1
Chapter 32
Evidentiality in Korean
Ho-min Sohn
1. Introduction
The grammatical concept of ‘evidentiality’ or ‘evidentials’ as the linguistic encoding of
information source was barely mentioned in traditional linguistic descriptions of Korean.
Inspired largely by Aikhenvald and Dixon (2003) and Aikhenvald (2004), however, a number of
Korean linguists have recently begun to explore evidentiality phenomena in Korean, including
half a dozen recent doctoral dissertations from U.S. institutions alone (e.g. N. Kim 2000; J. Song
2002, 2013; Strauss 2005; K. Chung 2005, 2006, 2007; M. Kim 2005, 2006, 2007; Papafragou,
Li, Choi and Han. 2006; J. Chung 2009, 2010; Kwon 2009, 2011, 2012a, 2012b; J. M. Lee 2010,
2011; K. Song 2010; C. Lee 2010; Lim 2010; Lim and C. Lee 2012; J.W. Lee 2012; J. Kim
2012; Rhoades-Ko 2013; H. Lee 2014; and Ahn and Yap 2014, 2015).
It is generally agreed that Korean does have a set of inflectional suffixes that function as evidential markers and that their uses in discourse are optional unlike such other grammatical categories as tense, honorifics, speech levels, and sentence types which are obligatorily marked.
There is a wide spectrum of disparity in opinion, however, as to the number and kinds of evidential markers, their syntactic and semantic functions, and their grammatical status vis-à-vis the other grammatical categories such as tense, aspect, and modality. Some recent proposals are given below to showcase to what extent linguists differ even in identifying evidentials in Korean.
N. Kim (2000) proposes three forms of reportative evidential in Korean: -ta-ko han, -ta
han, and –ta-n, all translated as ‘they say’. J. Song (2002, 2013) deals only with the inflectional 2 suffix –te as evidential. Strauss (2005) proposes that there are at least three direct evidential/mirative markers: -te, -ney, and -kwun.
K. Chung (2005) proposes that the suffix –te and its “present tense” counterpart –ney are evidential, admitting that some suffixes such as –ess are ambiguous between aspects or moods and evidentials. Similarly, J. M. Lee (2010, 2011) analyses –te and –ney as evidentials and argues that the direct vs. inferential vs. reportive evidential readings arise from –te and –ney by means of their interactions with tense and mood. She offers a modal analysis of the evidentials.
K. Song (2010) identifies the ‘visual/sensory’ –te, report/hearsay -(nu)n-tan-ta, –tay, -ta- mye(nse), -ta-ko; inferential –nun-ka-po; visual passive predicate po-i; and inferential predicate moyang-i as evidential markers. Kwon (2012b) proposes as evidential markers the direct/firsthand –te-, inferential –napo-, and the quotative/reportive –ay, and claims that the
Korean verbal complex can express three types of modes of access to information using the three evidential markers. J. Kim (2012) recognizes three evidential types in Korean: direct –te, reportative -tay, and inference –ci, proposing that the Korean evidential system corresponds to
B-1 system (‘Direct/Visual, Inferred, Reported’) in Aikhenvald (2004: 42). He further argues that Korean evidentials are presuppositional triggers and that Korean evidentials are classified as one category.
Viewing evidentials as a subclass of epistemic modality, H. Lee (2014: 252-255) proposes the following suffixes and periphrastic forms as indicating evidentiary sources of various information conveyed: (a) hearsay evidentials –tay and its sentence-type variants (-lay, - nyay, -(u)lay, and –cay), (b) deductive reasoning –keyss, (c) abductive reasoning –na-po and –
(nu)nka-po, (d) presumption –(u)l ke(s)-i and –(u)l-kel, (e) approximation -(u)n/-nun/-(u)l kes kath, -(u)n/-nun/-(u)l tus-ha, -(u)n/-nun/-(u)l moyang-i, and retrospection of past experience –te. 3
In addition, he (ibid.: 260) indicates that the verbal suffix –ney represents a genuine example of
“immediate” evidential as it can only refer to the speaker’s current experience of the situation.
Thus far, more than twenty different items have been proposed as evidentials in Korean.
These varying proposals appear to be due partly to different interpretations of the definitions and criteria of evidentials, partly to the intersection of modality and evidentiality, and partly to the polysemous nature of the suffixes and periphrastic constructions in question.
Amidst the diverse proposals on Korean evidentiality, I would like to present, tentative as it may be, what I think is a grammatical system of Korean evidentials in what follows. Extensive reference will be made to the various proposals advanced thus far.
2 The Korean evidential system
2.1 Background
Typologically, Korean is a language with head-final, predicate-final syntax in both main and subordinate clauses and typical agglutinative morphology. Thus, all lexical, phrasal and clausal modifiers precede their heads and several scores of inflectional suffixes are attached to predicates (verbs, adjectives, copulas) to perform various grammatical functions, such as tense/aspect, subject honorifics, addressee honorifics, modality, speech levels, sentence types, and clause types. Furthermore, being a language with honorifics, Korean sentences cannot be communicated in discourse without the use of appropriate speech levels that are portmanteaued
with sentence-type enders. Five speech levels (plain, intimate, familiar, polite, and deferential)
are of common use in contemporary Korean.
