about vietnamese "classifiers"

[khiflo]

"(...) Sachons qu'en tout état de cause, il faudrait d'abord tenir compte de l'opposition animé-inanimé, qui se retrouve dans l'opposition con-cái. A partir de cette dichotomie, la classe "inanimé" serait divisée en sous-classes, (...)"
from NGUYEN Phu Phong, Le syntagme verbal en vietnamien (Paris 1976)


"(...) First of all, we should consider the opposition living-non living, which is manifest in the opposition [i]con-cái. From this dichotomy, the "non living" word class can be divided into subclasses, (...)"

I wonder why so much linguists mention this as a fact, often without deep explanation. Personnally I can't feel such a "dichotomy" when I learn vietnamese. Are there scientific research about this vietnamese's animate/non-animate perception of the world? This reflexion looks like a "traditional knowledge transmission", something that someone said once and that nobody wants to question anymore...

why cái (and chiếc) could not simply be an ancient general classifier, and con, cây, bông, etc. the result of a long natural linguistic discrimination process?

[ChubbyChocobobo]

From the perspective of a native Vietnamese and a programming student :P, classifiers are like superclasses of Vietnamese nouns which represent particular tangible objects. It means those objects are derived from the classifiers and objects derived from the same classifiers have some common properties. For example, hoa hồng - hoa lan - hoa hướng dương are classified as hoa since they all are flowers.

Since we're discussing a language, there's nothing absolute or always true like in math. It's necessary to put the classifiers before the object to make it clear but it's not mandatory. Study the example of "đóa hoa hồng" and "đóa hồng". Đóa means "bouquet" and flower is already implied in it. Hence, we can drop "hoa" and make it "đóa hồng". And the borders between classifiers and objects as well as the border between 2 particular classifiers are very blur sometimes. You may wonder why there are con sông - con mèo - con tầu - con thuyền - con tầu vũ trụ (respectively: river, cat, train, boat, spaceship) but con máy bay (air plane). There's no scientific explanation for such irregularity. That's just the way it is. But in my opinion, máy is already another classifier (e.i. machine class) and more importantly bay (fly) already has the sense of moving in it. Another irregularity of classifier con is con đường (road). Although the road itself doesn't move at all but the people moving on it feel like it's moving and in term of physic, the road moves relatively to the people.

One last thing, many classifiers can be treated as objects. Hoa and con in our above examples are classifiers but they are normal objects in "một bông hoa" and "Chuồng gà này có 3 con".

PS: I'm no linguist and what I've said above are probably not correct in some ways but after all linguists didn't invent the language either, did they? :wink: :twisted:

[giang]

To be simple, first of all, classifiers are NOUN. That 's why we also call "classifying noun".

Classifiers are used to determine the category / class / group that the noun that follows it belong to.

What Chubby has said is not wrong. I just want to add that there is hypothesis that con tàu, con sông, con thoi belong to a group of mobility. But that idea is not totally supported.

Giang

[khiflo]

Thank you or your answers!

I absolutelly agree when you say that the border between one classifier and an other (or between a classifier and a noun) can be very blur. Sometimes, after a big headache, i'm not far from considering that there are no classifiers but only 2 different things
- names and the determiners of theses names (which are placed after the name). EX: tôi mua một hoa hồng
- individualizers EX : cái ghế làm bằng gỗ thì cũ quá, vứt đi!

I would like to focus on the animate-non animate or living-non living aspect expressed by con and cái . And the fact that every linguists mention this "dichotomy" use these exemples with cái used instead of con and con instead of cái . Is that argument really serious?

-Teacher, why do Vietnamese say "một con đường"?
-It's because the people moving on make it feel like it's moving. It is the same for "một con sông", it express that the water is moving...
-Teacher, why do Vietnamese say "một cái kiến"?
-mmm... it's because an ant is so small that sometimes you can't see it's movement.
-Teacher, why do Vietnamese say "một con thuyền"?
-Erh... it's because when the boat is in move, it seems to be something living.
-Teacher, why do Vietnamese say "một con mắt"?
-Because you eyes can move, of course! You see?
[the teacher randomly moves his eyes inside their orbits... then the pupil shake his hands]
-But teacher, can we say "một con tay"?
-... Euh... in fact not, you must say "một chiếc tay" or "một tay".
-So what does "chiếc" specify in that case?
-It is for things that usually goes by pair.
-I understand, for exemple : "một chiếc mắt"!
-Euh... no.
-Ah... Teacher, do boats goes by pair in Vietnam?
-Euh... not necessarily...
-Teacher, why do Vietnamese say "một con dao"?
-Ahem! ahem!... it's because... because, you know, the knife is made to be taken in your hand, and you give it a movement, and... and sometimes you don't know if you are controling your knife or if it's your knife which is controling you... you know, ahem!... as if the knife was a living thing!

Well... I really don't think that these exceptions in vietnamese grammar proves that cái is used for non animated things and con for animated things. But I would really like to know where this theory does comes from.


@Giang
To be simple, first of all, classifiers are NOUN. That 's why we also call "classifying noun".
As far as I understood, cái is not originally a noun, is it?
And con (classifier) is maybe just an homonym of con (child) ...
Classifiers are used to determine the category / class / group that the noun that follows it belong to.
When I say "tôi mua hoa hồng" does hoa inform us about the class which hồng belongs to, or does hồng inform us about the nature or hoa ?
Or maybe hoa is not a good exemple.

Thanks for your help

[nktvn]

Classifiers are tricky and I don't have any theory behind it. I am pretty sure you can use "con" with animals but why we say "con dao", "con mắt", "con đường", "cái mũi", etc. I have no idea.

[ChubbyChocobobo]

-Teacher, why do Vietnamese say "một con đường"?
-It's because the people moving on make it feel like it's moving. It is the same for "một con sông", it express that the water is moving...
-Teacher, why do Vietnamese say "một cái kiến"?
-mmm... it's because an ant is so small that sometimes you can't see it's movement.
-Teacher, why do Vietnamese say "một con thuyền"?
-Erh... it's because when the boat is in move, it seems to be something living.
-Teacher, why do Vietnamese say "một con mắt"?
-Because you eyes can move, of course! You see?
[the teacher randomly moves his eyes inside their orbits... then the pupil shake his hands]
-But teacher, can we say "một con tay"?
-... Euh... in fact not, you must say "một chiếc tay" or "một tay".
-So what does "chiếc" specify in that case?
-It is for things that usually goes by pair.
-I understand, for exemple : "một chiếc mắt"!
-Euh... no.
-Ah... Teacher, do boats goes by pair in Vietnam?
-Euh... not necessarily...
-Teacher, why do Vietnamese say "một con dao"?
-Ahem! ahem!... it's because... because, you know, the knife is made to be taken in your hand, and you give it a movement, and... and sometimes you don't know if you are controling your knife or if it's your knife which is controling you... you know, ahem!... as if the knife was a living thing!

:lol: Your teacher is funny. He tried to give explanation to all the irregularities of classifiers. My advice is to learn the nouns along with its classifier(s) if any, especially con/cái/chiếc, just like English learners learn English irregular verbs.

