LINGUIST List 5.406

Thu 07 Apr 1994

Qs: Intonation, English AP of NP, Group plurals, Eggs and yolks

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1. , Query: List intonation
2. , English AP of NP
3. Edith A Moravcsik, group plurals
4. Hartmut Haberland, Eggs and yolks in German

In preparation for a research project on list intonation, I am seeking
information on the variation in pitch as a list of items is spoken, in
particular, so-called "end-list declination." I would like to know of
any recent studies that have been done in the area, both within American
English and cross-linguistically. There is considerable literature on
sentence intonation, but information on end-list intonation is more
elusive. Any help with this project will be appreciated. Contact:
Hal Edwards (EdwardsTWSUVM)

In Donna Tartt's *The Secret History* I came across the phrase *[Perhaps he
(= Bunny) was in] too great of a hurry*. I know that Abney adduces such
structures in his DP-thesis in support of the hypothesis that A is the head
in English A-N combinations. I must admit that as a non-native I have
remained somewhat suspicious that such structures might not really exist. But
obviously they do. Does anyone know of any other literature (mainstream like
Abney or otherwise) that describes and/or discusses the AP of NP structure?
If there proves to be a sizeable amount of info, I will post a summary.

A few years ago I wrote a paper about constructions like *too big an error*
vs. *big an error (though it was)*. So another question that I have about
English AP of NP is: do native speakers have any intuitions about the status of
a sentence like

 (i) big of an error though it was, I can't be angry at him

Specifically, is (i) any worse (or better!?) than (ii):

 (ii) big an error though it was, I can't be angry at him

Thanks for any help.

Frits Stuurman (Utrecht University)

In some languages there is a plural morpheme that occurs with proper
names or names of relatives to designate a group of people consisting of
the person named and his associates or relatives. One language
that has this is Tagalog, another is Turkish, a third one is Hungarian.
For example, in Hungarian one could say "Smith-ek", meaning 'Smith and
his group (family etc.)' rather than meaning 'more than one Smith'.
I am interested in the crosslinguistic distribution of this "group plural"
and the specifics of its morphology, syntax, and semantics.
If your language(s) have it, could you let me know? I will post a summary.

Thank you very much.

Edith Moravcsik (edithconvex.csd.uwm.edu)

This query will mainly be of interest to native speakers of German, but I
think there are quite some on the list. Well, if we can discuss southern (sc.
US) accents and Canadian raising, why not regional German semantics?
There are (I think) some people (speakers of German, that is) who distinguish
between Eiweiss 'albumin, protein' = a chemical substance and Weissei 'the
white of the egg' = the egg minus shell and yolk. Is this correct, and in
which areas within the German speaking area are they to be found?
Is there an analogue distinction between Eigelb 'egg yolk as a substance' and
Gelbei 'egg yolk as part of the egg'. If yes, again, where?
The Grimms' Wo"rterbuch lists both Weissei and Eiweiss, but only Eigelb (as a
variant of Eiergelb, which I must consider as obsolete today.)
Hartmut Haberland
Dept. of Languages and Culture
University of Roskilde
Denmark