# Icelandic: orðaröð með "samt"



## Gavril

Sæl,

Í fyrri þræði leiðrétti NMMIG setningu mína svo:

_Þeir eru að bjóða húsið á 250.000 kr, en samt held ég *ég held samt* að við gætum samið um lægra verð._

Af hverju kemur "samt" hér á eftir sögninni?

Ég spýr því að það eru margar Google-niðurstöður fyrir _samt held ég_, með "samt" á undan sögninni -- hvað veldur annarri orðaröð, hvað hinni?

Takk


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## Silver_Biscuit

OK I had a think about it and I think the word order is not _wrong_ per se, but it changes what you are saying.

Þeir eru að bjóða húsið á 250.000 kr (haha this is still funny ) en *samt* *held **ég* að við gætum samið um lægra verð.
They are offering 250.000 kr on the house but *all the same* I think we can agree on a lower price (i.e. regardless of the fact stated in the first clause).

Þeir eru að bjóða húsið á 250.000 kr en *ég held samt* að við gætum samið um lægra verð.
They are offering 250.000 kr on the house; I think we can agree on a lower price *though*.

You clearly meant the second one, so the correction is a good one.


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## Donnerstag

Ég fellst á það að "_Þeir eru að bjóða húsið á 250.000 kr, en ég held samt að við gætum samið um lægra verð" _sé algengari setningaskipan, en ég sé ekki að það sé neitt að hinni. Hún er að mínu mati fullkomlega eðlileg íslenska líka.


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## Silver_Biscuit

To clarify, in the first sentence (pre-correction sentence), _samt_ didn't really have anything to do with _að halda_ I don't think... Maybe I'm overthinking it, though!


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## Donnerstag

Silver_Biscuit said:


> OK I had a think about it and I think the word order is not _wrong_ per se, but it changes what you are saying.
> 
> Þeir eru að bjóða húsið á 250.000 kr (haha this is still funny ) en *samt* *held **ég* að við gætum samið um lægra verð.
> They are offering 250.000 kr on the house but *all the same* I think we can agree on a lower price (i.e. regardless of the fact stated in the first clause).
> 
> Þeir eru að bjóða húsið á 250.000 kr en *ég held samt* að við gætum samið um lægra verð.
> They are offering 250.000 kr on the house; I think we can agree on a lower price *though*.
> 
> You clearly meant the second one, so the correction is a good one.



Já, þetta er rétt. Vel spottað


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## Gavril

Hi SB,



Silver_Biscuit said:


> Þeir eru að bjóða húsið á 250.000 kr (haha this is still funny ) en *samt* *held **ég* að við gætum samið um lægra verð.
> They are offering 250.000 kr on the house but *all the same* I think we can agree on a lower price (i.e. regardless of the fact stated in the first clause).



I'm not disputing your translation above (or NMMIG's original correction), but don't both word-orders with _samt_ have an implication of "regardless"? The difference seems to be in how strong the "regardless" is.

Thanks SB and Donnerstag for your help.


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## Silver_Biscuit

Uuumm, I would not say it's really a difference in emphasis (and would also advise against focusing too much on the choice of words that I made in English to try and get across the semantic difference as I saw it). It's more just about the relationship between the clauses. 

The first one says: A is true, but that doesn't matter, I think B, as if your opinion B is not challenged by fact A. 

The second one says: A is true, however I think B, in which you are setting up your opinion B _in opposition_ to A. 

The first is about dismissal (or disregarding, which is why I wrote regardless), the second is about disagreement (even though in this context you are not _actually_ disagreeing with A where A is the fact that these people offered a certain amount on the house - you are rather implying disagreement with their decision, you think they could get it for lower).

Edit: Maybe disagreement is not quite the right word... but I can't think of a better one, I hope you understand what I mean  Like your opinion is _interacting_ more with the first clause...

Edit edit: Also I hasten to add that I'm only really talking about this context.  Don't think I'm trying to make some sort of rule here. Different  contexts may well work differently, although I'm confident that some will work the same way. As I've said before on here, I'm  more of an "understanding what I'm reading/hearing" sort of person  rather than a rules person so I'm really only describing how I understand these two sentences differently.


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## Gavril

Silver_Biscuit said:


> Uuumm, I would not say it's really a difference in emphasis (and would also advise against focusing too much on the choice of words that I made in English to try and get across the semantic difference as I saw it). It's more just about the relationship between the clauses.
> 
> The first one says: A is true, but that doesn't matter, I think B, as if your opinion B is not challenged by fact A.
> 
> The second one says: A is true, however I think B, in which you are setting up your opinion B _in opposition_ to A.



