Timeline for か as a suffix to mean "a few": Why is 何__かがVERB not allowed
Current License: CC BY-SA 4.0
19 events
| when toggle format | what | by | license | comment | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| May 22, 2018 at 12:39 | comment | added | naruto | I'll probably say 何人か, but there is almost no difference. Not saying が is not informal at all in this case. You're not omitting anything in the first place. | |
| May 22, 2018 at 12:33 | comment | added | Yeti Ape | I think I get it now. One last thing. Which one would you choose in a formal correspondence? 何人かが or 何人か? | |
| May 22, 2018 at 12:25 | comment | added | naruto | @YetiApe Only 何ページかが欠けている is unnatural because ページ happens to be special. 何人か欠けている and 何人かが欠けている are both perfectly natural but the former is relatively more common. | |
| May 22, 2018 at 12:20 | vote | accept | Yeti Ape | ||
| May 22, 2018 at 12:16 | comment | added | Yeti Ape | Thank you for being patient with me (汗). Do you mean that although placing が after 何__か alters the structure, it is theoretically grammatical, yet uncommon/unnatural? I have my doubts since "何個かが" and such really yield few to no results on Google. But then again, just because it's grammatical doesn't mean people use it, I suppose? | |
| May 22, 2018 at 11:31 | comment | added | naruto |
@YetiApe Now you're going in the wrong direction... 何 + counter + か works both as a noun and as an adverb. What my answer and Eversome's answer are saying is that the adverbial usage is relatively more common. It's perfectly fine to say 何人かを呼ぶ, 何年かの時間, 何個かが残った, and so on.
|
|
| May 22, 2018 at 11:05 | comment | added | naruto | 何人かが exists, but is relatively uncommon. 何ページかが is even confusing because of the tricky nature of ページ. 何個かある does not have an explicit subject. | |
| May 22, 2018 at 10:28 | comment | added | Yeti Ape | @Eversome: I cannot believe I didn't think about Google's cunning tendency. This absolutely changes the situation. Now I think this 何__かが usage simply does not exist! Thank you so much for clearing things up. I don't see how leaving out が turns the preceding 何-counter-か pair into an adverbial ____ (insert proper linguistic term) though, because then what is the subject in sentences such as "何個かある"? Or do you mean that only the counter-か is acting adverbially, and 何 is the subject? | |
| May 22, 2018 at 9:10 | comment | added | Eversome | I found 19 results for "何人かがいる" and 227 results for "何人かいる" on Google. (Google's search estimate lies, so you need to go to the last page to see how many results it fetched.) Just a note: when you use a counter without a particle, you're using it adverbially. It's quantifying the real subject / object of the sentence. But when you use が, you're grammatically treating it as a noun. | |
| May 22, 2018 at 7:56 | vote | accept | Yeti Ape | ||
| May 22, 2018 at 11:00 | |||||
| May 22, 2018 at 7:56 | comment | added | Yeti Ape | I see what you mean now. The problem then is why people seem to treat 何個 in the same way as ページ. 何個 doesn't have the ambiguous nature of ページ, yet people exclusively say "何個かある" instead of "何個かがある." However, "何人かがいる" and "何人かいる" are both common, with the former being roughly 1.5 times more. There may or may not be more grammar involved in this. All things considered, as you have generously pointed out for me, while かが may be grammatical with 何個 (or even 何ページ), one has to take naturalness into account. Anyhow, I really appreciate your help. 勉強になりました！ | |
| May 22, 2018 at 7:23 | history | edited | naruto | CC BY-SA 4.0 |
added 14 characters in body
|
| May 22, 2018 at 7:14 | comment | added | naruto | @YetiApe See my edit, please. | |
| May 22, 2018 at 7:13 | history | edited | naruto | CC BY-SA 4.0 |
added 460 characters in body
|
| May 22, 2018 at 3:50 | comment | added | Yeti Ape | Thank you so much for taking the trouble to answer again. Unfortunately, it is still unclear to me. Do you mean that "何ページかが欠けている" is not ideal because of how ページ may connote the ordinal number of page? In fact, I assume if that meaning was used, "何ページかが欠けている" would mean, "*A few which pages are missing," which does not make sense. However, this does not explain why "何個かが欠けている," "何人かが欠けている, "and such are almost nowhere to be found either. Additionally, "何人かがいる/何人かが集まる" is common according to Google, but "何個かがある" isn't. 以上です。迷惑をかけたら本当にすみません… | |
| May 21, 2018 at 21:14 | history | undeleted | naruto | ||
| May 21, 2018 at 21:13 | history | edited | naruto | CC BY-SA 4.0 |
added 250 characters in body
|
| May 21, 2018 at 21:05 | history | deleted | naruto | via Vote | |
| May 21, 2018 at 21:04 | history | answered | naruto | CC BY-SA 4.0 |