Re: Vocatives

Dominic Bojarski wrote:

Thank, you, Harlan. I spent the day in the library checking this out,
and, as you say, there is broad consensus for reserving the term
"case" to morphologically distinguishable forms.

I also spent some time looking up Peter's suggestion that I use the
term "thematic roles". I found it difficult to match these to the
Polish or Latin cases, though.

There may not be an exact match. Part of the frustration in learning, and in particular in translating between, languages is that everything doesn't occur in lockstep, one-to-one correspondences. The Portuguese present and past subjunctive correspond to their counterparts in French; its personal infinitive corresponds to the English use of the infinitive after verbs of wanting and so forth in lieu of the subjunctive, but French doesn't have a corresponding construction and can only use the subjunctive; Portuguese has a future subjunctive that corresponds to no distinctive feature in French or English.

They have more to do with semantics
than actual grammar. I did eventually put me on the track of a term
that was closer to the mark: "grammatic relations".

Would it be correct to say that grammatic relations in Latin and
Slavic languages are largely indicated using different cases, whereas
in English, they are indicated by using word order and particles?

Taking into account Peter's note about "thematic" versus "grammatic", I'd say so. Also, prepositions in addition to word order and particles. Or maybe that's what you meant be "particles".


Sorry for implying that you were uncivil. You were just being a little
zealous.

Um. Good word. :-) I would have said "emphatic".

Again, thanks a lot. My students will appreciate it.

You're welcome.
.

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