The Obscured Subject

[agentpigeon]

I have a question regarding ASL grammar.
In English, there is such a thing as "obscured subject" (my own term). This is where one would say "It was punished," instead of the more concrete "He/she punished it." Another example would be "The orange was smelled" versus "He smelled the orange."

How does one interpret this, assuming no knowledge of who is performing the action (who punished, who smelled)? A translation such as "It punish" would mean "It punished," and "Orange smell" would mean "The orange smelled." Neither has the original meaning. How does one overcome this?

 

[RedFox]

I guess you're talking about passive voice. My idea about "It was punished," is to lean back so your body represents the object being punished, making a face and signing punish a few times. For "The orange was smelled," maybe you could sign that somebody indefinite smelled the orange.

 

[jillio]

To my knowledge, an "it" would not be punsihed. A he or a she would be punished. "It" implies an innanimate object, and innanimate objects cannot be punished.

Likewise, saying "The orange was smelled" makes no sense conceptually or grammatically, because someone must do the smelling. Unless there is a person present who is using their olifactory sense, smelling has not taken place. An orange is an innanimate object. It cannot move itself to be smelled. A person must act on the orange in order for smelling to take place. Therefore, one would say "I smelled the orange." or "He/She smelled the orange." but not "The orange was smelled." That phrasing does not answer the basic question of "by whom was the orange smelled?" Without a whom, there is no smelling.

 

[RedFox]

Pages about passive voice in English and ASL were found.

English passive voice
Passive voice and ASL

It's called passive voice because what normally would be the passive object, which gets acted on by the subject, is placed into the role of the subject in the sentence. In the orange example, the orange is the passive object being acted on (smelled) by the indefinite agent that normally would be the subject in active voice.

 

[jillio]

Pages about passive voice in English and ASL were found.

English passive voice
Passive voice and ASL

It's called passive voice because what normally would be the passive object, which gets acted on by the subject, is placed into the role of the subject in the sentence. In the orange example, the orange is the passive object being acted on (smelled) by the indefinite agent that normally would be the subject in active voice.

Agreed. But passive voice only conveys the proper concept in certain context.

 

[SimplyMints]

"We investigated the scene of the crime, but before we arrived, the evidence had already been disturbed. As we prepared ourselves for the possibility of charges relating to tampering with evidence, further investigation finally revealed that the 'tampering' offender was a raccoon who had entered through the open window in search of food."

 

[agentpigeon]

I guess you're talking about passive voice.

*smacks head on table* I knew that! I did! It just didn't come to mind. . .
I referred to it as the "obscured subject" because I commonly use the passive voice to literally "obscure the subject" from my listener's attention. It is kinder to say "I was tripped" instead of "Bryant, that idiot, tripped me!" It doesn't "point the finger" as blatantly. So when I became curious about the passive voice in ASL, I *naturally* used the wrong term! :s Oh well.

 

[agentpigeon]

To my knowledge, an "it" would not be punsihed. A he or a she would be punished. "It" implies an innanimate object, and innanimate objects cannot be punished.

Likewise, saying "The orange was smelled" makes no sense conceptually or grammatically, because someone must do the smelling. Unless there is a person present who is using their olifactory sense, smelling has not taken place. An orange is an innanimate object. It cannot move itself to be smelled. A person must act on the orange in order for smelling to take place. Therefore, one would say "I smelled the orange." or "He/She smelled the orange." but not "The orange was smelled." That phrasing does not answer the basic question of "by whom was the orange smelled?" Without a whom, there is no smelling.

Naturally, without a whom, there is no smelling. There must always be someone or something to perform an action. However, the pretext of my question was that the performer of the action is neither given by the context nor the sentence being interpreted. Somehow, the action must, in ASL, be shown to be done to the object without someone doing the action. I suppose RedFox's suggestion makes sense, but it still doesn't seem to "click" in my head. I guess what I'm struggling with is when the action in the sentence could be performed by either subject or object and with how to prevent confusion about who is doing what when translated into ASL.

 

[jillio]

Naturally, without a whom, there is no smelling. There must always be someone or something to perform an action. However, the pretext of my question was that the performer of the action is neither given by the context nor the sentence being interpreted. Somehow, the action must, in ASL, be shown to be done to the object without someone doing the action. I suppose RedFox's suggestion makes sense, but it still doesn't seem to "click" in my head. I guess what I'm struggling with is when the action in the sentence could be performed by either subject or object and with how to prevent confusion about who is doing what when translated into ASL.

Through placement and qualifiers.