DOCSLIB.ORG

Tsez Syntax: a Description Maria Polinsky Harvard University

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
Tsez Syntax: a Description Maria Polinsky Harvard University Tsez Syntax: A Description Maria Polinsky Harvard University [email protected] Draft, February 2015 1 Foreword This description of Tsez syntax was created as part of the volume “A Grammar of Tsez” prepared by Bernard Comrie and myself. Because this work is still a draft, chapters are not numbered, and each chapter has its own example numbering. I will be grateful for comments, criticisms, and suggestions. I am immensely grateful to the native speakers of Tsez who have generously shared their language with me over many years, especially Ramazan Rajabov, Paxrudin Magomedinov and especially Arsen Abdulaev and members of his family. I am also very grateful to my friends, colleagues, and students who have commented on various aspects of this work: Elena Anagnostopoulou, Ivano Caponigro, Isabelle Charnavel, Peter Cole, Jessica Coon, Greville Corbett, Diana Forker, Annie Gagliardi, Michael Goncalves, Scott Grimm, Sabine Iatridou, Beth Levin, Nick Longenbaugh, Ora Matushansky, Eric Potsdam, Omer Preminger, Nina Radkevich, Barbara Stiebels, Yakov Testelets, and †Helma van den Berg. Timothy Doner, Caitlin Keenan, and Kenneth Mai have helped in organizing the manuscript and updating the glosses. Some of the work presented here was funded by the National Science Foundation, the Max-Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, and the Davis Center for Russian and Eurasian Studies at Harvard University, whose support is gratefully acknowledged. All errors are my sole responsibility. 2 Abbreviations Interlinear morpheme-by-morpheme glosses follow the Leipzig Glossing Rules (http://www.eva.mpg.de/lingua/resources/glossingrules.php). Additional abbreviations, not present in the Leipzig list: ATTR—attributive form EXCL—exclamative particle HYP—hypothetical particle IND.EVID—indirect evidence IR—indexical reading OBL—oblique form (a free-standing form) OS—oblique stem SR—shifted reading UNCERT—particle of uncertainty VAL—validator particle Complex glosses consist of two or more simple glosses, divided by a dot, e.g., PST.WIT.NEG ‘Witnessed past negative’. Gender classes are indicated by Roman numerals, with genders I-IV distinguished in the singular, and IPL and nIPL distinguished in the plural. For nouns in absolutive, we indicate gender after the case gloss, e.g., ABS.III ‘Gender III, absolutive’. For those noun phrases whose gender may vary and is determined contextually, it is shown in parentheses, e.g., ABS(.II). Compound lexical items are presented with the = sign, for example, muži=q’ˤuri ‘bedding’, gaga=cagari- ‘be smooth, even’. 3 Contents Part 1: Phrases Nouns Nominalizations Predicates Attributives Adverbials and postpositions Part 2: Clauses Basic clause types Interrogatives Exclamatives Part 3: Sentences Complement clauses Relative clauses Adverbial clauses Clausal coordination: The linking of finite clauses Part 4: Clause level phenomena Agreement Reflexives and anaphora Particles Word order and information structure 4 Part 1: Phrases Nouns Nominalizations Predicates Attributives Adverbials and postpositions 5 Noun Phrase 1 General remarks A noun phrase can be expressed by a pronoun, by a head noun preceded optionally by various modifiers, or by one of a number of nominalized verb phrase structures. The latter are discussed in the chapters on nominalizations and complement clauses. Noun phrases can occur in argument positions or they can serve as complements to postpositions—the latter are discussed in the chapter on adverbial and postpositional phrases. Predicate nominals are discussed in the chapter on predicate phrase. Some examples of noun phrases are given below. Example (1) illustrates pronouns in the noun phrase position: (1) a. Di-q q’ˤanoquno ƛeb (yoł). 1SG-POSS.ESS forty year be.PRS ‘I am forty years old.’ b. Eli sadaq b-ik’-ān. IPL.ABS.(IPL) together IPL-go-FUT.DEF ‘We will go together.’ Tsez does not have third person pronouns; the language uses demonstratives in this function. An example containing two noun phrases expressed by demonstratives is given below: (2) Žed-ä yiła č’aq’ˤir-no. DEM.IPL-ERG DEM.nI.ABS kill-PST.nWIT ‘They killed it.’ (of an animal) The following example has two full noun phrases, both with modifiers: (3) Dä-z ɣˤway-ä yisi uži ћan-si. 1SG-GEN2 dog-ERG DEM.I boy.ABS.I bite-PST.WIT ‘My dog bit this boy.’ NPs can also be expressed by a substantivized adjective (4), participle (5), demonstrative (6), numeral (7), or deverbal noun (8): (4) B-ˤeɣa-t’a-ni-z-ä b-ˤeže-t’a-ni-za-s ħurmat IPL-young-DISTR-DEF- PL.OS-ERG IPL-old-DISTR-DEF- PL.OS-GEN1 respect.ABS.III b-oy-x. III-do-PRS ‘The young respect the old.’ (5) Ø-āy-ru-n-ä magalu eser-si. I-come-PST.PTCP-DEF-ERG bread.ABS.III ask-PST.WIT ‘The one who came asked for bread.’ 1 6 (6) a. Heme-z-ä sis kaɣat y-is-si. DEM-PL.OS-ERG one letter.ABS.II II-take-PST.WIT ‘They (those) received one letter.’ b. Yizi-ra-bi huni-x b-oq-xo. DEM-PL.OS-PL.ABS.IPL road-AD.ESS IPL-become-PRS ‘They get on their way.’ (Ražbadinno, Tawadin: 5) (7) Sida-q micxir zow-s. one-POSS.ESS money.ABS.III be-PST.WIT ‘One person (lit. one) had money.’ (8) Bˤeƛ’-e-z bˤabˤa-n-ä eli b-iz-ir-si. sheep-OS-GEN2 bleat-DVB-ERG 1PL.ABS.IPL IPL-rise-CAUS-PST.WIT ‘The sheep’s bleating woke us up.’ Nominalized verb phrases in NP positions are illustrated below. Example (9) shows a nominalized clause in the absolutive position, and example (10) shows a masdar clause in the sub-ablative form. (9) [Eni-y-ä kid becizi y-āy-ru-łi] elu-r r-iy-x. mother-OS-ERG girl.ABS.II praise II-do-PST.PTCP-NMLZ.ABS.IV 1PL-LAT IV-know-PRS ‘We know that Mother praised the girl.’ (10) [Debe-r neƛ-ani]-ƛ-äy r-аħir-x-ānu reƛ. 2SG-LAT give-MASD-SUB-ABL IV-boil-PRS-NEG meat.ABS.IV ‘I am not boiling the meat just to give it to you.’ (based on Imnajšvili 1963:237) 2 Generic noun phrases Tsez does not have determiners; the meaning of definiteness or specificity is conveyed by several other means, including definiteness marking on noun-modifying adjectives or participles (discussed in section 3.3 below), word order, and the use of demonstratives (see section 4.1 below). Generic noun phrases do not differ in form from non-generic ones. Generic forms of mass nouns appear in the singular: (11) Mesed xiriyaw (yoł). gold.ABS.III expensive be.PRS ‘Gold is expensive.’ If a mass noun is used in the plural form, that form refers to kinds: (12) Elu-s bat’=bat’iyaw akri-bi (yoł). IPL-GEN1 various cheese-PL.ABS.nIPL be.PRS ‘We have different kinds of cheeses.’ Generic forms of count nouns usually appear in the plural: 2 7 (13) a. Bibidoqudi-bi r-exu-s. dinosaur-PL.ABS.nIPL nIPL-die-PST.WIT ‘Dinosaurs are extinct (lit.: died).’ b. Bibidoqudi-bi ānu. dinosaur-PL.ABS.nIPL be.PRS.NEG ‘Dinosaurs are extinct (lit.: do not exist).’ The generic reading is often suppressed in nouns that appear post-verbally, at the right periphery of the clause, as that position is associated with topichood. Compare (13a) to (14), which does not have a generic reading: (14) R-exu-s bibidoqudi-bi. nIPL-die-PST.WIT dinosaur-PL.ABS.nIPL “As for dinosaurs, they died out.” #‘Dinosaurs are extinct.’ As long as the noun phrase appears preverbally, the generic reading can be associated with any case form; compare the generic genitive in (15) and lative/absolutive in (16): (15) K’et’u-s uyno k’onč’u (yoł). cat-GEN1 four leg.ABS.III be.PRS ‘A cat has four legs.’ (16) Xex-zā-r maroženi r-eti-x. child-PL.OS-LAT ice cream.ABS.IV IV-like-PRS ‘Children like/want ice-cream.’ Noun phrases in Tsez are strictly head final, and many of the concepts conveyed by post-nominal PPs in languages such as English are expressed by prenominal modifiers, most commonly genitives and relative clauses (for the latter, see the chapter on relative clauses). In what follows, we will first discuss noun modification by adjectives, demonstratives, and numerals, then turn to quantifiers and measure phrases, and lastly to NPs containing genitive expressions. The order of elements in the noun phrase is addressed in section 9. 3 Agreement and concord in the noun phrase 3.1 Case concord Many (not all) modifiers show case concord with the head noun; the distinction is between the direct form, used with the head noun in the absolutive case, and the oblique form, used elsewhere.1 Modifiers that have two distinct forms include attributives with the suffix –si ( oblique suffix –zo); numerals; a subset of demonstratives (section 4.1); and adnominal genitives 1 We will be referring to this formal contrast as “direct vs. oblique”; we mark only the oblique form explicitly in the glosses. 