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Re: [jboske] a quick note on poi'i, ce'u, ke'a, and 'bound ' ka (was: RE: The...



In a message dated 10/14/2002 6:13:51 PM Central Daylight Time, pycyn@hidden.email writes:

<<
1.  The restrictions on these things is not strictly grammatical -- though they should be. That is, {ke'a broda}, {ce'u broda}, and {ko'a kau broda} and {ko'a broda kau} all parse as sentences, without {poi} or some other subordinator -- and each is grammatical with the others' subordinators.  {ke'a} and {ce'u} are just KOhA and {kau}  is unrestricted UI

>>
1a. But the semantic restrictions are very strong: {ke'a}, as a sort of relative pronoun, only makes sense in a relative clause attached to a head; {kau} just labels "indirect question."  {ce'u}, on the other hand, makes perfectly good sense anywhere except as a sumti to the main selbri (and even there, it is possible: the difference between
"I assert that everything is broda" {roda broda}  and "of each thing, I assert that it is broda" {ce'u broda}). 

6.  So, at some level, {ce'u} is a transcendental universal with maximal scope (as far as I can see at the moment) -- certainly greater than the particulars of {kau}.

7.  Consequently, it is not quite right to call the {ce'u} in {la bab frica la djos le du'u ce'u broda} bound by the {la bab} and {la djos} (or by {frica}). The function that {le du'u ce'u broda} represents is the whole thing; it is just that only a couple of values are of interest: le du'u la bab broda kei and le du'u la djos broda kei. As witness the useful transformation to {le du'u la bab broda kei frica le du'u la djos broda}.

8.  From 1a. and 6 and 7, expressions like {le mamta ce'u} make perfectly good sense, in parallel with {le du'u makau mamta ce'u}, without falling into the more dubious situation of a main bridi one of whose sumti is {ce'u}.