Linguist Forum
Specializations => Morphosyntax => Topic started by: zaba on June 15, 2014, 10:07:49 PM
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I read on wikedia that,
Locative case - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Locative_case
... the locative case tended to merge with other cases: the genitive or dative.
In scenarios where the locative and genitive have merged, what would you call the result? I mean, what common properties do these two cases share? Sure, a linguist could just choose one or the other term, GEN or LOC but somehow that seems to biased by indoeuro langs.
Thanks!
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They're just labels, entirely meaningless.
Usually the "primary function" is still used as a label, or the "most important function", so probably genitive. But that's not an analysis.
Cases merge all the time, and we apply one label or the other. "Accusative" in English includes everything that isn't nominative. But it's just a name. (Some people care about this enough to use the term "oblique", though.)
As a simple example:
Latin: Nom, Acc, Gen, Dat, Abl
German: Nom, Acc, Gen, Dat
Where Latin uses the Abl usually German uses Dat. But it's called "dative".
There's no theoretical motivation for this label, nor should there be. It's just a name.
Also, cross-linguistically case names are applied very strangely, sometimes for almost no reason at all. And, yeah, it's biased by Indo-European. But again, they're just names. As evidence of this, look at Arabic where Nom and Acc are relatively similar (subjects and objects, but maaaany other functions too, such as Acc being used for adverbs), while Gen is used as the label for a case whose primary usage is not for possession.
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As evidence of this, look at Arabic where Nom and Acc are relatively similar (subjects and objects, but maaaany other functions too, such as Acc being used for adverbs), while Gen is used as the label for a case whose primary usage is not for possession.
It's my understanding that the case endings exist in the Qur'an but are ignored in regular Arabic speech. For example, the difference between al-kalbu (nominative) and al-kalbi (genitive) disappear and both are spoken as al-kalb.* It may still be printed with the case, but as far as I knew, it hasn't been pronounced for a long time. Is this not correct?
* That is, اَلْكَلْبُ (nominative), اَلْكَلْبِ (genitive) and اَلْكَلْب (unmarked), respectively.
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As a slight over generalization, yes. Some endings are preserved in formal usage. Diglossia in Arabic is complicated and no description applies to all varieties.