3 8 (direct form genitive 1 in -s, and oblique form genitive 2 in -z, discussed in section 5).2 The examples below show case concord on an adjective, a demonstrative, a numeral, and an adnominal genitive. More examples will appear in the individual sections. (17) a. sasaqo-si/ža zaman morning-ATTR/DEM time.ABS.III ‘morning time/that time’ b. sasaqo-zo/neł zaman-a-ł morning-ATTR.OS/DEM.nI.OS time-OS-CONT.ESS ‘in the morning time/at that time’ (18) a. oč’ino otaxi nine room.ABS.IV ‘nine rooms’ b. oč’ira otax-ā nine.OS room-IN.ESS ‘in nine rooms’ (19) a. ʕaƛo-s xalq’i village-GEN1 people.ABS.IPL ‘villagers’ (lit.: village’s people) b.
Load more

Recommended publications
  • Deixis and Reference Tracing in Tsova-Tush (PDF)
    DEIXIS AND REFERENCE TRACKING IN TSOVA-TUSH A DISSERTATION SUBMITTED TO THE GRADUATE DIVISION OF THE UNIVERSITY OF HAWAIʻI AT MĀNOA IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY IN LINGUISTICS MAY 2020 by Bryn Hauk Dissertation committee: Andrea Berez-Kroeker, Chairperson Alice C. Harris Bradley McDonnell James N. Collins Ashley Maynard Acknowledgments I should not have been able to finish this dissertation. In the course of my graduate studies, enough obstacles have sprung up in my path that the odds would have predicted something other than a successful completion of my degree. The fact that I made it to this point is a testament to thekind, supportive, wise, and generous people who have picked me up and dusted me off after every pothole. Forgive me: these thank-yous are going to get very sappy. First and foremost, I would like to thank my Tsova-Tush host family—Rezo Orbetishvili, Nisa Baxtarishvili, and of course Tamar and Lasha—for letting me join your family every summer forthe past four years. Your time, your patience, your expertise, your hospitality, your sense of humor, your lovingly prepared meals and generously poured wine—these were the building blocks that supported all of my research whims. My sincerest gratitude also goes to Dantes Echishvili, Revaz Shankishvili, and to all my hosts and friends in Zemo Alvani. It is possible to translate ‘thank you’ as მადელ შუნ, but you have taught me that gratitude is better expressed with actions than with set phrases, sofor now I will just say, ღაზიშ ხილჰათ, ბედნიერ ხილჰათ, მარშმაკიშ ხილჰათ..
    [Show full text]
  • Deverbal Nominals in Xhosa
    DEVERBAL NOMINALS IN XHOSA BY LOYISO KEVIN MLETSHE Dissertation presented for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy (African Languages) at Stellenbosch University Supervisor: Prof M.W. Visser DECEMBER 2010 ii DECLARATION By submitting this dissertation electronically, I declare that the entirety of the work contained therein is my own, original work, that I am the owner of the copyright thereof (unless to the extent explicitly otherwise stated) and that I have not previously in its entirety or in part submitted it for obtaining any qualification. Date: November 2010 Copyright © 2010 Stellenbosch University All rights reserved iii ABSTRACT The relationship between deverbative noun classification and their effect on the semantic meaning of the derived deverbal nominal has been the focus of many studies in linguistics, with special reference to African languages in recent years. The study maintains that the descriptive analysis of deverbal nominals in African languages does not fully interrogate the predicate argument structures of the verbs that host these deverbal nominals. This thesis is an investigation of how the syntactic properties of verbs from which deverbal nouns are derived are invoked in explaining the argument structure and event structure properties of deverbal nouns, particularly in Xhosa. The analysis presented here is situated in terms of a lexical semantic representation drawing on Pustejovsky (1996) and Busa (1996), which aims to capture linguistically relevant components of meaning. Chapter 1 presents the purpose and aims of the study, and states the theoretical paradigm on which this study is couched, namely Pustejovsky’s (1996) generative lexicon theory as well as the methodology for conducting the research.
