meaning - How should I parse the sentence "Buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo."


Why is the following statement valid, and how can I break it down so that it is easier to understand?



Buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo.




Answer



To buffalo means to intimidate. Buffalo is a place as well as an animal (bison), so there are buffalo from Buffalo as well as buffalo from other places. And they can intimidate anything, including bison.


If you really want the details, read it all here. It's semantically parseable, but you'd be lucky to find a context where you could meaningfully say it without sounding daft.


If you don't have time for the whole story, try this one, which is the breakdown for 11 consecutive 'buffalos' (beats OP's somewhat weedy 6!).


Bison from Buffalo [that other] bison from Buffalo intimidate [also] intimidate bison from Buffalo [that other] bison from Buffalo intimidate.


LATER The constant repetition is obviously intended to be somewhat confusing, so this may make it easier to understand the sentence. Note that there are three senses of the word 'buffalo' being used; as a noun (meaning bison), an adjective (from the town of Buffalo), and a verb (to intimidate). Try substituting different words with similar syntactic usage, such as cats, aggressive, and fight...


Aggressive cats [that other] aggressive cats fight [also] fight aggressive cats [that other] aggressive cats fight.


If that's still awkward, just accept that aggressive cats is simply a 'noun phrase' that could syntactically be substituted with a single word such as people...


People that other people fight also fight people that other people fight.


(i.e. - these people don't only fight the people that fight them - they also fight anyone else those other people fight)


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