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Demonstratives and Their Reflexes: a Study in Grammaticalization from Eyak

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Demonstratives and Their Reflexes: a Study in Grammaticalization from Eyak Chris Donlay LING 236: Advanced Language Change Final Paper November 30, 2009 Demonstratives and Their Reflexes: A Study in Grammaticalization from Eyak The demonstrative has long been cited as prime material for grammaticalization. Its very nature makes it prone to further evolution. Because it is deictic, its meaning is general and use frequent – two common preconditions for grammaticalization (Hopper and Traugott 2003). This flexibility allows it to appear in a variety of constructions, which then leads to the development of polysemy and perhaps morphological and phonological change. And indeed demonstratives often follow this path. In a cross-linguistic study of 85 languages, Diessel (1999) shows that they may grammaticalize into a number of other functions, from personal pronouns and complementizers to determiners, copulas and focus markers. No language will develop all of these uses, but most will develop some. And given the importance of the independent demonstrative, its original use remains even as it evolves other functions. This phenomenon, in which older and newer uses coexist within a language, is called layering in grammaticalization (Hopper and Traugott 2003:124-126). While Diessel instantiates these many functions with examples from a variety of languages, he does not focus on the resultant layering that exists in each. To that end, in this paper I analyze the grammaticalization of demonstratives in a single Native American language: Eyak, a relative of the Athabaskan family. Despite the fact that there are no historical records for the language, Eyak provides an ideal laboratory for this kind of study. Its demonstratives have clearly evolved in function but not to the point where morphological and phonological change have rendered them unrecognizable. As a result, it is possible to identify the demonstrative origins of certain pronouns, articles, copulas, focus markers and discourse markers in the language. This transparency also highlights two findings not discussed by Diessel: a dual demonstrative that simultaneously refers to two referents, and discourse markers that do not originate from adverbial demonstratives. Donlay, Demonstratives in Eyak, p. 2 Eyak Eyak is an extinct language formerly spoken by communities who lived on the Gulf of Alaska, roughly between the towns of Yakutat and Cordova (Krauss 1982). The language descends from the Athabaskan-Eyak family, which is believed to have existed approximately three millennia ago (Krauss 1982). Eyak split from Proto-Athabaskan at some point before the latter came into being about two thousand years ago. It is therefore a distant relative of Slave, the lone Athabaskan language included in Diessel’s study. Syntactically, Eyak is similar to its Athabaskan relatives. It is a verb-final language with complex verbal morphology. The verb structure consists of a stem and a series of templatic affix positions, both prefixes, suffixes and enclitics. All other elements in a clause occur before the verb and word order among them is flexible. Third person subjects are canonically not marked on the verb (Krauss 1965). The demonstrative system in Eyak is a simple one, containing four words: al nonhuman proximal aw nonhuman distal/unmarked anh human singular ahnu∙ human plural They are further described in the next section. The previously-mentioned dual demonstrative, unhaw, only exists in the focus construction and is discussed in that section. Eyak has not yet been fully documented. There is no comprehensive grammar, but a dictionary (Krauss 1970a) and annotated folktales (Krauss 1970b, Krauss 1982) have been published. The data used in this paper are gathered from the later work. And although the structure of narratives favor third-person constructions, there is enough reported speech in the tales to see how personal deictics function in the language. The spelling system used in the narratives is shown in Table 1 alongside their IPA equivalents, though only the former is used in this paper. The vowels in Eyak are [i, e, ǝ, a, u]; the shwa is transcribed as a. Long vowels are indicated with a raised dot (e.g. i∙ [i:]). Vowels may also be nasalized, which is shown in the transcription by n following the vowel (Krauss Donlay, Demonstratives in Eyak, p. 3 1970b, Krauss 1982). Interlinear glosses and literal translations are provided by me unless otherwise noted1. Table 1: Consonant inventory of Eyak Plain d [t] dl [tɬ] dz [ʦ] j [ʧ] g [g] gw [gʷ] g [q] Aspirated t [tʰ] tl [tɬʰ] ts [ʦʰ] ch [ʧʰ] k [kʰ] q [qʰ] Glottalized t’ [t’] tl’ [tɬ’] ts’ [ʦ’] ch’ [ʧ’] k’ [k’] q’ [q’] Fricative ɫ [ɬ] s [s] sh [ʃ] x [x] xw [xʷ] x [χ] Sonorant w [w] m [m] l [l] n [n] y [j] Glottal h [h] ’ [Ɂ] (adapted from Krauss 1970b, Krauss 1982) Defining a Demonstrative The origin of demonstratives is a controversial subject. The process of grammaticalization rests on the idea that all grammatical items evolve from lexical expressions. Yet demonstratives, which clearly count as grammatical items, were until