And by the way, we don't say "một cái kiến" or "một chiếc tay", we say "một con kiến" and "một tay"/"một cái tay"

tôi mua một hoa hồng

In fact, hoa hồng is not just rose in English. It's "the rose species" or "rose in general". You cannot buy a species of flower (rose) or, can you? So let it be, "Tôi mua một bông (hoa) hồng" (bông is a special classifier specifying a separated flower. Đóa, on the other hand, specifies a bunch of flowers that goes together in a bouquet). But you can also say "Tôi mua hoa hồng". Remember, when there is a quantifier (một in your above sentence, always look for an appropriate classifier to make the noun specific (in contrast with "general"). Study this example:

Clerk: Tôi giúp gì được chị không? (**Can I help you?)
Costumer: Tôi muốn mua xoài (**I want some mangoes)
Clerk: Chị muốn mua bao nhiêu? (**How many do you want?)
Costumer: Tôi mua 7 quả (xoài) (**I'll have 7 of them)

Note: Xoài in the last sentence is optional because both speakers know what kind of quả they are talking about. (Vietnamese are lazy :P we omit word whenever possible :P)

[nktvn]

And by the way, we don't say "một cái kiến" or "một chiếc tay", we say "một con kiến" and "một tay"/"một cái tay"

"cái kiến" is an archaic or literary use (e.g. con ong cái kiến). Try the Vietnamese dictionary on http://vdict.com and see for yourself. But "chiếc tay" is definitely bizarre.

[ChubbyChocobobo]

And by the way, we don't say "một cái kiến" or "một chiếc tay", we say "một con kiến" and "một tay"/"một cái tay"

"cái kiến" is an archaic or literary use (e.g. con ong cái kiến). Try the Vietnamese dictionary on http://vdict.com and see for yourself. But "chiếc tay" is definitely bizarre.

Yeah. Did I say "We don't say" or "We never say"? :wink: as long as every Vietnamese prefer con kiến, cái kiến stands no chances :twisted:

[giang]

As far as I understood, cái is not originally a noun, is it?
And con (classifier) is maybe just an homonym of con (child) ...

Cái, con and all other classifiers are obviously nouns.
If cái was not a noun then what would it be in "Tôi mua hai cái" ?
In a nous phrase, there are different kinds of relationship. There are grammatical relationship, there are semantic relationship, there are grammaticalized relationship. I think in "hoa hồng", the relationship is more semantic than grammatical. In my opinion, hoa is head, hồng is (as an adjective) a modifier. That relationship is different from the one between con and cá in "con cá". Con indicates category and cá is type/species/kind.

Read again what I wrote!
I just want to add that there is hypothesis that con tàu, con sông, con thoi belong to a group of mobility. But that idea is not totally supported.

I think that the fact that con is used for some inanimate things such as thuyền, thoi, đò, mắt, dao, đường comes from two reasons:

1. These things are quite mobile and move like animal. Imagine a thuyền boat that drifts downstream, it really looks like a crocodile or a huge fish, isn't it?

2. These things are not too closely attached to another structure, body or set, so they look like independent units --> they look like animals. The last part of Khiflo's story can be this:

- But teacher, can we say "một con tay"?
- Absolutely not.
- Why ?
- Tay is attached to the body, not an independent unit
- So how we say with tay?
- một cánh tay.
- Can we say chiếc tay.
- Well, it's different. Một chiếc tay is used for a statue's arm or a doll's arm.
- Teacher. I heard that chiếc is for things that usually goes by pair, is it right?
- Where did you find that crazy explanation?
- From VIEX forum, teacher.
- Really? The guys there may be crazy or what. Remember that all languages have exceptions and there are many things that linguists can explain. In French, I found no explanations on why amour is a masculine noun, when amours is a feminine noun

[nb]

I've seen you say this a few times and I always put it down to being a typo... but what is a "nous" phrase?

[giang]

Please read Wiki about that: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noun_phrase

A noun phrase is either a single noun or pronoun or a group of words containing a noun or a pronoun that function together as a noun or pronoun, as the subject or object of a verb.

EXAMPLES OF NOUN PHRASES:

EG: John was late.

('John' is the noun phrase functioning as the subject of the verb.)

EG: The people that I saw coming in the building at nine o'clock have just left.

('The people ... nine o'clock' is a lengthy noun phrase, but it functions as the subject of the main verb 'have just left'.)

(UsingEnglish.com)

[nb]

Um, so I'm guessing you don't realise you keep typing it as "nouS" and not "nouN" :?:

[khiflo]

- Teacher. I heard that chiếc is for things that usually goes by pair, is it right?
- Where did you find that crazy explanation?
@Giang
Yes, I read many times that chiếc can have such a meaning, that it can point on something which usually goes by pair (like a dropstick, a shoe, a glove, etc.). Here, for exemple : http://www.goloom.com:9090/ (chose the Viet-Viet dictionnary)

[EDIT : the adress is not aviable anymore. You can find the same dictionnary here : http://gkws0.informatik.uni-leipzig.de:8080/ ]

And I'm not satisfied by the explanation of the use of con with thuyền which suppose that a boat can be imagined like something living. Some people say that it is a poetic allusion from some old vietnamese writers, which are now used spontaneously without taking big care of the poetic meaning... My opinion about the exception of con occurences is that the use of con have a close relation with the use of chiếc, which is (from the chinese origin) already a general classifier which took different specificities during language history... like his relation with animals and (curiously) boats! And the reason why we can say "một chiếc thuyền" is maybe just because a lot of occurences of chiếc became con.

một chiếc chim --> một con chim
một chiếc thuyền --> một con thuyền

Cái, con and all other classifiers are obviously nouns.
If cái was not a noun then what would it be in "Tôi mua hai cái" ?
So cái would be a noun which means "a thing"?
I don't think so. The sentense "Tôi mua hai cái" may appear in a context.

It can be when you are in a market and you want to buy two chair. So you are talking about the chairs, the seller ask you how many you want to buy. You say "Tôi mua hai cái". It means "Tôi mua hai cái [ghế]". Here "ghế" is not obligatory because cái recalls the "thing" you were talking about before, like an arrow aiming on the word "ghế" in the sentense before.

If the context is indefinite, it could mean that "you buy two things" without saying what it is (for exemple, "wait me 2 minutes ok, I buy two things, then I come back!"). In that case, cái could also be like an arrow on something... indefinite, and not the thing itself. We could understand : "Tôi mua hai cái [gì đó]". And the word which replace the noun (ưithout being a noun) would be "gì" and not cái.

An other exemple : when you say "Bạn có thấy gì không?", is "gì" a noun which means "a thing"?


About the noun phrase :
I learnt that the particularity of a noun phrase* is that it don't have any verb. For exemple : "Durable development, the major stakes of the ten next years", which could be expresses by a verb phrase : ""Durable development is the the major stakes of the ten next years".

[EDIT : I confused between "noun phrase" and "nominal sentence", I appologize. Read more in next messages]

[khiflo]

:lol: Your teacher is funny. He tried to give explanation to all the irregularities of classifiers. My advice is to learn the nouns along with its classifier(s) if any, especially con/cái/chiếc, just like English learners learn English irregular verbs.
Yes, My teachers are sometimes funny, that's also my opinion. And learning mechanically the nouns and their corresponding classifier is maybe efficient to speak well, but i don't think that it's as funny as "vạch lá tìm sâu" :wink:
An other teacher of mine say that proper of linguistic is to look for regularities in something which seems to be irregular.

Just for personnal curiosity : I thought that đoá doensn't mean a "bunch" or even a "bouquet" of flowers, but that it just concern a [unit of] flower.

Trong cái bình đó có một đoá hoa There is a flower in that vase.

A vietnamese friend just confirm it to me. What about the other members here?

[nb]

About the noun phrase :
I learnt that the particularity of a noun phrase is that it don't have any verb. For exemple : "Durable development, the major stakes of the ten next years", which could be expresses by a verb phrase : ""Durable development is the the major stakes of the ten next years".