Until very recently, evidentiality was a novel concept in Korean linguistics. Even at present, a majority of Korean linguists and grammarians are either still unfamiliar with it or not 4 ready to accept it as a grammatical category in Korean. No contemporary dictionary of Korean has yet included it as a grammatical category. My own grammars (Sohn 1994; Sohn 1999) depict the inflectional system of Korean predicate constructions without reference to evidentiality.
This does not mean that Korean has no way to grammatically mark information source regarding whether the speaker saw an event, or heard it, or inferred it based on visual evidence or on common sense. I will look into the following issues:
1. What inflectional suffixes are to be considered as evidentials? Why?
2. How have these suffixes developed as evidentials?
3. What is the grammatical status of Korean evidentials?
4. How does evidentiality differ from and interact with tense/aspect and modality?
5. What are the typological features of Korean evidentials?
I will follow the definition of evidentials in Aikhenvald (2004) that evidentiality is a linguistic category whose real-life counterpart is information source and that it is a grammatical category which has source of information as its primary meaning—whether the narrator actually saw what is being described, or made inferences about it based on evidence, or was told about it. For typological discussion of Korean evidentiality, reference will be made to the following semantic types that Aikhenvald (2004:63) has observed as recurring.
I. VISUAL covers evidence acquired through seeing.
II. SENSORY covers evidence through hearing, and is typically extended to smell and
taste, and sometimes also touch. 5
III. INFERENCE based on visible or tangible evidence or result.
IV. ASSUMPTION based on evidence other than visible results: this may include logical
reasoning, conjecture or common sense.
V. REPORTED, for reported information with no reference to who it was reported by.
VI. QUOTATIVE, for reported information with an overt reference to the quoted source.
Aikhenvald adds that further parameters may involve general knowledge, different kinds of assumption and reasoning, and degrees of verbal report—secondhand and thirdhand.
My main concern is the structural aspects of the grammatical system of evidentials in
Korean, dealing only with relevant inflectional suffixes. Thus, I will not deal with lexical devices
and periphrastic constructions that are available to refer to information source as well. Nor do I
touch on the pragmatic analysis, discourse strategies, and first or second language acquisition of
evidentiality in Korean. Some of the works dealing with such non-structural aspects include M.
Kim (2005, 2006, 2011), Papafragou, Li, Choi and Han (2006), J. Kim (2012), Rhoades-Ko
(2013), and Ahn and Yap (2014, 2015).
Although not as strictly as languages like Quechua’s three evidentials (Faller 2002) and
Tariana’s five evidentials, as illustrated in Aikhenvald (2004), which obligatorily specify distinct sources of information with distinct morphemes, Korean has a set of inflectional suffixes that satisfy Aikhenvald’s definition of evidentiality and thus can be classified as evidentials. As in many languages, Korean evidentiality has a clause or a sentence as its scope and is marked on the predicate (verb, adjective, and copula) as inflectional suffixes. 6
All Korean evidentials are optional in occurrence. Thus, omitting an evidential does not
produce an ungrammatical or unnatural sentence, although the hearer might be curious about or
ask how the information was acquired.
1.2 Evidential markers in Korean
The inflectional suffixes in Korean whose primary meaning is viewed as encoding the source of
information can be classified into (a) perceptual, (b) quotative and reported (hearsay), and (c) inferential.
1.2.1 Perceptual evidentials
[1] The suffix -te
The pre-final inflectional suffix –te (and its variants –tey in familiar or polite-level ender tey(- yo), -ti in deferential-level ender –sup-ti-ta, -t in plain-level question ender –ti [-t + archaic ender
–i], and dialectally -tu) is the most extensively discussed suffix in regard to evidentiality and is recognized by most linguists working on Korean evidentiality as a direct or firsthand evidential.
Translated as ‘I have found that; I have realized that; it is known that; I heard that’ in dictionaries, this suffix denotes that the speaker has firsthand information about the situation, which was acquired prior to the speech time. Since this suffix is used when the speaker wants to communicate that (s)he has visual, sensory, or inferential evidence (e.g. ‘saw, felt, realized’) for what (s)he is talking about, its primary meaning and function is to refer to the source of the information expressed by the proposition.
In traditional and contemporary Korean grammar, this suffix is categorized variously as a tense marker (e.g. H. Choi 1965:348; Na 1971:129; Yeon and Brown 2011:200), an aspect marker (e.g. Martin 1954:37-40; H. Lee 1991), a mood marker (e.g. Yang 1972:4; Sohn 1975) or 7
a manner marker (e.g. Chang 1973:40). These various categorizations are obviously due to its
historical evolution, composite semantic contents, and syntactic functions.
In Sohn (1975), I analyzed –te as a retrospective mood marker with the semantic content of the speaker’s (in statement) and hearer’s (in question) past perception of a propositional content through (a) observation (e.g. see, witness, observe), (b) experience (e.g. feel, sense, experience), or (c) inference (realize, find out, notice, hear, learn, infer). I would like to essentially maintain the semantic contents of –te that I proposed then. Observe the plain-level sentences in (1), where the evidential readings are represented in square brackets.
(1) a. John-i ttena-ss-ta
John-SU leave-PAST-DEC
‘John left’
a’. John-i ttena-ss-n-i?
