# Norwegian: Posession ambiguity?



## sjiraff

Hi everyone, hope you are all well

I just realised I'm not sure if there are any exact rules to follow, or if it is as ambiguous as in English but for example the English sentence:

"He suspected he had lost some of his clothes" could mean He suspected he (someone else or himself) lost his (him or someone else, or someone else to the second person) clothes.

So in Norwegian is there any difference between:
Han mistenkte at han hadde mistet noen av klærne sine

and

Han mistenkte at han hadde mistet noen av klærne hans     (he thought someone else lost someone else's clothes, or he thought someone else lost HIS clothes?)

Thanks!


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## raumar

Hi sjiraff, 

If I understand "He suspected he had lost some of his clothes" correctly, there are five possible interpretations (please correct me if I am wrong):

A suspected A had lost some of A's clothes
A suspected B had lost some of B's clothes
A suspected A had lost some of B's clothes
A suspected B had lost some of A's clothes
A suspected B had lost some of C's clothes
In Norwegian, the distinction between "hans" and "sine" removes the ambiguity of "his", but the ambiguity of the second "he" remains. 

In _"Han mistenkte at han hadde mistet noen av klærne sine"_, the owner and the "loser" of the clothes is the same person, but we don't know whether this person also is the one with the suspicions: 

A suspected A had lost some of A's clothes
A suspected B had lost some of B's clothes

In "_Han mistenkte at han hadde mistet noen av klærne hans_", the owner and "loser" are different people:

A suspected A had lost some of B's clothes
A suspected B had lost some of A's clothes
A suspected B had lost some of C's clothes
By the way, "_å mistenke at ..._" is traditionally not considered correct in Norwegian (but it is used, probably as a result of influence from English and/or Swedish). The verb "mistenke" is traditionally used in sentences such as "A mistenkte B for tyveriet", where a person is the object. "He suspected he had lost.. " could be expressed as, for example:

_Han hadde en mistanke om at han hadde mistet.._
_Han trodde at han hadde mistet ..._
_Han var redd for at han hadde mistet...._


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## sjiraff

raumar said:


> In "_Han mistenkte at han hadde mistet noen av klærne hans_", the owner and "loser" are different people



Ah yes, but could it also mean that A suspected B had lost some of B's own clothes?



raumar said:


> By the way, "_å mistenke at ..._" is traditionally not considered correct in Norwegian (but it is used, probably as a result of influence from English and/or Swedish). The verb "mistenke" is traditionally used in sentences such as "A mistenkte B for tyveriet", where a person is the object. "He suspected he had lost.. " could be expressed as, for example:
> 
> _Han hadde en mistanke om at han hadde mistet.._
> _Han trodde at han hadde mistet ..._
> _Han var redd for at han hadde mistet...._



Oh I wasn't sure actually, I usually say "mistanke om at" actually just becase sometimes  I don't even know if you're always meant to have "om at" or just "at" after certain things, but that's good to know thanks!


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## raumar

sjiraff said:


> Ah yes, but could it also mean that A suspected B had lost some of B's own clothes?



No. If somebody lose their own clothes, the sentence is "_Han hadde mistet noen av klærne sine"._ Adding _"Han mistenkte at" _does not change that. 

The grammar behind this is explained better in this thread, especially in the first six posts: 
http://forum.wordreference.com/threads/norwegian-sin-vs-hans-hennes.2761772/

That thread also shows that the choice between hans/hennes/deres and sin/sitt/sine may be difficult when sentences become complex, with subordinate clauses. It is easy to make mistakes and mix them up, also for native speakers.


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## sjiraff

I mean, if someone thinks someone else has lost some of their clothes is it

Han trodde at han hadde mistet noen av klærne hans (A trodde at B hadde mistet noen av klærne hans/sine) (klærne til B) if you know what I mean

Thanks


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## raumar

sjiraff said:


> I mean, if someone thinks someone else has lost some of their clothes is it
> 
> Han trodde at han hadde mistet noen av klærne hans (A trodde at B hadde mistet noen av klærne hans/sine) (klærne til B) if you know what I mean
> 
> Thanks



Yes, all these "han" are confusing.... 

