100759
I was reading 銀河鉄道の夜, and I’m confused on the choice of word order in the
following sentence. I understand what the sentence means, but I do not
understand why みんな isnt before が.

> たしかにあれがみんな星だと

Let me know if more context is necessary.
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2023-08-22T13:55:02.820
100757
2023-08-22T21:01:26.487
2023-08-22T17:02:32.947
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56627
question
grammar word-choice word-usage
Word order in 銀河鉄道の夜
For clarity, in the context of the 銀河鉄道の夜 the clause the question is about is
meant as an answer to

> [...]このぼんやりと白いものがほんとうは何かご承知ですか。

— something the teacher asks the class while pointing to an illustration of
the Milky Way, and it is part of a longer sentence that continues on like so:

> たしかにあれがみんな星だと、いつか雑誌で読んだのでしたが...

With that out of the way, the reason みんな comes after が here is because it is
used as an adverb (meaning "all, everything, wholly") rather than a noun.

> たしかにあれが **みんな** 星だと _...that (it is/they are) certainly **all** stars_

みんな as a noun could not really have been used here, as would then refer to a
group of people, while the sentence is about what the Milky Way is composed
of.

This use corresponds to its second definition on
[jisho.org](https://jisho.org/search/%E3%81%BF%E3%82%93%E3%81%82) as well as
on
[goo.ne.jp](https://dictionary.goo.ne.jp/word/%E7%9A%86_%28%E3%81%BF%E3%81%AA%29/)
(here listed under みな). Those two sites also give the following examples,
respectively:

> 木の葉は **みんな** 落ちてしまった。The leaves have all fallen.  
>  今回の不始末は **みんな** 私の責任です This (case of) mismanagement is entirely my fault.
> (emphasis, second translation mine)

As adverbs cannot take the subject-marker が, the only way for this みんな to end
up before it would be by being placed before あれが, but while (as neither a
native speaker nor an advanced learner) I may be wrong on this and cannot
properly explain it, to me it sounds incredibly weird and is most likely just
incorrect.
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2023-08-22T21:01:26.487
100759
2023-08-22T21:01:26.487
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answer