John-SU leave-PAST-INDIC-INTER
‘Did John leave?’
b. John-i ttena-te-la [speaker’s past perception]
John-SU leave-RETRO-DEC
i. ‘[I saw] John leaving’
ii. ‘[I realized/noticed/learned] that John would be leaving’
b’. John-i ttena-te-nya/ttena-t-i? [hearer’s past perception]
John-SU leave-RETRO-INTER 8
i. ‘[Did you see] John leaving?’
ii. ‘[Did you realize/notice/learn] that John would leave?’
c. John-i ttena-ss-te-la [speaker’s past perception]
John-SU leave-PAST-RETRO-DEC
‘[I realized/noticed] that John had left’
c’. John-i ttena-ss-te-nya/-t-i? [hearer’s past perception]
John-SU leave-PAST-RETRO-INTER
‘[Did you realize/notice/learn] that John had left?’
Notice that while simple past sentences with the past/perfect marker –ess in (1a, a’) do
not indicate any information source, the sentences with -te indicates that the information was
obtained via the speaker’s (or hearer’s in question) visual or inferential perception of the event.
In a non-past sentence, –te has two readings: the speaker’s direct past perception through direct
visual observation, as in (1b-i, 1b’-i), and indirectly through inference based on the concrete
evidence or knowledge that the speaker had obtained through seeing and hearing, as in (1b-ii,
1b’-ii, 1c, 1d). Which reading is actually involved in a given situation is determined by a time adverbial such as nayil ‘tomorrow’ or cikum ‘now’ or a given discourse context.1
In a past sentence, -te always denotes the speaker’s past perception of the propositional
content through inference based on concrete evidence or acquired knowledge (e.g. result states,
1 This suggests that J. Lee’s (2010) claim that inferential evidential reading occurs with past tense and direct evidential reading with present tense is only partly true. 9
TV, newspapers, books, internet, announcements). Dual interpretation of –te in non-past
sentences apply to all action verbs, descriptive adjectives, and copulas, as illustrated in (2).2
(2) a. John-un solcikha-te-la
John-TOP open-hearted-RETRO-DEC
i. ‘[I saw] John was open-hearted’
ii. ‘[I learned] that John was open-hearted’
b. John-un solcikhay-ss-te-la
John-TOP open-hearted-PAST-RETRO-DEC
‘[I learned] that John had been open-hearted’
Another essential meaning of –te is the speaker’s (hearer’s in question) past perception of
a propositional content through his/her own firsthand experience (felt, sensed, experienced, etc.).
This meaning occurs mainly with sensory/emotive adjectives, unaccusative verbs, and the
conjecture suffix –keyss, and with the experiencer subject who is the speaker in statement and the
hearer in question. Since the speaker’s own feeling is involved and predicate referents are
unobservable, perception through observation is vacuous.
2 The dual interpretations of –te in non-past sentences is due to the nature of non-past (unmarked). Non-past denotes not only the moment of the speaker/hearer’s perception, but also the generic and future time in Korean. Only when the propositional content was in progress at the time and place of the speaker/hearer’s perception, the direct observation interpretation holds.
10
(3) a. na-nun kimchi-ka mayp-te-la
1-TOP kimchi-SU hot-RETRO-DEC
‘[I felt] the kimchi was hot’
b. ne-nun mopsi cichi-te-nya?
2-TOP very be-tired-RETRO-INTER
‘[Did you feel] you were very tired’
c. ne-nun cwuk-keyss-t-i?
2-TOP die-may-RETRO-INTER
‘[Did you feel] you would die?’
Sentence (3a) contain sensory/emotive adjective, while sentence (3b) has sensory/emotive unaccusative verb. In (3c), -te follows –keyss, an inflectional suffix denoting the speaker’s (hearer’s in question) conjecture.
It is well-known that the retrospective suffix –te cannot be used in predicate constructions that refer to the speaker’s conscious action (e.g. H. Lee 2014:254). A more precise statement may be that this suffix cannot be used to indicate the speaker’s visual perception of his/her own action or state. If it is used, the sentence would unintentionally third-personify the speaker, making the assertion pragmatically anomalous.
(4) a. ??na-nun nol-ko.iss-te-la
1-TOP play-PROG-RETRO-DEC 11
??‘[I saw] myself playing aroud’
b. ??na-nun solcikha-te-la
1-TOP open.hearted-RETRO-DEC
??‘[I saw] I was open-hearted’
As a pre-final inflectional suffix, –te is used in limited contexts of relative and conjunctive
clauses. It occurs in relative clauses as in coh-(ass)-te-n salam ‘a person who (I perceived) used to be good’, and in conjunctive clauses as in John-i ka-te-ni ‘(I saw) John went, and then …’ and nay-ka ka-ss-te-ni ‘When I went, …’. Space does not allow me to go into the discussion of the embedded use of –te (cf. Sohn 1975 and C. Lee 2010).
In terms of its origins, the evidential meaning of -te appears to have evolved from the assumed past/perfect –tɔ (> -te). Traditional linguists like Na (1971) regard –te as a genuine past- tense morpheme in Korean on historical grounds, in that the suffix –tɔ functioned as the only past tense in Middle Korean when the contemporary past/perfect suffix –ess and –ess-ess did not develop from the resultative state –e isi yet. Similarly, D. Choi (1988) points out that the 15th
century data showed that -te was used to indicate the speaker’s own action as well (cf. H. Lee
2014). Unlike its contemporary use as a pre-final suffix (a domain of the speaker’s subjective stance), in Middle Korean, -te was placed immediately after predicate stems, even before the subject honorific suffix, suggesting that it functioned as a past tense/aspect marker.
