Nouns and Noun Phrases - University of Macau Library

Determiners: articles and pronouns 843
IV. Collocations
Many more or less fixed combinations involve possessive pronouns within PPs. For
the following, we have relied heavily on the discussion in Haeseryn et al. (1997:
293), to which we refer the reader for more examples.
A. PPs headed by op
The first set of constructions involves PPs headed by the preposition op. In the first
subtype, exemplified in (461a), the possessive pronoun is followed by an NP
inflected with -s. In the second subset, exemplified in (461b), the possessive
pronoun is followed by a superlative adjective. In this construction, the pronoun z’n
is invariant and does not seem to have referring force; we are therefore not dealing
with a “true” possessive pronoun.
(461) a. We doen het op zijn hondjes. [refers to a certain sexual position]
we do it on ZIJN dogdim-s
‘We do it doggystyle.’
b. We zijn op zijn vroegst om vijf uur thuis.
we are at ZIJN earliest at 5 o’clock home
‘At best, we will be home at 5 o’clock (but probably later).’
In some cases, however, examples like (461) do seem to contain a true possessive
pronoun, which is clear from the fact that there is agreement between the pronoun
and the subject of the clause. Some examples are given in (462).
(462) a. Ik kleed me vandaag op m’n zondags.
I dress REFL today on my Sunday-s
‘Today, I will dress like in my Sunday best.’
a′. Jij kleedt je vandaag op je zondags.
you dress REFL today on your Sunday-s
‘Today, you will dress like on Sunday/at your best.’
b. ’s Avonds ben ik op m’n best.
at night am I at my best
‘In the evening, I am at my best.’
b′. ’s Avonds ben jij op je best.
at night are you at your best
‘In the evening, you are at your best.’
B. Met-PPs
Another more or less fixed combination consists of the proposition met followed by
a possessive pronoun which in turn is followed by a cardinal numeral or quantifier
inflected with -en (or, in Flemish, with ge- ... -en). This PP provides information
about the size of a set of entities denoted by a plural argument elsewhere in the
clause: in (463a) the subject pronoun we ‘we’, and in (463b), the direct object de
jongens ‘the boys’. In examples like these, we may be dealing with the spurious,
non-referring and invariant possessive pronoun zijn, or with a possessive pronoun
that agrees with the modified argument.