Chinese Language Stack Exchange is a question and answer site for students, teachers, and linguists wanting to discuss the finer points of the Chinese language. It only takes a minute to sign up.
Sign up to join this community
I know that the measure word for 街 is 条, but in this sentence the subject being identified is 街名, a word for "street name". My understanding is that a "name" has measure word 个:
那个街名是以一个将军的名字命名的
My questions are:
(a) Why is 条 being used here?
(b) Which version sounds more natural and correct?
Thank you for your help.
You are right, the correct classifier for 街名 is 个
那条街是以一个将军的名字命名的. would be the most natural way to speak.
We say 命名街道 (give name to a street), not 命名街名 (give name to a street name)
~
If you must use 街名, the correct sentence would be 那个街名是跟據一个将军的名字而起的
We say 起街名 (decide a street name), not 命名街名 (give name to a street name)
Haha, there is a very interesting trick in the original sentence.
那条街名是以一个将军的名字命名的
We should understand the sentence as:
[那条街] [名] [是以一个将军的名字] [命名的]
It's a clumsy sentence. Maybe 那条街是以一个将军的名字命名的 is an improvement.
Well, your sentence will be understood as:
[那个街名] [是以一个将军的名字] [命名的]
However, the sentence has its problem as well because 街 can be named but 街名 can not.
The original writer, in my opinion, is unaware of the clash between '名' and “命名的”, which caused the issue. Apparently, the issue per se is not the measure word in the original sentence.
Colloquially, those sentences are fine to speak in casual circumstances.
