# Norwegian: en ufødt kvinnes sønn



## timtfj

I've bought myself Inger Hagerup's Collected Poems (_Samlede_ _dikt_, Aschehoug, 2009 edition.) In _Jeg er det dikt_ we find the lines


> Jeg er den stumme leppes bønn.
> Jeg er *en ufødt kvinnes sønn*.


The poem is about things with no existence (it finishes _Jeg er de ting som aldri skjer_).

I understood _en ufødt kvinnes sønn_ as "the son of an unborn woman", and it seems pretty obvious that this makes most sense in the poem. But now I'm wondering about the construction, since a similar phrase in English could be ambiguous. Also, in a poem the ambiguity might be intentional and part part of its expression.

Grammatically, does *ufødt* refer


unambiguously to *kvinne*
unambigiously to *sønn*
ambiguously to whichever suits the context best?

Note that elsewhere she uses the phrase _November er *en gammel kvinne*,_ (not _ei gammel kvinne_). So the gender of *en* doesn't answer the question.

I'm more interested in how this construction works in general than in choosing the precise meaning in the poem, and in particular I'd like to know whether the kind of ambiguity that arises in English also happens in Norwegian.


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## TrampGuy

to me it sounds more like : "I am a woman's unborn son" but let's see what the natives has to say.


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## timtfj

TrampGuy said:


> to me it sounds more like : "I am a woman's unborn son" but let's see what the natives has to say.


Other lines refer mostly to things whose source doesn't exist: the poem nobody wrote, the note with no melody, an unlit fire. That's why I think the idea of an unborn mother is more likely. But I'm guessing it's grammatically ambiguous . . .


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## NorwegianNYC

Intuitively, I would go with "I am an unborn women's son", where the 'unborn' refers to the woman. Given that this is a poem, there is of course a certain degree of ambiguity, but for 'unborn' to reflect on the son - that would take a lot. It would make an 'odd' sentence rather than just an ambiguous one.

Whereas *kvinne* is often given as a feminine noun, you are as likely to see it as a masculine noun. Gender does not equate sex.


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## timtfj

NorwegianNYC said:


> Intuitively, I would go with "I am an unborn women's son", where the 'unborn' refers to the woman. Given that this is a poem, there is of course a certain degree of ambiguity, but for 'unborn' to reflect on the son - that would take a lot. It would make an 'odd' sentence rather than just an ambiguous one.
> 
> Whereas *kvinne* is often given as a feminine noun, you are as likely to see it as a masculine noun. Gender does not equate sex.


So the construction (in general---not just in the poem) does allow the same ambiguity that it would in English, then?

It would be odd in English too, since it can easily be clarified by writing "a woman's unborn son". Similarly "en kvinnes ufødt sønn" would be unambiguous as well as maybe flowing more easily (no "dtkv"), so I can see the oddness of it.

Another question about the grammar. Suppose I want to treat *kvinne* as feminine, while keeping the same meaning. Would the phrase then be *ei ufødt kvinnes sønn *(i.e. the son of *ei kvinne*), or still *en ufødt kvinnes sønn* (i.e. *en sønn* of an unborn woman)?


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## NorwegianNYC

It is indeed ambiguous, but connecting the article (en) with 'sønn' is difficult, in my opinion (although it makes perfect semantic sense). Imagine altering the sentence slightly: _En ufødt kvinnes hus_. The article here clearly refers to _kvinne_, but if we were to connect the article to the final noun, the sentence: _et ufødt kvinnes hus_ makes little sense.


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## TrampGuy

NorwegianNYC said:


> It is indeed ambiguous, but connecting the article (en) with 'sønn' is difficult, in my opinion (although it makes perfect semantic sense). Imagine altering the sentence slightly: _En ufødt kvinnes hus_. The article here clearly refers to _kvinne_, but if we were to connect the article to the final noun, the sentence: _et ufødt kvinnes hus_ makes little sense.



Maybe I'm missing something here, but what exactly is the problem with "en sønn"? 
And although we all agree on that "_en ufødt kvinnes sønn_" is ambiguous, I also believe we all agree on the absurdness of "Et ufødt kvinnes hus". So I'm not quite sure how this example serves your argument?


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## NorwegianNYC

Hi!
It was simply because I was trying to contrast the grammatical genders to make it clearer. Since _kvinne_ can be either M or F, I replaced _sønn_ with _hus_ (N), to see if it would still work. In _en ufødt kvinnes sønn_ the article can either go with _kvinne_ or _sønn_, so the sentence is ambiguous. However, if we replace it with a word in neuter the ambiguity goes away. It can never be _et ufødt kvinnes hus_. By extension, _en/ei ufødt kvinnes sønn_ refers to _kvinne_, and not _sønn_​.


