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Pooh-Bah
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Pooh-Bah
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>So unless somebody can show me a usage that is akin to saying "Get out," "Go west," or "Drive south" then I'm unconvinced of its claim to adverbial status.
"What shall we do with the artifacts we found?"
"Leave them in situ." Okay, I can accept that if it is meant to be equivalent as "Leave them there." And yet if you said "Leave them in that place" it would just be a plain old preposition. As for the Catalan, well...
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Carpal Tunnel
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And yet if you said "Leave them in that place" it would just be a plain old preposition. is a preposition, In that place is not. It is a prepositional phrase that is acting adverbially.
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Carpal Tunnel
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In is a preposition, In that place is not. It is a prepositional phrase that is acting adverbially.
I thought that's what I said above. (Scratches head.) One problem I have with folks who've learned the "old-fashioned" grammar (or what I would call the traditional Graeco-Roman one), is that they don't actually use the traditional terminology consistently. In is a Latin preposition; situ is a Latin noun in the ablative case. The ablative can be used instrumentally in Latin syntax, which roughly means what Faldo meant by adverbally. For example, gladio militem vulnat ("s/he wounds the soldier with a sword.")
[Fixed typos and a translation error.]
Last edited by zmjezhd; 11/17/10 01:40 PM.
Ceci n'est pas un seing.
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old hand
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... Deleted post ... Sorry ...
Last edited by Avy; 11/17/10 05:22 AM.
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Pooh-Bah
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In is a preposition, In that place is not. It is a prepositional phrase that is acting adverbially. Even you identify the phrase as prepositional phrase and state that it is acting as an adverb. Let's say I accept that it [the phrase] is acting as an adverb. Fine. Now you tell me, suppose you write the "Phrase a Day" email and today's phrase is "in the place." Do you identify this phrase as an adverb? Would that be the most direct way of identifying what this phrase is? I say that no, it would not. This "Phrase of the Day" is a prepositional phrase. That's what it is and what it will remain when it punches the clock and goes home to the wife. If you want to construct a sentence that uses it as an adverb, go right ahead. But by and large this phrase is a prepositional phrase, and if you intend to introduce it to the world it would be most appropriate to introduce it as what it really is, not as what it is currently serving as in a particular case. Similarly, if you're hosting a cook-out, and the neurosurgeon next door is helping you out by cooking the hotdogs, you might playfully introduce him or her as your chef, but if someone asked you in seriousness what he did for a living, you wouldn't say "Oh, he's a hotdog chef" except as a jest. In seriousness, you'd say he was a neurosurgeon. Or, if you know of a famous movie director who uses an Academy Award statue as a door stop, you wouldn't identify such a statue as a doorstop in a didactic setting. You'd identify it as an award. So now let's turn back to this phrase borrowed from Latin, in situ. How would one best introduce this phrase to the world? As an adverb? I say no. That's not the essence of its being. It is a Latin prepositional phrase that that can be pressed into service, I will grudgingly admit, as an adverb in a very broad sense, but it is very often used as an adjective. So in putting together a list of words or phrases under the heading of adverbs, I would not include this phrase.
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Carpal Tunnel
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So now let's turn back to this phrase borrowed from Latin, in situ. How would one best introduce this phrase to the world? As an adverb? I say no. That's not the essence of its being. It is a Latin prepositional phrase that that can be pressed into service, I will grudgingly admit, as an adverb in a very broad sense, but it is very often used as an adjective. So in putting together a list of words or phrases under the heading of adverbs, I would not include this phrase.Ah, well, what do we mean by is an adverb?  To me things bigger than words can be any part of speech when they fill the slot for that part of speech. The terms, after all, are really just arbitrary labels that somebody came up with during an analysis of the language (or borrowed from somewhere else) and applied. And dictionaries try to give succinct information about how a word, term, phrase is used syntactically in in a sentence. It's kind of like compounds. What is "backseat driver"? I would say it's a compound noun. Others would say it was two nouns, with one masquerading as an adjective. Syntactically, backseat driver works just like book or bagel, and that's why it'd be a noun for me. I realize that you find all this rubbish, as is your right. I did not mention before, but part of how I analyse the situation of in situ (here it's a noun) is colored by what I have studied about heads in linguistics ( link). All phrase have a head, that is the word (whose part of speech-ness) that determines the the the part of speech that the phrase is. Anyway, one of the problems I have with a traditional analysis of prepositions in English is that many of them show up in two different places: i.e., as particles (or preverbs in the older tradition) that attach themselves more or less to verbs given the verbs new meanings. For me, in "Mary looked up the author online", looked up is a verb. I am nervous calling up a preposition here, because it's not acting like one. Up in this instance is acting more like an adverb ( mirabile dictu). The up can even move behind the noun (or noun phrase) that it can be imagined to be the preposition of: e.g., "Mary looked the author up online". So, is up a preposition that plays an adverb or a verbal particle, or does it belong to some other category that traditional grammarians did not notice or name? Ah, well, I can tell I am not convincing you, and though I understand your analysis, I just don't think it would too helpful to the users of the dictionary. Folks who haven't studied Latin don't know how to analyze the phrase in situ, anymore than they know how to analyze the phrase I used above (which is categorized in the dictionary as an interjection). For them, in situ is a funny word (or phrase) that can be used as an adjective or an adverb. In the end it's not so much about what you call it as how you use it.
