Re: On case: (was Re: Learning a language)

From: Eugene Holman (holman_at_elo.helsinki.fi)
Date: 06/22/04 

Date: Tue, 22 Jun 2004 13:48:53 +0300

In article <ia5ed0p20stmvslfojh3dq3gb3vgji0gj7@4ax.com>, Ruud Harmsen
<realemailseesite01@rudhar.com> wrote:

> Mon, 21 Jun 2004 19:15:48 +0300: holman@elo.helsinki.fi (Eugene
> Holman): in sci.lang:
>
> [a long and interesting explanation of cases in Finnish and Hungarian]
>
> OK, you convinced me that Hungarian and Finnish have cases too. So
> I'll modify my statements:

Thank you for conceding this point.

>
> 1) The fact that Hungarian has something like 4 times as many cases as
> Russian, doesn't mean it is necessarily 4 times as difficult to learn
> as Russian. I[t] may even be easier.

Perhaps. The number of cases is not the issue, rather it is the
systematicity of the grammar. The Russian case system interacts with
systems of gender and declensional type, for which reason the same ending
can have different functions (e.g -u as in knigu, accusative singular of
the feminine -a stem k*** 'book', but also in mal'chiku, dative singular
of the masculine non-palatalized consonant stem mal'chik 'boy' as well as
in chayu, the partitive genitive of chay 'tea'), and the same function can
be designated by different endings (e.g. knig genitive plural (zero
ending) of k***, dverej, genitive plural of the feminine palatalized
consonant stem dver' 'door', volkov genitive plural of the masculine
non-palatalized consonant stem volk 'wolf'). Additionally, many of the
endings are synthectosemic: when added to a feminine a-stem the ending -u
denotes both accusativeness and singularity; when added to a masculine
non-palatalized consonant stem it designates both dativeness and
singularity. The corresponding plural forms are knigam and mal'chikam,
with the ending -am denoting dativeness and plurality.

In Hungarian the mapping between the form and content of case endings is
far more straightforward, and the only interaction between the stem and
the ending is limited to vowel harmony and, in some cases, assimilation at
the morpheme boundary. Hungarian case endings tend to be phonolgically
heavier than the case endings in Russian, they do not interact with gender
or declensional type, and they are halposemic: their sole function is to
indicate case relations. Other grammatical categories such as number do
not interact with them:
                   
                  Singular Plural család 'family'
Nominative család családok
Accusative családot csoládokat
Illative családba családokba
Inessive családban családokban
Elative családból családokból
Sublative családra családokra
Superessive családon családokon
Delative családról családokról
Allative családhoz családokhoz
Adessive családnál családoknál
Ablative családtól családoktól
Dative családnak családoknak
Instrumental családdal családokkal
Translative családdá családokká
Causal-final családért családokért
Essive-formal családként családokként
Terminative családig családokig
Distributive családoként -
Sociative családostul -

This basic pattern is invariable for all nouns, but the form of the stem
(ló 'horse' ~ lavak 'horses', híd 'bridge' ~ hidak 'bridges'), the linking
vowel (család 'family ~ családok 'families, but híd 'bridge' ~ hidak
'bridges'), vowel harmony (családban 'in the family: cseszében 'in the cup
< cszesze 'cup''), and the intitial consonant of the ending for some cases
(e.g. the assimilation of the initial consonant of the endings of the
Instrumental and Translative in the above paradigm), mean that producing
and interpreting the cases is not a simple matter of concatenation or
deconcatenation.

>
> 2) I'd rather learn Hungarian than Russian, because the latter seems
> easier to me (and more interesting). (So far I haven't learned either
> languages, but I made some attempts).

Russian is probably "easier" from your perspective because it is an
Indo-European language. The Russian case system has roughly the same
grammatical functions that the case systems have in Latin and German, and
it interacts with systems of gender and declensional type to produce the
same type of complex and frustrating synthectosemia that it does in those
two languages.

Hungarian being a non-Indo-European language, its case system has some
functions and meanings that take considerable getting used to for a
speaker of a (European) Indo-European language. In particular, the
Hungarian case system commits you to a very precise and systematic
analysis of concrete and abstract reality in terms of comings, stayings,
and depertures involving penetrations and contacts, with entities and
surfaces. The meanings and functions of the Hungarian cases are generally
more concrete than those of Russian (owing to the fact that some Russian
cases represent the merger and continuation of what were once more than
one case at an earlier stage in the language), and their morphological
markers are heftier, but they are still more abstract than those of
adpositions. Indeed, the Hungarian case system is complemented by a large
inventory of more precise postpositions which, like their counterparts in
Finnish, co-occur with nouns in specific cases and can also be inflected
for case and person:

elé '(to) in front of' eló´t '(at) in front of' eló´l 'from in front of'
(cf. Finnish eteen, edessä, edestä)

alá '(to) under' alatt '(at) under' alól 'from under'
(cf. Finnish alle, alla, alta)

alám '(to) beneath me' (cf. Finnish alleni)
alattam '(at) beneath me' (cf. Finnish allani)
alólam 'from beneath me' (cf. Finnish altani)

alád '(to) beneath you' (cf. Finnish allasi)
alattad 'beneath you' (cf. Finnish allasi)
alólad 'from beneath you' (cf. Finnish altasi)

The Hungarian case endings, like those of Finnish, Estonian, Turkish, and
Mongolian are overwhelmingly haplosemic, nor do they interact with systems
of gender or, for the most part, noun declension. Most of the
morphophonemic variation observed in the case markers of these languages
is a consequence of quite automatic interaction between word stem and
marker such as vowel harmony and assimilation. An extreme example is
provided by the Finnish illative case, the marker of which is an algorithm
that can produce more than twenty distinct forms, depending on the
phonological shape of the noun to which it is attached: maa 'country' >
maahan, tie 'road' > tiehen, pii 'flint' > piihin, suo 'swamp' > suohon,
suu 'mouth' > suuhun, syy 'reason' > syyhyn, pää 'head' > päähän, yö
'night' > yöhön; kala 'fish' > kalaan, nukke 'doll' > nukkeen, leike
'cutlet' > leikkeeseen, nuoli 'arrow'> nuoleen, tuoli 'chair' > tuoliin,
talo 'house' > taloon, kalu 'tool' > kaluun, äly 'intelligence' > älyyn,
isä 'father' > isään, pöllö 'owl' > pöllöön; talot 'houses' > taloihin,
leikkeet 'cutlets' > leikkeisiin, hevonen 'horse' > hevoseen, hevoset
'horses' > hevosiin.

Regards,
Eugene Holman