recently believed to be linguistic primitives. Diessel (1999) takes this view, suggesting that demonstratives may exist in language prior to the beginning of grammaticalization and, therefore, prior to any other grammatical form. More recently, Heine and Kuteva have shown that demonstratives may be derived from locative adverbs and even verbs such as ‘go’ or ‘see’ (2007:84). However, this does not completely disprove the earlier view. The fact that a language evolves new demonstratives does not mean that there were none previously, nor that all demonstratives originate in this way. Indeed, the literature is full of examples of new constructions supplanting older synonymous ones (e.g. Hopper and Traugott 2003). Their fundamental usefulness to communication suggests that ‘demonstratives might form a class of deictic expressions that belong to the basic vocabulary of every language’ (Diessel 1999:8). The data from Eyak does not resolve this issue; the origin of its demonstratives remains unclear. 11 Abbreviations: CONT contrastive, COP copula, CUST customary, DEM demonstrative, DIST distal, DU dual, FILL filler, FOC focus, HUM human, NEG negative, OBJ object, PFV perfective, PL plural, POSS possessive, PROG progressive, PROX proximal, REP repetitive, SG singular, SUBJ subject. Donlay, Demonstratives in Eyak, p. 4 Despite these questions, Diessel’s study of demonstratives is instructive. For example, he takes a broad view in defining the demonstrative, highlighting both its syntactic and pragmatic uses: They are primarily used to focus the hearer’s attention on objects or locations in the speech situation (often in combination with a pointing gesture), but they may also function to organize the information flow in the ongoing discourse. More specifically, demonstratives are often used to keep track of prior discourse participants and to activate specific shared knowledge. The most basic function of demonstratives is, however, to orient the hearer outside of discourse in the surrounding situation. (Diessel 1999:2) In the study, Diessel examines demonstratives in terms of four parameters: morphology, semantics, syntax and pragmatics. Each is discussed in turn, covering both Diessel’s generalizations and how they relate to the specifics of Eyak. Morphology Cross-linguistically, the morphology of demonstratives varies considerably (Diessel 1999:22). In some, demonstratives are invariable, in others they are highly inflected. Typically, they remain unbound, though cliticization is common. In Eyak, the four demonstratives are invariable and are largely unbound. They do take postpositions as suffixes, however. Unbound and bound demonstratives are shown in (1) and (2) respectively. (1) Aw qit dasa’iɫinu∙, DEM.DIST downhill dump-PFV-3PL They [literally ‘those’, i.e. ravens] dumped them down, (Krauss 1982:51) (2) Awq’ ya∙naht ate∙k’. DEM.DIST-on down.towards lie.down-CUST It would lie down on top of them [literally ‘on those’, i.e. ducks]. (Krauss 1982:49) Semantics Semantically, demonstratives typically contain two types of information: distance and reference (Diessel 1999:35-36). The former registers the relationship between the target item Donlay, Demonstratives in Eyak, p. 5 and the speaker’s deictic center, differentiating between, for example, proximal and distal. The latter encodes characteristics about the referent, which may include animacy, gender and humanness. In Eyak, the demonstratives are semantically asymmetric. The two nonhuman demonstratives encode both distance and reference, but number is not differentiated. Al is proximal, meaning ‘this one’/‘these’ and aw is distal meaning ‘that one’/‘those’. These forms also encode basic parameters about the referent, which may be animate but nonhuman, inanimate, or propositional. Furthermore, the distal has also developed an unmarked meaning (Krauss, personal communication), a common cross-linguistic occurrence (Diessel 1999). These three uses are instantiated in the following examples. (3) animate but nonhuman aw daɫaxwe∙k DEM.DIST groundhog those groundhogs (Krauss 1982:112) (4) inanimate aw t’ik’ɫ sixa’ DEM.DIST bow-and-arrow 1SG-POSS my bow-and-arrow [literally, ‘that bow-and-arrow of me’] (Krauss 1982:85) (5) propositional Awleht q'uhnu∙ aw shaxwa∙shɫ. DEM.DIST-because.of FOC-3PL DEM.DIST butcher-PFV That's why [literally, ‘because of that’, i.e. previous events] they butchered it. (Krauss 1982:52) The human demonstratives, on the other hand, only encode humanness and number, but not distance or gender. Anh refers to a singular human and ahnu∙ plural humans. They are also invariable and typically unbound, although they too may take postpositions as suffixes. Examples are shown below. Donlay, Demonstratives in Eyak, p. 6 (6) Anh utl’ yi∙nhinh awa∙ uxaht q’e’ sdiyahɫ. DEM.HUM.SG 3P-with be-3SG however 3P-without back go-PFV His companion [literally, ‘that one (who) is with him’], however, had gone back without him. (Krauss 1982:110:7) (7) Anhch’ k’ushiyah ula’x di∙’yahɫ. DEM.HUM.SG-with angry 3P-over become.angry-PFV She is infuriated with him. (Krauss 1982:91) Syntax In terms of syntax, Diessel (1999:57-58) distinguishes between the syntactic context and categorial status of demonstratives.
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