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Observations on French Possessives

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 April 2026

Ronald W. Langacker
Ronald W. Langacker*
Affiliation:
University of California, San Diego
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Abstract

A brief introduction presents the data to be accounted for. In §1, a transformational derivation is proposed for the possessive adjective construction of modern French, for example ma maison ‘my house’. All of the rules involved are seen to have independent motivation. Several other possessive constructions are examined in §2, and are shown to be surface reflexes of the intermediate stages required by the proposed derivation of possessive adjectives, thus constituting further evidence in support of this derivation. §3 is a somewhat more speculative treatment of other possessive phenomena.

Information

Type
Research Article
Information
Language , Volume 44 , Issue 1 , March 1968 , pp. 51 - 75
Copyright
Copyright © 1968 by Linguistic Society of America

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