I don't know if this is a correct assessment of that sentence. I don't know if I can properly explain what I mean because I don't have facts etc to back me up and help me explain myself, but I think that saying sentence A is the same as sentence B is not correct.

Sentence A has the purpose of giving something two labels. "Durable development" and "the major stakes of the ten next years" are being labeled onto what is about to be discussed... Item 1 has property A, and Item 1 also has property B.

Sentence B, however, is assigning one thing to another. "Durable development" = "the major stakes of the ten next years". Now this is a true statement, but I don't believe it's the same statement as Sentence A at all.

I think you could look at it perhaps like the two similar but unequal statements of "Computers, used for downloading porn" and "Computers are used for downloading porn". Sentence A introduces two things and associates them together, whilst sentence B is assigning one thing to another.

Maybe I'm wrong... I just wanted to stir up some thought and discussion. Feel free to ignore me.

[khiflo]

You are right when you say that the 2 phrases don't have exactly the same meaning. I didn't say it in the good way. I just wanted to give 2 examples to compare : one noun phrase, and one verbal phrase, using the same elements to make is clear. The first is equivalent to the second one (in the way that they use the form "A = B"), but with a different shade of meaning.

I think we are out of the subject now :D

[nb]

I like cheese.

[giang]

Dear Khiflo,

The discussion is very instructive and interesting. Here are my opinions:

1. You wrote
es, I read many times that chiếc can have such a meaning, that it can point on something which usually goes by pair (like a dropstick, a shoe, a glove, etc.)
Please note that chiếc in your case is the one that goes with 'đôi" in the contrast of "đôi", "chiếc". But when people says "Chiếc xe này của ai?", I strongly believe that it does not imply ant idea about "pair". Historically, chiếc did mean "one of the set", but after a long process of grammaticalization, chiếc becomes one of the classifiers.

2. You wrote:
I learnt that the particularity of a noun phrase is that it don't have any verb.
Once again, don't believe on everything you read :).
A noun phrase can "beautifully" include one or many verbs. The importance is that how those verbs functions. A phrase like "The man whom I met yesterday" CAN'T be anything else than a noun phrase in which "the man" is the head and "who i met yesterday" is the modifier.

3. You wrote
So cái would be a noun which means "a thing"?
I don't think so. The sentence "Tôi mua hai cái" may appear in a context.

It's the first time I heard from someone that a classifier is not a noun. It may be a new contribution to Vietnamese Grammar, but in my opinion, I am fraid not :) Do you know Khiflo how French call classifier? It's classificateur or nom de catégorie, so NOM de categorie means already a NOUN, no? In Vietnamese, classifier is called "danh từ chỉ loại", which means properly "a nous that classifies" And I think that cái means simply thing or object. If you don't think that classifier is noun, then what it is? Let's consider this example and no context is needed to understand:
Cái này là cái gì?
I can point at a thing and ask this. Is its meaning enough? Of course, don't refer to pragmatics to say that a context is needed, as an absolute requirement of contextualization.

4. I do think that many people, including Nguyen Phu Phong is confused of "cái" which is "danh từ chỉ loại" in "cái bàn" and "cái" which is "danh từ chỉ xuất" in "cái chiếc xe này". Somes reviews have been made on that, do you want to read them ? But I think it will go too far for you in the initial question.

5. You wrote
I learnt that the particularity of a noun phrase is that it don't have any verb. For exemple : "Durable development, the major stakes of the ten next years", which could be expresses by a verb phrase : "Durable development is the the major stakes of the ten next years"

"Durable development is the the major stakes of the ten next years" is NOT a verbal phrase, my friend, it IS a sentence. And the two groups of words above are different both in meaning and grammar.

You can read the following books to have more information about noun phrase and classifiers:
Nguyễn Tài Cẩn, Tiếng - Từ ghép - Đoản Ngữ
Đinh Văn Đức, Từ loại trong tiếng Việt
Cao Xuân Hạo, Mấy vấn đề Ngữ âm - Từ vựng - Ngữ Pháp

Giang

[khiflo]

It's my turn to ask you to read more carefully, anh Giang :)
I keep your numbers to answer :

1. I wrote that "chiếc can have such a meaning", it means that it can also have different uses, of course.
But i also read (and i believe) that chiếc is historically a classifier, from his first use in chinese, and it has been inserted in vietnamese mostly as a classifier (we can just rarely find it in a few compound nouns). And as a classifier (and not noun), it can induce to different meanings (which are close to each other). I don't know any case where chiếc can be considered as a noun.

2. I understand the problem about the "noun phrase", you're right and I was wrong. My mistake is because I didn't know that "phrase" is a "false friend".
english -> french
sentence = phrase
phrase = syntagme
Finally I don't disagree with you on that point :roll:
From now, please forgive my english mistakes... :wink:

3. Please. I didn't wrote that "classifiers are not nouns", i asked : "cái is not originally a noun, is it?".
I meant that cái is not a noun (at least not originally, as i wrote). Of course i know that quả, cơn, việc, bàn, nhà, etc. are nouns, and that they can be used as classifiers, and so be called "classifying nouns". But cái can not be called "classifying noun" whereas it's not even a noun. Neither do chiếc.

I don't think that cái is (even sometime) a noun which means "thing", "object" or "stuff", etc. I think it is just the way we translate it in english or french, and the translation is so evident that we automatically assimilate cái with the fruit of the translation, which is often "thing" or "stuff".

I even heard many people say that cái is originally a noun which means "the mother" (a meaning we can find in "con cái"). I wonder why it is so important to prove that cái is a noun. Isn't it obvious that it is a chinese classifier which have been used into vietnamese language as a classifier?

About your exemple "Cái này là cái gì?". I agree that here cái could be understood as a noun. But i think that it still can be understood as a reference (or a link) to a noun. Compare :
Cái này là cái gì?
Cái [x] này là cái [x] gì?
where x is "a thing i don't know the name and i'm showing with my finger"

and here, i am in a shop :
Cái này bao nhiêu tiền?
Cái [x] này bao nhiêu tiền?
here x can be "a thing i don't know the name and i'm holding in my hand"
x can also be "a vase in particular which are known by the seller, among a lot of different vases"
Cái bình này bao nhiêu tiền?

in all of these examples, cái would be a "từ chỉ xuất"*.

[*EDIT : Sorry, i confused. I thought that "từ chỉ xuất" was the vietnamese for "flécheur" in french (I don't know how to translate in english, maybe "arrow word"). A "flécheur" is a word that makes a link with an object which have been mentionned or understood before in the context. So what i wanted to say was : "in all of these examples, cái would be a "flécheur". Sorry]

4. I heard of it, i think it can explain many things but it's still not clear for me. What is your opinion about this theory?

[ChubbyChocobobo]

Long story short, most classifiers are not nouns. They just act like one when the nouns they support are omitted and implicit. Take for example, "Tôi muốn mua 7 quả (xoài)". As I stated above, we Vietnamese love omitting words to make sentences short. Therefor, whenever one analyzes the grammatical structure of a Vietnamese sentence, he MUST take the omitted words into account.

@khiflo: this is for you http://vietnameseonline.net/topic319.html don't get shocked, ok? :lol:

[giang]

Dear Khiflo,

Thank you so much for not having said that Classifiers are not Nouns. I may have read your posts carelessly and so apologies, my friend.

I am not sure that the present classifier cái comes from cái as mother in "ngón cái", sông cái", "con cái". Are you sure that "son" in son copain' and "son" in "Y a pas de son" are from the same root? No proof yet, or you can indicate me some researches on that ? Also, no proof yet for the origin of chiếc as coming from Chinese. Please tell me some books or papers that you read and used in your posts, kind of references ;)

I think that it is VERY important to know that all classifiers in this world are NOUN. Linguistically, it's very important to put them in a system. Why does people try to classify a word in to a part of speech, it's because it will function as it can do.