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## timtfj

NorwegianNYC said:


> Hi!
> It was simply because I was trying to contrast the grammatical genders to make it clearer. Since _kvinne_ can be either M or F, I replaced _sønn_ with _hus_ (N), to see if it would still work. In _en ufødt kvinnes sønn_ the article can either go with _kvinne_ or _sønn_, so the sentence is ambiguous. However, if we replace it with a word in neuter the ambiguity goes away. It can never be _et ufødt kvinnes hus_. By extension, _en/ei ufødt kvinnes sønn_ refers to _kvinne_, and not _sønn_​.


But isn't this simply because the article goes with whichever noun _ufødt_ refers to, and _ufødt hus_ makes no sense whereas _ufødt kvinne_ does?

In English we could say both _a friendly dentist's drill_ and _a faulty dentist's drill_. The first refers unambiguously to a friendly dentist since _friendly drill_ makes no sense, and the second refers unambiguously to a faulty drill since _faulty dentist_ makes no sense.

So I think you need to try an example where the adjective will work with either noun and the nouns have different genders---then see whether the article can be changed to switch meanings, or whether only one article works.


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## NorwegianNYC

Ah, I see what you are saying! I misunderstood. I was only trying to match up the articles/nouns/genders in various constellations to show that _en kvinne_ vs _ei kvinne_ was the same difference, and that it could be confusing because of _en sønn_. When I said _et hus_, it was to show that the initial article could not belong to the final noun.

_Ufødt_ is in reference to the woman. The son is the 'son of an unborn woman'. _Ufødt_ cannot refer to the son in this case. The clause _dentist's drill_ refers to a single item, whereas _kvinnes sønn_ does not. If _kvinnes sønn_ was meant to be one, and not two separate entities, Norwegian would require the use of a compound word (in this case _kvinnesønn_​)


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## TrampGuy

NorwegianNYC said:


> Ah, I see what you are saying! I misunderstood. I was only trying to match up the articles/nouns/genders in various constellations to show that _en kvinne_ vs _ei kvinne_ was the same difference, and that it could be confusing because of _en sønn_. When I said _et hus_, it was to show that the initial article could not belong to the final noun.
> 
> _Ufødt_ is in reference to the woman. The son is the 'son of an unborn woman'. _Ufødt_ cannot refer to the son in this case. The clause _dentist's drill_ refers to a single item, whereas _kvinnes sønn_ does not. *If kvinnes sønn was meant to be one*, and not two separate entities, *Norwegian would require the use of a compound word *(in this case _kvinnesønn_​)



Ahh...now we're getting somewhere. Is this a written grammatical rule btw?


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## Havfruen

So to clarify what NorwegianNYC said:

*en ufødt kvinnes sønn *the son of an unborn woman
*en ufødt kvinnesønn* the unborn son (of a woman)


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## timtfj

Havfruen said:


> So to clarify what NorwegianNYC said:
> 
> *en ufødt kvinnes sønn *the son of an unborn woman
> *en ufødt kvinnesønn* the unborn son (of a woman)


Men definitivt *kvinnesønn* og ikke *kvinnessønn*? Sammensetninger med genitiven bruker vanligvis *-s-* mellom de to delene, tror jeg. Eller er *-ss-* forkortet til *-s-* i denne eksempelen?


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## Sepia

Norvegian grammar is not worlds apart from Danish grammar. Whatever you do *ufødt *  refers right after it. So it is definitely an unborn woman. When did anyone say that poems have to be logical?

Whatever the grammar says, what would the word *kvinnesønn* mean? Since he es a son he has to be male, and all sons are born by women, when they are not seahorses.


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## vestfoldlilja

I think NorwegianNYC means that in the sentence: en ufødt kvinnes sønn, ufødt can only refer to _kvinnes_ and not _sønn_. Grammatically that is the only way for such a construct to work and indeed within the context of the poem it makes no sense for it to be unborn son of a woman. 

Kvinnesønn is not a word, but used here to show how compound words are put together in Norwegian to refer to something of the same unity, and to show why _kvinnes sønn_ is not the same as unborn son (of a woman). 

Other examples: 

Sommerfugler = literally summer + birds = butterflies

Ananasringer = literally pineapple + rings = rings of pineapple

Dyreunger = literally animal + children = baby animals

If any of these words are written as two words the meaning changes to either mean something else or to not mean anything at all. 

