the building's
foundations".
A characteristic of the descriptive genitive is that the
uninflected word can be substituted for the genitive form without
changing the meaning. "A summer thunderstorm" means the same as "a
summer's thunderstorm", and "the building foundations" means the same as
"the building's foundations". (But if an adjective is inserted, then
the genitive form is necessary: You can say either "New York's streets"
or "New York streets", but you can't say "New York smaller streets"; you
must say "New York's smaller streets".)
A characteristic of the possessive genitive is that the uninflected
word can't be substituted for the genitive form. You can say "Irene's
coat" but not "Irene coat". You can rephrase using an "of"
construction, but you must still keep the genitive form. Quoting the
Evanses, "Irene's coat" becomes "a coat of Irene's" and not a "coat of
Irene".
Genitive usages the Evanses discuss are:
Classifying or descriptive genitive,
Possessive genitive,
Subjective and objective genitive,
Genitive of purpose,
Measures and other adverbial genitives,
Survivals of an old genitive of source (e.g. "hen's eggs"),
Partitive and appositive genitive.
(It seems to me a better example of the old genitive of source
might be "virtue's rewards". The rewards don't in any sense belong to
an entity caller "virtue"; they belong to the person who is virtuous.
The genitive indicates only the source of the rewards, virtue.)
Bill Fisher
In article <Dz8E1...@world.std.com>, j...@world.std.com (Joseph C Fineman) writes:
> Avi Jacobson <avi_...@netvision.net.il> writes:
>
> >I believe "winter's {noun}" and "summer's {noun}" are fossilized
>
...
That's probably "genitive" and probably "productive" instead of
"recursive".
- billf