If you are sure that cái, chiếc are not nouns, so TELL ME what they are? Please don't avoid that question, because it's very important for all Vietnamese linguists, including me to know more about Vietnamese language.

About the example "Cái này là cái gì?". I agree that here cái could be understood as a noun. But i think that it still can be understood as a reference (or a link) to a noun.
Again, i don't understand what does it mean "BE UNDERSTOOD AS A NOUN". It makes no sense, my friend. A noun is a noun and if it is not and it must be something else!

Compare :
Cái này là cái gì?
Cái [x] này là cái [x] gì?
where x is "a thing i don't know the name and i'm showing with my finger"

and here, i am in a shop :
Cái này bao nhiêu tiền?
Cái [x] này bao nhiêu tiền?
here x can be "a thing i don't know the name and i'm holding in my hand"
x can also be "a vase in particular which are known by the seller, among a lot of different vases"
Cái bình này bao nhiêu tiền?

in all of these examples, cái would be a "từ chỉ xuất".
Very interesting, but I disagree :) (Sorry if I am direct, Khiflo).
I can make a thousand of [x] like you do.
You want to compare
Cái này là cái gì? And
Cái [x] này là cái gì?

COMPARE
Đây là bạn tôi.
[a] [b] [c] [d] [e] [f] đây [g] là [h] [i] [k] [l] bạn [m] [n] [o] [p] tôi.

Đây là bạn của tôi (This is my friend)
Người đàn ông đang ngồi ở đây chính là một trong những người bạn của gia đình chúng tôi (The man who is stiing here is really one of the friends of our family)

See! I can add as many as I want and it does not make any sense!
If you want to read more on "phép tỉnh lược" by Phạm Văn Tình to know more about the [x] you have put :)

http://www.dkthuquan.net/hinhlon%5C103751.jpg

in all of these examples, cái would be a "từ chỉ xuất".
Once again, you are wrong! what do you know about từ chỉ xuất and how it functions ? Please don't say that, my friend, it is really basic ;) : Từ chỉ xuất can't be the head of a nous phrase (syntagme nominal or group nominal in French) "cái này".

One last thing you need to know when 'playing" with parts of speech: There are different ways to label a word, grammatical way, syntactic way and functional way. A noun can be a classifier, a head can be a verb, a subject can be a verb bla bla bla. :D

Sorry If i will not be able to follow up all of your replies. Cheers

[nb]

About the example "Cái này là cái gì?". I agree that here cái could be understood as a noun. But i think that it still can be understood as a reference (or a link) to a noun.
Again, i don't understand what does it mean "BE UNDERSTOOD AS A NOUN". It makes no sense, my friend. A noun is a noun and if it is not and it must be something else!

Example time... Imagine a race with people wearing different coloured shirts. If someone said "red will win" then "red" isn't a competitor but is instead a reference / link to a competitor. That example doesn't particularly help Khiflo's statement because now that I've thought about it for a second I realise that 'red' is a noun and an adjective... so my example is still using a noun.

If you have ever done any computer programming then the mindset that Khiflo is in is the same as when you use 'pointers'... you work with a reference to a variable, and not the actual variable itself. I totally get how Khiflo is thinking, even if in the world of grammar etc it doesn't hold correct / valid like it does in programming.

It's like "đó"... you aren't explicitly describing what you are talking about, but instead are just referencing something.

*shrug

[ChubbyChocobobo]

There you go NB. Hurrrrraaaa.

[khiflo]

Dear Giang
Honestly, i'm a little upset because the way you discuss is not very fair. I know that i'm only a learner, not a native, and that i'm not a linguist, that i did't read enough books, etc. Ok. But is that a reason not to have ideas and to try to confront them with other people?
When i write a post, i take a long of time to write it as clear as possible, to think about a good way to argument, etc. So please try to avoid anwers like "what do you know about từ chỉ xuất and its functions?"; or "my friend, it is really basic", or "you need to know when 'playing" with parts of speech", or "If you want to read more on "phép tỉnh lược" (no, please tell me what do YOU know about it, if it's so important, i read vietnamese very slowly so if i have to read all the books you tell me, i'll be able to post back only next year...).:cry:
French are so sensitive, uh? :lol:

I know that you didn't cố ý make me upset, so now i'm not upset anymore :wink: I'll try to answer your question with arguments as much reasonnable as i can.


1. One more time... Please Giang, read what i wrote. :roll:
I even heard many people say that cái is originally a noun which means "the mother" (a meaning we can find in "con cái").
It means that is is not my opinion, and what i wrote before and after proves that i think the opposite. If i'm comparing cái in "con cái" with cái in "một cái ghế", it's because some of my vietnamese teachers do it (yes, really, native speakers!) to explain that cái originally belongs to the noun class. And i strongly dispute this idea (i think you'll agree with me on that point, even if you think that cái is a noun).

2. I can try to prove that chiếc comes from chinese. Compare :

tiếng Hán................ : 隻身
phiên âm Hán Việt....: chiếc thân
tiếng Việt .................: chiếc thân

tiếng Hán................ : 一隻鞋
phiên âm Hán Việt....: nhất chiếc giày
tiếng Việt .................: một chiếc giầy

tiếng Hán................ : 一隻船
phiên âm Hán Việt....: nhất chiếc thuyền
tiếng Việt .................: một chiếc thuyên
................................: một con thuyền (that's one reason to believe that there is a relation between con and chiếc)
other example of chiếc -> con :
tiếng Hán................ : 一隻鸡
phiên âm Hán Việt....: nhất chiếc kê
tiếng Việt .................: một con gà

...is it convincing enough?
You can check by yourself here :
http://www.cojak.org/index.php?term=chi%E1%BA%BFc&function=kVietnamese_lookup
here : (just type "chiếc" in the form)
http://www.nomfoundation.org/nomdb/lookup.php
here : (in "TIỂU TỪ ĐIỂN CHỮ NÔM" section)
http://www.huesoft.com.vn/hannom/

3. You didn't ask me before...
If you are sure that cái, chiếc are not nouns, so TELL ME what they are? Please don't avoid that question
I think that cái and chiếc are not noun but grammatical words (some says "từ công cụ") in most cases (i'm not talking about their presence in "con cái" or "chiếc thân").

YES chiếc does have a meaning (we'd better say that it "spread" a meaning on the word which is after or before itself). Up to me (after some readings), this meaning can be "only one, lonely, one of a pair", or "something small" or, "something which is controled by a hand". But the fact it has a meaning don't make him being a noun!

As a "not-noun word", lots of linguists tried to name this word class. A lot of them agree to consider it as "classifier", even if classifying is only one of the multiple function that "classifiers" can have. As you certainly know, they can at least :
- classify
- count (their presence is sometime needed after a numeral)
- individualize
- arrow (point on something that have been mentioned before)
- ... ?
Anyway, even linguist who dispute this term, they often accept to use it because it's pratical, and because it's hard to find a name for something which have so many possible function.

4. I'm sorry but...
COMPARE
Đây là bạn tôi.
[a] [c] [d] [e] [f] đây [g] là [h] [k] [l] bạn [m] [n] [o] [p] tôi.
Đây là bạn của tôi (This is my friend)
Người đàn ông đang ngồi ở đây chính là một trong những người bạn của gia đình chúng tôi (The man who is stiing here is really one of the friends of our family)
See! I can add as many as I want and it does not make any sense!
Really, don't you think that you play the game of the "devil's advocate"?:evil:
Really, what i did is simply show by using [x] is the absence of a word that could be said, but which can have been implied (ẩn). You can see this procedure in every grammar book, so don't be surprised like that.

