Re: cleft place structures

la djim. kartr. cusku di'e:
> In a subordinate clause the modified object is
> assumed present in the first place after conversion of the clause. I'm
> not sure how this is accomplished, but ke'a (right?) represents the
> modified object, suitable for explicit placement in other cases (sorry
> -- places).

Right.

>There are also anaphora <digit>fi'e (like pa fi'e) to
> represent explicitly the N'th place of the containing phrase.

Actually, "fi'e" represents the whole of the containing bridi, so you can
access a specific place with "le SE fi'e", where "SE" = null for 1st place,
"se" for 2nd place, "te" for 3rd place, etc.  This works because "le"
selects the front place and the conversions bring a different place to the
front.  Note the distinction between GOhA selma'o, which replicates the
bridi, and the dai-series of KOhA selma'o, which are sumti which refer
to the bridi.  "di'u" is "the previous utterance", whereas "go'i" is more
like "ditto".

> In my ideal world filled with replicated sumti, the modified object 
> anaphor would be provided automatically (if not user-provided) very
> much like the anaphora for replicating into or out of abstract sumti.

Official doctrine here is that "ke'a" is typically the appropriate filler
of an elided x1 place in a relative clause.  However, this is not automatic;
if "ke'a" appears elsewhere, then "da" may be more like it:

	lo mlatu poi zbasu ke'a loi slasi
	the cat such-that [something] makes it [the cat] from plastic

probably does not refer to a magical cat that constructs itself.

> A small point: just what is the replicated object?  Example:
> 
> 	le mlatu poi         nenri  le mapku
> 	the cat  restrictive inside the hat
> 
> Is the occupant of nenri x1 "the cat", a sumti or...
> 
> 	mi bajra fi'o  nenri  kuo       le kumfa
> 	I  run   (tag) inside (tag end) the room
> is nenri x1 an abstract sumti something like "lo nu mi bajra"? (And is
> this syntax right, particularly is kuo needed?  I know about ne'i but I
> need to use fi'o.)  The first  interpretation is very natural, but if
> the idea of modal operators is to add nonstandard cases to the brivla
> relation, then they should relate the phrase arguments (hat, room) to
> the superior bridi or s-bridi, not to its x1 occupant(s).  

The terminator is not "ku'o" but "fe'u"; this is a reserved terminator
for "fi'o", but it is usually needed only when the "fi'o"-tag is being
used as a tense adverb, not as a marker for an additional place.

You misunderstand the way selma'o BAI tags work.  The x1 place of a
tag, considered as a selbri, is the sumti which follows, and the x1
place is the only place which exists (all others are elliptical).

The true interpretation of

	mi bajra fi'o nenri le kumfa

is

	I run with-interior: the room

which means something like

	I run with the room inside me.

whatever that means; in other words, "le kumfa" is the x1 place of "nenri".
You want:

	mi bajra fi'o se nenri le kumfa
	I run with-surroundings: the room

This can best be seen by looking at the causals:  "ri'a" means "with cause",
whereas "seri'a" means "with effect".  It is an easy mistake to make, and
several texts have been published (notably "The Open Window" in JL10) which
contained omitted conversions of BAIs.

> In the first example the cat-thing is an x1 occupant of mlatu and what
> I would like to see is that the bridi "x1 mlatu" is related to the hat.
> In other words, "the relation of the sumti referent catting occurs
> (restrictive) within the hat".  This isn't what we usually think of for
> a subordinate clause on a sumti, but if you think about what's really
> going on, that's really what it means.  

Sez you, quoth I. :-)

The bracketing of "le mlatu poi nenri le mapke" is not

	(le (mlatu (poi nenri (le mapke))))

but
	((le mlatu) (poi nenri (le mapke)))

In other words, the sumti is not

	that-which-I-describe-as-a-(cat-in-the-hat)

but

	that-which-I-describe-as-a-cat which-is-really-in-the-hat.

Remember that "le" is non-veridical, and its scope is short; it is
limited to just the following selbri.  So the cat in the hat may or may
not be a cat, but it must be really in a hat (or something I call a hat,
"le mapku").  In any event, the "nenri" part is veridical.

-- 
cowan@snark.thyrsus.com		...!uunet!cbmvax!snark!cowan
		e'osai ko sarji la lojban