# Those books of yours



## john_riemann_soong

Are there any languages which combine both aspects into a convenient construction? 

I know for example, the definite aspect is roughly redundant when talking about something you are own, and vice versa (or is it?), because talking about items that somebody owns tends to be definite. Hence, "the books you read", and not "your books you read". 

But it's less redundant with the demonstrative, isn't it? We have "those books you own" in English, but it's a tad inflated. It's especially unwieldy when one is referring to an item in conversation, e.g. "the government wants to take away this right of yours", which is less poignant than if one could say "they want to take away your-these rights" (they sound better than the first when split up, e.g. "take away your rights" and "take away these rights" separately).


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## elroy

In Palestinian Arabic, we say كتبك هدلاك (_kutbak hadlaak_), which combines both elements and is not awkward.


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## modus.irrealis

I'm not sure if it's exactly what you want, but if you flip around one your examples, you get a construction that used to exist in English, where you can find things like "this thy servant." I don't know if it worked with "that" (and I'm thinking it didn't), so maybe there's something else going on here.



john_riemann_soong said:


> I know for example, the definite aspect is roughly redundant when talking about something you are own, and vice versa (or is it?)


If I understand you right, I don't think it is, because you'll always need to have a way to distinguish between "my book" and "a book of mine." Greek actually uses the same construction for both:

to vivlio mou = my book (lit. the book of-me)
ena vivlio mou = a book of mine (lit. a book of-me)

where the difference between the two depends solely on whether the definite or indefinite article is used. And if you wanted a demonstrative, you just add it to the definite version just like you would if the possessive weren't there, and you get:

ekino to vivlio mou = that book of mine (lit. that the book of-me)

It's not really combining the aspects like you ask, but it's convenient in that everything involving possession uses the same construction (unlike English).


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## john_riemann_soong

modus.irrealis said:


> If I understand you right, I don't think it is, because you'll always need to have a way to distinguish between "my book" and "a book of mine."




This is the part I didn't get. Why is there _always_ a need? I know that the current meaning of English "of" was in fact due to Romance influence (to translate _de_), and wasn't native to Old English (it originally just meant "off"). Thus, it would seem a construction like "of mine" wouldn't have existed in Old English (or not at least until late O.E. anyway).


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## badgrammar

I am not sure if I understand the question either...

In French you would have 
"Tes livres" (your books)
"Les livres à toi" (the books of yours)

The second case is as if you were making a distinction between the books that belong to you and the books that belong to others, whereas the first case is more simple.


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## Outsider

In Portuguese, you can say:

_esses livros_ = those books
_os teus livros_ = your books
_esses teus livros_ = those books of yours

It does not sound awkward in general, though I wouldn't normally speak this way about books.


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## Frank06

Hi,

in *Dutch*:
those books: die boeken
your books: jouw boeken (je boeken)
 those books of yours: die boeken van jou (die boeken van je)

Groetjes,

Frank


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## Thomas1

_te książki_ - those books (or more precisely _these books, _we use _those_ really sparingly)
_twoje książki_ - your books 
_those books of yours_ - te twoje książki


Similarly to Portuguese, it doesn't sound dire but I wouldn't also use this wording pertaining to books.



Tom


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## Hakro

*Finnish:*
those books = nuo kirjat
your books = (sinun) kirjasi - possessive pronoun (sinun) is not obligatory, possessive suffix (-si) is enough
those books of yours = nuo (sinun) kirjasi

But Finnish language seems to be changing so that possessive suffix is disappearing, and then possessive pronoun is of course necessary.
those books of yours = nuo sinun kirjat


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## Outsider

badgrammar said:


> I am not sure if I understand the question either...
> 
> In French you would have
> "Tes livres" (your books)
> "Les livres à toi" (the books of yours)
> 
> The second case is as if you were making a distinction between the books that belong to you and the books that belong to others, whereas the first case is more simple.


If I'm not mistaken, French would require a periphrasis:

_Ces livres, qui sont à toi_ (lit. "Those books, which are yours").


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## badgrammar

Not necessarily.  Consider:

C'est dans quel livre? 
Dans ton livre à toi.

C'était quelle voiture? 
C'était ta voiture à toi.

Come to think of it, you're right that "Les livres à toi" is not correct, it is more "child speak".  It should be "tes livres à toi".  And in that case, it comes down to a simple emphasis or redundancy...  

