This question has been parading
itself on Facebook for a while now like the madman in Achebe's The Madman,
looking for whom would do justice to it. Here is what I've got to say.
The statement, "A
mother beat up her daughter because she was drunk" is a clear case of
ambiguity. In English, ambiguity is a situation where a sentence can be
interpreted in more than one way. Ambiguous expressions, either caused by a
phrase or a word/lexical item, are always difficult to be given precise
meanings.
There are two types of
ambiguity:
1. Lexical ambiguity.
2. Structural ambiguity.
In lexical ambiguity, a
word, usually a polysemous word, will make a sentence to have more than one
meaning. For example, the word, "grace" in the sentence,
"Everyone needs grace to make it in life". This
sentence is ambiguous, (that is, it can be interpreted in more than one way)
because of the presence of the polysemous word, "grace". Is it that
everyone needs grace (as a person) to make it in life, or we
need the grace (of God) to make it in life? These are two
possible questions that will marry the mind of a reader who comes across such
sentence, and this will inarguably leave a reader in a state of confusion while
trying to ascertain the intended meaning of a writer.
Structural ambiguity
occurs when a phrase makes a sentence to have more than one possible meaning.
For example, the phrase, "the shooting of the robbers", in the
sentence, "The shooting of the robbers came as a shock", makes the
sentence ambiguous. Is it that the shooting (operation) which was done by the
robbers came as a shock, or the act of shooting the robbers came as a shock?
These are two possible ways one can interpret the sentence.
Let's now analyse our sentence of study:
"A Mother beat up her daughter because she was drunk."
The question is,
"who was drunk?". The truth of the matter is that no one can
precisely state or tell who was drunk between them because the sentence is
assigned with more than one interpretation. The ambiguity of this sentence is
caused by the lexical item, she, which is a pronoun. The speaker or
writer (of the sentence) assigned two antecedents, "a mother" and
"her daughter", to the pronoun, "she", without clearly
stating which of the antecedents the pronoun is referring to, thereby making it
difficult for the listener or reader to give a precise interpretation to the
sentence. So, while some would say that it was the mother who was drunk, others
would argue that it was the daughter who was drunk. We don't need to blame them
for the different interpretations because the sentence does not carry a precise meaning.
However, only the speaker
or writer of such sentence can state/give its actual meaning although that
doesn't disambiguate the sentence. But what happens in a case like this where
the speaker is unknown or can't be found to give the actual interpretation of
the sentence? In a case like this, one will only resort to disambiguating the
sentence in order to get a precise meaning. To disambiguate means to give a
precise or one interpretation to a sentence or construction which can be
interpreted in more than one way. The question now is, "how can one
disambiguate or give a precise interpretation to our sentence of study?"
HOW TO DISAMBIGUATE THE
SENTENCE, "A MOTHER BEAT UP HER DAUGHTER BECAUSE SHE WAS DRUNK."
We can disambiguate the
sentence by either of the following ways:
1. Inserting a more
definite noun phrase "the daughter" and deleting the pronoun
"she". So, the sentence should read:
"A mother beat up her
daughter because the daughter was drunk."
2. By inserting the
appositive phrase "the mother" after "she".
So, the sentence should read:
"A mother beat up her
daughter because she, the mother, was drunk".
3. Inserting the adjectives
(that are nominalised),"former" and "latter",
to refer to "mother" and "daughter"
respectively:
"A mother beat up her
daughter because the former was drunk." (In this case,
the mother is the one who was drunk)
or
"A mother beat up her
daughter because the latter was drunk. (In this case, it is her
daughter who was drunk).
In sum, ambiguous
sentences make it difficult for a reader or listener to understand a speaker's
intent. Therefore, for easy comprehension of a statement, a speaker should
avoid using ambiguous sentences.