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Universität Duisburg-Essen Jan Tent The Structure of Deictic Day-Names Systems: Evidence for Universal and Culture-Specific Conceptualisations of Diurnal Division of the Time Continuum? Series A: General & Theoretical Papers ISSN 1435-6473 Essen: LAUD 1998 (2nd ed. with divergent page numbering 2007) Paper No. 435 Universität Duisburg-Essen Jan Tent Macquarie University, Australia The Structure of Deictic Day-Names Systems: Evidence for Universal and Culture-Specific Conceptualisations of Diurnal Division of the Time Continuum? Copyright by the author Reproduced by LAUD 1998 (2nd ed. with divergent page numbering 2007) Linguistic Agency Series A University of Duisburg-Essen General and Theoretical FB Geisteswissenschaften Paper No. 435 Universitätsstr. 12 D- 45117 Essen Order LAUD-papers online: http://www.linse.uni-due.de/linse/laud/index.html Or contact: [email protected] Jan Tent THE STRUCTURE OF DEICTIC DAY-NAME SYSTEMS: EVIDENCE FOR UNIVERSAL AND CULTURE-SPECIFIC CONCEPTUALISATIONS OF DIURNAL DIVISION OF THE TIME CONTINUUM? Abstract. This paper is a cross linguistic study examining the structure of deictic day-name systems of 157 of the world's languages. Most of these systems reveal a recurring structural symmetry in the number of diurnal units identified either side of 'today'. As well as this type of numerical symmetry, most languages exhibit a morphological symmetry, and several a lexical symmetry. A small number of languages have numerically and/or morphologically asymmetrical systems. The nature of these symmetries and asymmetries in the light of linguistic relativity is briefly explored. 1. Introduction In the discussion of calendric units, in his now famous Santa Cruz Lectures on Deixis, Charles Fillmore (1975:47) mentions that many languages have a rich set of lexicalisations for deictic day-names. He refers to Persian (Farsi) which has a deictic day-name system that names two days ahead of and four days back from 'today', Japanese and Russian which both have systems extending three days either side of 'today', Vietnamese with a system extending three days ahead of 'today' and four days back, and Chinantec with a deictic day- name system that names four days on either side of 'today'. In this paper I shall examine such systems in more detail to see whether they reveal any universal characteristics in structure and composition. The study is based on a corpus of the deictic day-name inventories of 157 unsystematically sampled, but genetically diverse languages.1 The number of day-names per system ranges from 3 to 13, and the morphological complexity can range from simple monomorphemic lexemes to complex polymorphemic expressions. Most languages in the sample reveal a high degree structural and morphological symmetry in their systems, and almost two-thirds of the languages have a day-name system consisting of 5 items (i.e. two days named either side of'today').2 1 These were obtained via the generous replies to requests for data through the electronic discussion lists LINGUIST-List and INFO-SIL; personal communications with linguists, and a few non-linguist native speakers; and a number of grammars and dictionaries. In general I have accepted on good faith the assessments, descriptions, orthographical representations of day-name systems offered by my sources, though very occasionally I have had to make my own assessment on minor points. Tables cataloguing the languages in the corpus, their genetic affiliation and region where spoken are given in the appendix. 2 Any generalisations made or conclusions drawn regarding the structure of day-name systems refer only to those systems in my corpus. It is folly appreciated that day-name systems not mentioned in this survey may behave quite differently. 1 Deictic day-names are nouns or time adverbials which name, or identify, diurnal spans in relation to the 'coding time' (CT) of an utterance (i.e. the time at which an utterance is produced). Accordingly, the time adverbials today, temet (Luiseno), aujourd'hui (French), and marima (Erromangan - Sie) identity the diurnal span which incorporates the CT. On the other hand, yesterday, waxaam, hier, and ninu have reference to a prior time and identify the diurnal span preceding one which incorporates the CT; whilst tomorrow, 'exengay, demain, and mram have reference to a later time and identify the diurnal span following the one which incorporates the CT. Deictic day-names have two types of referent (Fillmore 1975) — they can either refer to the entire diurnal span (or to a certain length of time during the mentioned diurnal span), as in (1a), or to a specific point within the mentioned diurnal span, as in (1b): (1) a. It rained here in Suva yesterday. b. I'm flying out to Kiribati tomorrow. Day-names can also be used non-deictically as (2) shows: (2) "Work in the villages was still done communally, [...]