Klarinet Archive - Posting 000084.txt from 2000/01

From: Karel Vahala <vahalakv@-----.au>
Subj: Re: [kl] Re: languages
Date: Tue, 4 Jan 2000 05:31:00 -0500

Gender has nothing in common with "case". A given noun will have one gender only,
but will have multiple cases available to it, depending on the language in
question. My own language, Czech, has 3 genders: male, female and neutral. The
nouns, however, go through 7 cases in singular and 7 cases in plural. As a simple
illustration, a noun changes its case ending instead of the use of prepositions as
in English : with, to, for, and so on. The meaning of gender and "case" are very
different.

Karel.

Roger Shilcock wrote:

> It all depends what you define as gender --- if you count the noun classes
> of Bantu languages as a form of gender, there are languages with teens of
> them. Finnish is generally said to have fifteen cases, by the way, though
> some of them are hardly used in the spoken language. There are languages
> in the Caucasus with far more cases than this.
> Roger Shilcock
>
> On Fri, 24 Dec 1999, Rien Stein wrote:
>
> > Date: Fri, 24 Dec 1999 23:03:51 +0100
> > From: Rien Stein <rstein@-----.nl>
> > Reply-To: klarinet@-----.org
> > To: klarinet digest <klarinet@-----.org>
> > Subject: [kl] Re: languages
> >
> > On Thu, 23 Dec 1999 23:39:14 -0500 Danny Ehrhart wrote:
> >
> > >what about us students that are taught French but don't speak it. I'm prime
> > >example. I don't see why we need masculine and feminine articles?! (That's
> > >the part I have the most trouble with!) But I try, maybe I'll be able to
> > use
> > >it some day!
> >
> >
> > Dear Danny
> >
> > French is a rather uncomplicated language: it has only two genders. Many
> > languages have three, usually indicated as male, female and neutral. I am
> > not aware of any language having more than three genders.
> >
> > You can do quite without genders: English contains only one, the Indonesian
> > has none at all, and also this language, like Russian, has no articles.
> > Don't shout hoorray to these languages, though, they are not simple! In
> > Russian you have no articles, but you "ll meet all three the genders, and
> > besides six cases (and many more difficulties), in Finnish (I never learned
> > that one, but a friend of mine did) you have even eight. So cheer up, do the
> > best you can, and try to get fluent in French. Be not as that LA woman, that
> > said to me "I teach French, but I cannot speak it!" It gives much richness
> > to your life, when you master a language, and, believe me, I think it is
> > easier to become fluent in a foreign language, than to learn to play
> > clarinet ...
> >
> > Rien
> >
> >
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