What I tried to say, was that if A thought that B had lost B's own clothes, it must be ".... _klærne sine_". The reflexive pronoun "_sine_" reflects back on the subject, which is B. If A thought that B had lost either A's or C's clothes, it is "_klærne hans_".


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## sjiraff

raumar said:


> Yes, all these "han" are confusing....
> 
> What I tried to say, was that if A thought that B had lost B's own clothes, it must be ".... _klærne sine_". The reflexive pronoun "_sine_" reflects back on the subject, which is B. If A thought that B had lost either A's or C's clothes, it is "_klærne hans_".




Ah, got it now, thanks a lot Raumar


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## Ben Jamin

raumar said:


> In Norwegian, the distinction between "hans" and "sine" removes the ambiguity of "his", but the ambiguity of the second "he" remains.


A better answer should be rather: "In Norwegian, the distinction between "hans" and "sine" *removed once *the ambiguity, but now  most of the speakers use "sin" about another person then the acting subject".

Example: "Politiet kjørte ham til leiligheten sin", meaning the apartment of the person being transported by the police.

Most people in media both speak and write so nowadays, and the confusion is even worse than in English, because some still believe that the "old" system still functions.

If you google "Per Egil Hegge" and "sin" you will get a series of articles about this subject.


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## sjiraff

Ben Jamin said:


> A better answer should be rather: "In Norwegian, the distinction between "hans" and "sine" *removed once *the ambiguity, but now  most of the speakers use "sin" about another person then the acting subject".
> 
> Example: "Politiet kjørte ham til leiligheten sin", meaning the apartment of the person being transported by the police.
> 
> Most people in media both speak and write so nowadays, and the confusion is even worse than in English, because some still believe that the "old" system still functions.
> 
> If you google "Per Egil Hegge" and "sin" you will get a series of articles about this subject.



Oh my, I would have thought it would be "leiligheten hans" since "Politiet" are the first and main "person" in the sentence, and the man is in the middle, basically like an object they are responsible over. (Sorry I'm really bad with knowing the proper gramatical terms for what these are in sentences).

Thanks Ben


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## Ben Jamin

sjiraff said:


> Oh my, I would have thought it would be "leiligheten hans" since "Politiet" are the first and main "person" in the sentence, and the man is in the middle, basically like an object they are responsible over. (Sorry I'm really bad with knowing the proper gramatical terms for what these are in sentences).
> 
> Thanks Ben


You are right sjiraff, it would be the only option in "archaic" Norwegian that I learned 33 years ago, but it does not work like that now. Now the word "sin/sine" is used indiscriminately, and denotes usually the person that stands nearest the pronoun in the sentence. Only dinosaurs like Per Egil Hegge and a couple of other guys understand the original usage.
It is stunning how fast the Norwegian language changes. I'm curious if there is another language in Europe that changes so fast.


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## sjiraff

Ben Jamin said:


> You are right sjiraff, it would be the only option in "archaic" Norwegian that I learned 33 years ago, but it does not work like that now. Now the word "sin/sine" is used indiscriminately, and denotes usually the person that stands nearest the pronoun in the sentence. Only dinosaurs like Per Egil Hegge and a couple of other guys understand the original usage.
> It is stunning how fast the Norwegian language changes. I'm curious if there is another language in Europe that changes so fast.


I've noticed a lot of things too even from the materials i've read, which say one thing is absolutely wrong yet it's becoming the norm.
I'm quite sure all European languages are suffering the same, maybe with the exception of Icelandic, but I'm honestly not sure why it seems to be happening to Norwegian even faster.


