# 愛花が好きでつきあってたヤツ



## John_Doe

> その俺が愛花が好きでつきあってたヤツをなんで殴る資格がある？



I don't understand who loved whom. And is it a grammatically ambigious sentence or not?


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## Cowrie

Hi John, 
My first interpretation (because you might have a hidden context ) is as follows. 

There are three people who are involved in this sentence. 
A: 俺, the speaker
B: ヤツ
C: 愛花, who loved (and was seeing) B 

I don’t like talking about grammar, so I’ll wait together with you for the answer.


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## John_Doe

B and Aika loved each other. That's why I am confused. I don't get what "A" specifically meant (Aika loved or B loved her). By the way, A loved her, too, but it was unrequited love.

Seeing as you didn't give a clear-cut answer, can I take it that the sentence is ambigious without the broader context?

I don't know what exactly is needed to figure out the answer, I'll just cite what was said earlier.



> A: 愛花の弱み握って無理やりつきあってたとかなのか？
> B: いや、逆に弱み握られてた気分だったけど。
> A: なら俺がお前を殴る理由はねぇよ。…その俺が　愛花が好きでつきあってたヤツをなんで殴る資格がある？


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## Nobu.0

Hello again John!
I don't think there's anything ambiguous in the sentence. Translation will be as follows:

その俺が愛花が好きでつきあってたヤツをなんで殴る資格がある？
Why am I qualified to hit someone whom Aika loved and was dating?

So there are three actors here. B and C are in love and dating. A is about to hit B, but decides not to because C loved B.


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## Flaminius

愛花が好きでつきあってたヤツ can be parsed as having Aika as the subject as well as the object.  The context is more fitting to the former because Aika's lovelorn step-brother turns down hitting her boyfriend on the ground of respecting Aika's choice.


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## John_Doe

> I don't think there's anything ambiguous in the sentence. Translation will be as follows:


How would you change the sentence so that it is it's B (yatsu) who loved Aika, then?



> The context is more fitting to the former because Aika's lovelorn  step-brother turns down hitting her boyfriend on the ground of  respecting Aika's choice.


That's probable. I'm just not good at deciding what's more important, grammar or context, if there is any room for ambiguity.


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## diiv

In fact, 愛花が好きでつきあってたヤツ can be interpreted in the following  three ways.
- someone who loved and dated Aika
- someone whom Aika loved and dated, or
- someone whom Aika dated by her own choice (more literally, someone whom Aika liked to date)
In the last one, 好きでつきあってた　is regarded as the  "好きで + verb" combination (and not two separate actions), which serves to stress that the subject is doing something on their own will.


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## Flaminius

John_Doe said:


> That's probable. I'm just not good at deciding what's more important, grammar or context, if there is any room for ambiguity.


This is somewhat related to what I pointed at in another thread:
http://togetter.com/li/567493

When 5 elements are put together by binary operations, there are 14 binary trees (14 is the 4th (=5-1) Catalan number).  Substituting the elements with five words [頭が, 赤い, 魚を, 食べた, 猫] in this order, we reduce the possible structures to 5, about 1/3 of the original figure.  This is the power of grammar.  Possibilities are further reduced by factoring in meaning of individual words, context, or knowledge of how the world works in general.

Given the context and knowing a few cliché descriptions of romantic relationships, I can safely say that it is Aika that loved the boy (not excluding a mutual feeling).


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## Nobu.0

> How would you change the sentence so that it is it's B (yatsu) who loved Aika, then?


Sorry I've never thought of the possibility to interpret 愛花 as an object... To make the sentence unambiguous, how about this?
その俺がなんで、愛花を好きでつきあってたヤツを殴る資格がある？


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## John_Doe

> To make the sentence unambiguous, how about this?


Oh, it was that simple. Isn't 好きan adjective? I mean only verbs can take を, can't they?


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## Flaminius

The complement for 好き can be marked either by _-o_ or _-ga_.

For details, take a look at a previous thread:
〇〇を好きだ and 〇〇が好きだ


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## John_Doe

Thank you all for your help.



> When 5 elements are put together by binary operations, there are 14 binary trees (14 is the 4th (=5-1) Catalan number). Substituting the elements with five words [頭が, 赤い, 魚を, 食べた, 猫] in this order, we reduce the possible structures to 5, about 1/3 of the original figure. This is the power of grammar.


I saw the picture the other day. Yes, 5 is much better than 14 but actually the picture gave me the chills because all 5 structures are translated into 5 different sentences in Russian.


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