5. English mistake from me...
Again, i don't understand what does it mean "BE UNDERSTOOD AS A NOUN". It makes no sense, my friend. A noun is a noun and if it is not and it must be something else!
Again, sorry for my english... when i said that in "Cái này là cái gì?" cái can be understood as a noun, i mean that it is easy (but wrong) to understand cái as a noun (for example : "stuff"). If i follow you, we could compare :

[i]Cái này là cái gì? = Stuff này là stuff gì?
For me, here cái is not a noun which means "thing, stuff, etc."
For me, cái just point on a thing which is not said:
Cái [x] này là cái [x] gì?

As Chubby wrote, word omission is common in vietnamese ("Tôi muốn mua 7 quả (xoài)")

Now here is a better example to illustrate what i think :
Imagine that we show to someone a picture. On the picture, we can see a table. On the table there are two objects. We ask the guy : "what is on the table?" The guy don't know what the 2 things are, he has never seen such things. He may say : "There are two things (on the table)". But if this guy is vietnamese, we may have this dialog :
Question can be :
................Có (cái) gì trên bàn?
................Trên bàn có (cái) gì?
Answer can be :
................Có hai đồ vật.
................Có hai thứ.
................Có hai cái gì đó.
He will NOT say :
................Có hai cái. (có hai cái what ?!?)
He can't say that, because if he does, it would suppose that he knows what the things are, and that these things had been mentionned before in their disscussion.
Now if we ask him how many things he sees on the table...
Question can be :
................Trên bàn có bao nhiêu đồ vật ?
Question can NOT be :
................Trên bàn có bao nhiêu cái ?
because we didn't mention before the thing we are talking about now!

[b]It's my turn to ask you a question : if cái and chiếc are nouns, what do they mean?

[nb]

I think maybe we need to look at it this way... Classifiers may not actually represent something specific and identifiable, but are still nouns due to their partnering with a proceeding noun. They are not nouns just because they can and sometimes are used on their own without a proceeding noun, but are instead in this case a noun because in this instance they are simply a part of a sentence that has been shortened but if it was not shortened would have a proceeding noun as expected.

"Cái" by itself is nothing and doesn't even exist, however "cái + OBJECT" is something and is a noun. But you say "What about when you don't know what something is and so use the term 'cái này'? It means 'this thing'. 'Này' refers to the noun before it, and in this case the noun is 'cái'. If the object is unknown then 'cái' is the complete object by itself as it has no following noun to attach to it... therefore 'cái' must be a noun because it is used to refer to something that has no name." Well that thought process is flawed because even though you may be unable to specify what an object is and so just use 'cái' as a complete identifier doesn't mean that the object doesn't have a noun identifier that would otherwise have been placed after the classifier 'cái'

I see it as basically saying "Cái (noun omitted due to it being unknown) này". Just because the proceeding noun is omitted doesn't mean it doesn't exist and in a perfect world would have been combined with the 'cái' classifier. Just like instead of saying "Hey Mr NB!" someone could just say "Hey Mr!", especially if they didn't know my name... but in a perfect world I would be referred to by my title (Mr / Mister) and my name (NB), but in the case where my name isn't known or doesn't need to be specified "Mr" by itself can refer to me and be understood to do so. I know that's not a perfect example because I'm trying to say that, for example, there is no such thing as "cái" and no such thing as "ghế"... but together "cái ghế" = chair... there just happen to be lots of circumstances where it's unnecessary to specify both words for people to still understand. Actually, now I realise I've just contradicted my first paragraph, but I'll leave it unedited for the sake of following my thought process (if I even have a thought process *yawn*).

I've been awake too long, so am I just rambling? Have I re-hashed something that has already been covered and I don't realise? Am I talking rubbish? Oh well if I have *shrug*. [smilie=pdt_aliboronz_28.gif]

[nktvn]

1. One more time... Please Giang, read what i wrote. :roll:
I even heard many people say that cái is originally a noun which means "the mother" (a meaning we can find in "con cái").
It means that is is not my opinion, and what i wrote before and after proves that i think the opposite. If i'm comparing cái in "con cái" with cái in "một cái ghế", it's because some of my vietnamese teachers do it (yes, really, native speakers!) to explain that cái originally belongs to the noun class. And i strongly dispute this idea (i think you'll agree with me on that point, even if you think that cái is a noun).


It is true that "cái" is an antiquated word for "mother" (as in "con dại cái mang", meaning the mother is responsible for her child's behavior) but I don't think there's a relationship to the "cái" we've been talking about here (the first "cái" can stand alone, but the latter might not). I don't want to downplay what your teachers said but what they said was weak evidence for classifying "cái" as a noun anyway. Yes, tracing the history of a word gives us insight into how it developed over time but saying a word was a noun should not be taken as suggesting that it would remain a noun. Take the English "text" for example. It now becomes a verb. That we are native speakers does not necessarily mean that we understand our own language fully. Everyone has his theory about how language functions. It's good to discuss multiple viewpoints.

While it is true that Chinese and Vietnamese share many characteristics, Vietnamese has gone its own path to such extend as that between British and American English (these two Englishes are closer than the Chinese-Vietnamese relationship, but I hope you get the point). I'm in no position to comment on the Chinese-Vietnamese comparison but I don't think that provides convincing evidence. For example, "nhất thiết" in Chinese transcription would mean "all", but that's not the case in Vietnamese. "Xuất ngoại" in Chinese transcription would mean "to go out". In Vietnamese, it means "to go overseas". After all, what's the point of comparing "chiếc" in Chinese and Vietnamese? I don't understand how things will go after you can prove "chiếc" is from Chinese.


3. You didn't ask me before...
If you are sure that cái, chiếc are not nouns, so TELL ME what they are? Please don't avoid that question
I think that cái and chiếc are not noun but grammatical words (some says "từ công cụ") in most cases (i'm not talking about their presence in "con cái" or "chiếc thân").
YES chiếc does have a meaning (we'd better say that it "spread" a meaning on the word which is after or before itself). Up to me (after some readings), this meaning can be "only one, lonely, one of a pair", or "something small" or, "something which is controled by a hand". But the fact it has a meaning don't make him being a noun!


"cái" and "chiếc" *are* nouns. I know this by looking at the definition and functions of a noun. By definition, a noun is a word that refers to a thing, a place, a name, or whatever thing you can imagine. By saying that "chiếc" means "something blah blah blah", you are already classifying it as a noun since "something" is a noun (an unknown or understood thing). Talking about their functions, "cái" and "chiếc" function like nouns. One might look at the word "cái bàn" and say "cái" modifies "bàn", which is a noun, so "cái" must be an adjective, not a noun. True. But isn't it true that *nouns* can function like adjectives in English? (car door, color television, computer monitor, etc.) What do you mean by "grammatical words"? Do you mean "syntactic expletives (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Expletive#Syntactic_expletives)", words that "perform a syntactic role but contribute nothing to meaning"? Or do you mean words like "hell, bloody" as in "What the hell is this bloody thing?" Either choice is unreasonable because "cái", "chiếc", or "con" goes with specific objects and describes the raw shape/functions/etc. of those objects and so is not semantically empty.