    [Show full text]
  • Natural Language Processing Introduction
    SYNTAX Sudeshna Sarkar 14 AUG 2019 Syntax • Constituency • Ordering • Grammatical relations and dependency – Heads, agreement, grammatical function • Key formalisms – Context-free grammars – Dependency grammars • Resources – Treebanks 15-Aug-19 Constituency • Basic idea: groups of words act as a single unit • Constituents form coherent classes that behave similarly – With respect to their internal structure: e.g., at the core of a noun phrase is a noun – With respect to other constituents: e.g., noun phrases generally occur before verbs Constituency: Example • Noun phrases in English... • They can all precede verbs • They can all be preposed/postposed Example of Constituent Tree ((Paul (gave Peter (two pears))) .) S VP NP V NP NP Z N N C N Paul gave Peter two pears . 5 Example of Dependency Tree [#,0] ([gave,2] ([Paul,1], [Peter,3], [pears,5] ([two,4])), [.,6]) # gave . Paul Peter pears two 9.12.1999 http://ufal.mff.cuni.cz/course/npfl094 6 Words and Phrases • Word (token): smallest unit of the syntactic layer – grammatical (function) words – lexical (content) words • Phrase – Sequence of immediate constituents (words or phrases). • Phrase types by their main word—head – Noun phrase: the new book of my grandpa – Adjectival phrase: brand new – Adverbial phrase: very well – Prepositional phrase: in the classroom – Verb phrase: to catch a ball 7 Noun Phrase • A noun or a (substantive) pronoun is the head. – water – the book – new ideas – two millions of inhabitants – one small village – the greatest price movement in one year since the World War II – operating system that, regardless of all efforts by our admin, crashes just too often – he – whoever 9.12.1999 http://ufal.mff.cuni.cz/course/npfl094 8 Evidence of Constituency 1.
    [Show full text]
  • Prior Linguistic Knowledge Matters : the Use of the Partitive Case In
    B 111 OULU 2013 B 111 UNIVERSITY OF OULU P.O.B. 7500 FI-90014 UNIVERSITY OF OULU FINLAND ACTA UNIVERSITATIS OULUENSIS ACTA UNIVERSITATIS OULUENSIS ACTA SERIES EDITORS HUMANIORAB Marianne Spoelman ASCIENTIAE RERUM NATURALIUM Marianne Spoelman Senior Assistant Jorma Arhippainen PRIOR LINGUISTIC BHUMANIORA KNOWLEDGE MATTERS University Lecturer Santeri Palviainen CTECHNICA THE USE OF THE PARTITIVE CASE IN FINNISH Docent Hannu Heusala LEARNER LANGUAGE DMEDICA Professor Olli Vuolteenaho ESCIENTIAE RERUM SOCIALIUM University Lecturer Hannu Heikkinen FSCRIPTA ACADEMICA Director Sinikka Eskelinen GOECONOMICA Professor Jari Juga EDITOR IN CHIEF Professor Olli Vuolteenaho PUBLICATIONS EDITOR Publications Editor Kirsti Nurkkala UNIVERSITY OF OULU GRADUATE SCHOOL; UNIVERSITY OF OULU, FACULTY OF HUMANITIES, FINNISH LANGUAGE ISBN 978-952-62-0113-9 (Paperback) ISBN 978-952-62-0114-6 (PDF) ISSN 0355-3205 (Print) ISSN 1796-2218 (Online) ACTA UNIVERSITATIS OULUENSIS B Humaniora 111 MARIANNE SPOELMAN PRIOR LINGUISTIC KNOWLEDGE MATTERS The use of the partitive case in Finnish learner language Academic dissertation to be presented with the assent of the Doctoral Training Committee of Human Sciences of the University of Oulu for public defence in Keckmaninsali (Auditorium HU106), Linnanmaa, on 24 May 2013, at 12 noon UNIVERSITY OF OULU, OULU 2013 Copyright © 2013 Acta Univ. Oul. B 111, 2013 Supervised by Docent Jarmo H. Jantunen Professor Helena Sulkala Reviewed by Professor Tuomas Huumo Associate Professor Scott Jarvis Opponent Associate Professor Scott Jarvis ISBN 978-952-62-0113-9 (Paperback) ISBN 978-952-62-0114-6 (PDF) ISSN 0355-3205 (Printed) ISSN 1796-2218 (Online) Cover Design Raimo Ahonen JUVENES PRINT TAMPERE 2013 Spoelman, Marianne, Prior linguistic knowledge matters: The use of the partitive case in Finnish learner language University of Oulu Graduate School; University of Oulu, Faculty of Humanities, Finnish Language, P.O.
