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Plural adjectives followed by multiple *single* nouns.

de ceigered, 2011-aŭgusto-19

Mesaĝoj: 9

Lingvo: English

ceigered (Montri la profilon) 2011-aŭgusto-19 12:20:56

As the title says, "Plural adjectives followed by multiple single nouns", are these actually needed/practiced/acceptable? And does this happen in Spanish, French, Polish, (or even Hebrew/Arabic if they apply) or anything else? (since I've spent so much time with Indonesian (still suckin' at it though), which doesn't have such fiddly concepts, I haven't even thought about it properly in any language other than EO)

I made a habit out of it, since I used to think of multiple single nouns being enough to make an adjective plural (e.g. la amindaj hundo kaj kato), but after being faced with another of these not-really-too-common situations, I decided to not do this, since it does feel a bit silly and overzealous, and confusing (after all, the idea of grammatical agreement is that you can link "agreed" words together knowing they're related, so "la aminda hundo kaj kato" means the adjective's technically matching both. At the same time, it's then ambiguous if they're both loveable, or only the dog).

I'd expect if it happens in all of those above indo-european languages that it'd be acceptable enough in Esperanto.

tommjames (Montri la profilon) 2011-aŭgusto-19 12:32:37

ceigered:(e.g. la amindaj hundo kaj kato), but after being faced with another of these not-really-too-common situations, I decided to not do this

"la aminda hundo kaj kato" means the adjective's technically matching both.
PMEG's opinion is that you must use -j:

pmeg:Se A-vorto priskribas plurajn O-vortojn, ĝi havu J-finaĵon, ĉar la signifo estas multe-nombra:

En la ĉambro estis verdaj seĝo kaj tablo.

Miland (Montri la profilon) 2011-aŭgusto-19 12:32:58

PMEG ("Evito de miksaj formoj") indicates a Zamenhofan usage, that a single adjective can be followed by multiple single nouns, because its presence before the second noun can be treated as implicit. However the same page does say that the "mixed" form is logical, so in theory it should be acceptable.

EDIT: the form is used earlier in the page, cf. tommjames' message.

PMEG doesn't condemn the Zamenhofan usage outright, possibly because mia frato kaj fratino is part of the Fundamenta Ekzercaro (No. 18), as is sia karaktero kaj vizaĝo (No. 11). Therefore the form could be regarded as part of the netuŝebla Fundamento.

erinja (Montri la profilon) 2011-aŭgusto-19 12:33:40

In Esperanto you DO use a plural adjective for multiple singular nouns.

So the correct sentence is "la amindaj hundo kaj kato"

If you were to say "la aminda hundo kaj kato", it's still grammatically correct, BUT it means that only the dog (not the cat) is loveable.

ceigered (Montri la profilon) 2011-aŭgusto-19 13:35:49

Thanks guys, I thought that was the case. My memory hasn't been serving me as well as I'd like this week okulumo.gif

Does this occur in languages other than EO, btw?

geo63 (Montri la profilon) 2011-aŭgusto-19 13:38:43

Polish language does not have this feature (as far as I know, some Polish linguist would say more, I think):

amindaj hundo kaj kato
kochany (singular) pies z kotem

or

kochany pies i kot

UUano (Montri la profilon) 2011-aŭgusto-24 01:25:23

ceigered:Does this occur in languages other than EO, btw?
The rule is the same in French, although the adjective usually comes after the noun(s). Adjectives must agree in gender and number with the words they modify - so a string of singular nouns is treated the same as a plural noun in the case where the adjective describes all of them.

La amindaj kato kaj hundo =
Le chat et le chien aimables. (the definite article le must be repeated in French.)

ceigered (Montri la profilon) 2011-aŭgusto-24 13:39:59

UUano:la amindaj kato kaj hundo =
Le chat et le chien aimables. (the definite article le must be repeated in French.)
Merci beaucoup okulumo.gif Gotta love how the presence of gender or not can have such huge ramifications for a language that we'd take for granted!

marcuscf (Montri la profilon) 2011-septembro-14 18:50:35

This happens in Portuguese too. Multiple singular nouns require a plural adjective.

In casual speech it does sound somewhat weird and overzealous, but in standard Portuguese (books, magazines, formal speech, etc.) the plural form is required.

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