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## applefarm

raumar said:


> Hi sjiraff,
> 
> If I understand "He suspected he had lost some of his clothes" correctly, there are five possible interpretations (please correct me if I am wrong):
> 
> A suspected A had lost some of A's clothes
> A suspected B had lost some of B's clothes
> A suspected A had lost some of B's clothes
> A suspected B had lost some of A's clothes
> A suspected B had lost some of C's clothes
> In Norwegian, the distinction between "hans" and "sine" removes the ambiguity of "his", but the ambiguity of the second "he" remains.





sjiraff said:


> I've noticed a lot of things too even from the materials i've read, which say one thing is absolutely wrong yet it's becoming the norm.
> I'm quite sure all European languages are suffering the same, maybe with the exception of Icelandic, but I'm honestly not sure why it seems to be happening to Norwegian even faster.



In Estonian language one could write "AAA"-sentence without ambiguity so:

"He suspected *he himself* had lost some of *own *clothes".

But the "AAB"-sentence would be impossible to write without ambiguity. Only way to use persons name "B" at the end:
"He suspected *he himself* had lost some of *B *clothes".

But having only 3 "he"-s in sentence would give the same ambiguity (A/B/C) as described for English and Norwegian.

(
I guess juridical world have solution for such ambiguity thing.
For example, in Estonian language peoples last names when put to Genitive and other Cases, can change the appearance of the word/name such that this Genitive form can mean totally other word/name/person. Example:

Name 1:  Andres Mägi.
Genitive 1: Andres *Mäe*.
Name 2:  Andres Mäe.
Genitive 2: Andres *Mäe*.

Here the "name 1" and "name 2" differ in nominative case, but in genitive case they appear the same.
In Estonian legal/court text therefore is sometimes written this way:

"Andres Mägi (Andres Mägi) is suspected to steal *Andres Mäe (Andres Mäe)* clothes and therefore must *Andres Mäe (Andres Mägi)* home seached until stolen clothes found."
In that example sentence 2 bold names are in genitive and looks the same but round brackets with name in Nominative Case are added in legal texts, that removes ambiguity.

I guess human languages don't have to be so precise as computer programming languages. In computer languages no ambiguityis possible in grammar- one must use unique names ("A, B or C"), no ambiguity with "he".
)


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## raumar

Ben Jamin is of course right in pointing out that many Norwegians mix _hans/hennes/deres_ and _sin/sitt/sine_. It is not difficult to find examples of such mistakes - I still call it a mistake, even if that makes me a dinosaur. I think Ben is exaggerating a bit, though. But that is just my impression. It would be interesting to know if there are any systematic studies of how well this distinction is maintained in Norwegian today. Maybe some of the linguists in this forum could help us? 

Applefarm: I think we could get rid of some more ambiguity also in Norwegian, by using some more words, such as _han selv_ (he himself) and _hans/sine egne_ (his own).


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## Ben Jamin

Ben Jamin said:


> You are right sjiraff, it would be the only option in "archaic" Norwegian that I learned 33 years ago, but it does not work like that now. Now the word "sin/sine" is used indiscriminately, and denotes usually the person that stands nearest the pronoun in the sentence. Only dinosaurs like Per Egil Hegge and a couple of other guys understand the original usage.





raumar said:


> Ben Jamin is of course right in pointing out that many Norwegians mix _hans/hennes/deres_ and _sin/sitt/sine_. It is not difficult to find examples of such mistakes - I still call it a mistake, even if that makes me a dinosaur. I think Ben is exaggerating a bit, though. But that is just my impression. It would be interesting to know if there are any systematic studies of how well this distinction is maintained in Norwegian today. Maybe some of the linguists in this forum could help us?
> 
> Applefarm: I think we could get rid of some more ambiguity also in Norwegian, by using some more words, such as _han selv_ (he himself) and _hans/sine egne_ (his own).


You are right, "jeg tok litt for mye tran", but the tendency of disappearing understanding of the reflexive possessive pronouns in Norwegian is clear. You won't find many people under 30 that can use them correctly. Maybe one of the factors contributing to the trend is the increasing use of "garpegenitiv", which has introduced the double role of the pronoun and casued confusion.


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