79909
Here's a small thing I never thought about for too long as I always kinda
dismissed it due to the context usually being clear enough, but now I've
gotten curious and I figured I'd ask away:

Let's take the example from the thread title「酒を飲ませる人」: Can this generally be
understood as both "the person, who makes/lets somebody else drink alcohol"
and "the person, who's being made/let to drink alcohol"? Same question
with「命令する人」: "The person who gives orders" and "the person who receives
orders"?

I'm not really sure how I'd go about googling this particular question so I
apologize if this is a very simple one.

Thank you very much in advance!
CC BY-SA 4.0
2020-07-31T21:58:06.090
79905
2020-08-04T02:08:58.340
2020-08-04T02:08:58.340
5010
35224
question
grammar relative-clauses ambiguous-relative-clauses
Ambiguity when describing with verbs, e.g. 酒を飲ませる人
Yes, 酒を飲ませる人 is ambiguous. In general, this ambiguity can happen in Japanese
relative clauses typically when a verb takes two or more human arguments (～が,
～に, ～を, etc). Here are similar questions:

  * [Clarification about how 惚れた should be translated](https://japanese.stackexchange.com/q/60895/5010)
  * [が in subordinate clauses](https://japanese.stackexchange.com/q/30171/5010)
  * [How does the passive form work here?](https://japanese.stackexchange.com/q/38739/5010)
  * [The meaning of ”あれは魔術師に与えられた祝福”](https://japanese.stackexchange.com/q/76392/5010)
  * [Relative Clause Ambiguous](https://japanese.stackexchange.com/q/60385/5010)
  * [Parsing the sentence 書く人物の顔が頭に入っていないと効果はない](https://japanese.stackexchange.com/q/64621/5010)

Usually the surrounding context can tell the intended interpretation. To
disambiguate this without any further context, you can simply fill one of the
missing arguments.

  * 彼女 **が** 酒を飲ませる人: the person who she gives alcohol to
  * 彼女 **に** 酒を飲ませる人: the person who makes her drink alcohol
CC BY-SA 4.0
2020-08-01T00:17:40.707
79909
2020-08-01T00:22:46.570
2020-08-01T00:22:46.570
5010
5010
79905
answer