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Missing things out

od EldanarLambetur, 16. februar 2012

Sporočila: 9

Jezik: English

EldanarLambetur (Prikaži profil) 16. februar 2012 00:10:41

When speaking, we leave things out for convenience. Especially in set phrases (ĝis (la revido) and jes ja (jes, tiel ja estas)). Also leaving out the "ti-" correlatives before matching relative "ki-" ones when it's sensible for example.

I want to know the most understandable way of leaving something particular out.

If I were being lazy, as often I am, in English I might say some of the following:

"Working from home today"
"Having a break"
"Going to lunch in a minute"
"About to give a talk"

So the thing that all of these things have in common, is that the subject is implied and the subject is obviously me ("I", "I'm working from home today" etc.).

Now, is there a sensible way to leave out "mi" in Esperanto under such circumstances? Should I literally just drop it:

- Laboras hejme hodiaŭ

Or would using a participle be better?

- Laboranta hejme hodiaŭ

Do you have a better suggestion? (Even if you think such sentences are evil ridego.gif)

sudanglo (Prikaži profil) 16. februar 2012 00:23:20

Very interesting question Eldanar. My immediate reaction is that sentences like 'Laboras hejme hodiaŭ(?)' conflict with some basic principle.

RiotNrrd (Prikaži profil) 16. februar 2012 02:21:02

My immediate reaction to reading any sentence that starts with a plain "[root]as" is that my brain supplies a missing, default, "it's".

Pluvas. It's raining.
Gravas, ke... It's important, that...
Laboras hejme hodiaŭ. It's working from home today.

So... No. I would not write it that way.

sudanglo (Prikaži profil) 16. februar 2012 11:23:41

Riot makes a good point.

It is an established pattern in Esperanto that if a sentence begins with an -as word, it will either be one of a small group of words that require no subject, or it will raise an expectation that the grammatical subject will follow later in the sentence.

Esperanto can make use of certain freedoms concerning word-order that English can't.

What I noticed when teaching English to foreigners is that the student would often produce a sentence that to English ears would sound incomplete, because there was nothing in the object or complement position in the sentence.

Thus, he might say 'You want?', instead of 'Do you want it/one'.

Esperanto however seems to often permit objectless sentences in conversation.

Ĉu vi volas? seems normal Esperanto.

My tentative initial hypothesis is that you generally don't drop the subject in Esperanto in informal speech, but you may be able to drop the object.

Komprenas?

goli (Prikaži profil) 16. februar 2012 12:12:11

I think that laboras is better there than laboranta because I think that Esperanto's participles are likely to work as adjectives, not as a part of a tense form. But I think it's possible to say either laboras, and laboranta. Esperanto always gives wide freedom in syntax 'cause it has no exact syntax, actually. As I see this, syntax of Esperanto is say like you want.

darkweasel (Prikaži profil) 16. februar 2012 12:47:22

The correct way to put this, according to PMEG, is laboras, see: Forlaso de subjekto

EldanarLambetur (Prikaži profil) 16. februar 2012 18:46:33

My initial feeling was more "laboranta" (laborante?) than "laboras", but I think this was English influence.

Thinking about it more, if it were "laboranta" I'm dropping "mi estas", which is only a more clumsy way of saying "mi laboras" in this context anyway!

So with the information from PMEG (thanks darkweasel) my gut is leaning toward "laboras".

Especially after reading this example:

Kion li faris? — Iris al la urbo! = Li iris...

It's a stone's throw away from:

Boss: Kion vi faras hodiaŭ?
Me: Laboras hejme

I feel you'd all know what I meant?

EldanarLambetur (Prikaži profil) 16. februar 2012 18:49:16

I think looking at the example isolated, you're right that I already insert an "it" when I see no subject. Which is probably why PMEG says this style is only in rapid everyday usage, and usually heavily contextualised.

sudanglo (Prikaži profil) 16. februar 2012 20:55:34

PMEG says Oni normale ne forlasas la subjekton de ĉefverbo, se la ĉefverbo mem ĉeestas en la frazo. Tio estas baza principo en Esperanto

Where you can, it would seem to be a requirement that it be very clear what the missing subject is

In this dialogue — Kion li faris? — Iris al la urbo the subject of the second 'iris' has already been supplied

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