If you can't see them as NOUNS, how about thinking the words as units for objects? Because units are nouns (pound, liter, mile, etc.), so are these words. "Một cái" or "hai cái" is not grammatically different from "một lít" or "hai lít". English indicates that these units are nouns by saying "20 poundS". Surely, out of context, you can't say "I have bought 20 pounds" since the other person more than likely will ask "Of what?". Same thing here with "cái", "chiếc", and stuff. It's just how you group things together. They can't mean anything useful out of context but once the context is clear, they can stand alone and function like NOUNS. Sometimes we just use them and can't provide an explanation. It's like telling why we use "liter" for liquid but "meter" for length.


Again, i don't understand what does it mean "BE UNDERSTOOD AS A NOUN". It makes no sense, my friend. A noun is a noun and if it is not and it must be something else!
Again, sorry for my english... when i said that in "Cái này là cái gì?" cái [size=12]can be understood as a noun, i mean that it is easy (but wrong) to understand cái as a noun (for example : "stuff"). If i follow you, we could compare :

Cái này là cái gì? = Stuff này là stuff gì?
For me, here cái is not a noun which means "thing, stuff, etc."
For me, cái just point on a thing which is not said:
Cái [x] này là cái [x] gì?


The fact that "cái" is generally used with "things" makes it seem to carry the meaning of "thing" but it actually doesn't. "Cái" does not mean "thing" per se but a "unit" for that thing. This makes sense because you might not know what an object is but you know for sure that it is a *thing.* Hence the use of "cái" for *any* inanimate thing unknown, and "con" for animate things. We are not talking about pointers in computing here (thanks god, no debugging, no memory leaks in languages :cry: ) so I take what you say: "cái just point on a thing which is not said" to mean "cái is a thing which is not said."

A: Cái đó là cái gì?
B: (Cái) đó là (một) cái thuyền. ("con thuyền" is rather stilted)

We do say "con thuyền" (usually a literary use) but look at this conversation:

A (pointing to a ship): Con đó là con gì?
B: Con đó là con thuyền.

Does the conversation sound right? I don't think so! Though there may be some kind of rationale behind the use of "con" (which I don't know), "thuyền" is always a thing and so if you don't know what it is, you can't use "con". (The moment B heard A's question, I'm pretty sure B was confused.)


Now here is a better example to illustrate what i think :
Imagine that we show to someone a picture. On the picture, we can see a table. On the table there are two objects. We ask the guy : "what is on the table?" The guy don't know what the 2 things are, he has never seen such things. He may say : "There are two things (on the table)". But if this guy is vietnamese, we may have this dialog :
Question can be :
................Có (cái) gì trên bàn?
................Trên bàn có (cái) gì?
Answer can be :
................Có hai đồ vật.
................Có hai thứ.
................Có hai cái gì đó.
He will NOT say :
................Có hai cái. (có hai cái what ?!?)

He can't say that, because if he does, it would suppose that he knows what the things are, and that these things had been mentionned before in their disscussion.

Now if we ask him how many things he sees on the table...
Question can be :
................Trên bàn có bao nhiêu đồ vật ?
Question can NOT be :
................Trên bàn có bao nhiêu cái ?
because we didn't mention before the thing we are talking about now!


He won't say like that because as I said "cái" does not mean "thing" but it is a *unit* to that "thing" and necessarily goes with some other noun to describe that noun just as "mile" or "gallon" by itself can never be clear unless attached to other nouns first (e.g. road, water, gas, etc.). Because we have yet to know what that thing is, we naturally add "gì đó" (cái + gì đó) as a placeholder. (If you think about it, using placeholders is not at all uncommon, "I don't remember his name or age. He is John something and is forty something".) In fact, all of the answers above, though grammatical, are pragmatically unacceptable. So saying "có hai cái", "có hai thứ", "có hai cái gì đó", or "có hai đồ vật" will always leave the asker puzzled, "Có cái gì? (What is it?)". People use "cái" to request information about some unknown thing(s), so why should one ever give back a circular answer?

So to sum things up,

1. "cái", "con", "chiếc", etc. are like units for objects and thus are NOUNS.
2. "cái" is generally used for an inanimate thing. If you know what that thing is, you can generally use "cái" but there are exceptions (e.g. con thuyền, con mắt, con dao, etc.) (= Knowledge of an object might confuse you). Otherwise, always use "cái" or "con" for inanimate/animate things, respectively. (= Ignorance is bliss.)
3. they can't make sense by appearing out of context.

[giang]

Dear khiflo,

I have been so busy to answer your posts. Read nktvn for further explanation. Remember that a noun may not have an explicit meaning, but it functions as a noun.

The internet resources you give me are not liable nor exact. I can make some websites like that and say the opposite. What may be true it's that chiếc had been borrowed from Old Chinese, but it is internalized and functions in its own way.

PS: I don't think you were confused of noun phrase, because if you thought that it was "phrase nominale" in French, then it has no meaning ! :geek:

[giang]

Dear Giang
Honestly, i'm a little upset because the way you discuss is not very fair. I know that i'm only a learner, not a native, and that i'm not a linguist, that i did't read enough books, etc. Ok. But is that a reason not to have ideas and to try to confront them with other people?

Dear Khiflo, you are right that I did not cố ý. We are both very direct in the used terms and I did not care about the way I wrote, just about the contents. It must be my mistake. Sorry ;)

[nb]

All your civilities are belong to us!!!! :twisted:

I still want to know if "nouS" has been a typo of "noun" or have I missed something?

[ChubbyChocobobo]

*Whispering: NB, "belong" is a verb *twisted evil* but don't worry I won't tell anybody :P shhhhhhhhhhh

[nktvn]

*Whispering: NB, "belong" is a verb *twisted evil* but don't worry I won't tell anybody :P shhhhhhhhhhh

*Whispering: ChubbyChocobobo, "belong" is a verb but I can see that you've missed NB's joke. Try googling to see why.

All your thoughts are belong to me. :twisted:

[ChubbyChocobobo]

You've pwned me, nktvn :P. BTW we're being digressive. Get back to work! *shouting*

[nb]

You're both noobs...

All your net-jokes are belong to me! :twisted:

[ChubbyChocobobo]

Nb is Mr.Know-it-all everyone :lol:

[nb]

* nods 8)

[Cesar]

Thank you or your answers!

I absolutelly agree when you say that the border between one classifier and an other (or between a classifier and a noun) can be very blur. Sometimes, after a big headache, i'm not far from considering that there are no classifiers but only 2 different things
- names and the determiners of theses names (which are placed after the name). EX: tôi mua một hoa hồng
- individualizers EX : cái ghế làm bằng gỗ thì cũ quá, vứt đi!

I would like to focus on the animate-non animate or living-non living aspect expressed by con and cái . And the fact that every linguists mention this "dichotomy" use these exemples with cái used instead of con and con instead of cái . Is that argument really serious?

-Teacher, why do Vietnamese say "một con đường"?
-It's because the people moving on make it feel like it's moving. It is the same for "một con sông", it express that the water is moving...
-Teacher, why do Vietnamese say "một cái kiến"?
-mmm... it's because an ant is so small that sometimes you can't see it's movement.
-Teacher, why do Vietnamese say "một con thuyền"?
-Erh... it's because when the boat is in move, it seems to be something living.
-Teacher, why do Vietnamese say "một con mắt"?
-Because you eyes can move, of course! You see?
[the teacher randomly moves his eyes inside their orbits... then the pupil shake his hands]
-But teacher, can we say "một con tay"?
-... Euh... in fact not, you must say "một chiếc tay" or "một tay".
-So what does "chiếc" specify in that case?
-It is for things that usually goes by pair.
-I understand, for exemple : "một chiếc mắt"!
-Euh... no.
-Ah... Teacher, do boats goes by pair in Vietnam?
-Euh... not necessarily...
-Teacher, why do Vietnamese say "một con dao"?
-Ahem! ahem!... it's because... because, you know, the knife is made to be taken in your hand, and you give it a movement, and... and sometimes you don't know if you are controling your knife or if it's your knife which is controling you... you know, ahem!... as if the knife was a living thing!

