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this post was submitted on 27 Apr 2024
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chapotraphouse
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In linguistics, clusivity^[1]^ is a grammatical distinction between inclusive and exclusive first-person pronouns and verbal morphology, also called inclusive "we" and exclusive "we". Inclusive "we" specifically includes the addressee, while exclusive "we" specifically excludes the addressee; in other words, two (or more) words that both translate to "we", one meaning "you and I, and possibly someone else", the other meaning "me and some other person or persons, but not you". While imagining that this sort of distinction could be made in other persons (particularly the second) is straightforward, in fact the existence of second-person clusivity (you vs. you and they) in natural languages is controversial and not well attested.^[2]^ While clusivity is not a feature of standard English language, it is found in many languages around the world.
In Chinese there's 咱们(zanmen) as an explicit inclusive we.
All the English-derived creole languages of Melanesia have clusivity in a really nice way. They inspired how my conlang handles clusivity, and are an interesting look at what the future daughter languages of English might look like when empire falls and this tongue goes the way of Latin. I only learned about these languages' clusivity because Vanuatu's national anthem is called what else but "Yumi, Yumi, Yumi".
Key:
What does 咱 mean without the 们?
Apparently just I or me. Although all the examples I can find never have it being used on its own.
This is a great site for this sort of stuff.
https://dictionary.writtenchinese.com/worddetail/zan/11558/1/1
Yeah, ik some chars dont have a standalone meaning, but I've also never seen 们 used with a character that doesn't stand on its own. 咱俩 seems useful in some situations over 我们 or 咱们.
This site is dope. Bookmarked. Thank you!