    [Show full text]
  • Modelling the Causative-Inchoative Alternation
    Modelling the causative-inchoative alternation Christopher Piñón (Düsseldorf) Abstract. The causative-inchoative alternation has traditionally been modelled in terms of the causa- tivization of inchoative verbs. I argue that this analysis conflicts with the way the causative- inchoative alternation is predominantly expressed crosslinguistically, which would sooner suggest that the causative-inchoative alternation involves the decausativization of causative- inchoative verbs. After considering two further models for the causative-inchoative alterna- tion (that of Parsons (1990) and Levin and Rappaport Hovav (1995)) and finding them want- ing as well, I propose a new model (the Y-model) that derives the meaning of a causative- inchoative verb and its inchoative counterpart from the meaning of their shared verb stem. The Y-model does justice both to the morphological facts of the causative-inchoative al- ternation and to the idea that an inchoative verb is a decausative (or more precisely: a deagentive) version of its causative-inchoative counterpart. 1 Introduction The causative-inchoative alternation is traditionally said to be a lexical causative alternation.1 In what follows, I will speak of ‘alternating pairs of verbs’, or more simply of ‘alternating verbs’, for pairs of verbs that participate in this alternation. Such pairs consist of a transitive and an intransitive member that are semantically related in roughly the following way: the intransitive member (a.k.a. an inchoative verb) denotes a change of state and the transitive member (a.k.a. a causative-inchoative verb) denotes a bringing about of this change of state. This informal characterization can be tested against the following pairs of sentences containing alternating verbs: (1) (a) Rebecca broke the pencil.
    [Show full text]
  • TRADITIONAL GRAMMAR REVIEW I. Parts of Speech Traditional
    Traditional Grammar Review Page 1 of 15 TRADITIONAL GRAMMAR REVIEW I. Parts of Speech Traditional grammar recognizes eight parts of speech: Part of Definition Example Speech noun A noun is the name of a person, place, or thing. John bought the book. verb A verb is a word which expresses action or state of being. Ralph hit the ball hard. Janice is pretty. adjective An adjective describes or modifies a noun. The big, red barn burned down yesterday. adverb An adverb describes or modifies a verb, adjective, or He quickly left the another adverb. room. She fell down hard. pronoun A pronoun takes the place of a noun. She picked someone up today conjunction A conjunction connects words or groups of words. Bob and Jerry are going. Either Sam or I will win. preposition A preposition is a word that introduces a phrase showing a The dog with the relation between the noun or pronoun in the phrase and shaggy coat some other word in the sentence. He went past the gate. He gave the book to her. interjection An interjection is a word that expresses strong feeling. Wow! Gee! Whew! (and other four letter words.) Traditional Grammar Review Page 2 of 15 II. Phrases A phrase is a group of related words that does not contain a subject and a verb in combination. Generally, a phrase is used in the sentence as a single part of speech. In this section we will be concerned with prepositional phrases, gerund phrases, participial phrases, and infinitive phrases. Prepositional Phrases The preposition is a single (usually small) word or a cluster of words that show relationship between the object of the preposition and some other word in the sentence.
