Question!

[Taka]

Originally Posted by Casiopea

Wow! You read that in 1 minute! Hmm.

Strictly, not in 1 minute.

Originally Posted by Casiopea

There are two meaning:

1. have (possess)
2. have (a synonym for give/hold)

EX: I am going to have (i.e. give/hold) a party for you.
EX: I am going to have (i.e. give/hold) you a party.

When "have" is used to mean, "give/hold", it takes on a different structure. It adopts the structure of "give".

Nope. I've checked again all of my dictionaries, but none of them says "have" can have such a structure.

Is that usage one of your Canadian dialect? No..., first of all, are you the same Casiopea who said this?:

Originally Posted by Casiopea

You're right. :!: 'have' is not ditransitive. Moreover, since 'myself' can be moved around the sentence, it couldn't be an object:

I, myself, am going to have some fun.
I am, myself, going to have some fun.
I am going to have, myself, some fun.
I am going, myself, to have some fun.
I am going to have some fun, myself.

Thank you for questioning. Keep it up. :D

Q: How/why are you going to have some fun?
A: By myself, for myself, with myself.

Seems to me that 'myself', a nominal, is functioning as part of an adverb phrase, headed by a non-overt preposition (by, for, with).

If you are the same person, I have to say that you are very inconsistent and confusing...(Actually, I was impressed by the analysis above and I thought that was the conlusion of this discussion).

[blacknomi]

Originally Posted by Taka

Thank you, blacknomi. We are both students of English, so exchanging our ideas is very important. I'm glad you've joined the discussion here and had your say.

gam ba de ne! (Sorry for poor Japanese.)

Originally Posted by Taka

Ambiguous, it may be; I should say it is "confusing".

If there is a way to disambiguate those sentences, say, by intonation or punctuation, they shouldn't be confusing. That's what I'm trying to achieve here.

Originally Posted by Taka

Anyway, you didn't use the word "ambiguous" in another forum, but said, seemingly with confidence, "it is an indirect object", didn't you?

Yes, but I'm not trying to defend it here. When I wrote that posting (sorry, people, for talking about a posting elsewhere), the possibility of the emphatic reflexive didn't occur to me. Now that I've realized, thanks to you, that the emphatic reflexive is a possibility, I'm looking for a way to distinguish between the emphatic reflexive and the indirect object.

Originally Posted by Taka

That's right, if we just consider that case. However, as we've seen in other cases where reflexives are used for the verbs that cannot be followed by indirect objects, I'd say your "indirect-object" theory is ad hoc; it might work only for the verb "find" and other transitive verbs that have the "V+IO+DO" construction.

It may well be an overgeneralization to extend the emphatic-reflexive theory to cases where an indirect object is possible, right?

Originally Posted by Taka

It could be, and why couldn't it be? In fact, I would rather say it emphasizes the subject.

So are you saying that all the reflexive pronouns that occur between a verb and its object are instances of the emphatic reflexive, regardless of whether the verb is monotransitive or ditransitive?

Originally Posted by Taka

You wouldn't say like this is a case of a reflexive noun used as an indirect object just because your English-Japanese dictionary says so, would you?

No, I wouldn't. I thought it would be natural to take it as an indirect object in the case of ditransitive verbs with a regular intonation pattern.

Originally Posted by Taka

And taking "universality" and "simplicity" of logic into consideration, I'd say it's safe to see the "myself" of "buy myself" as one of those emphatic reflexives.

If we can be sure that what we are looking at is a uniform phenomenon. There is always a danger of overgeneralization/oversimplification, isnt' there? When we collapse two cases into one, we'd better check if those two cases behave in the same way in various aspects, right? Intonation being one of them.

Taroimo

[RonBee]

Originally Posted by Taka

Then, what about this one?

I saw myself the next car back.

http://www.oldielyrics.com/lyrics/ja...affic_jam.html

It makes sense if you put yourself in the speaker's place. He is imagining himself in the car behind him. Thus, he is able to "see himself" from that car. Of course, you can't normally see yourself from outside of yourself, but that is what that means.

:)

[RonBee]

Originally Posted by Taka

OK, how about this one?

I saw myself the complexities and fragility of the peace-building process.

http://europa.eu.int/comm/external_r...ech_01_192.htm

Doesn't look like this person was intoxicated during the speech.^_^

It would have been better to have quoted the entire sentence, thus:

• I went to Colombia a few weeks ago and I saw myself the complexities and fragility of the peace-building process.

Neither the second I nor myself is needed there, and myself should definitely have been omitted. The speech is verbose and turgid. The speaker comes across as trying very hard to impress people.

It is an especially worthy goal to say what you mean and mean what you say. If you can do that consistently you will have accomplished much.

:)

[Edited to correct my mistakes.]

[RonBee]

Originally Posted by Taka

Thanks for your devoted explanation, Casiopea.

But then, how do you analyze a simple sentence like:

I am going to have myself some fun.

with your theory?

You wouldn't say that this case is exceptional and "myself" there is an emphasis of the subject. I don't mean to insult you at all, but if you would, to be honest, I'd say your theory is a bit inconsistent...

I think you meant detailed explanation, eh? :)

I would say some fun is the direct object there, and myself is the indirect object.

:)

[RonBee]

"I am going to have myself some fun" looks perfectly good to me. It is not, I think, necessarily ambiguous. It would have to occur within some kind of context, and the context would probably clear up any possible ambiguity.

:)

[RonBee]

Something can be either a reflexive or an indirect pronoun, but not both.

:)

[RonBee]

Originally Posted by Casiopea

Transitive verbs can handle one object only, never two.

I am not sure I understand. A verb can't have two objects? What about:

• I saw the bike and the rider.

[RonBee]

Say:

• That cleared up some doubts I had been having.

:)