This paper explores variation in the patterns of reflexivity marking in the Mano language and possible influence from the Kpelle language by using an experimental design with a picture questionnaire. While Kpelle does not have a morphological distinction between reflexive and basic pronouns, the Mano variety spoken by Mano-dominant individuals does possess such a distinction in 3sg. In contrast, the Mano variety spoken by Kpelle-dominant individuals shows a pattern borrowing from Kpelle into Mano, whereby the basic pronoun is used for both coreferential and disjoint readings. In a bilingual village, however, despite daily usage of both languages, almost all speakers from our sample manifest a uniform pattern that aligns closely with the monolingual Mano pattern of reflexivity marking. Therefore, the intensity of contact alone does not predict the amount of influence of Kpelle on Mano. Contrary to predictions by Labov (2010. Principles of linguistic change. Volume 3, Cognitive and cultural factors. Hoboken: Wiley-Blackwell: 5), we conclude that the languages spoken in a multilingual speech community do not necessarily converge and that a balanced multilingual community may provide enough input to acquire monolingual-like competence, at least according to the specific parameter under investigation. In the long run, however, convergence between Mano and Kpelle could indeed be taking place, with Mano losing its reflexivity contrasts, having already lost the contrast in 3pl.
{"title":"Do languages spoken in multilingual communities converge? A case study of reflexivity marking in Mano and Kpelle","authors":"Maria Khachaturyan, George Moroz, Pe Mamy","doi":"10.1515/ling-2022-0111","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1515/ling-2022-0111","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000 This paper explores variation in the patterns of reflexivity marking in the Mano language and possible influence from the Kpelle language by using an experimental design with a picture questionnaire. While Kpelle does not have a morphological distinction between reflexive and basic pronouns, the Mano variety spoken by Mano-dominant individuals does possess such a distinction in 3sg. In contrast, the Mano variety spoken by Kpelle-dominant individuals shows a pattern borrowing from Kpelle into Mano, whereby the basic pronoun is used for both coreferential and disjoint readings. In a bilingual village, however, despite daily usage of both languages, almost all speakers from our sample manifest a uniform pattern that aligns closely with the monolingual Mano pattern of reflexivity marking. Therefore, the intensity of contact alone does not predict the amount of influence of Kpelle on Mano. Contrary to predictions by Labov (2010. Principles of linguistic change. Volume 3, Cognitive and cultural factors. Hoboken: Wiley-Blackwell: 5), we conclude that the languages spoken in a multilingual speech community do not necessarily converge and that a balanced multilingual community may provide enough input to acquire monolingual-like competence, at least according to the specific parameter under investigation. In the long run, however, convergence between Mano and Kpelle could indeed be taking place, with Mano losing its reflexivity contrasts, having already lost the contrast in 3pl.","PeriodicalId":47548,"journal":{"name":"Linguistics","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":1.1,"publicationDate":"2024-05-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"141049043","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Dialect classification is a long-standing issue in Chinese dialectology. Although various theories of Chinese dialect regions have been proposed, most have been limited by similar methodological issues, especially due to their reliance on the subjective analysis of dialect maps both individually and in the aggregate, as well as their focus on phonology over syntax and vocabulary. Consequently, we know relatively little about the geolinguistic underpinnings of Chinese dialect variation. Following a review of previous research in this area, this article presents a theory of Chinese dialect regions based on the first large-scale quantitative analysis of the data from the Linguistic Atlas of Chinese Dialects, which was collected between 2000 and 2008, providing the most up-to-date picture of the full Chinese dialect landscape. We identify and map a hierarchy of 10 major Chinese dialect regions, challenging traditional accounts. In addition, we propose a new theory of Chinese dialect formation to account for our findings.
