[B-Greek] Definiteness

Iver Larsen iver_larsen at sil.org
Sun Oct 8 03:14:40 EDT 2006


----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Rolf Furuli" <furuli at online.no>
To: <b-greek at lists.ibiblio.org>
Sent: Saturday, October 07, 2006 8:25 AM
Subject: Re: [B-Greek] Can a Noun function like an Adjective?


> Dear Iver,
>
> Your discussion below is interesting and fine. If I understand you
> correctly, as a descriptive linguist you say that a substantive must either
> be definite or indefinite, but in addition a substantive may signal
> characteristics or qualities without loosing its definiteness or
> indefiniteness. Have I undeerstood you correctly?
>
> Best regards,
>
> Rolf Furuli
> University of Oslo

I deliberately avoided using the term definite, because it appears to be used in different ways by different people and 
is therefore confusing. Are you using the term within discourse analysis (participant reference), lexical semantics or 
syntax? I find it hard to imagine "definiteness" as a property of a word taken out of context.

If you can define the way you use the word, I should be able to respond.

Iver Larsen 




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