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Compounding, Preposed Adjectives and Intensifiers in Scottish Gaelic

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Compounding, Preposed Adjectives and Intensifiers in Scottish Gaelic Csonka, Veronika (2016) Compounding, preposed adjectives and intensifiers in Scottish Gaelic. PhD thesis. http://theses.gla.ac.uk/8220/ Copyright and moral rights for this work are retained by the author A copy can be downloaded for personal non-commercial research or study, without prior permission or charge This work cannot be reproduced or quoted extensively from without first obtaining permission in writing from the author The content must not be changed in any way or sold commercially in any format or medium without the formal permission of the author When referring to this work, full bibliographic details including the author, title, awarding institution and date of the thesis must be given Enlighten:Theses http://theses.gla.ac.uk/ [email protected] “A nation survives through its language and traditions.” (Earl István Széchenyi, supporter of the Hungarian language reform in the19th century) Compounding, Preposed Adjectives and Intensifiers in Scottish Gaelic Veronika Csonka MRes in Scottish Gaelic, MA in Linguistics Submitted in fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of PhD School of Humanities/ Sgoil nan Daonnachdan College of Arts University of Glasgow/ Oilthigh Ghlaschu June 2016/ Ògmhios 2016 1 2 Abstract This thesis deals with the topic of compounding in Scottish Gaelic, in particular the relationship between marked adjective + noun compounds (e.g. deagh oidhche ‘good night’) and their unmarked noun + adjective alternatives (e.g. oidhche mhath, literally ‘night good’). The first part of the thesis surveys the relevant linguistic literature on compounding, with a specific focus on compounding in Celtic languages, and the research question for the investigation is specified as follows: in which circumstances do Gaelic speakers use the marked adjective + noun constructions in contrast to the umarked alternatives? The investigation itself consists of two experimental studies. The first of these is a corpus study using a 2.5 million word, mainly 20th century subcorpus of Corpas na Gàidhlig, a 19 million word corpus of Scottish Gaelic texts covering a range of genres, dialects and historical periods. In the course of this study, all phrases in which these adjectives occurred were collected and analysed. To annotate data the freeware AntConc concordance package was used, followed by a statistic analysis of the annotated phrases. A range of hypotheses were developed as a result of the corpus study, for example: (a) the role of conceptuality, subjectivity and emphasis in the use of preposed adjectives as opposed to their plain counterpart; (b) the religious register of ma(i)th good; and (c) the role of contrast in the use of attributive plain adjective aosta compared with the highly productive use of the preposed adjective seann- to convey the meaning ʻold’. The second experimental study involved interviews with native speakers, with the aim of providing further evidence relating to these hypotheses. 10 interviews were conducted with native speakers of Gaelic, mainly applying pictures and translations of the relevant adjectival phrases, investigating the meaning, stress pattern and hyphenation of these, as well as the default adjectives in loan words or with tangible nouns (e.g. vehicles, animals), etc. This combined methodology revealed various factors that influence the choice between marked adjective + noun and unmarked noun + adjective constructions, including: (a) dialect (with the overall use of preceding adjectives in South Uist, but the preference for math ʻgood’ in Lewis); (b) register (ma(i)th in religious texts); (c) conceptualisation in the vocabulary (by the preceding adjectives deagh- ʻgood’ and droch- ʻbad’ qualifying abstract concepts, whereas the plain adjectives math ʻgood’ and dona ʻbad’ tangible and countable nouns); (d) pragmatic factors such as the emphatic nature of deagh- as opposed to math; and (e) grammatical factors (see the use of deagh-/droch- in subjunctive clauses, particularly in time expressions). 3 Content 1. Introduction ........................................................................................................................... 12 1.1. Methods……………………………………...………………………………………………..13 1.1.1. Corpus study………………………………..………………………………………………13 1.1.2. Interviews……………………………………...……………………………………………14 1.2. Structure of thesis…………………………………………………………………………….15 1.3. Findings……………………………………………………………………………………….16 1.4. Accents and abbreviations…………………………………………………………………...17 2. Compounding ......................................................................................................................... 18 2.1 Definitions ............................................................................................................................ 18 2.2 Problems............................................................................................................................... 19 2.3 Similarity to idioms .............................................................................................................. 23 2.3.1. Continuum........................................................................................................................ 24 2.4. Lexicalisation (and compositionality) ................................................................................. 25 2.5. Novel compounds (productivity) ........................................................................................ 27 2.6. Metaphoricity ...................................................................................................................... 28 2.7. Context ................................................................................................................................ 28 2.8. Classification of compounds ............................................................................................... 29 2.8.1. Exocentric vs endocentric compounds ............................................................................. 32 2.9. Criteria for compoundhood ................................................................................................ 33 2.9.1. Features (in different languages) ..................................................................................... 33 2.9.2. Phonological criteria ........................................................................................................ 35 2.9.3. Morphological and syntactic tests for distinguishing compounds .................................. 35 2.10. Compounding within Linguistics ...................................................................................... 37 2.10.1. Generative Linguistics.................................................................................................... 37 2.10.2. Other linguistic frameworks .......................................................................................... 40 3. Compounding in Celtic languages ......................................................................................... 42 3.1. Definition of compounds ..................................................................................................... 42 3.2. Constructional idioms ......................................................................................................... 45 3.3. Proper names ...................................................................................................................... 47 3.4. Compounds in Brittonic languages..................................................................................... 47 3.5. Irish (and Manx) compounds ............................................................................................. 50 3.5.1. Types of compounds ......................................................................................................... 50 3.5.1.1. Irish constructional idioms ........................................................................................... 53 3.5.2. Classification of Irish compounds .................................................................................... 61 3.5.3. Signs of compoundhood in Irish………………………….………………………………..69 3.5.3.1. Lenition and other phonological issues in Irish compounds……......………………….69 4 3.5.3.2. Plural of Irish compounds .............................................................................................70 3.5.4. Manx compounds .............................................................................................................72 3.6. Scottish Gaelic compounds..................................................................................................75 3.6.1. Compound types ...............................................................................................................75 3.6.2. Stress in Scottish Gaelic compounds ................................................................................76 3.6.3. Scottish Gaelic preceding adjectives ................................................................................78 3.6.4. Lenition .............................................................................................................................79 3.6.5. Evidence for compoundhood in Scottish Gaelic ..............................................................81 3.6.6. Conclusion ........................................................................................................................82 3.7. Classification of Scottish Gaelic compounds ......................................................................84 3.7.1. Proper compounds ...........................................................................................................84
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