Re: [tied] Re: Utility of Articles (was: Rise of the Feminine)

>From: "����� ���������" <ponaryad@...>
>
>
>Me:
> >> It is so in the sense that in the languages of Eastern and South-
>Eastern Asia the usage of classifiers is a very developed feature.
>But really, something similar is attested also in many other
>languages, including some IE ones.
> >> ... I think, something similar exists even in such English
>expressions as: two cups of coffee, five glasses of milk, etc.
>
>
>Richard:
> > In the examples you give, the construction is resorted to
>because 'coffee' and 'milk' are uncountable.

How so? It is perfectly understandable to say "Give me two coffees to go."

>And the classifier
>analogue is not fixed; you could have two mugs of coffee,

In tbis case, the genitive indicates content. Mugs is not a counter. It is
quite permissible to say "Give me to mugs to go." with content either fixed
by context, or implied that they are empty. In English, the genitive has
taken over the intent of the "filled with" case. That is, you could say
"Give me two cups filled with coffee". Cups is not a classifier in that
case.

>depending
>on whether you have a saucer to rest the container on. A good
>example is beer - three bottles of beer / three mugs of beer / three
>pints of peer - depending very much on how it is dispensed. At a
>pinch 'coffee' and 'beer' may be made countable in commerical
>cicumstances, where the unit is fixed by context.

Once again, this is "filled with", rather than a classifier.

> > The better analogy is 'three head of cattle'. The classifier-
>equivalent is fixed here. But I wonder if this is because 'cattle'
>is close to being uncountable, perhaps because it has no singular,
>but has an obvious unit. I do not feel comfortable saying 'three
>cattle'; I would say 'three cows', or 'three heifers', or 'three
>bullocks', etc. depending on the age and sex of the animals.

Slightly different problem here. Cattle is a collective, though the intent
is somewhat the same. Not (three head) of cattle, but "three (head of
cattle)". The "head" in this case is what we are talking about, and the
cattle is the genitive that says what it is made of. "A soup of cucumbers"
is a soup made of cucumbers, &c

>
>
>I think that it is possible to describe English as a language that needs
>classifiers with uncountable nouns :-) It is interesting that in Russian,
>where classifiers are used more widely, with uncountable nouns they are not
>obligatory (as thay are not with other nouns). For example, when you are
>buying two bottles of milk in a shop, you may say either:
>
>dve butylki moloka
>two CLF (lit. bottles) milk

Once again, this is "give bottles (filled with) milk"

>or:
>
>dva moloka
>two milk
>
>Nevertheless, the construction without classifiers becomes impossible if
>the numeral demands the noun to be morpholoically plural ("2", "3", "4" in
>Russian do not, but others do). It is because uncountable nouns have no
>plural form, and therefore when buying 10 bottles of milk, it is possible
>to say only <desjat' butylok moloka> - with a classifier.
>
>==========
>Vadim Ponaryadov

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