# Position of Direct Object



## Engeland

Hoi!

Can someone please explain this?



Sara zalde hondmorgenhebben




Sara zalmorgeneen hondhebben


Are these sentences supposed to be formed like this?
If so, why?

-Sam


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## bibibiben

There's a general tendency in Dutch to mention "old" information first and put newer information towards the end of the sentence. The definite article in "de hond" indicates that the dog is somehow known to the hearer, if only because it was mentioned in the preceding sentence. The indefinite article in "een hond" indicates that the dog hasn't been introduced yet and constitutes completely new information.

Please note that "morgen" could be considered older information than "de hond", but also newer information:



Sarazalmorgende hondhebbenSarazalde hondmorgenhebben


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## Engeland

Ah, thank you. So if the person you are talking to is familiar with the D.O, you put it at the start. And if not, at the end?


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## Peterdg

But it is strange anyway; look:

Sara zal de hond morgen hebben.
Sara zal morgen de hond hebben.
Sara zal morgen een hond hebben.

are all correct but:

Sara zal een hond morgen hebben. This is impossible.

There is so much going on in one's mother tongue one is not aware of.


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## ThomasK

Good point, and yet, _een hond _cannot be considered new information, or very vital information. I do not know whether you can suggest an explanation here, Bibibiben. Sometimes - it seems to me - object and verb seem to constitute an entity as such (e.g., direction: _naar school gaan_) and breaking it up leads to ungrammatical sentences. Maybe an indef. object + verb constitute such an entity too, but I had never noticed that, or been aware of that before...


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## bibibiben

ThomasK said:


> Good point, and yet, _een hond_ cannot be considered new information, or very vital information.



_New information_ doesn't necessarily equal _vital information_. Most of the time it simply means _information not yet mentioned_. The presence of an indefinite article (_een_) is an indicator that information hasn't been mentioned yet. So yes, _een hond_ in _Ik zal morgen een hond krijgen_ constitutes new information. 




ThomasK said:


> Sometimes - it seems to me - object and verb seem to constitute an entity as such (e.g., direction: _naar school gaan_) and breaking it up leads to ungrammatical sentences.


 
_Naar school_ is not a direct object. Engeland’s question refers to the placement of definite and indefinite direct objects. Subjects, indirect objects, adjuncts, prepositional objects etc. all occupy different positions in the sentence.


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## ThomasK

I did not mean to say that direction is a _direct _object. I just meant to say that some - what I call - 'objects' (because they seem to constitute an entity with the verb, as opposed to adverbials) seem to have to remain close to the verb.  -- I think you are right about _een hond ; morgen _is indeed less important here.


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## bibibiben

ThomasK said:


> I did not mean to say that direction is a _direct _object. I just meant to say that some - what I call - 'objects' (because they seem to constitute an entity with the verb, as opposed to adverbials) seem to have to remain close to the verb.  -- I think you are right about _een hond ; morgen _is indeed less important here.


 
The word you’re looking for is _argument_, not _object_. There are core arguments (direct object and indirect object), which are complements of the verb, and oblique arguments (or adjuncts), which are non-complements of the verb. However, there’s also a certain type of adjunct, obligatory predication adjunct (other names exist), that is to be considered a complement of the verb as well.* Examples are _naar school_ in _naar school gaan,_ _op de tafel_ in _op de tafel leggen, in een flat_ in _in een flat wonen_ etc.

Optional adjuncts, obligatory adjuncts and (in)direct objects may seem to follow the same word order rules. For example, when emphasized, they can all be put in initial position:




direct object:
*De tafel*
heeft
hij
gisteren
in elkaar
gezet.
(en niet de kast)
optional adjunct:
*In die flat*
hebben
de monteurs
gisteren
aan de lift
gewerkt.
(en niet in die andere flat)
obligatory adjunct:
*In die flat*
wonen
mijn ouders.
(en niet in  die andere flat)


 


When not emphasized, all three sentence elements behave quite differently, though.

The direct object will follow the left-right principle (links-rechtsprincipe).



rather old information:
Hij
heeft
de tafel
gisteren
in elkaar
gezet.
Hij
heeft
gisteren
de tafel
in elkaar
gezet.
rather new information:
Hij
heeft
gisteren
een tafel
in elkaar
gezet.


 


The same is true for the optional adjunct, _but the initial position is still available,_ while there’s only one slot left in medial position.



rather old
information:
In die flat
hebben
de monteurs
gisteren
aan de lift
gewerkt.
rather new information:
De monteurs
hebben
gisteren
in die flat
aan de lift
gewerkt.


 


When not emphasized, the obligatory adjunct is always near the so-called ‘second pole’ (tweede pool), a slot that’s not always occupied. Note that definiteness doesn’t change the position of the obligatory adjunct.




unoccupied second pole:
Mijn ouders
wonen
in die flat.
occupied second pole (_wonen_):
Mijn ouders
willen
in die flat
wonen
occupied second pole (_gaan wonen_):
Mijn ouders
willen
deze maand
in die flat
gaan wonen
occupied second pole (_gaan wonen_):
Mijn ouders
willen
deze maand
in een flat
gaan wonen.
occupied second pole (_gewoond_):
Mijn ouders
hebben
steeds
in die flat
gewoond.
occupied second pole (_gewoond_):
Mijn ouders
hebben
steeds
in een flat
gewoond.
occupied second pole (_willen wonen_):
Mijn ouders
hebben
altijd
in een flat
willen wonen.


 

*The ANS qualifies them as ‘inherente zinsdelen’.


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## ThomasK

Is 'argument' the right term? I am learning interesting things. I liked the idea of "objects" versus "ad-verbials" because I liked to read 'additional, extra, not belonging to the core' into the _ad_-. The distinction, I thought, was based on semantic grammar (W.I.M. Van Calcar, long ago), and on the idea of valency, which I have always considered extremely helpful to help students analyse sentences, but I did realize that one can hardly call a predicate (after a copula) an object. 

I also thought direction was a separate category, but I now see it is better treated in a larger category...


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## bibibiben

ThomasK said:


> Is 'argument' the right term? I am learning interesting things. I liked the idea of "objects" versus "ad-verbials" because I liked to read 'additional, extra, not belonging to the core' into the _ad_-. The distinction, I thought, was based on semantic grammar (W.I.M. Van Calcar, long ago), and on the idea of valency, which I have always considered extremely helpful to help students analyse sentences, but I did realize that one can hardly call a predicate (after a copula) an object.
> 
> I also thought direction was a separate category, but I now see it is better treated in a larger category...



Well, valency is about how many arguments a verb requires. You can't talk about valency without talking about arguments. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Valency_(linguistics)#Valency_in_syntactic_theory. The argument-adjunct distinction is also wellknown. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argument_(linguistics).


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## ThomasK

Thanks for this valuable information. I might need to update my knowledge ! ;-(


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