Case (definition)

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Definition

'Case' indicates the function of Noun Phrases in a sentence. In English only pronouns are marked for case.

  • A pronoun functioning as the subject of a sentence is said to be in the Nominative Case (eg. I, he, she, we, they).
  • A pronoun functioning as the object of a sentence is said to be in the Accusative Case (e.g. me, him, her, us, them).
  • A pronoun functioning as a possessor is typically in the [[Genitive Case (definition)|Genitive Case), (e.g. my, your, his, her, our, their).
  • English doesn't have a dative case, but instead marks indirect object and related notions with prepositions.

Gaelic makes no distinction between Nominative and Accusative case and instead combines them into a common case (also sometimes called Direct Case). It does however, distinguish a genitive case and dative case. These are most readily visible in the determiner (article) system of the language.

See Also

External Links

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References

SIL entry on Case
"The Linguistics Encyclopedia" by Kirsten Malmkjær (2002), pgs. 251-256