Timeline for Can a sentence have an indirect object without a direct object?
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| Jul 30, 2023 at 19:00 | comment | added | MarcInManhattan | @tchrist In the second example, I'd consider "him" a direct object. That means that its syntactic role has shifted from the first sentence although its semantic role hasn't changed at all, but that's OK, since syntax <> semantics. It also means that the meaning of the verb has shifted so that it means something like "inform". (In fact, "inform" can perform a similar trick: "Inform him that dinner is ready" vs. "Inform him". "Ask" is another common verb that also does so.) However, this is just terminology; there's no practical difference between your interpretation and mine AFAIK. | |
| May 26, 2017 at 4:04 | comment | added | tchrist♦ | The only English ditransitive verb that allows the indirect object to be retained and the direct object omitted when understood is tell. If you want to tell him something important, then if you do tell him, both instances of him there are still tell’s indirect object. It does not suddenly become a direct object just because the "it" or the "something important" has been elided in the second instance. | |
| May 26, 2017 at 3:57 | history | edited | user31341 | CC BY-SA 3.0 |
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| May 26, 2017 at 2:31 | comment | added | Mitch | @jlovegren Can you then add that to your answer? | |
| May 26, 2017 at 2:29 | comment | added | user31341 | @Mitch English is not very permissive on omitting arguments. If a verb sense requires certain arguments, they normally cannot be omitted entirely. As for the case where a verb which is normally ditransitive has a sense requiring only one argument, marked like an indirect object (a prepositional phrase), then the sense would normally be classified as extended intransitive rather than ditransitive. (e.g., get in The cat got under the table. | |
| May 25, 2017 at 22:58 | comment | added | Mitch | This answer covers a lot of the relevant concepts, but I don't see an explicit response to the stated question, can an indirect object appear without a direct object in a sentence with a ditransitive verbs? | |
| Oct 20, 2014 at 22:53 | comment | added | user31341 | @talrnu ran is intransitive whether or not to the store is there. to the store is not an object (direct or otherwise). | |
| Oct 20, 2014 at 14:17 | comment | added | talrnu | I'm getting hung up on the idea that "ran" in my example is intransitive (as a simpler version of my example sentence, "Jim ran.", illustrates). Are you saying the addition of "to the store" makes my example transitive? | |
| Oct 20, 2014 at 1:24 | comment | added | Cerberus - Reinstate Monica | @jlovegren: Yes, I think that is an excellent description! I don't think we have a word for "type of argument" in this sense. | |
| Oct 19, 2014 at 21:17 | comment | added | user31341 | @Cerberus sounds like the label marks a type of argument that is involved in a valence alternation construction. i think it's a potentially useful label. i can't think of an equivalent English term. | |
| Oct 19, 2014 at 18:25 | comment | added | Cerberus - Reinstate Monica | @jlovegren They are mostly the same as in English: the term is used for all languages, not just to describe Dutch—but we also include anything with for/voor that indicates a recipient, such as this letter is for you / deze brief is voor jou. My translation of the other examples: ik gaf Caesar een boek, ik gaf het aan Caesar, ik misgunde hem zijn geluk, de Oudheid week voor de Middeleeuwen. Note that the last one is less literal. So it is a bit of a complicated label. Perhaps it is syntacto-semantic after all...perhaps it should be abolished altogether... | |
| Oct 19, 2014 at 17:59 | comment | added | user31341 | @Cerberus can you write out the examples in Dutch? | |
| Oct 19, 2014 at 7:49 | comment | added | Cerberus - Reinstate Monica | Hmm that is interesting, because, in Dutch, we have a term meewerkend voorwerp, roughly "coöperating object", which includes I gave Caesar a book, I gave it to Caesar, I begrudged him his luck, Antiquity surrendered to the Middle Ages, etc. Not all of those are indirect objects, nor are they all true recipients. It is a syntactic category with a strong connection to semantics, but it is not defined semantically. It seems English does not have such a term. | |
| Oct 18, 2014 at 18:47 | comment | added | F.E. | +1 for using a vetted grammar source in your explanation. :) | |
| Oct 18, 2014 at 17:16 | comment | added | rogermue | I wouldn't think of buying such a grammar. | |
| Oct 18, 2014 at 17:10 | comment | added | user31341 | @rogermue it's very expensive so don't buy it if you don't want it! | |
| Oct 18, 2014 at 17:09 | comment | added | user31341 | @tchrist I don't know why the authors chose those terms. The choice of terminology is arbitrary. | |
| Oct 18, 2014 at 17:01 | comment | added | rogermue | I'm really glad that I haven't such a grammar. | |
| Oct 18, 2014 at 16:19 | comment | added | tchrist♦ | Why monotransitive and ditransitive instead of unitransitive and bitransitive? | |
| Oct 18, 2014 at 15:12 | history | edited | user31341 | CC BY-SA 3.0 |
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| Oct 18, 2014 at 15:04 | history | edited | user31341 | CC BY-SA 3.0 |
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| Oct 18, 2014 at 14:58 | history | edited | user31341 | CC BY-SA 3.0 |
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| Oct 18, 2014 at 14:52 | history | answered | user31341 | CC BY-SA 3.0 |