方言分类是汉语方言学中一个长期存在的问题。尽管已经提出了各种汉语方言区理论，但大多数理论都受到类似方法论问题的限制，特别是由于它们依赖于对方言图的单个和总体的主观分析，以及它们对语音的关注超过了对句法和词汇的关注。因此，我们对中国方言变异的地理语言学基础知之甚少。本文回顾了以往在这一领域的研究，首次对《中国方言地图集》（Linguistic Atlas of Chinese Dialects）的数据进行了大规模的定量分析，在此基础上提出了中国方言区域理论。我们确定并绘制了中国 10 大方言区的层次结构图，对传统说法提出了挑战。此外，我们还提出了一种新的中国方言形成理论来解释我们的发现。
{"title":"Geographic structure of Chinese dialects: a computational dialectometric approach","authors":"He Huang, Jack Grieve, Lei Jiao, Zhuo Cai","doi":"10.1515/ling-2021-0138","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1515/ling-2021-0138","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000 Dialect classification is a long-standing issue in Chinese dialectology. Although various theories of Chinese dialect regions have been proposed, most have been limited by similar methodological issues, especially due to their reliance on the subjective analysis of dialect maps both individually and in the aggregate, as well as their focus on phonology over syntax and vocabulary. Consequently, we know relatively little about the geolinguistic underpinnings of Chinese dialect variation. Following a review of previous research in this area, this article presents a theory of Chinese dialect regions based on the first large-scale quantitative analysis of the data from the Linguistic Atlas of Chinese Dialects, which was collected between 2000 and 2008, providing the most up-to-date picture of the full Chinese dialect landscape. We identify and map a hierarchy of 10 major Chinese dialect regions, challenging traditional accounts. In addition, we propose a new theory of Chinese dialect formation to account for our findings.","PeriodicalId":47548,"journal":{"name":"Linguistics","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":1.1,"publicationDate":"2024-04-23","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"140666200","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Analyzing the diachrony of Hebrew bein, originally a spatial preposition ‘within/among’, this article traces several grammaticization clines associated with bein’s gradual evolution into a rich variety of functions within various constructions. While its early function is purely locative, bein later participates in an array of constructions and sub-constructions, where its syntactic status, its semantic meanings and functions, as well as its discourse role, have shifted considerably. Bein may thus be part of a conjunctive or a disjunctive construction, but it may also be part of an ‘in any case’ adverbial, and later an ‘anyway’ discourse marker. It conveys different locative construals (‘within’, ‘among’ and ‘between’), but also various abstract symmetric relations, such as ‘difference’, ‘dispute’ and ‘separation’. Some bein constructions partition a set, focusing on a subset of it, while in other cases bein serves as an ‘all-purpose’ preposition. Nevertheless, our goal is to show how each grammatical, semantic and discoursal phase is well motivated, given the previous phase. Based on written historical corpora, from Biblical to contemporary Hebrew, we provide a step-by-step diachronic development from earlier to later bein functions.
{"title":"From location to conjunction, disjunction, partition, exemplification and association: Hebrew bein constructions","authors":"Ruti Bardenstein, Mira Ariel","doi":"10.1515/ling-2022-0115","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1515/ling-2022-0115","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000 Analyzing the diachrony of Hebrew bein, originally a spatial preposition ‘within/among’, this article traces several grammaticization clines associated with bein’s gradual evolution into a rich variety of functions within various constructions. While its early function is purely locative, bein later participates in an array of constructions and sub-constructions, where its syntactic status, its semantic meanings and functions, as well as its discourse role, have shifted considerably. Bein may thus be part of a conjunctive or a disjunctive construction, but it may also be part of an ‘in any case’ adverbial, and later an ‘anyway’ discourse marker. It conveys different locative construals (‘within’, ‘among’ and ‘between’), but also various abstract symmetric relations, such as ‘difference’, ‘dispute’ and ‘separation’. Some bein constructions partition a set, focusing on a subset of it, while in other cases bein serves as an ‘all-purpose’ preposition. Nevertheless, our goal is to show how each grammatical, semantic and discoursal phase is well motivated, given the previous phase. Based on written historical corpora, from Biblical to contemporary Hebrew, we provide a step-by-step diachronic development from earlier to later bein functions.","PeriodicalId":47548,"journal":{"name":"Linguistics","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":1.1,"publicationDate":"2024-04-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"140676718","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
In French, Italian, and other Romance languages indefinite nominal phrases can be introduced by what appears to be the conflation of a genitive preposition and a definite article, the so-called “indefinite partitive articles” (e.g., Fr. Je cuisine de la soupe depuis deux jours. ‘I’ve been cooking soup for two days’). This is rather unexpected, since these nominal phrases are neither definite nor in a syntactic position in which we expect to find a genitive preposition. This led part of the literature to consider them as built by lexical items synchronically distinct from the genitive preposition/definite article but homophonous with them. This contribution shows how a constituent-based approach to the lexicon-syntax interface as nanosyntax, paired with a specific take on the sequence of syntactic functions, can capture their apparently conflicting distribution without stipulating multiple homophonous lexical items. The key factor in this proposal is a revised analysis of the Romance lexical item (LI) for (i) definite articles – linked to a constituent containing not only features of definiteness but also lower indefinite features and higher nominative/accusative case features – and (ii) the genitive preposition DE – linked to a constituent containing not only genitive features but also lower nominative/accusative features. Holding these LIs crosslinguistically stable, the variation attested in this domain is modeled as depending on the amount of functional structure lexicalized by the nominal root in the different languages.