But how are you not also doing this when you dismiss A?



> The first is about dismissal (or disregarding, which is why I wrote regardless), the second is about disagreement (even though in this context you are not _actually_ disagreeing with A where A is the fact that these people offered a certain amount on the house - you are rather implying disagreement with their decision, you think they could get it for lower).
> 
> Edit: Maybe disagreement is not quite the right word... but I can't think of a better one, I hope you understand what I mean  Like your opinion is _interacting_ more with the first clause...



I'm not sure I understand -- do you mean that #2 (_samt_ following the verb) concedes more ground to the other person than #1 (_samt_ before the verb)? I.e., #2 allows that the other person could be partially right?

I'm wondering now how much _samt_ actually adds to the meaning of the original sentence -- how is _en ég held samt_ different from simply _en ég held_?


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## Silver_Biscuit

Gavril said:


> I'm not sure I understand -- do you mean that #2 (_samt_ following the verb) concedes more ground to the other person than #1 (_samt_ before the verb)? I.e., #2 allows that the other person could be partially right?



No I'm not saying that. I especially made sure to mention that I wasn't trying to make any sort of rule! I mean that this is what effect moving _samt _around has in this sentence. It's not about conceding ground either... it's just about how you are situating your view in relation to the first part of the sentence. Just think about the difference between _however_ and _regardless_. I assume as a native English speaker you have a good sense of how these words have different implications.

_En ég held samt_ sounds stronger to me than _en ég held_. That's a matter of emphasis.


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## Gavril

Silver_Biscuit said:


> No I'm not saying that. I especially made sure to mention that I wasn't trying to make any sort of rule!



I didn't mean to imply that you were.



> I mean that this is what effect moving _samt _around has in this sentence. It's not about conceding ground either... it's just about how you are situating your view in relation to the first part of the sentence. Just think about the difference between _however_ and _regardless_. I assume as a native English speaker you have a good sense of how these words have different implications.



If you say, _A, but regardless B_, maybe there tends to be an implication that you already held opinion B before hearing A, or that B was already seen as a strong possibility. The same sentence with _however/though_/etc. doesn't necessarily imply that -- if you say _A; however, B_, then maybe B only occurred to you after hearing A. Is this closer to what you meant in the last post?


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## Silver_Biscuit

OK cool. Yeah, sounds like you're understanding what I meant now, even though I wouldn't say it says all that much about when you thought of B. Like the second one means it is a response or engagement with the idea, and the first one is just dismissing it.


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## Gavril

Silver_Biscuit said:


> OK cool. Yeah, sounds like you're understanding what I meant now, even though I wouldn't say it says all that much about when you thought of B. Like the second one means it is a response or engagement with the idea, and the first one is just dismissing it.



I think this makes sense to me if, instead of "dismiss", we say "shelve" or "change the subject".

E.g., it sounds a bit odd to say,

_They're offering the house for 300 thousand kr, but *regardless*, I think we can negotiate a better price_

because _regardless_ suggests that you're shifting the focus away from whatever they are offering, but then you continue discussing just that.

Now are we in agreement?


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## Silver_Biscuit

Eh no, it really is dismiss.



Gavril said:


> E.g., it sounds a bit odd to say,
> 
> _They're offering the house for 300 thousand kr, but *regardless*, I think we can negotiate a better price_
> 
> because _regardless_ suggests that you're shifting the focus away from whatever they are offering, but then you continue discussing just that.



You have identified the reason the correction happened in the first place. It does indeed sound a bit odd.


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## Gavril

_dismiss_ suggests that one is completely abandoning something, whereas _shelve_ or a similar verb makes it clear(er) that you may return to that something later, maybe as soon as the next sentence.


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## Silver_Biscuit

What are you getting at? That your original sentence should not have been corrected? I know what dismiss means (and it's not synonymous with abandon, by the by) and I can assure you that is precisely what I meant to say. You don't believe me, got it, take whatever you want away from this thread, I feel like I'm banging my head against a wall here so I'm out.


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## Gavril

Silver_Biscuit said:


> What are you getting at? That your original sentence should not have been corrected?



The Icelandic sentence that I started this thread about? No, the only thing I questioned is one (English) word used in the explanation of why it was corrected.

Thanks for sharing your Icelandic knowledge on this thread.


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## Gavril

> No, the only thing I questioned is one (English) word used in the explanation of why it was corrected.



Also, I didn't mean to say _dismiss_ was incorrect in this context -- I'm sorry if that's how I came off --, just that the (seemingly) intended meaning was clearer to me if certain other words/phrases were used in its place.


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