The Word 'to'

[Luukhin]

I very clearly addressed words which modify nouns. If one wants to make the case that words that modify nouns should not be considered adjectives in Thai, then one is obligated to follow that same reasoning and argue that English has no adjectives. The real question is: what is that point of that argument? Whence this campaign to abolish the word "adjective?" That's like saying an elephant should not be called an elephant simply because you prefer another word for it.

Khun Mangkorn, as the one who made the comment, I will tell you my point why I made the argument that Thai has no adjectives. As a native speaker of Thai, I look at the language from a different perspective. Each language has its own grammar. What is true in one may not be true in another. First, I would like to talk about the difference between adjectives in English and ADVECTIVAL verbs in Thai.

In English, an adjective is a word used to decribe the features of persons or things denoted by nouns or pronouns. A given occurrence of an adjective can generally be classified into one of the two main kinds. That is, premodification (red car) and postmodification (I am hungry.) An adjectival verb in Thai is used to decribe the same. but it can only be placed after a noun or a pronoun. In thai, รถแดง is not a noun phrase 'red car' but a clause "a car is red". To prove that it is a clause, I can add more words in between like ไม่ 'not' as in รถไม่แดง "a car is not red" As it is a clause which is composed of a subject and a predicate, it is equivalent to a clause like ผมยิ้ม 'I smile' except that ยิ้ม is a predicate that describe action. I believe that if you look at the Thai language this way, it will help simplify your learning process. All adjectival verbs can be placed in the same position as verbs. Thai put words together from left to right to get the message across. Each word that follows modifies the preceding words. For example, รถสีแดงจอดอยู่หน้าบ้าน This sentence is composed of two clauses, one is a main clause 'รถจอดอยู่หน้าบ้าน' , and the other is an embeded clause 'รถสีแดง'. I will show you how I interpet the sentence and แดง is a verb in that sentence.

รถสีแดงจอดอยู่หน้าบ้าน

The /car/ of which the /colour/ /is red/ /is parked/ /in front of/ the /house/.

[Rikker]

I don't find that a very satisfying argument, especially when taken from a larger linguistic perspective. It seems based entirely on word order, and not on similarities/differences in syntactic function. To put it a different way, "since verbs and adjectives both follow nouns, adjectives = verbs" ... that's the basic argument.

Sure, you can separate รถไม่แดง, but again that comes back to word order -- what's different about the underlying structure? If we say it means "the not-red car" or "the car wasn't red" ... what's wrong with claiming it's an adjective with a zero copula? Take a sentence like รถไม่แดงเลย เหลืองต่างหาก and I think you can analyze it either way. How is a zero copula analysis different from sentences like ฉันคนไทย ฉันถึงเชียร์ทีมชาติไทย "I'm Thai--so I root for the Thai team." We could say that's zero copula, or (following your lead) alternately that คน is a nominal verb "(to be a) person"! What would Occam say?

Do you accept a sentence like รถสีแดงไว้ "the car (was) red/the car redded"? And how about parsing something like รถแดงบ้างเหลืองบ้าง -- would you say it's noun + predicate, "the car(s) was/were sometimes red and sometimes yellow". Seems a more likely interpretation is as a noun phrase "some red cars, some yellow cars". Is there a pragmatic difference?

Or how about ระวังรถแดง "watch out for the red car" or "be careful that your car doesn't become red"? If we change that to ระวังผิวแห้ง, we can alternately interpret that as "be careful of red skin" (ผิวแห้ง = noun phrase), or "be careful of your skin becoming red" (ผิวแห้ง = noun + predicate) ... but I don't see any reason to reject the noun phrase option in favor of the other. Rather, I think both are simply possible interpretations.

And about premodification vs. postmodiciation, Thai does both, too. แถวหลัง "the back row" is post-, but หลังบ้าน "backyard, behind the house" is pre-. ใจดี is post-, and ดีใจ is pre-.

Interesting postulation, but I still don't think it's very instructive from a practical/pedagogical standpoint. Mental acrobatics.

Edited September 27, 2008 by Rikker

[Luukhin]

I don't find that a very satisfying argument, especially when taken from a larger linguistic perspective. It seems based entirely on word order, and not on similarities/differences in syntactic function. To put it a different way, "since verbs and adjectives both follow nouns, adjectives = verbs" ... that's the basic argument.

Another point to prove that adjectives in Thai are verbs is the collocation of กำลัง '~ing' and adjectival verbs as in หน้ากำลังแดง 'my face is red (~ing). Compare that with this sentence ผมกำลังร้องเพลง 'I am singing'. While in English, 'my face is red (ing)' is unacceptable.

Sure, you can separate รถไม่แดง, but again that comes back to word order -- what's different about the underlying structure? If we say it means "the not-red car" or "the car wasn't red" ... what's wrong with claiming it's an adjective with a zero copula? Take a sentence like รถไม่แดงเลย เหลืองต่างหาก and I think you can analyze it either way. How is a zero copula analysis different from sentences like ฉันคนไทย ฉันถึงเชียร์ทีมชาติไทย "I'm Thai--so I root for the Thai team." We could say that's zero copula, or (following your lead) alternately that คน is a nominal verb "(to be a) person"! What would Occam say?

