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Post by Geoff on Jan 20, 2012 2:16:55 GMT
My grammar book defines case as: The change of form that a noun or pronoun undergoes to indicate its relationship to other words in a sentence. There are three cases in English - nominative, possessive, and objective. This definition is better understood by reading here with more insight if you click on the " case" link. Perhaps someone can explain case better than I have.
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Post by Twoddle on Jan 20, 2012 12:50:06 GMT
Cases are more important in inflective languages - where the spelling (usually the endings) of nouns and pronouns changes depending upon their function in a sentence - than in English where we tend not to change the spelling of words but instead to rely on the order in which words appear in the sentence. The only inflective language with which I'm familiar is Latin, so I'll use the cases from that to explain.
Nominative Case We use the nominative case for the subject of a sentence - the noun or pronoun that's "doing" something. In "Jane praises John", Jane is doing the praising, so she's the subject of the sentence, and "Jane" is in the nominative case.
Accusative Case As Geoff mentioned, we'd know it better as the "objective case", where the object of a sentence is the noun or pronoun that's having something "done" to it. In "Jane praises John", John is having something done do him - he's being praised - so "John" is the object of the sentence and is in the objective (or accusative) case.
Genitive Case What we call the "possessive" case, though it doesn't necessarily imply ownership, merely some form of association. It can involve the use of the word "of" ("The mother of Jane"), a possessive apostrophe (Jane's mother), or a possessive pronoun/adjective (Her mother).
Dative Case Where the words "to" or "for" are (or could be) used. For example, "He gave his son a car", which could be rewritten, "He gave a car to his son"; "She made him a present", or "She made a present for him". In those examples "son" and "him" are in the dative case.
Ablative Case When "with" is used. In "Jane went there with John", "John" is in in the ablative case.
Vocative Case "John, you're laughing"; "Mary, you're running"; "O master!"
It's debatable whether the dative and ablative cases really exist in modern English, the vocative case isn't very significant, and the nominative and accusative are better recognised as subjective and objective.
As far as I know, the only English words that change with their cases are pronouns. Examples of subject (or nominative case) pronouns are I, you, he, she, we, who, they and it; object (or accusative case) pronouns are me, you, him, her, us, whom, them and it. Genitive, dative and ablative case pronouns are the same as object pronouns.
As I mentioned, most of the cases are important only in inflective languages. In Latin, for example, the word for woman is:- Nominative: Femina (singular), feminae (plural). Accusative: Feminam (s), feminas (p). Genitive: Feminae (s), feminarum (p). Dative: Feminae (s), feminis (p). Ablative: Femina (s), feminis (p).
That's one of five types (or declensions) of noun, each type having different case inflexions, and there are irregular nouns too. Thank goodness we speak English!
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Post by Dave on Jan 20, 2012 16:02:24 GMT
I think I've heard the vocative also called the addressive (in English, not Latin).
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Post by Pete on Jan 21, 2012 10:50:08 GMT
I learned some Russian once and they also had 6 cases: nominative, accusative, genitive, dative, instrumental and locative. I suspect that instrumental was close to the ablative described by Twoddle. But my recollection is that locative was to do with location, so associated with "in", "on", etc.
Of course, it was 40 years ago and I have forgotten almost everything I learned except the names of the cases.
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Post by Pete on Jan 21, 2012 10:50:48 GMT
Of course, it was 40 years ago and I have forgotten almost everything I learned except the names of the cases. And the word for brother, which is 'brat'! ;D
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Post by Twoddle on Jan 21, 2012 11:16:44 GMT
Of course, it was 40 years ago and I have forgotten almost everything I learned except the names of the cases. More like forty-five years ago for me, and I've forgotten most of it too, but I still have my Clarendon Latin Primer sitting on a bookshelf and I couldn't possibly have produced my previous message without it!
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Post by Tone on Jan 21, 2012 21:11:03 GMT
Well done, Twoddle!
But now would you explain why it is claimed that the objective case cannot be used with verb "to be".
Tone
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Post by Twoddle on Jan 21, 2012 23:52:38 GMT
Well done, Twoddle! But now would you explain why it is claimed that the objective case cannot be used with verb "to be". Tone What, again?! Briefly, it's because the verb "be", together with one or two others ("become" springs to mind) don't "do" anything, and nothing is "done" to anything by them, so they can't possibly have objects. The nouns or pronouns to the right of them are precisely the same entities as the nouns or pronouns to the left of them, and are unsullied, virgo intacta, and undone-to. They're called "copulates" of each other, I think. In "I am Twoddle", "I" isn't doing anything to "Twoddle", and "Twoddle" hasn't had anything done to it by "I"; "I" merely states that it is identical to "Twoddle", so "Twoddle" isn't the object of "am". Therefore, if you replace "Twoddle" with the appropriate personal pronoun, it must be the subject pronoun "I", not the object pronoun "me", i.e. "I am I" not "I am me". Bugger! That was meant to be brief!