. Tomorrow's tasks were announced by village criers at sundown today." (Lai 1992:66) The day-name inventories depicted in this paper are represented in the following manner (where N = "now" or 'the present diurnal span'; deictic items consecutively preceding N are indicated by a minus symbol, e.g. -1, -2, -3 etc.; and those consecutively following N with a plus symbol, e.g. +1, +2, +3 etc.): (3) a. Luiseño: waxaam -1 temet N 'present diurnal span' 'exngay +1 b. French: avant-hier -2 hier -1 aujourd'hui N demain +1 après-demain +2 c. Erromangan~Sie: nowisas -5 nowimpe -4 nowinag -3 nome -2 2 ninu -1 marima N mran +1 weme +2 winag +3 wimpe +4 wisas +5 2. Morphology of Deictic Day-Names Individual day-names are either monomorphemic or polymorphemic. Monomorphemic day- names — which comprise 49% of the 908 day-names in my corpus (450/908) — are either lexemes for the adverb meaning "now" (for hodiernal reference), or specialised non- transparent lexemes that name specific diurnal spans which are not defined in relation to each other. Polymorphemic expressions reveal three basic types of structure: • TYPE 1: Expressions consisting of a pre- and/or post-modified specialised non- transparent lexeme that names or identifies a specific diurnal span (32% - 289/908). • TYPE 2: Expressions consisting of the pre- and/or post-modified lexeme for "day" (18% - 162/908). • TYPE 3: A small group of miscellaneous items that are either transparent periphrastic phrases that describe the diurnal span being referred to, or pre- modified lexemes for the adverb meaning "now" (1% - 7/908). Pre- and post-modifiers can be in the form of one or more adverbial particles, prepositions/postpositions, adjectives, numerals, or determiners. All these are either affixes or free standing forms (see section 7.1). Following are examples the major polymorphemic day-name types in my sample: TYPE 1 : SPECIALISED DAY-NAME LEXEME + MODIFIER(S) a) Modifier = adverbial particle or preposition/postposition. As one might expect, this type of construction is most commonly used for day-names that identify diurnal units beyond -/+1 . They are also often defined in relation to preceding day- names. French: avant-hier '-2' (avant 'before', hier '-1'), après-demain '+2' (apres 'after', demain '+!'). German: vorgestern '-2' (vor- 'before', gestern '-1'), übermorgen '+2' (über- 'over', morgen '+1'). 3 Polish: przedwczoraj '-2' (przed- 'before', wczopraj '- r), pojutrze '+2' (po-'after' , jutrze < jutro '+1 '). Greek: proxθés '-2' (pro- 'before', xθhés '-1'), meθávrio '+2' (meθ- < meda 'after', ávrio '+1'). Estonian: üɫeeile '-2', uɫehomme '+2' (uɫe- 'over', eile '-1', homme '+1'). Sāmoan: talātu ananafi '-2' , talātu taeao '+2' (talātu > tala LOCATIVE BASE + atu DIRECTIONAL MARKER — away from speaker, ananafi '- 1 ', taeao '+1 ' Carib: mony koinaro '-2', mony koro'po '+2' (mony 'before/after', koinaro '-1 koro'po ‚+1’). Southern Tepehuan: vasmutakaav '-3' (takaav '-1', vas 'farther away', mu < mummu 'very far away'). Sulka: tetok '-2', tenmo '-1', ngmo '+1', ngtok '+2' (te- PAST, ng- FUT, tok ‘-/+2’, nmo/mo ‘-/+1’) Tolo: bongi ba '-2’ (bongi 'night', ba 'far back'). Kalam: (see 15b) employs the past time particle/affix atk or -tk with all its day-names preceding N. Guerrero Nahuatl: (4) ikwitlapanyewiptla -3 *- = 3SGPOSS yewiptla -2 -kwitlapan = 'behind' yalowa -1 ye- = 'already' aman N wiptla = '+2' mostla +1 wiptla +2 ikwitlapanyewiptla +3 b) Modifier = adjective. Though nowhere near as common, this type of construction is also mostly used for day- names beyond -/+1. Chamorro: nigapña '-2', agupa’ ña '+2' (nigap '-1', agupa '+1', na 'more'). Arosi: nonora wou '-2', ho'oawou '+2', nanora raha won '-4' (nanora '-1', ho'oa '+1', wou 'yonder', raha 'big'). 4 Varapu: (5) bariraravova -3 -ravova = 'one after the next' baririra -2 -ra = 'next' bariri -1 mare N uri +1 urira +2 uriranova +3 c) Modifier = numeral. This type of construction is not as common as one might expect. However, it does seem to be quite regularly used in a number of Oceanic and Mayan languages. These include: Lenakel: nhiksil '-3', tonhiksil '+3' (nhni < nihin '-2', ksil < kesil 'three', to- FUT). Kilivia: bogiyu '+1', bogitolu '+2' (bogi 'night', yu 'two', tolu 'three'). Wayan: (6) also has the base bogi 'night', to which numerals (rua 'two', tolu 'three', vā 'four', lima 'five', ono 'six', vitu 'seven' etc.) are affixed (see also section 7.3): (6) etc. a bogivitu -1 a = 3 SG PAST a bogiono -6 ei = 3SG FUT a bogilima -5 a bogivā -4 a bogitolu - 3 a bogirua -2 nanoa -1 nikua N nimataka +1 ez bogirua +2 ei bogitolu +3 e/ bogivā +4 e/ bogilima +5 ei bogiono +6 ei bogivitu +1 etc. Huixtec Tzotzil (7) and Veracruz Huasteco (15a) offer other, though slightly le transparent, examples: 5 (7) oxje - 3 cha'- & chab = < chib 'two' chabje -2 ox- = < oxib 'three' volje -1 avi c 'ac 'al to N oc'om +1 cha 'ej +2 oxej +3 (d) Modifier - "day". Carib: mony ne koinaro '-3', mony ne koro 'po '+3' (mony 'before/after', ne 'day', koinaro '-1', koro'po '+1').
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