Although –te still incorporates past time as an inherent semantic feature, it cannot be
regarded as a past tense or aspect marker in contemporary Korean, as (a) the meaning of the speaker’s perception is primary, (b) there are genuine past/perfect markers –ess and –ess-ess that 12
fill an independent morpho-syntactic slot preceding the –te slot in predicate constructions, (c) it
cannot be used with a proposition that denotes the speaker’s activity or non-sensory state, and (d)
while it does not make the proposition a past or perfective event, as seen in John-un nayil ttena- te-la ‘[I found out] that John leaves tomorrow.’
In my earlier studies (Sohn 1975, 1994, 1999), I have termed –te as the retrospective mood along with the indicative mood –(nu)n/ni and the requestive mood –si in view of their morpho- syntactic parallelism. For the reasons discussed thus far, however, it is more appropriate for -te
(perceptual evidential) and the elements to be discussed below to be subsumed under the category of evidentiality.
[2] The sentence ender –ney
Another direct, firsthand evidential in Korean is the sentence ender –ney (e.g. Strauss 2005; K.
Chung 2005; J. M. Lee 2011a, b; H. Lee 2014:260). It refers to the speaker’s instantaneous perception of a situation or event, often with mild exclamation. Thus, traditionally and in most dictionaries, it is treated as an exclamation sentence ender. Strauss (ibid.) terms –ney as a cognitive realization marker along with –te-la and the mirative –kwuna.3 K. Chung (2005) proposes that –
ney is the “present tense” counterpart of the evidential –te. J. Lee (ibid.) similarly views –te and –
ney as evidentials. H. Lee (ibid.) indicates that –ney is an immediate evidential. Observe the sentences in (5) where –ney is used as a sentence ender.
(5) a. pakk-ey pi-ka o-ney(!)
3 As H. Lee (2014:260) points out, the so-called mirative –kwun(a/yo) cannot be regarded as an evidential marker because, unlike
–ney, it can refer to both present and past experience (e.g. pi-ka w-ass-te-kwun! ‘It rained!’)
13
outside-at rain come-DEC/INST
i. ‘It’s raining outside’ (familiar level)
ii. ‘Ah, [I see] it’s raining outside!’ (evidential)
b. John-un nayil ttena-ney-yo
John-TOP tomorrow leave-INST-POL
‘[I realize] John leaves tomorrow’
c. cengmal sok sangha-ney-yo
really inside/mind hurt-INST-POL
‘[I feel] I am really upset!
d. John-un pelsse ttena-ss-ney-yo
John-TOP already leave-PAST-INST-POL
‘[I realize] John has already left’
e. na-nun phikonhay cwuk-keyss-ney-yo.
1-TOP tired die-may-INST-POL
‘[I feel] like I am dying of exhaustion!’
When –ney is used without the politeness particle –yo, it may denote two different situations. First, it is used as a familiar-level declarative sentence ender, as opposed to other speech levels and other sentence types. In this prototypical use, the intonation contour usually ends in a 14
low tone with no exclamation. In this use, -ney does not function as an evidential, but simply
denotes an assertive illocution in a familiar-level speech act. The second use is to express the speaker’s instantaneous perception of an event or state (frequently unexpected ones), in which case the intonation contour usually ends in a slightly raised (mid) tone unless it is followed by the politeness particle –yo with a low tone. This second use of –ney is as an evidential since it expresses the source of the information of the propositional content, namely the speaker’s instantaneous perception.
Notice in the illustrative sentences in (5) that –ney, as an evidential, carries the meaning of the instantaneous (here and now) perception of the proposition through observation, experience, and inference. This semantic content of –ney is not different from that of –te, except that the perception time is the utterance time (here and now) in the former and prior to the utterance time in the latter. In this respect, K. Chung’s (2005) proposal that –ney is the present-tense counterpart of the evidential –te appears partly correct, although I disagree with the view that both -te and – ney mark tense in contemporary Korean. On the other hand, there are several morpho-syntactic disparities as well as similarities. Disparities include that (a) -te is a pre-final suffix, whereas –ney is a sentence ender; (b) -te refers to the hearer’s perception in question, whereas –ney cannot be used in question at all; (c) -te can be used in a relative and conjunctive clauses, but -ney cannot be used in any embedded clause; and (d) –te is used in all speech levels, whereas –ney is used only in two levels: familiar -ney and polite –ney-yo. One similarity is that both can occur after the conjecture -keyss as in ka-ss-keyss-tey-yo ‘I perceived (someone) might have gone’ and ka-ss- keyss-ney-yo ‘I perceive (someone) may have gone’. Also, both occur after the inference evidential suffix –na-po (to be discussed below), as in ka-na-po-tey-yo ‘I perceived (someone) appeared to be going’ and ka-na-po-ney-yo. ‘I perceive (someone) appears to be going.’ 15
All the above-mentioned disparities will disappear if –ney is compared to –tey, instead of
–te. I assume that the contemporary familiar-level ender -ney developed from the fusion of the
indicative suffix –ne (< -nɔ) and the archaic familiar-level ender –i. As we observed in (5a), the
evidential meaning must have diverged from this familiar-level ender –ney. When the polite-level
ender –yo is attached to –ney (as in –ney-yo), –ney lose its level meaning while retaining only the
evidential meaning. Similarly, -te has fused with the archaic ender -i to develop the familiar-level
ender –tey and loses its level meaning in the polite level –tey-yo. Thus, K. Chung’s (2005) proposal
that –ney is the present-tense counterpart of the evidential –te is misleading. A more correct
statement may be that –ney is the present counterpart of –tey. One difference, however, is that the
suffix –te is inherently an evidential in all contexts, whereas the indicative –ne by itself cannot
function as an evidential.
