Sunday, August 31, 2008

Dikduk Question: "Mah Choshevet At"

I speak to my daughter in Hebrew. I brought her to work in New Jersey on Friday and at one point asked her what she thought. Because I want her to understand the flexibility of Hebrew, I said "Mah Choshevet At?" instead of "Mah At Choshevet?" and was corrected by 2 people who said that was wrong.

I did a search and found a book entitled "Mah Choshevet Miri"--and was told that nouns are different from pronouns. Does that make sense?

Bottom line: is "Mah Choshevet Miri" acceptable Hebrew?
Exit question: does anyone, anywhere speak/write like that--switching the subject and predicate of a sentence?

Thank you in advance for any help on this question.

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2 comments:

  1. Batya10:47 PM

    In general, I have pretty good "instincts" for grammar.

    I think that "Mah Choshevet Miri?" is very 3rd person and more "theoretical" than "Mah Miri choshevet?" Like you're guessing what Miri is thinking, not a simple factual question.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Daled Amos12:01 AM

    OK, but how about when you are directly addressing a person--2nd person? Does it have a different sense than when stated the more usual way?

    ReplyDelete

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