Neha Patil (Editor)

Oblique case

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In grammar, an oblique (abbreviated OBL; from Latin: casus obliquus) or objective case (abbr. OBJ), is a nominal case that is used when a noun phrase is the object of either a verb or a preposition. A noun or pronoun in the oblique case can generally appear in any role except as subject, for which the nominative case is used. The term "objective case" is generally preferred by modern English grammarians, where it supplanted Old English's dative and accusative. When the two terms are contrasted, they differ in the ability of a word in the oblique case to function as a possessive attributive; whether English has an oblique rather than an objective case then depends on how "proper" or widespread one considers the dialects where such usage is employed.

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An oblique case often contrasts with an unmarked case, as in English oblique him and them vs. nominative he and they. However, the term oblique is also used for languages without a nominative case, such as ergative–absolutive languages; in the Northwest Caucasian languages, for example, the oblique-case marker serves to mark the ergative, dative, and applicative case roles, contrasting with the absolutive case, which is unmarked.

Bulgarian

Bulgarian, an analytic Slavic language, also has an oblique case form for pronouns:

Dative role:

  • "Give that ball to me" дай тaзи топка на мен (day tazi topka na men)

    • (This oblique case is a relic of the original, more complex proto-Slavic system of noun cases, and there are remnants of other cases in Bulgarian, such as the vocative case of direct address)

    English

    An objective case is marked on the English personal pronouns and as such serves the role of the accusative and dative cases that other Indo-European languages employ. These forms are often called object pronouns. One can observe how the first person pronoun me serves a variety of grammatical functions:

  • in an accusative role for a direct object (including double object and oblique ditransitives):
  • in a dative role for an indirect object:
  • as the object of a preposition (except in possessives):
  • in copular deixis:
  • in existentials (sometimes, but not always, replaceable by the nominative—in very formal style):
  • in a nominative role with predicate or verbal ellipsis:
  • in coordinated nominals:
  • as a disjunctive topic marker:
  • as a comedic stylistic effect of blatant error (nonstandard, pidgin, baby or foreigner talk or "broken English"):

    • The pronoun me is not inflected differently in any of these uses; it is used for all grammatical relationships except the genitive case of possession (in standard English) and a non-disjunctive nominative case as the subject.

    Hindustani

    Hindustani has an oblique case for pronouns which is used exclusively with postpositions. For nouns the oblique and dative cases are merged.

    References

    Oblique case Wikipedia
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