[3] The sentence ender te-la-ko
The sentence ender –te-la-ko [intimate level] and –te-la-ko-yo [polite level] have been fossilized as a retrospective evidential in the rough meaning of ‘You know, I saw/experienced/inferred that’. This frequently used casual ender consists of the declarative evidential ender –te-la + quotative particle ko. The particle ko, however, has lost its quotative function due to the loss of the following main verb ha ‘say’ and obtained the grammaticalized and subjectified meaning of the speaker’s own casual/emphatic report of the proposition to the addressee. Compare the retrospective evidential sentences (6a, b, c) with te-la-ko constructions (6a’’, b’, c’).
(6) a. pakk-ey pi-ka o-tey-yo
outside-at rain-SU come-RETRO-POL
‘[I saw] it raining outside’ 16
a’. pakk-ey pi-ka o-te-la-ko-yo
outside-at rain-SU come-RETRO-DEC-QT-POL
‘[you know, I saw] it raining outside’
b. ku ttay cengmal sok sangha-te-la
that time really inside/mind hurt-RETRO-DEC
“[I felt] I was really upset that time’
b’. ku ttay cengmal sok sangha-te-la-ko
that time really inside/mind hurt-RETRO-DEC-QT
“[You know, I felt] I was really upset that time’
c. John-un nayil pwusan-ey ka-tey-yo
John-TOP tomorrow Pusan-to go-RETRO-POL
‘[I learned] John is leaving for Pusan tomorrow’
c’. John-un nayil pwusan-ey ka-te-la-ko-yo
John-TOP tomorrow Pusan-to go-RETRO-DEC-QT-POL
‘[You know, I learned] John is leaving for Pusan tomorrow’
The semantic differences between the two sets are minor. While (6a, b, c) are straightforward expressions of the speaker’s visual observation, experience, and inference, (6a’,
b’ c’) express the speaker’s visual observation, experience, and inference with the connotation of 17
the speaker’s casual/emphatic report with some emotive appealing to the addressee, comparable
roughly to the English discourse marker ‘you know’.
Unlike the pre-final –te, which is used in question, –te-la-ko(-yo) is used exclusively in statement and cannot be used in question, except in echo questions like pakk-ey pi-ka o-te-la-ko- yo? ‘Are you saying that you saw it raining?’ Another restriction is that only the intimate (-te-la- ko) and polite level (-te-la-ko-yo) are available. The evidential –ney has not been extended to a similar construction.
2.2 The quotative and reported (hearsay) evidentials
Quotative and reported (or hearsay) evidentials are indirect and secondhand ones. Discussions on
these evidentials have focused on the sentence enders –ta-n-ta/-la-n-ta and –tay/-lay (and their variants), both translated as ‘someone reports that, I heard that’, where –la and –lay occur immediately after a copula (i) or the retrospective evidential -te (e.g. H. Lee 1991, 2014; N. Kim
2000; S. Sohn and Park 2003; Chung 2005; J. Chung 2009, 2010; Lim 2010; J. Kim 2012). K.
Song (2010) discusses -ta-mye(nse) and -ta-ko, in addition to -ta-n-ta and –tay, while Ahn and
Yap (2014, 2015) examine the development of -ta-ko, -ta-mye, -ta-myense, ta-nu-n, and –ta-n-ta, tracing their pragmatic functions in discourse.
The genesis of quotative/reported evidentials is caused by the omission of the quotative particle ko ‘that’ in a plain-level quotative clause and the verb of saying ha (contracted from malha ‘say, talk’) in the main clause. The reduction process is assumed to be initiated by the omission of ko, as its omission is predictable and recoverable before a main clause verb of saying and does not affect the bi-clausehood. The next step is the omission of the main clause verb ha due arguably to the well-known inter-vocalic h weakening in Korean (e.g. Sohn 1999:175) and 18
subsequent shortening of geminate aa (e.g. Sohn ibid.:176). When this so-called ko ha ‘say that’
omission happens, the orphaned suffixes in the main clause are agglutinated to the embedded
sentence ender, deriving new mono-clausal enders.
Depending on the embedded sentence types, the innovated enders are (a) declarative
series ‘X reports that’: plain –ta/la-n-ta (< -ta/-la ko ha-n-ta), intimate –tay/-lay (< -ta/-la ko
hay), familiar –ta/la-ney (< -ta/-la ko ha-ney), polite –tay/lay-yo (< -ta/-la ko hay-yo), deferential
–ta/la-p-ni-ta (< -ta/-la ko ha-p-ni-ta), and relative –ta/la-nu-n (< -ta/-la ko ha-nu-n), (b) interrogative series ‘X asks Y whether’: plain –nya-n-ta (< -nya ko ha-n-ta), intimate –nyay (< - nya ko hay), etc. and relative –nya-nu-n (<-nya ko ha-nun-n), (c) propositive series ‘X suggests that’: plain –ca-n-ta (< -ca ko ha-n-ta), intimate –cay (<-ca ko hay), etc. and relative –ca-nu-n (<
-ca ko ha-nu-n), (d) imperative series ‘X commands that’: plain –(u)la-n-ta (< -(u)la ko ha-n-ta), intimate –(u)lay (<-(u)la ko hay), etc. and relative –(u)la-nu-n (<-(u)la ko ha-nu-n).
