From ragnarok@pobox.com Fri Dec 20 09:36:35 2002 Return-Path: X-Sender: raganok@intrex.net X-Apparently-To: lojban@yahoogroups.com Received: (EGP: mail-8_2_3_0); 20 Dec 2002 17:36:34 -0000 Received: (qmail 81517 invoked from network); 20 Dec 2002 17:36:33 -0000 Received: from unknown (66.218.66.216) by m9.grp.scd.yahoo.com with QMQP; 20 Dec 2002 17:36:33 -0000 Received: from unknown (HELO smtp.intrex.net) (209.42.192.250) by mta1.grp.scd.yahoo.com with SMTP; 20 Dec 2002 17:36:35 -0000 Received: from Craig [209.42.200.38] by smtp.intrex.net (SMTPD32-5.05) id A53F1D30158; Fri, 20 Dec 2002 12:37:03 -0500 To: Cc: "Lojban@Yahoogroups. Com" Subject: RE: [lojban] Lojban gender (was: RE: [conculture] Re: Temples in Louisianne Date: Fri, 20 Dec 2002 12:36:32 -0500 Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Priority: 3 (Normal) X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook IMO, Build 9.0.2416 (9.0.2910.0) In-Reply-To: Importance: Normal X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V5.00.2314.1300 X-Declude-Sender: raganok@intrex.net [209.42.200.38] X-Note: Total weight is 0. Whitelisted X-eGroups-From: "Craig" From: "Craig" Reply-To: X-Yahoo-Group-Post: member; u=48763382 X-Yahoo-Profile: kreig_daniyl >> In the same article, Quine shows us that grammatical gender has its uses >> He gives the English sentence: >> >> He removed the manuscript from the briefcase and cast it into the sea >> >> What was cast into the sea, the manuscript or the briefcase? We don't know >> In French, the difference in gender leaves no doubt: >> >> Il retira le manuscrit de la serviette et le (la) jeta dans le mer >> >> "le" means "le manuscrit" and "la" means "la serviette" without ambiguity >> Of course it's annoying that French (and even more so, German) genders have >> to be learned one by one. In Lojban, we have 17 genders, with a >> pronoun suitable to each: the b-gender, the d-gender, the f-gender, >> and so on >Unusually, though, "le xunre cukta", "the red (xunre) book (cukta)", >takes the gender not of the head (c-gender) but of the modifier >(x-gender), though if the modifier is postposed, "le cukta co xunre", >it takes the gender of the head. I'm not sure these are real genders - they use the same article(s), for instance, and adjectives don't have to agree with them.