[duo797]

Dictionary of Basic Japanese Grammar defines まま as 'An already given state or condition remains unaltered.'

I think the example that first comes to my mind when I think of まま is 電気をつけたまま寝てしまいました。 (From the same book) It's translated as 'I fell asleep leaving the lights on.' The part we're interested in is 電気をつけたまま. So here 電気をつける　is 'Turn on the lights', and 電気をつけた is 'Turned on the lights'. So taking the technical definition, adding まま to 電気をつけたまま means 'I turned off the lights [and this state remains unaltered]'.

Since I assume someone more talented than I will come along, I have two questions. Obviously the 自動詞 counterpart to 電気をつける is 電気がつく. Would it be natural to say 電気がついたまま寝てしまいました。? In this case I'm just trying to say that 'the lights were on' and not necessarily that I or anyone else turned them on. Also, in this case, would the が ->　の that happens often in relatively clauses (for example, 水がない would usually be said 水のないところ when it's a relative clause) happen in this instance. In short, would the phrasing change from 電気がついたまま to 電気のついたまま? A native or near-native opinion on that would be very appreciated. Also, to the OP, I hope I helped you a bit. If you don't already own it, I would definitely suggest picking up or at least taking a look at the 'Dictionary of Basic Japanese Grammar'. It's part of a 3-book collection that covers basic, intermediate, and advanced grammar patterns with explanations, related patterns, and lots of example sentences.