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From: Peter Hullah <Peter.Hullah@eurocontrol.fr>
Subject: Re: Recursiveness and Left-Branching (was: How long can this go on?)
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Date: Thu, 22 Feb 1996 10:42:23 GMT
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Avi Jacobson wrote:
> 
> Dear Henry, Lorne, and whoever cares:
> 
> Henry McGilton wrote:
> >
> > In article 95q@sifon.cc.mcgill.ca, LBECKMAN@ORPLA.RVH.MCGILL.CA (LORNE BECKMAN) writes:
> >     *Can one write something like ...I dunno, um... "My girlfriend's
> >     *sister's teacher's wife's parents' house's market value..."?
> >     *
> >     *Better to write "the market value of the house of the parents of the
> >     *wife of the teacher of [the sister of] my girlfriend"?

> The reason Henry finds the nesting of possessive (genitive) forms so
> annoying -- and perhaps more so than the nesting of prepositional phrases
> with "of" -- is that they branch to the left.  Here is "the dog of the
> neighbor of my mother":
> 
> [What are we discussing?]
>    /\
> The dog
>       \
>       [whose dog?]
>           \
>            of the neighbor
>                     \
>                    [which neighbor?]
>                       \
>                        of my mother
> 
> Note that the modifying prepositional phrases come *after* the noun they
> modify.  Most European languages are mostly right-branching, and logic
> would indicate that intricate right-branching structures are a little
> easier to understand than intricate left-branching structures because the
> "important" word comes first.  (I originally followed that last sentence
> with a discussion of what is important, but decided to give it up.  The
> notion that the noun is more important than the modifiers is arguable and
> not worth discussing here.)
> 
> But some linguistic structures in English are "left-branching", meaning
> that instead of descending the ladder, you climb it, and the important
> word comes at the end.  Possessives are left-branching.  Here is "my
> mother's neighbor's dog":
> 
>                                 [What are we discussing?]
>                                            /
>                                          dog
>                                         /
>                             [whose dog?]
>                            /
>                      neighbor's
>                       /
>       [whose neighbor?]
>       /
> My mother's
> 

What's nice about languages which allow left-branching and right-branching in
this context is that they can be mixed to help comprehension:

"the market value of the house of the parents of my girlfriend's sister's teacher's wife"

In this case the "important" word is still at the beginning and the economy of
the left-branching structure is preserved.

(This can, of course only be done one way around (the left-branching part at the end) 
- and thus only once in the clause. The left-branching part can, on the other hand,
start anywhere in the clause.)

Pete

PS How does one describe the chaining of adjectives in a language like French
where they go in front of and after the noun: 
"Une grande, belle, nouvelle maison blanche"

-- 

Peter H.C. Hullah                     Technical Services
e-mail: Peter.Hullah@eurocontrol.fr   EUROCONTROL Experimental Centre
Phone:  +33 1 69 88 75 49             BP 15, Rue des Bordes,
Fax:    +33 1 60 85 15 04             91222 BRETIGNY SUR ORGE CEDEX
                                      France