There is no need to call adjectival verbs in Thai ‘a zero-copula’ as no copular is omitted. For the sentences, ‘The car is not red, but yellow’ and ‘I am Thai, so I barrack for the Thai team,’ the difference between the two sentences is that you can add ‘เป็น’ in the latter ‘ฉัน(เป็น)คนไทย ฉันถึงเชียรทีมชาติไทย, but not the former ‘X รถไม่เป็นแดงเลย เป็นเหลืองต่างหาก.’ As I said that เป็น was omitted and คนไทย ‘a Thai person or a person, which is thai’ :-) is a noun not an adjective ‘Thai’.

Do you accept a sentence like รถสีแดงไว้ "the car (was) red/the car redded"? And how about parsing something like รถแดงบ้างเหลืองบ้าง -- would you say it's noun + predicate, "the car(s) was/were sometimes red and sometimes yellow". Seems a more likely interpretation is as a noun phrase "some red cars, some yellow cars". Is there a pragmatic difference?

I don’t accept that sentence. Verbs can be categorized into many categories according to their characteristics. Some describe action, some describe state et cetera. ไว้ ‘(to do) in advance, in preparation’ describes action. With that it should not be used to test whether the word in question is a verb. Its occurrence is restricted to action verbs only.

รถแดงบ้างเหลืองบ้าง and what? The sentence can’t end there. Yes, you are right. The interpretation is like a noun phrase ‘some red cars, some yellow’ but I would call it a reduced nominal clause. รถแดงบ้างเหลืองบ้าง may function in a sentence either as a subject or an object as in รถแดงบ้างเหลืองบ้างจอดอยู่หน้าบ้าน ‘some cars [which are] red and some [which are] yellow are parked in front of the house.’ As it is an embedded clause functioning either as a subject or an object, it is reduced to a noun phrase like clause. Nominal บ้าง + nominal บ้าง suggests the meaning of ‘some..and some..’

บ้าง in two independent clauses as in ผมนอนบ้างอ่านหนังสือบ้าง ‘I sometimes sleep and I sometimes read books’ means ‘sometimes’

And about premodification vs. postmodiciation, Thai does both, too. แถวหลัง "the back row" is post-, but หลังบ้าน "backyard, behind the house" is pre-. ใจดี is post-, and ดีใจ is pre-.

The examples given are all examples of postmodification.

หลังบ้าน ‘the back part of [what?] the house’ and ดีใจ ‘glad’ literally as in ‘feel good at [what?] heart’

P.S. The adjectival verbs that I talked about are at a sentence level. In the end, it is up to one what one finds best in one’s learning. After this post, I will not be able to answer in the post for a while. My exams are coming up. I am learning Chinese and Japanese.

[Rikker]

Excellent response, and obviously there's much merit to this way of thinking, even if I'm not ready to go as far as you do with the notion.

You're busy, but indulge me to reply anyway. Whenever you manage to come back around I'll be happy to hear your further thoughts.

Even if we accept รถสีแดง as noun+predicate from an abstract perspective, it still isn't an acceptable complete sentence from a traditional teaching perspective. We can only interpret it as "red car" for functional use. What about มี as a zero copula in this case? ต้นไม้สีเขียว vs. ต้นไม้มีสีเขียว.

I've seen a native Thai specifically state that the construction ต้นไม้สีเขียว is an incomplete thought, since it's only a noun phrase, and that มี is necessary to complete it. Now, I think that ต้นไม้สีเขียว is a complete thought when taken in the proper context, say of juxtaposition: ต้นไม้หลังบ้านสีเขียว ต้นไม้หน้าบ้านสีแดง "The tree behind the house is green, the tree in front of the house is red." For me, I still fall into the camp of multiple syntactic roles.

I want to hear your thoughts a bit more about post/premodification in Thai. I'll accept, as you replied, that one can call my counter-examples post-modification. In fact, taking it further, some other interesting examples of apparent postmodification of "adjectival verbs": แปลกตา "strange (in appearance)", หนักมือ "heavy (for the hands to carry)", เมื่อยตัว "sore (in the body)". This is interesting because they're not transitive verbs, so the following nouns appear to be a postmodification, as distinct from typical verb+object constructions ลืมตา, แบมือ, or ตีตัว.

How would you explain constructions like ขี้- or น่า-? เขาลืม vs. เขาขี้ลืม, or ข้าวเหนียว vs. คนขี้เหนียว, and so forth.

And how about construction like น้อยคน -- I predict you'll say คน modifies น้อย, but I think the analysis can go either way. Another interesting case is แปลกคน, as in คุณนี่แปลกคนจริงๆ.

And, indisputably I think, there is clear premodification through influence from Sanskrit/Pali/English what have you. มหาราชา, อภิมหาสงคราม, อนุปริญญา. Compare เมียน้อย (post-mod) vs. อนุภรรยา (pre-mod). The Thai name of Chula, จุฬาลงกรณ์มหาวิทยาลัย, following the pattern X University (as in, say, English), while pretty much every other institution is University X, with typical Thai postmodification.

Awaiting your response whenever you get can give it. Good luck on your exams!

Edited September 29, 2008 by Rikker

[Radius]

Only I have to say about the continuation of this thread is: wow!