Ma faute à moi!!!   I think you are correct, Outsider!


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## john_riemann_soong

Hmm, why isn't the extra possessive redundant? 

I wouldn't envision this usage for books either, but it was the first simpleexample I could think of. In English, it's sometimes used in jest. 

e.g. "That car of yours, it's always emitting a strange sound. Are you sure it's not having any problems?"


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## modus.irrealis

john_riemann_soong said:


> This is the part I didn't get. Why is there _always_ a need? I know that the current meaning of English "of" was in fact due to Romance influence (to translate _de_), and wasn't native to Old English (it originally just meant "off"). Thus, it would seem a construction like "of mine" wouldn't have existed in Old English (or not at least until late O.E. anyway).



You might be right and I was wrong with always -- I was just assuming that all languages would have a way of distinguishing between the two, but perhaps that's not the case. And from what I know of Old English, you seem to be right about it, so I guess there you'd have to say something like "a book that I have" to get the "a book of mine" idea across. But my main point was that there are some languages where indicating possession has no effect on whether something will be taken to be definite or indefinite.



john_riemann_soong said:


> Hmm, why isn't the extra possessive redundant?



What I understand about the French is that it's emphatic and so not really redundant. The difference is the difference between "your book" and "_your_ book" but in French you can't just apply more stress to a word to make it emphatic so you have to repeat the idea. (It's like emphasizing the subject of a verb, where you say "Toi, tu l'as fait.")


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## karuna

Latvian also has something like Finnish.

your books – _tavas grāmatas
_these books – _šīs grāmatas
_these books of yours – _tavējās grāmatas
Tavējais _is the definite form of the adjective _tavējs _derived from the pronoun _tavs. _
This usage is rather colloquial though and grammarians would frown upon it. _Tavējais _can also be a noun meaning 'your close relative'.


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## irene.acler

*Italian*:
your books - i tuoi libri / i vostri libri 
these books - questi libri
these books of yours - questi tuoi libri / questi vostri libri

In Italian it doesn't sound awkward, but I wouldn't say that in normal speech, I'd simply say "i tuoi/vostri libri".


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## roh3x2n

Farsi
haan ketaab haye shoma.


Urdu 
Woh Aap kay ketaabay.


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## User1001

*Bahasa Indonesia (Indonesian):*
*Book:* buku
*Books:* buku-buku
*These are your books:* baku-baku ini punyamu.


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## lazarus1907

In Spanish:

_Esos libros tuyos

tuyos = of yours
_


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## Etcetera

In Russian:
those books = эти книги (well, those is actually те, but эти suits better)
your books = твои книги
those books of yours = эти твои книги
So, the construction is really nice and by no means awkward.


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## Outsider

badgrammar said:


> Not necessarily.  Consider:
> 
> C'est dans quel livre?
> Dans ton livre à toi.
> 
> C'était quelle voiture?
> C'était ta voiture à toi.
> 
> Come to think of it, you're right that "Les livres à toi" is not correct, it is more "child speak".  It should be "tes livres à toi".  And in that case, it comes down to a simple emphasis or redundancy...
> 
> Ma faute à moi!!!   I think you are correct, Outsider!


Mais peut-on dire _Ces livres à toi_ ?

Note: In Portuguese, "this thy servant" can be translated word for word as _este teu criado_ (which sounds more plausible than "these books of yours".)


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## Maja

Thomas1 said:


> _those books of yours_ - te twoje książki





Etcetera said:


> In Russian:those books of yours = эти твои книги


In Serbian: *te tvoje knjige* (*те твоје књиге*)


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## Vejrudsigt

*Danish*: de bøger af dig, jer, Dem


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## daoxunchang

Really, I'm at a loss as to what the question under discussion is. I guess it's about how to talk about something what one owns of is doing something about "natually" in one's language? Whether a possessive determiner is always needed?
If so, my offer is thus:
your你的
these books这些书
But: these books of yours 你（的）这些书
the books you read 你you读read的indicating possessive relation这些these书books

If I'm wrong in my understanding, please do tell me. I'll correct it.


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## john_riemann_soong

> I guess it's about how to talk about something what one owns of is doing something about "natually" in one's language? Whether a possessive determiner is always needed?


The concept of combining the possessive and the demonstrative aspect (and perhaps the definite/indefinite aspect) basically - and which parts are illegal in some languages (or redundant).

