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| ] | |||
| <br/> | |||
| PN = ]<br/>poopskid | |||
| N = ]<br/> | |||
| V = ]<br/> | |||
| NP = ]<br/> | |||
| RC = ]<br/> | |||
| VP = ]<br/> | |||
| S = ] | |||
| ]] | |||
| "'''Buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo'''" is a ] ] in ], used as an example of how ]s and ]s can be used to create complicated linguistic constructs. It has been discussed in literature since 1972 when the sentence was used by ], an associate professor at the ].<ref>Rapaport, William J. 22 September 2006. "". Accessed 23 September 2006. ()</ref> It was posted to ] by Rapaport in 1992.<ref name="Linguistlist">Rapaport, William J. 19 February 1992. "". Accessed 14 September 2006.</ref> It was also featured in ]'s 1994 book '']'' as an example of a sentence that is "seemingly nonsensical" but grammatical. Pinker names his student, Annie Senghas, as the inventor of the sentence.<ref>Pinker, Steven. ''The Language Instinct: How the Mind Creates Language'', William Morrow and Company, Inc., New York, 1994. p. 210</ref> | |||
| The sentence's meaning becomes clearer when it's understood that it uses the city of ], and the somewhat-uncommon verb "to buffalo" (meaning "to bully or intimidate"), and when the punctuation and grammar is expanded so that the sentence reads as follows: "Buffalo buffalo that Buffalo buffalo buffalo, buffalo Buffalo buffalo." The meaning becomes even clearer when synonyms are used: "Buffalo bison that other Buffalo bison bully, themselves bully Buffalo bison." | |||
| ==Sentence construction== | |||
| ] of the sentence]] | |||
| ] | |||
| ] | |||
| The sentence is unpunctuated and uses three different readings of the word "buffalo". In order of their first use, these are: | |||
| * '''a.''' the city of ], ], which is used as a ] in the sentence and is followed by the animal; | |||
| * '''n.''' the ] ], an animal, in the plural (equivalent to "buffaloes" or "buffalos"), in order to avoid ]s; | |||
| * '''v.''' the ] "]" meaning to bully, confuse, deceive, or intimidate. | |||
| Marking each "buffalo" with its use as shown above gives: | |||
| :Buffalo<sup>a</sup> buffalo<sup>n</sup> Buffalo<sup>a</sup> buffalo<sup>n</sup> buffalo<sup>v</sup> buffalo<sup>v</sup> Buffalo<sup>a</sup> buffalo<sup>n</sup>. | |||
| The sentence uses a ], so there are no commas, nor is there the word "which," as in, "Buffalo buffalo, which Buffalo buffalo buffalo, buffalo Buffalo buffalo." This clause is also a ], so the word ''that'', which could appear between the second and third words of the sentence, is omitted. | |||
| Thus, the ] sentence reads as a claim that bison who ''are intimidated or bullied by bison'' are themselves ''intimidating or bullying bison'' (at least in the city of Buffalo– implicitly, Buffalo, NY): | |||
| :#Buffalo buffalo (buffalo from Buffalo NY) Buffalo buffalo buffalo (that the buffalo from Buffalo NY bully) buffalo Buffalo buffalo (are bullying buffalo from Buffalo NY) | |||
| :# buffalo(es) from Buffalo buffalo(es) from Buffalo intimidate buffalo(es) from Buffalo. | |||
| :#Bison from Buffalo, New York, who are intimidated by other bison in their community, also happen to intimidate other bison in their community. | |||
| :#'''''The''''' buffalo '''''from''''' Buffalo '''''who are''''' buffalo'''''ed by''''' buffalo '''''from''''' Buffalo, buffalo (verb) '''''other''''' buffalo '''''from''''' Buffalo. | |||
| :#Buffalo buffalo (main clause subject) Buffalo buffalo (] subject) buffalo (subordinate clause verb) buffalo (] verb) Buffalo buffalo (main clause direct object). | |||
| The sentence can be clarified by substituting the synonym "bison" for the animal "buffalo", "bully" for the verb "buffalo", and "New York" to refer to the state of the city Buffalo: | |||
| :*"New York bison New York bison bully, bully New York bison", or: | |||
| :*"New York bison whom other New York bison bully, themselves bully New York bison". | |||
| Or, alternatively with the city name intact: | |||
| :"Buffalo bison Buffalo bison bully bully Buffalo bison". | |||
| Removing the classifier noun "Buffalo" (the city) further clarifies the sentence (note that the initial capital is retained as the common noun "buffalo" now starts the sentence): | |||
| :"Buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo." | |||
| :"Bison bison bully bully bison." | |||
| ===Usage=== | |||
| ] has pointed out that there is nothing special about eight "buffalos"; any sentence consisting solely of the word "buffalo" repeated any number of times is grammatically correct. The shortest is "Buffalo!", which can be taken as an ] instruction to bully someone (" buffalo!") with the implied subject "you" removed.<ref>{{Cite book | year=2000 | title = Sweet reason: a field guide to modern logic | author1=Thomas Tymoczko | author2=James M. Henle | edition=2 | publisher=Birkhäuser | isbn=978-0-387-98930-3 | pages=99–100, 104 | url=http://books.google.com/?id=LQnsSuvP9dAC&pg=PA99 | postscript=<!--None-->}}</ref> Tymoczko uses the sentence as an example illustrating ]s in linguistics.<ref>{{Cite book | year=2000 | title = Sweet reason: a field guide to modern logic | author1=Thomas Tymoczko | author2=James M. Henle | edition=2 | publisher=Birkhäuser | isbn=978-0-387-98930-3 | pages=104–105 | url=http://books.google.com/?id=LQnsSuvP9dAC&pg=PA99 | postscript=<!--None-->}}</ref> | |||
| ==Other words using the same pattern== | |||
| Other English words can be used to make grammatical (but not necessarily meaningful) sentences of this form, containing endless consecutive repetitions. Any word that is both a plural noun and an uninflected transitive verb will work; for example, ''police'' or ''dice''. Adding a place name like ], can allow for a sentence identical in structure to the Buffalo example, though not necessarily with uniform pronunciation: "Police police Police police police police Police police." | |||
| A somewhat similar non-punctuated example is "]". This could concern a situation in an English class regarding the usage of the word ''had'', and might be punctuated as, "James, while John had had 'had', had had 'had had'; 'had had' had had a better effect on the teacher." | |||
| ==In popular culture== | |||
| An expanded form of the sentence is a lyric in the ] song "]" from the soundtrack of '']''. | |||
| ==See also== | |||
| *] | |||
| * '']'' | |||
| * ] | |||
| * ] | |||
| * ] | |||
| ==References== | |||
| {{reflist}} | |||
| ==External links== | |||
| {{Spoken Misplaced Pages|buffalo8.ogg|2006-12-09}} | |||
| {{wiktionary|buffalo}} | |||
| *"" at ], 20 January 2005 | |||
| *Easdown, David. {{PDF||273 KB}} | |||
| ===Video clip=== | |||
| * {{youtube|hv-fMZgyuaw|Explanation of the concept}} | |||
| {{Use dmy dates|date=April 2011}} | |||
| * {{youtube|65Mv3jHgiew|Video explanation of this sentence}} | |||
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| {{Link GA|ja}} | |||