From owner-freebsd-chat Fri Feb 9 16:31: 8 2001 Delivered-To: freebsd-chat@freebsd.org Received: from mail.inka.de (quechua.inka.de [212.227.14.2]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 625F837B69D for ; Fri, 9 Feb 2001 16:30:49 -0800 (PST) Received: from kemoauc.mips.inka.de (uucp@) by mail.inka.de with local-bsmtp id 14RNw7-00030Q-00; Sat, 10 Feb 2001 01:30:47 +0100 Received: (from daemon@localhost) by kemoauc.mips.inka.de (8.11.1/8.11.1) id f1A0F5343395 for freebsd-chat@freebsd.org; Sat, 10 Feb 2001 01:15:05 +0100 (CET) (envelope-from daemon) From: naddy@mips.inka.de (Christian Weisgerber) Subject: Re: Laugh: [Fwd: Microsoft Security Bulletin MS01-008] Date: Sat, 10 Feb 2001 00:15:04 +0000 (UTC) Message-ID: <962168$1abq$1@kemoauc.mips.inka.de> References: <4.3.2.7.2.20010208193726.04763b10@localhost> <20010209143121.J16260@wantadilla.lemis.com> <20010209153743.D18596@cs.mcgill.ca> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit Originator: naddy@mips.inka.de (Christian Weisgerber) To: freebsd-chat@freebsd.org Sender: owner-freebsd-chat@FreeBSD.ORG Precedence: bulk X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Mathew KANNER wrote: [French] > > "on" is masculine. > > Really? I have a vague memory of being taught that it was > used when the speaker is referring to a group of people, which he is a > member of -- no inference on the makeup of the group nor speaker can > be made, Much like "we" in English. Semantically, "on" can be either: - An impersonal third person, like German "man". In English the same is expressed variously with one/you/they or passive voice. - First person plural in colloquial language. Grammatically, "on" is always third person singular as you can see from the verb agreement. The gender can be deduced from the participle in compound tenses: "on est allé" => masculine. Of course French has grammatical gender, which makes all this somewhat irrelevant to the discussion at hand as Modern English doesn't. The English pronoun coreference (he/she/it, they--which/who) is based on the semantics of the word. The resulting system is quite complicated. A simplified overview from Quirk/Greenbaum/Leech/Svartvik, _A Comprehensive Grammar of the English Language_: PRONOUN GENDER CLASS EXAMPLE COREFERENCE .- (a) male brother who - he |- (b) female sister who - she .- personal ----+- (c) dual doctor who - he/she | .- |- (d) common baby who - he/she/it animate --| | | which - it | |- `- (e) collective family which - it | | who - they `- non- --+---- (f) higher which - he/it personal | male bull (who) - he | animal |---- (g) higher which - she/it | female cow (who) - she | animal `---- (h) lower ant which - it animal (he/she) inanimate ------------------ (i) inanimate box which - it > Can anyone suggest a good "English grammar for programmers" type book? In practice, you don't learn grammar from reading a book about it. You learn it by unconsciously mimicking other people's speech or writing. English grammar is fiendishly complex. The abovementioned book is the standard reference. Weighing in at 1780 pages, it is indeed quite comprehensive but certainly not complete. -- Christian "naddy" Weisgerber naddy@mips.inka.de To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-chat" in the body of the message