Transcategorization phenomena with other pos-values

Confusion can be made between the values possessive determiner and possessive pronoun.

Syntactic criterion:

- the possessive pronoun, which is morphologically identical to the corresponding adjective (this does not happen in English, e.g. my book/mine), is recognized with respect to the pronominal adjective, since it is inserted in an NP preceded by an article and not accompanied by a noun:

Vuoi una penna? Prendi la mia. and not * Prendi mia.

The adjective is not accompanied by the noun when it is in predicative function:

Questa penna e' mia.

The corresponding adjective can be also preceded by the article, but is by necessity linked to the noun:

Prendi la mia penna

- A particular lexical class of nouns, the family names, can be preceded or not by the article:

mia sorella/la mia sorella, (but not * la mia madre).

pos=pron, type=poss pos=det, type=poss

D e s c r i p t i o n E x a m p l e D e s c r i p t i o n E x a m p l e

pronoun questa casa e' meglio della mia/pron   determiner la mia/det   casa e' nuova

e' il mio/pron   mio/det   padre verra' domani

quel cane e' il nostro/pron   il nostro/det   fratello e' la'

non spende il denaro degli altri, ma il proprio/pron   Mario vide Carlo con la propria/det   moglie

Antoher typical transcategorization phenomenon is between possessive determiner and possessive pronoun, where the pronoun can be categorized as a noun (in the meaning exemplified below) and between possessive determiner and personal pronoun:

pos=noun pos=det, type=poss

D e s c r i p t i o n E x a m p l e D e s c r i p t i o n E x a m p l e

noun = parents i miei/noun   sono piu' anziani dei tuoi pronoun i miei/det   abiti sono malconci

noun = what is due to me datemi il mio/noun   mio/det   figlio e' piu' piccolo del tuo

noun = opinion voglio dire la mia/noun   la mia/det   carriera e' al culmine

noun = letter dopo che e'arrivata l'ultima tua/noun   la tua/det   volonta' e molto ferma

noun = allies arrivano i nostri/noun   i nostri/det   bambini sono i piu' belli

pos=pron, type=pers pos=det, type=poss

D e s c r i p t i o n E x a m p l e D e s c r i p t i o n E x a m p l e

pronoun vado con loro/pron, type=pers   determiner i loro/det, type=poss   figli