This section describes typical differences between written and spoken language.
In spoken language and modern written language, some particles and other modifiers that refer to something in a sub-ordinate clause have the strong tendency to fall into that sub-ordinate clause themselves.
Original sentence:
| You | try | YN | I | drink | tea? | ||||||||||||||
| Did you try the tea I am drinking? | |||||||||||||||||||
Sentence with a fallen YN marker:
| You | try | I | drink | YN | tea? | ||||||||||||||
| Did you try the tea I am drinking? | |||||||||||||||||||
The reason might be that in complex sentences, a REF marker can be omitted using this construction. (The original sentence above might also be read as `Did you try whether I drink tea?' but this is an unlikely interpretation without a context, so the reference marker can be omitted here anyway).
Original sentence with a REF marker:
| You | try | YN | I | drink | REF | tea? | |||||||||||||
| Did you try the tea I am drinking? | |||||||||||||||||||
Words like ASS, `which', DET etc. behave the same way.
This phenomenon is not restricted to single words.
| Shall | you | drink | I | like | far | DET | tea | ||||||||||||
| You should drink the tea over there that I like. | |||||||||||||||||||
The original sentence would be:
| Shall | you | drink | far | DET | I | try | REF | tea | |||||||||||
| You should drink the tea over there that I like. | |||||||||||||||||||
It may be seen that the SKIP particle is replaced by a noun to clarify the meaning or to express other shades.
If it is more precise, it is regarded stylistic freedom to either use NULL or a more precise term. The following examples show this.
| WHICH | person | hurt | you | ||||||||||||||||
| WHICH | SKIP | hurt | you | ||||||||||||||||
| WHICH | hurt | you | |||||||||||||||||
| Who hurt your? | |||||||||||||||||||
| WHICH | thing | hurt | you | ||||||||||||||||
| WHICH | SKIP | hurt | you | ||||||||||||||||
| WHICH | hurt | you | |||||||||||||||||
| What hurt your? | |||||||||||||||||||
Some missing fillers cannot be replaced even in colloquial speech, because the fill-in would have to use SKIP itself to form a matching word. E.g. Tyl-Sjok does not have a word for `reason' or `(the) cause', but uses NULL cause instead. This makes its usage awkward.
| ?WHICH | NULL | cause | cause | pale | you | ||||||||||||||
| WHICH | SKIP | cause | pale | you | |||||||||||||||
| WHICH | cause | pale | you | ||||||||||||||||
| Why are you so pale? | |||||||||||||||||||