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Post by Geoff on Jan 22, 2012 3:57:32 GMT
Twoddle,
I like your explanation, one I've never had before. I remember learning only that the verb to be always takes the same case after it as before it.
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Post by Twoddle on Jan 22, 2012 11:38:37 GMT
Twoddle, I like your explanation, one I've never had before. I remember learning only that the verb to be always takes the same case after it as before it. Geoff, at my school I learnt the same from my English teachers as you did from yours - the verb "to be" doesn't have an object - but with no explanation given. It was Latin that showed me the logic behind it. I had a fearsome Latin teacher who'd keep the class standing for anything up to thirty minutes of each lesson while he prowled among the desks, whacking his ruler on our shoulders and demanding instant translations of randomly chosen sentences, or declensions of nouns, or conjugations of verbs. One error would result in verbal castigation, two in the writing of lines, and three in detention. I wasn't particularly keen on Latin but I was so terrified of that sod that Latin was one of only two GCE subjects in which I gained an "A" grade!
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Post by Pete on Jan 22, 2012 17:14:07 GMT
I had a fearsome Latin teacher who'd keep the class standing for anything up to thirty minutes of each lesson while he prowled among the desks, whacking his ruler on our shoulders and demanding instant translations of randomly chosen sentences, or declensions of nouns, or conjugations of verbs. One error would result in verbal castigation, two in the writing of lines, and three in detention. I wasn't particularly keen on Latin but I was so terrified of that sod that Latin was one of only two GCE subjects in which I gained an "A" grade! Which just goes to prove that the old teaching methods were the best.
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Post by Verbivore on Jan 23, 2012 6:05:06 GMT
Twod: Excellent summations of the cases! In the English "possessive" we include what the Latin-speakers called Genitive, Dative, and Ablative: "possessive" plus indirect objects. Put simply, if a word is preceded by of, to, for, by, with, or from its English case is, for want of a better term, Possessive. My Latin teacher was nothing like yours, Twod: he was more intent on teaching us old Roman culture and dirty jokes (in Latin!). Of course, we had to translate the jokes. Although we don't formally have a vocative in English, it is that noun form which ought, rightly, be accompanied by the comma of direct address or an exclamation mark.
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Post by Tone on Jan 24, 2012 20:56:06 GMT
>Briefly, it's because the verb "be", together with one or two others ("become" springs to mind) don't "do" anything, and nothing is "done" to anything by them, so they can't possibly have objects.<
But surely (to me, at least) they do "do" something. They establish the relationship! And I feel that "establishing a relationship" is indeed doing something.
>In "I am Twoddle", "I" isn't doing anything to "Twoddle", and "Twoddle" hasn't had anything done to it by "I"<
Your "Twoddle" has had a relationship established -- it has been made equivalent to "I".
Tone
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Post by Twoddle on Jan 24, 2012 22:16:10 GMT
>Briefly, it's because the verb "be", together with one or two others ("become" springs to mind) don't "do" anything, and nothing is "done" to anything by them, so they can't possibly have objects.<But surely (to me, at least) they do "do" something. They establish the relationship! And I feel that "establishing a relationship" is indeed doing something. >In "I am Twoddle", "I" isn't doing anything to "Twoddle", and "Twoddle" hasn't had anything done to it by "I"<Your "Twoddle" has had a relationship established -- it has been made equivalent to "I". Tone What makes you say that "I" established the relationship, rather than Twoddle? I see nothing in the sentence to suggest that a relationship has been established anyway, but, if it has, there's no indication as to who established it. "I am Twoddle" or "Twoddle is I": they're identical statements. In fact neither has established a relationship with the other, nor has one been made equivalent to the other, as they've always been the same entity; they're the same thing described with different words. If I were to write, "I have established a relationship with myself", I'd agree that "I" has done something, although even there I'd use the reflexive pronoun rather than the objective one; but in merely stating that "I" is the same thing as "I" (or Twoddle"), nothing is in the objective case. I am I; I am Twoddle; Twoddle is Twoddle; Twoddle is I; and no-one's done anything to anyone. Look at it mathematically: I = Twoddle Twoddle = I. The French have solved the problem by inventing disjunctive pronouns. Not "C'est je" or "C'est me", but "C'est moi". We missed a trick there. (If you'd tried using the accusative case with "to be" in my Latin class, you'd still be in detention today.)
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Post by Dave on Jan 25, 2012 7:59:48 GMT
I think Tone is saying that am is establishing the relationship between I and Twoddle rather than I or Twoddle doing the establishing. And by establishing something, something is being done. And by writing this, he can be right while being opposite the popular view!
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