Talk:Genitive case

I'm not a professional or amateur linguist - I am a humanist who uses and has taught langauges (I taught high school Latin for 8 years). None of these case descriptions is general enough to pass muster. The PRIMARY function of words in the genitive case is possession. There are other uses of the genitive. Lots of them.

I recognize that this is just a start. In the long run I think the case entries should be edited by a linguist or philologist - at the very least we need a reasonably complete description of case in Indo European, and that doesn't complete the essay. Then they could be linked from target languages. The description of the cases in specific languages should be in that language entry or (heaven forfend) on a subpage (English/Possession; Old English/Genitive Case). --MichaelTinkler

What is the etymology of english's 's ? FvdP

An adjectival form?

The article begins "The genitive case is an adjectival form of a noun". Surely this is incorrect - an adjectival form of a noun would be an adjective, no? I presume the point being made is that a noun in the genitive case will often describe another noun, but that does not make it "adjectival". In addition, adjectives and pronouns can also be in the genitive case, so the genitive case (or any other case) is more than a form of the noun.

Unless anyone is able to convince me from a position of knowledge that this is a reasonable description of the genitive then I'm looking to re-write the first para in the near future. Valiantis 23:29, 18 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Is there someone with more liguistic expertise than me who would be willing to re-write the explanation of why we have -'s instead of -es? The definition now makes it sound like it's a spelling change and not a sound change, but I don't know how to rewrite it. --UnDeadGoat

Extraneous material

I don't think it's really necessary to have an explanation of astronomical notation in a linguistics article. The paragraphs about English -'s are very well, but also seem a bit out of place -- they should be a sub-article to English grammar at most. This page also definitely needs attention (examples). --Pablo D. Flores 17:57, 18 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Correct use of genitive with words ending with s and x

What is correct?

Alex' uniform or Alex's uniform?

Girls' best friend or Girls's best friend?

Thanks, --Abdull 15:22, 16 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]

"Alex's uniform" is correct... also,

"(one, a) girl's best friend" and "(more than one) girls' best friend"

Hope this helps.

Why use the preposition of?

I am not a linguist or anything like one, but this article seems odd to me. I don't understand the difference between the use of the preposition of in the example "men of Rome" and the form "Roman men". I think the second example expresses the same idea. Is it a matter of the second phrase being in a different case? Similarly for the "wheel of cheese" example wouldn't "cheese wheel" serve to express the same thought? Can someone explain why one is genative and the other isn't and what the difference is between the two? TIA - Vivafelis 03:59, 25 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Some languages distinguish these two. For example, Finnish origin-indicator "roomalaiset miehet" (men living in Rome) vs. genitive "Rooman miehet" (men that are "owned by" Rome, that is, come from Rome, such as Italian state officials, irrespective of their place of dwelling or origin). Likewise, compound words are different. --Vuo 12:26, 25 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]

I don`t think English makes this distinction (I could be wrong). Would that mean that the genetive case is in use in the phrase "Roman Men", or is there some other case at work? Could it be that it is just a dative (or whatever) with "Roman" acting as an adjective? TIA - Vivafelis 17:01, 25 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]

I'd like to clarify a few concepts. This article treats case as a synonym for word function. This is a general definition. But a more strict definition says that case is a bound morpheme that attaches to a noun (or adjective), and has several other common features. There's no genitive case in "Roman men" in any reasonable sense; it's just a noun with an attribute shown by an adjective. There may be a genitive relationship in "men of Rome", shown by the preposition of, but there's no genitive case either, in the latter sense (which is what most linguists understand as case). The -'s ending looks like a genitive case mark, but it is not — though it does show a genitive relationship, it's not a case but a clitic.

Another thing... In "cheese wheel" we find a sort of genitive relationship expressed by compounding (English does all kinds of things with compounding). "Wheel of cheese" is the same relationship, shown differently. "Cheese's wheel" is nonsense, but if pressed to interpret it, I'd say it means a wheel that belongs to someone called Cheese... ;) I think the most common way to show a genitive relationship in English is with of, since compounds are idiosyncratic and the possessive -'s is a bit restricted. --Pablo D. Flores (Talk) 19:01, 25 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]

"A common misconception"?

The article seems to have adopted the POV that "linguists" generally reject the notion that English still has a genitive case, and argues that English no longer does since the marker -'s has been cliticized. I question whether this is true: the Merriam-Webster Dictionary of English Usage and the Oxford English Grammar both refer to an English genitive case. Moreover, I've tried to expand the several uses to which the particle is put in English, showing that it continues to function as a genitive case. -- Smerdis of Tlön 20:08, 16 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

"Of" marks both possession and many things which genitive cases in languages which have them mark. Does that make "of" a genitive case in English? Not at all: A genitive case is first and foremost a case, and to be one it must be an affix. The English ’s is not an affix, but a clitic, for reasons discussed elsewhere, therefore it is not a marker of a genitive case, but simply a clitic. (It would seem inaccurate though to call ’s a "possessive marker"; perhaps "genitive marker" is more suitable, I'm not sure.) —Felix the Cassowary 00:52, 17 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Collective plurals seem to have a genitive construction: pair of shoes, herd of sheep, set of tableware, flock of birds, pack of cards, school of fish, bunch of grapes, yoke of oxen, etc. etc.

Is this possibly a vestige of an Indo-european feature which has survived at least in several Slavic languages when enumerating things? one takes nominative; two, three or four take genitive singular; five or more take genitive plural? Did Old English have something similar which was largely lost along the way?