In English you can't combine articles, e.g. "the your book", "his that book", but circumlocutions like "of yours" (not native to Old English). I guess "over there" sometimes works, but often - mostly even - the demonstrative aspect is figurative - e.g. "what we just talked about".


Consider the nuances betweeen these sentences:

"My book is missing."

It's either an implicit assumption that the speaker expects the audience to know what he's talking about, or a simple way to say it and expect the audience to say, "what book is it?" To me, it seems that "my book" alone has a definite aspect by default.

"A book of mine is missing."

This puts it in the indefinite, which to me, places less of an assumption over the audience. The audience will probably still ask "what book?", but to me this statement is more euphemistic (think "I want" versus "I would like").

"That book of mine, it's gone missing again!"

The demonstrative seems to be more powerful than the definite. And you wouldn't use "that book of mine" with people you wouldn't know, for example. Again, there's an implicit assumption - just like the first example - that the audience knows what book is being roughly talked about. As would be expected of friends, who might know what you read.


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## daoxunchang

So what do you mean by "combine" articles? Do you mean whether you can just put them one after the other without any connective word, here, I presume, you are refering to "of"?
Ok, let me see whether I've understood:
My book is missing. 我(not exactly "my我的", but means the same)书(book)掉lost了(particle, indicating past tense)。
A book of mine is missing.我一(one)本(measure word)书掉了。
That book of mine is missing.我那(that)本书又(again)掉了。

So my conclusion: we can combine articles in Chinese.

(But, doesn't article only refer to "the", "a", and "an"?)


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## john_riemann_soong

For demonstratives, you have "pronouns" and "articles". 

In English they are generally the same: e.g. "don't do _that_!" (_that_ is a dem. pronoun) or "_this_ soup is better than the others" (_this_ is a dem. article). 

In French you have "je n'aime pas cela" ("I don't like that";_ cela_ is a dem. pronoun) and you have "j'aime ce livre" ("I like this book"; _ce_ is a dem. article). Latin and other Romance languages have different words for demonstrative pronouns and demonstrative particles.


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## daoxunchang

So you mean "combine demonstratives"? Then am I right in saying that we can combine them in Chinese? Sorry for such bother.


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## Outsider

john_riemann_soong said:


> In English they are generally the same: e.g. "don't do _that_!" (_that_ is a dem. pronoun) or "_this_ soup is better than the others" (_this_ is a dem. article).


The terms I am familiar with are demonstrative pronoun for the former and demonstrative adjective for the latter. "Determiner" may also apply, but "articles" are something else.

Your original question concerns whether one can combine a demonstrative adjective with a possessive adjective. The ancient phrase "this thy servant" (demonstrative + possessive + noun), mentioned in the previous page, is a perfect example of this in English.


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## Abbassupreme

roh3x2n said:


> Farsi
> haan ketaab haye shoma.


 
There is no "h" in Iranian Persian's pronunciation of that sentence, although it _is_ correct.  Anyway, there's more to the story than that:

"Ân" is the literal (i.e. written works) way of saying "that", but in _spoken_ Persian, it is pronounced "Un", with the Spanish/Italian/German "u".  So . . . 

"Un ketâb-hâ ye shomâ" is the formal way of saying "those books of yours".  Informally, one would say "Un ketâb-hâ ye to."


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## Encolpius

Czech --- ty tvoje knihy
Hungarian ---  I am afraid it is impossible to say it in Hungarian...strange/interesting enough...I am perplexed 
How about other non-IE languages?


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## ilocas2

Czech: ty tvé knížky


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## Encolpius

Encolpius said:


> Hungarian ---  I am afraid it is impossible to say it in Hungarian...strange/interesting enough...I am perplexed


I've been thinking about the issue and since there is no sentence I got confused

a könyv - the book, a könyved - the book of your, a könyveid - the books of yours
*azok a könyveid* (már nagyon ócskák) --- it sounds more natural in a particular sentence


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## 810senior

English in title is too hard to translate into Japanese as it is. We don't, at least I do, use two or more demonstratives in the sentence.
So we've got to contrive to translate it by other means, for example: あなたが持っているそれらの本(lit. those books which you have, you=single) or あなたがたが持っているそれらの本(lit. those books which you have, you=plural)

I think we commonly say "その本, あなたの本(that book(s) or your book(s))" in that same case, without modifying as seen in the above sentence)


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