Bosnian to Punjabi: keep the boundaries of coordinated noun phrases visible
An adjective can describe one member rather than the entire pair
Columbia’s Bosnian lesson demonstrates adjective agreement with a noun, including the change from crvena knjiga to crvenu knjigu when the phrase has a different grammatical role. An adjective’s relationship to its noun is part of the source meaning. That relationship must remain clear when several nouns are joined.
Gill and Gleason’s Punjabi reference grammar discusses a construction in which a modifier before two connected nouns belongs to the first noun phrase. Its example ਚੰਗਾ ਮੁੰਡਾ ਤੇ ਕੁੜੀ describes a good boy and a girl; it does not automatically give both people the same description. The position of a translated adjective can therefore affect its scope.
A source description of two items must not become a description of only one
Consider an original Bosnian list in which a damaged chair and an undamaged table are being collected. The damage belongs only to the chair. A different list might explicitly describe both pieces as damaged. These are different instructions even when the inventory contains the same furniture.
When building the Punjabi list, establish whether each description applies to one item or the coordinated group. Repeating or separately expressing a property can be necessary to retain a source statement about both items. Conversely, extending a first noun’s property to the second can invent a defect or a qualification that the Bosnian writer never stated. Source agreement helps parse individual noun phrases; it does not make a single target modifier cover every following noun.
A conventional pair can behave differently from an ordinary list
The Punjabi grammar separately presents ਮਾਂ ਪਿਉ as a conventional two-noun compound for parents and illustrates a modifier belonging to that combined expression. The authors distinguish such compounds from freely coordinated noun phrases.
A Bosnian reference to somebody’s parents can therefore be expressed as a recognized target unit, whereas a newly assembled list of relatives should not automatically receive the same treatment. In an original account mentioning a mother and a neighbor, both people may be female adults, but the pair is not thereby equivalent to the conventional parents expression. Preserve the actual membership and the ownership relation rather than selecting a familiar compound because two people appear together.
Agreement on the target verb does not necessarily describe only the nearest person
Gill and Gleason describe feminine plural agreement for two coordinated singular feminine subjects, and masculine plural for the illustrated mixed singular pair. They also note variation with coordinated plural nouns of different genders, so their examples should not be reduced to one universal nearest-noun rule.
For a Bosnian report that two sisters went home together, the target must retain two participants and their shared event. For a report involving a sister and a brother, the agreement construction changes without changing who traveled. Read the coordinated subject as a complete phrase before interpreting the target verb ending. An ending chosen for the group must not cause one participant to disappear, and an agreement form must not be used to infer a new participant whom the source did not identify.
Language references