    [Show full text]
  • 2014. the Use of Adverb in Article
    CHAPTER II LITERATURE REVIEW 2.1 Part of Speech Part of speech is word classification based on their function. Sherlock (2012, p.12) says that there are eight kinds of part of speech in English namely noun, pronoun, adjective, adverb, verb, conjunction, interjection, and preposition. Noun is a name of person, thing, idea and so on. Noun has functions as a subject, object, and other. For example, song, Angie, table, book, lips and so forth. Pronoun is a word used to take the place of a noun. A pronoun is used as a noun such as, her, him, them and so on. Adjective is used to modify a noun or a pronoun. An adjective may be a single word, a phrase, or a clause such as, beautiful, smart, short and so forth. Adverb is one of the parts of speech. Adverb is used to give more information, also used to modify verb, adjective and adverb such as, faithfully, certainly, quietly and so on. Verb is a word used to express action, being, or state of being such as, work, write, play, cook and so on. Conjunction is the other part of speech. Conjunction has function to connect words or groups of words. For example, and, but, and or. A familiar word has no grammatical to the rest of the sentence and it can be used to express strong feeling such as, oh , ssttt, ouch and so forth. Preposition shows the relations between its object and some other words in the sentence. For example, on, in, above, between and so on.
    [Show full text]
  • Adverbs and Adverbial Phrases Worksheets
    Adverbial Phrases An adverbial phrase is a group of words that act together as an adverb, giving more information about a verb, adjective, or other adverb in a sentence. The adverbial phrase answers the same questions as a regular adverb: how/how much, when, or where. Underline the adverbial phrase. On the line, write the question it answers. 1. We expect our grandparents to arrive in about an hour. __________________________________________ 2. My cousin watches television almost as much as you do. __________________________________________ 3. The weatherman says it will rain all day. _____________________________________________________ 4. Your brother plays soccer better than my brother does. _________________________________________ 5. Our friend drives on Mondays. ____________________________________________________________ 6. Gerard and Donna will walk on the footpath. __________________________________________________ 7. The frog jumps through the tall grass. ____________________________________________________ 8. Mum combs my hair more gently than Dad does. ________________________________________________ 9. He found his lucky coin in the morning. ______________________________________________________ 10. We raced our toy cars on the playground. ___________________________________________________ 11. Patrick and Anthony were reading their books in the car. ________________________________________ 12. The music teacher played the violin better than her student. _____________________________________ 13. Georgia tried to talk to Ryan
    [Show full text]
  • The Finnish Noun Phrase
    Università Ca’ Foscari di Venezia Facoltà di Lingue e Letterature Straniere Corso di Laurea Specialistica in Scienze del Linguaggio The Finnish Noun Phrase Relatore: Prof.ssa Giuliana Giusti Correlatore: Prof. Guglielmo Cinque Laureanda: Lena Dal Pozzo Matricola: 803546 ANNO ACCADEMICO: 2006/2007 A mia madre Table of contents Acknowledgements ………………………………………………………….…….…… III Abstract ………………………………………………………………………………........ V Abbreviations ……………………………………………………………………………VII 1. Word order in Finnish …………………………………………………………………1 1.1 The order of constituents in the clause …………………………………………...2 1.2 Word order and interpretation .......……………………………………………… 8 1.3 The order of constituents in the Nominal Expression ………………………… 11 1.3.1. Determiners and Possessors …………………………………………………12 1.3.2. Adjectives and other modifiers …………………………………………..… 17 1.3.2.1 Adjectival hierarchy…………………………………………………………23 1.3.2.2 Predicative structures and complements …………………………………26 1.3.3 Relative clauses …………………………………………………………….... 28 1.4 Conclusions ............……………………………………………………………. 30 2. Thematic relations in nominal expressions ……………………………………….. 32 2.1 Observations on Argument Structure ………………………………….……. 32 2.1.1 Result and Event nouns…………………………………………………… 36 2.2 Transitive nouns ………………………………………………………………... 38 2.2.1 Compound nouns ……………….……………………………………... 40 2.2.2 Intransitive nouns derived from transitive verbs …………………… 41 2.3 Passive nouns …………………………………………………………………… 42 2.4 Psychological predicates ……………………………………………………….. 46 2.4.1 Psych verbs ……………………………………………………………….
