Talk:Coverb

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[edit] Coverb vs. Converb

The content covering Converbs was moved away from here. Discussion at Talk:Converb#Wrong Phenomenon. --Latebird (talk) 13:26, 28 December 2007 (UTC)

I will get around to fixing this up at some stage, but I'm considerably busier now than I was when I requested the split. jangari - ngili-ma 00:29, 7 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Coverb

Topic moved here from Talk:Converb after split. --Latebird (talk) 15:47, 28 December 2007 (UTC)

I've seen this term pop up here and there but still don't know much about what a coverb is.

I'd be willing to bet they are classified differently by different analyses of the same language. I'm sure I've seen them mentioned in relation to Chinese. Part of speech formerly mentioned them in relation to only Australian languages. But now I'm looking at a textbook, "Hungarian: An Essential Grammar", ISBN 0-415-22612-0, which devotes its chapter 4, section 6 to this class of words.

They seem to be separable prefixes which fill rolls similar to the adverbial parts of English phrasal verbs or the separable prefixes of German verbs. They can indicate direction, manner, grammatical aspect, and more. Some are idiomatic, changing the meaning of the verb they attach to. Coverbs do not freely mingle with verbs but each verb may have a set of coverbs it can pair with. Only one coverb can attach to a verb at a time.

Please add any comments and observations on what properties coverbs have in other languages. — Hippietrail 06:21, 4 Dec 2004 (UTC)

I've done a fair bit of work in coverbs over the past 2 years and will endeavour to fix up this page. Aidhoss 00:33, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Coverbs in Swiss German???

Topic moved here from Talk:Converb after split. --Latebird (talk) 15:40, 28 December 2007 (UTC)

Hello everybody,

I've read the article and struggled to find a counterpart or a possible way of paraphrasing what a coverb does in my own mothertounge. After a few moments of searching my mind, I found a construction that I actually do use very often, and so do many other speakers of Swiss German ("Alemannisch" in Wikipedian). I would now let you linguists (though I consider myself one, too) decide whether or not you would find the following something like a coverb-like usage...

In Swiss German, there are two constructions that denote direction away and direction towards, formed with what I would perceive to be forms of the verbs gaa ([gɑː] - to go) and choo ([xɔː] - to come).

Swiss German	Ich gang go poschte	Ich chum cho hälfe
IPA (sort of)	ɪx - gɑŋ - gɒ - poʃtə	ɪx - xʊm - xɒ - hælfə
Word by Word	I - go - go - to shop	I - come - come - to help
(in 3rd pers)	he - goes - go - to shop	he - comes - come - to help

(Sorry, couldn't be bothered anymore to change the whole thing into 3rd person. Still, I've added the English 3rd person in order to illustrate the syntax.)

The inserted verb stems (go and cho) are in an infinite form and unstressed. The only semantic weight that they carry is that they emphasise the direction. Historically, I take it there is little doubt that the form is basically a derivation of constructions like "I go (to) work", with a prefix-like redoublication of the verb in front of the action, which is thereby located as near or far from the speaker, as if it were a noun. Note that the only finite forms are those in 2nd position, gang and chum

Their character of being some kind of preposition to a verb is illustrated by the even less "grammatically correct" usage of go and cho outside phrases containing the verbs to go and to come, respectively:

"Wo isch de Peter?" - "Er isch go poschte." - (Where is Peter? - He is go to shop.)

"Und, was hätter gmacht?" - "Er isch cho hälfe." - (So, what did he do? - He is come to help.)

Note that in both of these phrases, the originally present past participles ğange and choo are now missing.

I don't know, give me your ideas, I'd be glad to hear a more professional (or well-founded at least) opinion on the matter.

Cheers, Trigaranus 21:28, 15 August 2007 (UTC)