opinion; (deictic and anaphoric) proper nouns: Rosemary's baby, Nixon's pardon, Ms.Trilling's book; full noun phrases: the office manager's desk, a child's toy, the tall guy's shoes. genitives are noun phrases and each can contain its own determiner, just like any other noun phrase. What does this modify in: This boy's father What would be the genitive construction modifying father? What does a modify in a child's furniture? What modifies furniture? A genitive phrase can contain another genitive phrase and that phrase can contain another genitive phrase, and so on. What modifies what in My aunt's boyfriend's mother's car? Each of these genitive phrases can be paraphrased by a single genitive determiner: her car, his mother, her boyfriend, my aunt. 1. Possessive Genitives – can be paraphrased with have or own. The child's bicycle was smashed to bits. [The child had a bicycle.] Weifang's pencil fell on the floor. [Weifang had a pencil.] Their yacht won't fit in this harbor. [They own a yacht.] A bully stole my kids' cookies at recess. [My kids had cookies.] Hamish's hair is black. [Hamish has hair.] My mother is a surgeon. [I have a mother.] 2.Subject genitives - the relationship of the genitive word to the noun it modifies is like the relationship of a subject to its predicate. Susan’s application was denied. Madonna’s performance was outstanding. Picasso’s last painting was stolen from its owners. - The police didn't believe Mary's story. - Hemingway's novels are exciting. - The government was surprised by his defection. - Carol resented the child's refusal. - The Dean's lecture was boring. - Mozart's quartets are magnificent.
Howis the following sentence ambiguous?
Marge's new novel is on the table 3. Object genitives: In some genitive constructions, the relationship of the genitive word to the noun it modifies is like the relationship of a direct object to its verb. Max's promotion made him happy.
The city's destruction was total.
She was upset by that neighbor's murder. Freddie's eviction shocked everyone. I was surprised by Nixon's pardon. Sometimes a genitive can be ambiguous. Sylvia's photograph Liz had heard about Jane's betrayal Liz had heard about Jane's betrayal of her friends. Liz had heard about Jane's betrayal by her boss. Nouns that are modified by subject and object genitives are often, but not always, deverbal nouns, i.e., nouns derived from verbs: betrayal, refusal, eviction, and destruction; also the nouns murder and pardon derive from identical verb forms 4. Periphrastic genitive: genitive nouns are not always marked by {‘s}. In Old English, most genitives were marked with inflectional suffixes but after the Norman invasion that pattern changed somewhat. French genitives have always been prepositional constructions, e.g., la maison de Marie ("the house of Marie"), and as a result of the language contact between French and English after the eleventh century, Modern English uses both the inflection and the preposition to mark genitive relationships. Entities fairly high on the animacy scale, people and higher order creatures, require an inflected possessive genitive—Teresa's book, the dog's dish, the bird's perch. Inanimate nouns typically take an of genitive—the shape of the rock, the color of that hat, the top of the table. There are, however, many contexts in which the use of an inflected genitive with an inanimate noun is perfectly acceptable: The building's design was very functional. The of genitive is almost never used to modify a human possessor. *The coat of Jesse and *the office of Marilyn While the periphrastic form of the genitive can be used with any semantic type, it is most often used when the noun being modified is inanimate. For this reason some genitives are more likely to be periphrastic than others. Genitives that reflect part/whole relationships and measurements are frequently periphrastic. When a periphrastic genitive expresses a part/ whole relationship, the noun phrase being modified is the part and the NP within the prepositional phrase refers to the whole—the legs of the table, the side of the cabinet. Of course, inflected genitives can express part/whole relationships, too, and here the inflected noun (or genitive pronoun) refers to the whole—the book's cover, a car's interior, the dog's tail. More examples The roof of the house blew off during the big storm. That woman scratched the hood of my car with her keys. The tree's branches swayed in the wind. My car's battery is dead. / Its battery is dead Genitives of measure have an interesting history. In Old English, the plural genitive marker was not {-s} as it is in Modern English, but rather a vowel, usually -a. Sometime later, vowel suffixes were lost in English and so the plural genitive had no ending at all. Eventually most plural genitives took on the (-s) genitive marker. However, the lack of a plural marker in some genitive constructions is remnant of the ancient form: a nine inch stick and a two hour lecture. In genitives of measure, the measurement term is the noun head and the entity being measured always takes inflectional or periphrastic genitive form.
the length of this room
the baby's length More examples None of my students knows the circumference of the earth. The length of the trial surprised the jurors. She calculated the weight of the shipment. I was intimidated by the man's size. Do you know Sally's weight? Possessive Carol's suit was wrinkled. The child's face was sunburned.
Subject Frank Lloyd Wright's homes
are priceless now. The boy's lie outraged his mother. Object Daphne's promotion pleased everyone. Victoria was upset about the rejection of her proposal. Part/ whole The book's cover was torn. The roof of the barn blew off. Measure The weight of the cargo was calculated. 1. She wasn’t convinced by Tony’s testimony. 2. The boy’s toy was stolen. 3. The windshield of my car was shattered. 4. Theo’s promotion surprised us. 5. Mary’s coat seems expensive. 6. The roofs of the houses were blown off. 7. The girl’s lie infuriated her parents. 8. The diameter of this circle is 6cm. 9. Their car is parked outside. 10. Our teacher’s lecture was inspiring. 11. We’ve heard about Sylvia’s eviction. 12. The length of the racing track is 15km. 13. The petals of that rose are so delicate. 14. My son’s weight concerns me a little. 15. The city’s devastation was in the news I am reading a novel of Austen‘s
Such constructions are highly
constrained in terms of form. The noun head is usually indefinite, i.e., preceded by the article a. The genitive NP (i.e., the NP carrying the {-s} suffix) must have highly specific reference; it often contains a pronoun or a proper noun. A friend of Bill's is coming over later. An idea of yours has been adopted by the boss. An admirer of my mother's sent her a dozen roses. *The friend of Bill's is coming over is ungrammatical as is *A friend of a Bill's is coming over. Demonstrative determiners can appear in the noun head of a double genitive construction. I can't stand those cats of Susan's. That music of Stan's is simply awful. This idea of theirs is great. In these sentences the NP is highly definite; the speaker knows that the hearer is familiar at some level with the cats, the music, and the idea. Constructions like these are often used emphatically. I can't stand those cats of Susan's sounds much stronger than I can't stand Susan's cats In fact, even a noun like child can be used in an emphatic double genitive— That child of mine will drive me insane! The Queen of England's robe The Wife of Bath's Tale the dentist who lives around the corner 's car
Q: Recently, did your research assistant Judi
Smith make a grammatically interesting statement regarding where her friend, Vickie, parks at The Miami Herald? A: Yes. She said, quote: "She comes and parks in whoever's not here's space that day."