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b-hebrew - Re: [b-hebrew] Any meaning to the Dagesh?

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  • From: Brak <Brak AT neo.rr.com>
  • To: David Kummerow <farmerjoeblo AT hotmail.com>
  • Cc: b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org
  • Subject: Re: [b-hebrew] Any meaning to the Dagesh?
  • Date: Thu, 26 Feb 2009 15:39:45 -0500

David Kummerow wrote:
Hi John,

Well, you pick an example where the "base" parts are the same. Dividing between a "base" morpheme and a "prefix" morpheme to answer you question is entirely arbitrary, linguistically speaking. In any case, [ha$omer] differs from [ha$$omer] with respect to the dagesh. The prefixed morphemes are /ha/ and /haC/ (more correctly /haμ/, where μ stands for mora). Again I assert that in this morpheme, removal of the dagesh changes the morpheme, and hence its semantics, entirely. The principle, therefore, that in BH the dagesh is phonemic -- and hence meaningful -- is established. Whether a linguistic side effect of this is that some verbal or nominal morphology solely differs with respect to this morpheme is entirely secondary -- meaning that the answer to your question regarding "bases", whether affirmative or negative, does not really matter with respect to the phonemic status of dagesh. By removing dagesh from /haC/, you remove the distinguishing phoneme from the morpheme, hence there is significant meaning loss in doing so.
The base parts are not the same graphically - as one has a dagesh, the other doesn't.
My diving the word is not arbitrary! The morpheme breaks I gave are not of my invention!
My question is about the "base" - weather you approve of it or not. So please don't tell me what questions to ask.

So my question is what it is: Does the addition of a dagesh(es) into the "base" of the word change the meaning the of "base" of the word?




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