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"ĉi tio" vs. "tio ĉi" in practice

by Rajzino, August 21, 2015

Messages: 12

Language: English

Rajzino (User's profile) August 21, 2015, 4:29:03 PM

I am a komencanto (just about learning for a week now), and I know that in theory ĉi tio and tio ĉi (and other ĉi + ti-words) are one and the same and interchangeable. But I know from other languages I speak that in practice this is rarely fully the case. There is usually still a difference, be it a nuance in meaning, in what situations they are more likely used, or just plain frequency of use.

So I was wondering what is the case with ĉi tio, tiam ĉi, tie ĉi, ĉi tial, etc. etc. Could you please share general observations or your own preferences? In which way you prefer to use them, which way you generally hear people use them, whether you can think of specific situations where you or others prefer one over the other, and so on.

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For example, to me "tio ĉi estas" is slightly easier to say than "ĉi tio estas", but "ĉi tiel estas" rolls off the tongue slightly better than "tiel ĉi estas", leading me to believe that I might eventually gravitate to a preference of "tio/tiu/tie ĉi" over "ĉi tio/tiu/tie", but "ĉi tiel/tial" over "tiel/tial ĉi".

I also get the impression that some fluent speakers might not always fully pronounce the i in ĉi, resulting the pronunciation ĉ'tio for ĉi tio, which may be annoying to pronounce after a "d" or "t". Leading me to believe that in fast speech "sed tio ĉi" tends to be preferred to "sed ĉi tio", because it's easier to pronounce and understand. (though this doesn't necessarily apply to textual communication, of course)

And purely based on intuition I get the impression that the intonation of tio ĉi (ti↘o↗ĉi) lends itself better for emphasis (e.g. "No, this is the one!" ) than ĉi tio (ĉi ti↘o)

(If you had not noticed, I'm a bit of a linguistics nerd. lango.gif)

Tempodivalse (User's profile) August 21, 2015, 5:41:20 PM

From my observation, it is more common to place the ĉi first. When it goes second, this is normally for euphony or ease of pronunciation. I tend to vary without thinking, based on whatever sounds nicer to me.

In older texts, you are much more likely to see the ĉi placed second. I'm not sure why this is.

I'm not sure there is necessarily a nuance of emphasis like you suggest - maybe among some speakers, but this would probably be more a factor of intonation, which you can't always emulate in text well.

Vestitor (User's profile) August 21, 2015, 6:15:36 PM

I saw ĉi tio first so now tio ĉi just feels odd. I don;t like the way it's allowed to move about, there can be too much flexibility in a language sometimes. Normally, in most cases, the modifier comes before the word it modifies and I think this sort of pattern helps learning more than the ability to shift things about all the time.

Kirilo81 (User's profile) August 21, 2015, 6:57:48 PM

In fact, according to my experience there really is no difference.

I strongly prefer ĉi tio (in fact so much that sometimes I intentionally say tio ĉi so that my children don't think it is the only possibility; my son, however, always puts ĉi first), because modifying elements usually come first in Esperanto (with the notable exception of mem), so it seems more logical for me.

Rajzino (User's profile) August 22, 2015, 1:40:52 PM

Dankegon, ĉiuj! Both the responses and the poll results so far are very helpful for me getting a sense of how the two placements of ĉi are used!

So based on the responses so far, in general there is a preference for ĉi tio, but a significant amount of speakers uses both based on various factors. Interesting stuff!

Tempodivalse:I'm not sure there is necessarily a nuance of emphasis like you suggest - maybe among some speakers, but this would probably be more a factor of intonation, which you can't always emulate in text well.
Yeah, I meant that that the stress pattern possibly lends itself better to an emphasizing intonation in spoken Esperanto. I also assume in text it would not help too much.

Vestitor (User's profile) August 22, 2015, 11:53:09 PM

I had a little note in the envelope from the UEA today (free issue of the - very thin - revuo). It begins...
'Ĉu tiu ĉi revuo plaĉas al vi?..

So clearly they choose tiu ĉi over ĉi tiu.

Tempodivalse (User's profile) August 23, 2015, 12:09:19 AM

Vestitor:I had a little note in the envelope from the UEA today (free issue of the - very thin - revuo). It begins...
'Ĉu tiu ĉi revuo plaĉas al vi?..

So clearly they choose tiu ĉi over ĉi tiu.
In that case, it probably had something to do with euphony - two cx in a row can sound a bit cacophonous... Try it both ways (with cxu) and see if you don't agree.

Rajzino (User's profile) August 23, 2015, 2:38:23 AM

Yeah, I sound like some kind of rodent if I try to say "ĉu ĉi tiu" quickly, heheh.

But that gave me an idea! I searched the UEA site for the word ĉi to see how it's used throughout the site. After counting uses in a certain number of search results (not counting sentences found exactly the same on several pages) I found dozens upon dozens of cases of tiu ĉi, and only 4 times ĉi tiu, 1 time ĉi tiuj, and 1 time ĉi tiujn. So the UEA clearly does prefer tiu ĉi.

Other ti-words are hard to tell, because the sample size was too small. Of non-tiu cases I counted ĉi tio once, tie ĉi thrice, and ĉi tie six times. It's interesting that I found a couple more ĉi tie's than tie ĉi's, considering the strong preference for tiu ĉi.

It's also worth noting that in this article, out of 58 cases of ĉi, only 2 of them have the ĉi in front, one of which is a ĉi tie. (the contexts are "...nelonge ĉi tie detalitaj..." and "pli ol ĉi tiujn magrajn..." ) Although it also has three tie ĉi's. (not all of which I counted for my data, because frankly I got bored halfway along the page)

So there. A very messy not too accurate mini study on the usage of ĉi tiu vs. tiu ĉi on the UEA website.

Tempodivalse (User's profile) August 23, 2015, 3:19:24 AM

So there. A very messy not too accurate mini study on the usage of ĉi tiu vs. tiu ĉi on the UEA website.
Thanks - this was quite illuminating and countered some of my previous notions about the ĉi usually coming first.

Can anyone with better Tekstaro skills than myself calculate the frequency of correlative+ĉi vs ĉi+correlative?

tommjames (User's profile) August 23, 2015, 8:59:23 AM

Tempodivalse:Can anyone with better Tekstaro skills than myself calculate the frequency of correlative+ĉi vs ĉi+correlative?
Your wish is my command sir!

ĉi+correlative:
\bĉi (ti|ĉi)(o|u|el|am|e|om|al|es)\b
Suma nombro de trafoj: 4295.

correlative+ĉi:
\b(ti|ĉi)(o|u|el|am|e|om|al|es) ĉi\b
Suma nombro de trafoj: 2641.

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