Well... I really don't think that these exceptions in vietnamese grammar proves that cái is used for non animated things and con for animated things. But I would really like to know where this theory does comes from.


@Giang

As far as I understood, cái is not originally a noun, is it?
And con (classifier) is maybe just an homonym of con (child) ...

When I say "tôi mua hoa hồng" does hoa inform us about the class which hồng belongs to, or does hồng inform us about the nature or hoa ?
Or maybe hoa is not a good exemple.

Thanks for your help

Cesar,
Firstly, I agree with Giang about the nature of 'cai, con,etc.' in Vietnamese. These words must be nouns, countnouns. That means they precede other nouns that are always massnouns. This combination creates a noun phrase. In principle, we use 'cai' before a noun indicating objects (in northern Vietnamese, 'cai' is also used before nouns indicating means of transport, e.g. cai taxi, cai xe dap,etc. 'Con' is mostly used to refer to animals, but there are some exceptions: con song, con suoi,(we also use in written language 'dong' song, 'dong suoi' for its shape) con dao, (con is replaced with 'cai' in northern Vietnamese), con mat,ect. And you ask how we explain the usage of 'con'. This might be explained by the possible motion of the objects indicated by nouns: con song, con suoi,con thuyen, con duong, etc. The motion should be understood as cultural conventions. We say con song, but we have to say cai ho (a lake), although it might be in motion, or 'con' can't appear before 'bien' (sea). I try to explain as following: in the cognition of the Vietnamese, 'ho' can be an object like others (ho ca, ho boi), and 'bien' (sea), 'dai duong' (ocean) are nouns referring to the entities that cannot be determined in terms of its shapes. We do not say 'mot chiec tay' or 'mot tay' when describing it as part of our body, but we say 'mot ban tay' for 'a hand', 'mot canh tay for an arm. 'Hoa' is not a classifier, it is certainly a massnoun. So, for 'a flower' we have to say 'mot cai hoa', and 'hong' is a noun as well, it indicates the color. 'Hong' function as a modifier to 'hoa' to answer the question 'hoa gi?' - hoa hong, hoa mai, hoa dao,etc. The noun phrase 'hoa hong' is uncountable, so 'hoa hong' in 'toi di mua hoa hong' can be translated as roses or the rose).
I hope my simple ideas can help you.
Ciao.

[ChubbyChocobobo]

This combination creates a noun phrase. In principle, we use 'cai' before a noun indicating objects (in northern Vietnamese, 'cai' is also used before nouns indicating means of transport, e.g. cai taxi, cai xe dap,etc. 'Con' is mostly used to refer to animals, but there are some exceptions: con song, con suoi,(we also use in written language 'dong' song, 'dong suoi' for its shape) con dao, (con is replaced with 'cai' in northern Vietnamese)

I have to disagree with you on the regional differences regarding this issue. I've been living in Hanoi since I was born and frankly, I don't hear people say "Cái tắc-xi" and "Cái sông" very much. I'm not saying that it's wrong to use Cái for those words. I mean people here normally don't say like that. We actually use "Chiếc tắc-xi" and "Con sông" a lot more frequently. I don't know where you got the idea but that's definitely not a fact.

Let's get back to the main topic here. So we have 3 argurable classifiers in Vietnamese. They are Con, Cái anh Chiếc. People, in general, have in mind that Con classifier is exclusive for Animals and think of other cases as exceptions; but in fact, Con is used to classify (mostly) any object that can move, especially animal. Rivers and Streams flow but Lake and Pond don't. The road you're driving on is not moving but in term of physics, it's moving pass you relatively and gives you the feeling that you're staying still, not the road. And this is interesting, a knife doesn't move at all but it has tongue and nose (Luỡi dao and Mũi dao). That makes it a Con. Yet, there are lots of exceptions. Though we have Con thuyền (boat) and Con Tầu (ship) but never Con ô-tô or Con máy bay (Automobile and Airplane). For in-air and on-ground vehicles, use Chiếc instead.

Chiếc and Cái usages are very close. They are interchangable in most cases. People tend to use Chiếc for objects that usually come in pair (e.g. Chiếc dép, chiếc đũa). For the rest, both Chiếc and Cái can be used but Chiếc is more preferable.

After all, you'd better learn the nouns along with their classifiers. The rules help but don't completely rely on them.
Chubby.

[Cesar]

I have to disagree with you on the regional differences regarding this issue. I've been living in Hanoi since I was born and frankly, I don't hear people say "Cái tắc-xi" and "Cái sông" very much. I'm not saying that it's wrong to use Cái for those words. I mean people here normally don't say like that. We actually use "Chiếc tắc-xi" and "Con sông" a lot more frequently. I don't know where you got the idea but that's definitely not a fact.

Let's get back to the main topic here. So we have 3 argurable classifiers in Vietnamese. They are Con, Cái anh Chiếc. People, in general, have in mind that Con classifier is exclusive for Animals and think of other cases as exceptions; but in fact, Con is used to classify (mostly) any object that can move, especially animal. Rivers and Streams flow but Lake and Pond don't. The road you're driving on is not moving but in term of physics, it's moving pass you relatively and gives you the feeling that you're staying still, not the road. And this is interesting, a knife doesn't move at all but it has tongue and nose (Luỡi dao and Mũi dao). That makes it a Con. Yet, there are lots of exceptions. Though we have Con thuyền (boat) and Con Tầu (ship) but never Con ô-tô or Con máy bay (Automobile and Airplane). For in-air and on-ground vehicles, use Chiếc instead.

Chiếc and Cái usages are very close. They are interchangable in most cases. People tend to use Chiếc for objects that usually come in pair (e.g. Chiếc dép, chiếc đũa). For the rest, both Chiếc and Cái can be used but Chiếc is more preferable.

After all, you'd better learn the nouns along with their classifiers. The rules help but don't completely rely on them.
Chubby.

Dear Chubby,
Thanks for your advice!
I think before saying that people do not use a word you have to fully collect the proof. I' m from Hanoi as well. I think the sentence 'Co cho mot cai taxi bay cho' is natural. I didn't say we can say 'cai song' as you said. I heard the HN people like you use ' No moi tau mot con SH'. That' s the language of a group of people.

Think carefully before saying something!
Ciao

[ChubbyChocobobo]

'Con' is mostly used to refer to animals, but there are some exceptions: con song, con suoi,(we also use in written language 'dong' song, 'dong suoi' for its shape) con dao, (con is replaced with 'cai' in northern Vietnamese), con mat,ect.

Sorry I got you wrong. I thought the bold text above is applied to the underlined one too. Still, I think it should be "Con can be replaced with cái in North Vietnam" since it's optional.

And you also pointed out a very interesting usage of Con. That is, Con can be used to classify Industrial products as well. It's commonly applied to notebooks, cellphones, automobiles and motorbikes. And because it's a slang, use it in casual situations only. Again, I don't think there is a regional difference here. I saw many printing products (especially, cellphone and automobile magazines) from the South use this slang too.
Chubby

PS: It's a debate, Ceasar. Don't hold back and don't get upset easily. Welcome to VIEX *Grin*.