The whole reduction processes involved may be schematized as: Plain-level embedded sentence ender (-ta/-la, –nya, –(u)la, -ca) + ko # ha(y)-suffixes > (predictable ko deletion) -ta/-la,
-nya, -(u)la, -ca # ha(y)-suffixes > (intervocalic h weakening) -ta/-la, -nya, -(u)la, -ca # a(y)- suffixes > (geminate-vowel shortening) -ta/-la, -nya, -(u)la, -ca + (y)-suffixes > (agglutination of orphaned ender) –ta(y)/-la(y), -nya(y), -(u)la(y), -ca(y) + main clause suffixes. The innovated enders can be made interrogative like –ta/la-ni?, tay/lay-ni?, tay/lay-yo? and –ta-p-ni-kka?, but cannot be made imperative nor propositive. Notice that the most frequently discussed –ta/la-n-ta and –tay/-lay are only a frequently used sub-set of the whole set of innovated enders.
The distinction is made between quotative and reported evidentials. If the reporter is specified overtly or covertly in a sentence (less grammaticalized), it is interpreted as a quotative. 19
If the reporter is so general and thus unspecifiable (slightly more grammaticalized), the reported
reading is obtained.4
[1] Quotative evidentials: declarative -ta(y)/-la(y), interrogative -nya(y), imperative –(u)la(y),
and propositive -ca(y)
The plain-level embedded sentence enders of the four sentence types function as quotative evidentials if, due to ko ha omission, followed by one or more inflectional suffixes, including a sentence ender. The variants tay/-lay, nyay, -cay, and -(u)lay are evidentials by themselves since
they have absorbed the segment –y of the saying verb ha(y), as in ka-cay < ka-ca (ko ha)y
‘someone suggests us to go’, ka-lay-yo < ka-la (ko ha)y-yo ‘someone commands us to go’. I assume that the quotative meaning of the omitted ko ha is not lost but attached to the embedded enders to render them quotative evidentials. Native speakers can readily recover the bi-clausal form ko ha based on the quotative meaning in the embedded enders. Thus, the evidential –tay in
(7d) is generated from (7a) via (7b) and (7c), while (7a) can be readily recovered from (7d) based on the quotative meaning of -tay.
(7) a. nayil pi-ka o-n-ta ko hay-yo
tomorrow rain-SU come-INDIC-DEC QT say-POL
4 This ender has been even more grammaticalized via the speaker’s subjectification, to indicate the speaker’s own affection-laden informing to the addressee, as in seysang-ey-nun chakha-n salam-to manh-ta-n-ta ‘There are many good people in the world as
well, my dear.’ (Sohn 1978). 20
b. nayil pi-ka o-n-ta hay-yo
tomorrow rain-SU come-INDIC-DEC say-POL
c. nayi pi-ka o-n-ta ay-yo
tomorrow rain-SU come-INDIC-DEC say-POL
d. nayil pi-ka o-n-tay-yo
tomorrow rain-SU come-INDIC-QUOT-POL
‘They said it will rain tomorrow’
All the sentences in (7) are grammatical and largely synonymous. In view of the seeming synonymy, one may want to argue that the evidential suffixes are not grammaticalized ones but merely synchronic contractions that can easily be recoverable by native speakers to full bi-
clauses. Indeed, the omitted ko ha seems to be present in native speakers’ psychological reality,
suggesting that they are a recoverable deletion.
Yet, there are some reasons to treat the innovated suffixes as evidentials as against their
bi-clausal counterparts. First, native speakers use them as regular mono-clausal suffixes in a
manner parallel to –tey-yo and ney-yo, as in ttena-keyss-tey/ney-yo ‘I perceive(d) that X might/may have left’ and ttena-keyss-tay-yo ‘X said that (s)he will leave’. Second, unlike in a bi- clausal situation where the verb ha can be preceded by a negative adverb an ‘not’ or mos
‘cannot’ and followed by a subject honorific –(u)si or a modal, the evidential suffixes cannot be negated, subject-honorified, or modalized. Third, there are connotative differences in the apparent synonymy. The meaning in the un-omitted ko ha constructions carries relatively more 21
formal connotation with the speaker’s objective stance, whereas the meaning of the ko ha-
omitted enders carries more casual connotation with the speaker’s somewhat subjectivized stance
(sometimes with emotive connotation). Finally, there is some evidence that quotative/reported
evidentials are in the process of incipient grammaticalization, as shown in the unnaturalness of
evidential constructions with two subjects (upper and lower). For instance, (8a) where only one
subject occurs as the reporter is natural, but (8b) in which two subjects appear sounds unnatural,
requiring forced interpretation.
(8) a. kyoswu-nim-un phathi-ey o-si-keyss-tay-yo
professor-HT-TOP party-to come-SH-will-QUOT-POL
‘The professor said he would come to the party’
b. ?John-i kyoswu-nim-un phathi-ey o-si-keyss-tay-yo
John-SU professor-HT-TOP party-to come-SH-will-QUOT-POL
‘John says the professor will come to the party’
[2] Reported (hearsay) evidentials: the declarative –ta(y)/-la(y)
Only the declarative evidentials –ta(y)/-la(y) may function as hearsay evidentials, as in hankwuk- ey cwungkwuk haksayng-i manh-tay-yo ‘[they say/I heard/it is said] that there are many Chinese students in Korea’. Some linguists include the sentence-type variants, such as -nyay, -(u)lay, and
–cay as quotative/reported evidentials (e.g. H. Lee 2014). Thus, Kwon (2011) sets up –ay to
cover all these variants as well as -tay. These variants, except the declarative, however, function 22
as quotative but not as reported, as they require an overt or covert reporter, as in John-un na-
eykey mikwuk ka-nyay ‘John asked me whether I am going to America’,
[3] The sentence ender –ta/la-mye(nse) ‘I heard that, is it true?’