Sommer fugler – this is a not a common phrase and would mean birds that are only around for the summer, which is referred to as trekkfugler in Norwegian, as they leave come autumn. 

Ananas ringer – pineapple calling (which makes no sense since pineapples cannot make calls to people or other pineapples) 

Dyre unger – expensive children.


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## timtfj

Sepia said:


> Whatever the grammar says, what would the word *kvinnesønn* mean? Since he es a son he has to be male, and all sons are born by women, when they are not seahorses.


Doing the equivalent in English would be a poetic form of expression. It would mean that we were focusing on the mother as well as on the son, or on the fact of being human ("born of woman") and therefore dependent on others, or on the fact that we all have mothers, or something like that. It wouldn't change the logical meaning, but it would change the weight of meaning or the focus of attention. It states the same fact, but creates a different mental image with different associations.

But as I said originally, I'm mostly interested in the grammar of the phrase and similar ones, rather than the specific line of poetry. My main question has been answered: in English you can interpret "a small dentist's drill" as *{a small {dentist's drill}}* or as *{{a small dentist}'s drill}*, but in Norwegian the equivalent could only mean *{{a small dentist}'s drill}*.

What I'm less clear about is what rule is being applied in forming *kvinnesønn* from *kvinnes sønn* (regardless of whether it's a logical word to want to form). Since the genitive is involved ("mother's son" not "mother-son") I'd expect the *-s* from *kvinnes* to be retained, making it *kvinnessønn*. So I'm interested in what the conventions are here, and why there's only one *s*. When the second element of a compound like this already begins with *s*, do we shorten the resulting *-ss-* to *-s-*? Or is the genitive *-s* just not needed in the first place?


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## NorwegianNYC

vestfoldlilja said:


> I think NorwegianNYC means that in the sentence: en ufødt kvinnes sønn, ufødt can only refer to _kvinnes_ and not _sønn_. Grammatically that is the only way for such a construct to work and indeed within the context of the poem it makes no sense for it to be unborn son of a woman.
> 
> Kvinnesønn is not a word, but used here to show how compound words are put together in Norwegian to refer to something of the same unity, and to show why _kvinnes sønn_ is not the same as unborn son (of a woman).



Thank you Lilja!

Yes, an overwhelming majority sons are indeed born from women... However, my point - which Vestfoldlilja so elegantly elaborates - is that *timtfj*'s dentist example requires extra attention in Norwegian. In English, _a small dentist's drill_ is ambiguous because the pairing of the words is contextually contingent. It can either be a small dentist or a small drill. In Norwegian, the difference would be: 'en liten tannleges bor' (with 'en' referring to 'tannlege') and 'et lite tannlegebor' (with 'et' referring to 'bor' (= drill, bore)). In other words, no ambiguity.

In creating a compound, an agglutinating is sometimes used to ease the pronunciation. This is either -e- or -s-. In a word like 'kvinnesønn', made by lexemes 'hvinne' and 'sønn', there is no need for an extra, intrusive sound, so none is added


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## bicontinental

timtfj said:


> What I'm less clear about is what rule is being applied in forming *kvinnesønn* from *kvinnes sønn* (regardless of whether it's a logical word to want to form). Since the genitive is involved ("mother's son" not "mother-son") I'd expect the *-s* from *kvinnes* to be retained, making it *kvinnessønn*. So I'm interested in what the conventions are here, and why there's only one *s*. When the second element of a compound like this already begins with *s*, do we shorten the resulting *-ss-* to *-s-*? Or is the genitive *-s* just not needed in the first place?



In Norwegian cow´s milk is _kumelk_ whereas mother´s milk is _mor*s*melk_. In Norwegian (and in Danish) there are almost as many exceptions as there are ‘rules’ when it comes to the construction of compound nouns. This link to Riksmålsforbundet provides some useful guidelines: http://www.riksmalsforbundet.no/Spr...ing.aspx?PID=297&M=NewsV2&Action=1&NewsId=926 
 When writing these compound nouns it is important to note that the constructed compound noun is almost always one word, which of course, is in contrast to the conventional way of writing attributive nouns in English: 
Birth certificate [not birthcertificate]              is dåpsattest [not dåps attest eller dåp attest]
  (This was explained very well in previous posts above.)
    Hyphenation is limited to a few situations as summarized here in Språkrådet: http://www.sprakrad.no/nb-NO/Sprakhjelp/Skriveregler_og_grammatikk/Bindestrek/#letter


Bic.


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