[giang]

Firstly, I agree with Giang about the nature of 'cai, con,etc.' in Vietnamese. These words must be nouns, count nouns. That means they precede other nouns that are always mass nouns. This combination creates a noun phrase. In principle, we use 'cai' before a noun indicating objects (in northern Vietnamese, 'cai' is also used before nouns indicating means of transport, e.g. cai taxi, cai xe dap,etc. 'Con' is mostly used to refer to animals, but there are some exceptions: con song, con suoi,(we also use in written language 'dong' song, 'dong suoi' for its shape) con dao, (con is replaced with 'cai' in northern Vietnamese), con mat,ect. And you ask how we explain the usage of 'con'. This might be explained by the possible motion of the objects indicated by nouns: con song, con suoi,con thuyen, con duong, etc. The motion should be understood as cultural conventions. We say con song, but we have to say cai ho (a lake), although it might be in motion, or 'con' can't appear before 'bien' (sea). I try to explain as following: in the cognition of the Vietnamese, 'ho' can be an object like others (ho ca, ho boi), and 'bien' (sea), 'dai duong' (ocean) are nouns referring to the entities that cannot be determined in terms of its shapes. We do not say 'mot chiec tay' or 'mot tay' when describing it as part of our body, but we say 'mot ban tay' for 'a hand', 'mot canh tay for an arm. 'Hoa' is not a classifier, it is certainly a massnoun. So, for 'a flower' we have to say 'mot cai hoa', and 'hong' is a noun as well, it indicates the color. 'Hong' function as a modifier to 'hoa' to answer the question 'hoa gi?' - hoa hong, hoa mai, hoa dao,etc. The noun phrase 'hoa hong' is uncountable, so 'hoa hong' in 'toi di mua hoa hong' can be translated as roses or the rose).
I hope my simple ideas can help you.
Ciao.

Well, the participation of Cesar has made the topic much more interesting. I took time to read again and again the above-quoted post by Cesar and I have to say that I can learn many things from it.

First of, I don't think Cesar got upset with the debate. Maybe it's just a way of expressing.

Secondly, it's true that the usage of con for SH, A còng is very interesting, and even though it may belong to slang words, it's authentically spoken by people, so it's a phenomenon of language and deserves some researches.

a knife doesn't move at all but it has tongue and nose (Luỡi dao and Mũi dao).

As for that point, it is referred to as association (liên tưởng), which is a phenomenon of egocentrism (dĩ ngã vi trung), a human tendency of associating human body parts with other non human parts. And we have mũi tàu, đầu tàu, đuôi xe, chân bàn, mặt bàn, tay lái, mắt bão, lưỡi dao, lưng ghế etc.

For the rest, both Chiếc and Cái can be used but Chiếc is more preferable.
I don't get it, Chubby. Can you explain more ?

To Cesar, I like the concept "cultural conventions" you wrote. It helps much to explain many differences between the languages.

Giang

[ChubbyChocobobo]

@Giang: I mean, in situations where one can use either Chiếc or Cái, he tends to use Chiếc more often.

So far, we've been discussing on classifiers for tangible objects; but the issue on intangible objects is also as important. Before we go any further into the debate, I'd like to mention you that I am not a linguist. Hence, what I'm gonna tell you (as well as what I've told you) is merely based on my observation of Vietnamese and my perception about the language.

As we all already know, classifiers help us in counting nouns; but I'd like to extend the concept of classifier. That is "Classifiers are particles that we add before uncountable words (e.i. nouns, verbs and adjs) to make them countable". It's as simple as that. Let's take a look at these facts:(Legend: Noun, Verb, Adj, classifier)
Vài quả táo(some apples) but NOT vài táo.
Hai quả táo (Two apples) but NOT hai táo.

Vài quyển sách(some books) but NOT vài sách.
Bốn cuốn sách(four books) but NOT bốn sách.

Hai chai bia (two bottles of beer) but NOT hai bia. (*)
Hai cốc bia (two glasses of beer) but Not hai bia. (*)

Vài cái chết (some deaths) but NOT vài chết.
Hàng trăm cái chết (hundreds of deaths) but NOT hàng trăm chết.

Vài quả đấm(some punches) but NOT vài đấm. (*)
Một cái tát (a slap in the face) but NOT một tát (*)

Một sự hành hạ (a torment) but NOT một hành hạ.
Vài lời lên tiếng (a speaking up) but NOT Vài lên tiếng.

Vài niềm vui(some pieces of joy) but NOT vài vui.
Một niềm hạnh phúc(a pieces of happiness) but NOT một vui.

Vài nỗi buồn(some feelings of sorrow) but NOT Vài buồn.
Mội nỗi đau(a pain) but NOT Một đau.

Vài nét đẹp(some beautiful attributes) but NOT Vài đẹp.
Một nét quyến rũ ( an attractive attribute) but NOT một quyến rũ.

(*) NOTE: You may sometimes hear people say "hai bia" or "một đấm" but you know, we all love the shortcuts, don't we?

As Giang pointed out, classifiers are nothing but nouns or more precisely, countable nouns. To convert a word (whether it is a noun, a verb or an adj) to a countable nouns, a classifier is used and the word acts as an adj to the classifier.

When someone asks, "Bạn đang ăn quả gì thế?" (What fruit are you eating?), you can answer "Táo" (Apple) or "Quả táo" (Apple Fruit). Now focus on Apple Fruit. Apple is a noun in both Vietnamese and English and it acts as an adj in the cause of Apple Fruit. Since Táo alone cannot be counted and it acts an adj to support the classifier Quả, do you see that Táo can be considered as an adj as well? If not, do you see something similar in "Cái chết". Cái is a classifier (or in other words, a countable noun) and Chết is a verb but acts as an adj to support Cái.

The conclusion is, apart from conjunction words (but, and, or, although...), Vietnamese has 2 types of words. They are classifier and non-classifier :p.
Sometimes a verb acts as a noun.
Sometimes a noun acts as a verb.
Sometimes an noun acts as an adj.
Sometimes an adj acts as a noun.
Sometimes an adj acts as a verb.
Sometimes a verb acts as an adj.
They are just the ways they are in Vietnam.

(sing with me doman and edgeeee)

@BOB: I look forward to your red pen :). Thanks in advance.

[giang]

Hehehe
Dear Chubby. I love your conclusion:
Sometimes a verb acts as a noun.
Sometimes a noun acts as a verb.
Sometimes an noun acts as an adj.
Sometimes an adj acts as a noun.
Sometimes an adj acts as a verb.
Sometimes a verb acts as an adj.
They are just the ways they are in Vietnam.

(sing with me doman and edgeeee)
On that point, it will deserve another long discussion again, in a new thread, but I like constructive/instructive discussions that help all of us to know more.

I mean, in situations where one can use either chiếc or cái, he tends to use Chiếc more often.

You need to carry out a survey/research to conclude that. Any statistics standing for that will be welcome :) :)

Now a question for you: what is "cái" in "cái con bé này".

Giang

[giang]

PS: Sometimes linguists make things more complicated in a useless way :D

[doman]

PS: Sometimes linguists make things more complicated in a useless way :D

Hi ! Post-whore's back !
I disagreeded ! Not sometimes but anytime ! If they don't do it, they won't be linguists anymore !http://us.i1.yimg.com/us.yimg.com/i/mesg/emoticons7/4.gif

[doman]

Now a question for you: what is "cái" in "cái con bé này".

Giang

adj ofcourse ! B'cause without it, the sentence "con bé này!" is still perfect.

I have an another question:

What is different in "con cái" in these sentences :

-Tôi đau bởi con cái !
-Tôi bị cắn bởi con cái !