The sentence ender –ta/la-mye/mey and its source form –ta/la-myense are used when the speaker
heard the propositional content indirectly and would like to mildly confirm what (s)he has heard.
This ender is viewed as a reported or hearsay evidential (e.g. K. Song 2010; M. Kim 2011; Ahn
and Yap 2014, 2015).5
I speculate that this ender has developed from ko ha omission in a conjunctive clause and
the omission of the main interrogative clause. The processes involved may have been: plain-level
ender –ta/-la ko# ha-myense ## interrogative clause > (ko ha omission) –ta/-la-myense ##
interrogative clause > (main clause deletion while attaching the interrogative connotation to -
myense) –ta/-la-myense?! Hypothetically, the historical source of (9) is assumed to be John-un
aphu-ta (ko ha)-myense (cip-ey iss-ni)? ‘Is John staying home saying that he is sick?’, if the
parenthesized parts are lost and the ender –ta-myense was subjectified and optionally contracted.
(9) John-un aphu-ta-mye(nse)-yo?!
John-TOP sick-DEC-while-POL
‘I heard that John is sick, is it true?’
5 K. Chung (2005) and Ahn and Yap (ibid.) include the speaker’s emphatic assertion –ta/la-ko ‘I am saying that’ (e.g. na-nun an ka-n-ta-ko ‘[I say] I won’t go’) in their list of evidentials. This form developed from main-clause omission in a reportative
sentence, leaving the quotative particle ko intact. The orphaned ko in the sentence-final position has been subjectified as the
speaker’s own emphatic and casual report of the propositional content. 23
2.3 Inferential evidentials
[1] The phrasal suffix –na/nunka-po ‘it seems, it looks like’
The innovated inflectional suffix –na-po and its free variant –(n)un-ka-po are viewed as (indirect
or secondhand) inferential evidentials (e.g. Strauss 2005:440; K. Song 2010; Sohn 2012; Kwon
2012a, b; H. Lee 2014). Notably, Kwon (2012b:114) argues that –na-po is an inferential
evidential marker, defining “inferential evidentiality as a situation in which information has been
inferred using inductive logic applied to circumstantial sensory evidence (Aikhenvald 2004:36).”
H. Lee (2014) indicates that abductive reasoning is manifested by –na/nunka-po in that a source
or cause is conjected based on a situation that is known to be its consequence. Thus, for example,
seeing someone yawning, one can say phikonha-na-po-ayo ‘he seems to be tired.’
As I indicated in Sohn (2012), -na/nunka po- has two distinct usages: the indirect question in the literal meaning of ‘see whether’ (10a) in a bi-clausal construction and the evidential function of the speaker’s inference as a mono-clausal suffix in the sense of ‘it seems (looks, appears), I guess’ (10b). The evidential suffix is assumed to have diverged from the bi-clausal indirect question construction through structural reanalysis and semantic shift. Due to the decategorization involved (cf. Hopper 1991), the suffix is unable to take any TAM suffix, including subject honorific -usi, past/perfective –ess(-ess), modal –keyss, or indicative –n, nor negation an/mos, as in (10b, cf). In the evidential usage, no imperative, propositive, or interrogative sentence is allowed.
In all speech levels, only the declarative occurs.
(10) a. pi-ka o-na/nunka po-ass-eyo
rain-SU come-whether see-PAST-POL 24
‘I checked whether it was raining or not’
b. pi-ka o-na/nunka-po-ayo
rain-SU come-seem-POL
‘It seems to be raining’
cf. *pi-ka o-na/nunka-po-ass-eyo (use of past/perfective –ass)
rain-SU come-seem-PAST-POL
‘It seemed to be raining’
*pi-ka o-na/nunka-po-n-ta (use of indicative -n)
rain-SU come-seem-INDIC-DEC
‘It seems to be raining’
[2] The phrasal suffix –nun/un/ul-moyang-i ‘it appears, it seems’
The phrasal suffix –nun/un/ul moyang-i is regarded as an inferential evidential (e.g. K. Song
2010, H. Lee 2014). This suffix has developed from a relative clause ender –(n)un (non-past in verb), -un (past or non-past in adjective), or –ul (prospective) + noun moyang ‘appearance, shape’ + copula i ‘is the appearance that’. The decategorization of the bi-clausal construction to a suffix is observed in the fact that the copula i cannot be inflected in terms of tense, subject honorific, or modal. The speaker can use this phrasal suffix only when there is external circumstantial sensory evidence for saying the proposition. For instance, hearing (but not seeing) rain falling, the speaker may utter (11a), while seeing the overcast, (s)he may utter (11b). 25
(11) a. pi-ka o-nun-moyang-i-eyyo
rain-SU come-REL-appearance-be-POL
‘It seems to be raining’
a. pi-ka o-l-moyang-i-eyyo
rain-SU come-REL-appearance-be-POL
‘It appears that it will rain’
Now the question is how the inferential evidential –na-po and –nun/un/ul-moyang-i are different from the inference-based perceptual evidentials –te and –ney. The former convey the speaker’s inference made on the basis of what (s)he has seen or heard. The latter, on the other hand, do not convery an inference but the speaker’s perception of an inferred situation as if it is an observed fact. The former have inferences as core meanings, whereas the latter have visual, experiential, or inferential perceptions as their core meanings.