Ceci n'est pas un seing.
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stranger
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stranger
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>So unless somebody can show me a usage that is akin to saying "Get out," "Go west," or "Drive south" then I'm unconvinced of its claim to adverbial status.
"What shall we do with the artifacts we found?"
"Leave them in situ." Okay, I can accept that if it is meant to be equivalent as "Leave them there." And yet if you said "Leave them in that place" it would just be a plain old preposition. As for the Catalan, well... Wrong traslation, I think... you can say I enjoyed the concert in situ; that is you were in the concert when the concert was playing (right time AND place). You didn't watch it on TV or in Youtube... although you were watching it at the right time.
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Pooh-Bah
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Pooh-Bah
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Ah, well, what do we mean by is an adverb? To me things bigger than words can be any part of speech when they fill the slot for that part of speech. The terms, after all, are really just arbitrary labels that somebody came up with during an analysis of the language (or borrowed from somewhere else) and applied. And dictionaries try to give succinct information about how a word, term, phrase is used syntactically in in a sentence. It's kind of like compounds. What is "backseat driver"? I would say it's a compound noun. Others would say it was two nouns, with one masquerading as an adjective. Syntactically, backseat driver works just like book or bagel, and that's why it'd be a noun for me. I realize that you find all this rubbish, as is your right. I did not mention before, but part of how I analyse the situation of in situ (here it's a noun) is colored by what I have studied about heads in linguistics ( link). All phrase have a head, that is the word (whose part of speech-ness) that determines the the the part of speech that the phrase is. Anyway, one of the problems I have with a traditional analysis of prepositions in English is that many of them show up in two different places: i.e., as particles (or preverbs in the older tradition) that attach themselves more or less to verbs given the verbs new meanings. For me, in "Mary looked up the author online", looked up is a verb. I am nervous calling up a preposition here, because it's not acting like one. Up in this instance is acting more like an adverb ( mirabile dictu). The up can even move behind the noun (or noun phrase) that it can be imagined to be the preposition of: e.g., "Mary looked the author up online". So, is up a preposition that plays an adverb or a verbal particle, or does it belong to some other category that traditional grammarians did not notice or name? Ah, well, I can tell I am not convincing you, and though I understand your analysis, I just don't think it would too helpful to the users of the dictionary. Folks who haven't studied Latin don't know how to analyze the phrase in situ, anymore than they know how to analyze the phrase I used above (which is categorized in the dictionary as an interjection). For them, in situ is a funny word (or phrase) that can be used as an adjective or an adverb. In the end it's not so much about what you call it as how you use it. As a matter of fact I have studied Latin ( mirabile dictu), although not beyond 2 semesters. Nevertheless I don't think that you can settle this question by referring to Latin grammar. It may shed some light on it but Latin grammar does not have the last word. And, I agree that backseat driver is a compound noun.
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stranger
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stranger
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I saw the adverb "in situ"on AWAD and yesterday, Tuesday, it was a "question" on Jeopardy. No one of the contestants got it but I did and shouted to the TV "What is "in situ",what is" in situ, " 
Last edited by Judith O'Neil; 11/17/10 07:31 PM.
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Carpal Tunnel
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I saw the adverb "in situ"on AWAD and yesterday, Tuesday, it was a "question" on Jeopardy. No one of the contestants got it but I did and shouted to the TV "What is "in situ",what is" in situ, " the answer was "adverb"?! (heh)
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