    [Show full text]
  • Spatial Semantics, Case and Relator Nouns in Evenki
    Spatial semantics, case and relator nouns in Evenki Lenore A. Grenoble University of Chicago Evenki, a Northwest Tungusic language, exhibits an extensive system of nominal cases, deictic terms, and relator nouns, used to signal complex spatial relations. The paper describes the use and distribution of the spatial cases which signal stative and dynamic relations, with special attention to their semantics within a framework using fundamental Gestalt concepts such as Figure and Ground, and how they are used in combination with deictics and nouns to signal specific spatial semantics. Possible paths of grammaticalization including case stacking, or Suffixaufnahme, are dis- cussed. Keywords: spatial cases, case morphology, relator noun, deixis, Suf- fixaufnahme, grammaticalization 1. Introduction Case morphology and relator nouns are extensively used in the marking of spa- tial relations in Evenki, a Tungusic language spoken in Siberia by an estimated 4802 people (All-Russian Census 2010). A close analysis of the use of spatial cases in Evenki provides strong evidence for the development of complex case morphemes from adpositions. Descriptions of Evenki generally claim the exist- ence of 11–15 cases, depending on the dialect. The standard language is based on the Poligus dialect of the Podkamennaya Tunguska subgroup, from the Southern dialect group, now moribund. Because it forms the basis of the stand- ard (or literary) language and as such has been relatively well-studied and is somewhat codified, it usually serves as the point of departure in linguistic de- scriptions of Evenki. However, the written language is to a large degree an artifi- cial construct which has never achieved usage in everyday conversation: it does not function as a norm which cuts across dialects.
    [Show full text]
  • The Semantic Determinants of Argument Expression: a View from the English Resultative Construction
    To appear in J. Gueron´ and J. Lecarme, eds., The Syntax of Time, MIT Press, Cam- bridge, MA. The Semantic Determinants of Argument Expression: A View from the English Resultative Construction July 2002 Beth Levin Malka Rappaport Hovav Stanford University The Hebrew University of Jerusalem ([email protected]) ([email protected]) 1 The Appeal of Aspectual Determinants of Argument Expression In recent literature, argument expression is often taken to be most immediately determined by aspectual properties. This idea is reflected in statements as strong as Tenny’s Aspectual Interface Hypothesis that “Only the aspectual part of the- matic structure is visible to the universal linking principles” (1994:2) and in van Hout’s (1996) proposal that many argument expression alternations are instances of event type-shifting — i.e., aspectual reclassification. It is also implicit in Verkuyl’s (1993:20) Plus Principle, a compositionality principle which requires objects to contribute to bounding an event, preventing push and other basically atelic transi- tive verbs from being analyzed as true transitives (329-349). The most frequently cited aspectual semantic determinants include predicate (or event)-related notions such as telicity and boundedness and NP (or entity)-related notions such as incre- mental theme (Dowty 1991), measure (Tenny 1987, 1992, 1994), delimiter (Borer 1994; Ritter and Rosen 1998; Tenny 1987, 1992, 1994), and subject of result (Borer 1998). Researchers crucially tie these aspectual notions to the transitivity of the predicate and to the direct objecthood of the relevant NPs. In this paper, we argue that the impact of traditionally recognized aspectual properties — particularly the notions just cited — on argument expression has been overestimated (see also Reinhart 2000).
    [Show full text]
  • Compositionality in English Deverbal Compounds
    Chapter 3 Compositionality in English deverbal compounds: The role of the head Gianina Iordăchioaia University of Stuttgart Lonneke van der Plas University of Malta Glorianna Jagfeld Lancaster University This paper is concerned with the compositionality of deverbal compounds such as budget assessment in English. We present an interdisciplinary study on how the morphosyntactic properties of the deverbal noun head (e.g., assessment) can pre- dict the interpretation of the compound, as mediated by the syntactic-semantic relationship between the non-head (e.g., budget) and the head. We start with Grim- shaw’s (1990) observation that deverbal nouns are ambiguous between composi- tionally interpreted argument structure nominals, which inherit verbal structure and realize arguments (e.g., the assessment of the budget by the government), and more lexicalized result nominals, which preserve no verbal properties or arguments (e.g., The assessment is on the table.). Our hypothesis is that deverbal compounds with argument structure nominal heads are fully compositional and, in our system, more easily predictable than those headed by result nominals, since their composi- tional make-up triggers an (unambiguous) object interpretation of the non-heads. Linguistic evidence gathered from corpora and human annotations, and evaluated with machine learning techniques supports this hypothesis. At the same time, it raises interesting discussion points on how different properties of the head con- tribute to the interpretation of the deverbal compound. Gianina Iordăchioaia, Lonneke van der Plas & Glorianna Jagfeld. 2020. Compositionality in English deverbal compounds: The role of the head. In Sabine Schulte im Walde & Eva Smolka (eds.), The role of constituents in multiword expressions: An interdisciplinary, cross-lingual perspec- tive, 61–106.
    [Show full text]