[3] Evidential or modal?: -keyss, -ci, -ul-kes-i, -ulkel, etc. Inflectional suffixes like the speaker’s volition/conjecture –keyss, speaker’s comittal/suppositive/suspective –ci, speaker’s prediction –ul-kes-i, and speaker’s presumption – ulkel are treated as evidentials by some linguists (e.g. K. Song 2010; J. Kim 2012; H. Lee 2014).
As the authors concerned argue, all these suffixes cannot be felicitously used without the speaker’s having some background evidence or knowledge. For example, some linguists regard 26
the suffix –keyss as evidential because it indicates that the propositional content conveyed is the
speaker’s conjecture made through his/her deductive reasoning based on the evidence that (s)he
has acquired or the relevant knowledge he has.
The same suffixes, however, are treated as epistemic modal elements by many linguists as well, because they satisfy the common definition of epistemic modality that it refers to the way the speaker communicates his/her doubts, certainties, and guesses or to the degree to which the speaker is committed to the truth of the propositional content conveyed.
The issue is: what is the primary meaning of these suffixes, the source of information or
the speaker’s evaluation/judgment/belief of the knowledge upon which a proposition is based? In
this respect, I would prefer to view these elements as modal, rather than evidential. It is
undeniable, however, that all evidentials have some modal force, while all modal elements have
some evidential force.
2. Grammatical status of Korean evidentials
As observed thus far, the Korean evidential system consists of the three sub-classes: perceptual,
quotative/reported, and inferential. All the members of the three sub-classes are inflectional
suffixes that occur optionally in predicate constructions. In view of their broad semantic scopes,
they are placed at the pre-final or final slots in predicate constructions.
The three sub-classes are in a syntagmatic relationship and can occur in sequence in a
predicate construction, while the members of each sub-class are in a paradigmatic relationship
and only one member may occur in a given sentence. When all three sub-classes happen to occur
in a simple sentence, the syntagmatic order among them is Inferential + Perceptual +
Reportative/hearsay. Furthermore, evidentials occur after the subject honorific (-usi), 27
tense/aspect (-ess(-ess)), and volitive/conjecture/future (–keyss) if any of these occurs, as
illustrated in (12).
(12) a. John-un ttena-na-po-te-lay-yo
John-TOP leave-INFER-RETRO-QUOT-POL
‘(Someone) says that (s)he perceived that John seemed to be leaving’
b. kyoswu-nim-un ttena-si-ess-keyss-ney/tey-yo
professor-HT-TOP teave-SH-PAST-may-INST/RETRO-POL
‘I perceive(d) that the professor may/might have left’
Thus, I propose that the inflectional structure of Korean predicates include the evidential
categories as illustrated in (13), where ( ) stands for optional occurrence. Notice that only the stem and sentence/clause type suffixes occur obligatorily.
(13) Predicate stem-(SH) (TAM) (INFER) (RETRO) (QUOT/REP) (AH) (INDIC) DEC
ka ‘go’ -(u)si-ess-ess-keyss-na-po -te -la -p -ni -ta
‘(The reporter) says [-la] (s)he perceived [-te] that it appeared [-na-po] (to him/her) that (a
senior person) might [–keyss] have gone’ (talking to a senior addressee [-p-ni-ta])
3. A brief conclusion
Based on the foregoing observation, Korean evidentials may be characterised as follows. First,
Korean evidentials, all optional in occurrence, are classified into three sub-classes: perceptual, 28
quotative/reported, and inferential, each of which has two or more paradigmatically related
member evidentials. The three sub-classes are syntagmatically related, occurring in the order of
inferential, perceptual, and quotative/reported.
Second, perceptual evidentials manifest a contrast between a prior perception
(retrospective) evidential and an instantaneous perception evidential. The semantic feature of
pastness is built in the former, but the evidential marker does not function as a past tense marker
in contemporary Korean.
Third, all the proposed evidentials are inflectional suffixes. They are distinguished from
and interact with TAM elements. All three sub-classes occur only after TAM, indicating that they
are distinct from TAM and their semantic scopes are broader than TAM.
Fourth, all the proposed evidentials are reanalyzed, subjectified products through grammaticalization from non-evidential constructions. Past perception –te was assumed to have developed from the past tense marker, instantaneous perception –ney from the familiar-level
sentence ender, quotative/reported evidentials from bi-clausal quotative sentences, and the
inferential evidentials from complex sentences with a verb of seeing or a noun of appearance.
Finally, some periphrastic constructions, which are yet to be grammaticalized, function like
evidentials. This is an interesting topic for further study.
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Abbreviations
1 1st person
2 2nd person
AH addressee honorific
DEC declarative
HT honorific title
INDIC indicative
INFER inferential
INST instantaneous
INTER interrogative
PAST past
POL politeness 34
PROG progressive
QT quotative particle
QUOT quotative
REL relativizer
REP reported
RETRO retrospective
SH subject honorific SU subject TAM tense-aspect-mood TOP topic