Timeline for Why are both definite article ("les") and possessive determiners ("mes", "tes") used here for body parts?
Current License: CC BY-SA 4.0
11 events
| when toggle format | what | by | license | comment | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Aug 15, 2021 at 23:53 | comment | added | jlliagre | @Lambie I wrote: It (redundancy) might also be used when talking to kids to make clearer what is said so it looks like we agree here. I wouldn't necessarily rule out avec les mains with kids though: images-na.ssl-images-amazon.com/images/I/… | |
| Aug 15, 2021 at 23:37 | comment | added | Lambie | I don't think you can say "avec les mains" in this song. It would not work as a song. The point is for the kids to identify their own hands when they hear it. Je fabrique avec les mains? This is a kid's learning song so deux mains dix doigts. I don't think it is redundant, I think it's for practicing numbers. It's only redundant for an adult but not for a very small child who is learning about deux mains and dix doigts. Numbers. | |
| Aug 15, 2021 at 23:30 | comment | added | jlliagre | @Lambie It's doubly redundant. Deux is redundant because mes mains already means both of them, unless I'm Kali ;-) and mes is redundant when we can just say avec les mains. | |
| Aug 15, 2021 at 23:17 | comment | added | Lambie | @silph I don't see how avec mes deux mains is redundant?? She is not performing an action on her body....She is using her hands to "fabriquer". | |
| Nov 6, 2020 at 11:42 | history | edited | jlliagre | CC BY-SA 4.0 |
added 396 characters in body
|
| Nov 6, 2020 at 11:29 | history | edited | jlliagre | CC BY-SA 4.0 |
added 396 characters in body
|
| Nov 6, 2020 at 11:13 | vote | accept | silph | ||
| Nov 6, 2020 at 11:13 | comment | added | silph | if you are willing, could you add this information to your answer? i had understood the "rule" too rigidly; i didn't know that redundancy is actually usually allowed; and that it can be done for emphasis; and that redundancy is actually encouraged in some contexts (eg kids shows) to make the meaning more clear. | |
| Nov 6, 2020 at 11:09 | comment | added | jlliagre | Redundancy is rarely grammatically incorrect, if ever. These are more style recommendations and sometimes, emphasizing whose body parts it is about is definitely fine, like avec mes deux mains or avec mes dix doigts. One can even argue deux is redundant too as you can't have more ;-) Note also that when talking to kids, we often use more redundancy to make the sentence clearer to them. | |
| Nov 6, 2020 at 10:49 | comment | added | silph | Your comment aout "Je me replie les james" is useful to me, to remind me that things can be grammatical, but still wrong only because it's unidiomatic. I'm still not 100% sure what counts as a "redundant determiner". I added another clip from a children's show, where a woman sings: "Avec mes deux mains" and " Avec mes dix droigts"; isn't "mes" in both cases redundant? If it is redundant, is it considered to be incorrect French? | |
| Nov 6, 2020 at 10:23 | history | answered | jlliagre | CC BY-SA 4.0 |