在法语、意大利语和其他罗曼语中，不定名词性短语可以通过似乎是属格介词和定语的混合来引入，即所谓的 "不定偏正结构冠词"（例如，Fr. Je cuisine de la soupe depuis deux jours.我煮了两天汤'）。这是相当出乎意料的，因为这些名词性短语既不是定语，也不在我们期望找到属格介词的句法位置上。因此，部分文献认为它们是由与属格介词/定语同步但同音的词项构成的。这篇论文展示了如何通过基于成分的纳米合成语法（nanosyntax）方法来处理词汇-语法界面，并配以对句法功能序列的特定理解，从而在不规定多个同音词项的情况下捕捉到它们表面上相互冲突的分布。这一建议的关键因素是对罗曼语词项（LI）的修订分析：(i) 定语--与一个不仅包含定语特征，而且包含较低的不定冠词特征和较高的名词性/指称性特征的成分相联系；(ii) 属格介词 DE--与一个不仅包含属格特征，而且包含较低的名词性/指称性特征的成分相联系。如果这些词性在跨语言上保持稳定，那么在这一领域中出现的变化将取决于不同语言中由名根词性化的功能结构的数量。
{"title":"What’s hidden below definiteness and genitive: on indefinite partitive articles in Romance","authors":"Francesco Pinzin","doi":"10.1515/ling-2022-0059","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1515/ling-2022-0059","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000 In French, Italian, and other Romance languages indefinite nominal phrases can be introduced by what appears to be the conflation of a genitive preposition and a definite article, the so-called “indefinite partitive articles” (e.g., Fr. Je cuisine de la soupe depuis deux jours. ‘I’ve been cooking soup for two days’). This is rather unexpected, since these nominal phrases are neither definite nor in a syntactic position in which we expect to find a genitive preposition. This led part of the literature to consider them as built by lexical items synchronically distinct from the genitive preposition/definite article but homophonous with them. This contribution shows how a constituent-based approach to the lexicon-syntax interface as nanosyntax, paired with a specific take on the sequence of syntactic functions, can capture their apparently conflicting distribution without stipulating multiple homophonous lexical items. The key factor in this proposal is a revised analysis of the Romance lexical item (LI) for (i) definite articles – linked to a constituent containing not only features of definiteness but also lower indefinite features and higher nominative/accusative case features – and (ii) the genitive preposition DE – linked to a constituent containing not only genitive features but also lower nominative/accusative features. Holding these LIs crosslinguistically stable, the variation attested in this domain is modeled as depending on the amount of functional structure lexicalized by the nominal root in the different languages.","PeriodicalId":47548,"journal":{"name":"Linguistics","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":1.1,"publicationDate":"2024-04-18","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"140688773","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
In Russian, the subordinator kak ‘how’ is both a manner question word and an eventive complementizer. The Russian linguistic tradition explains the colexification of the two functions in terms of a semantic shift from manner as characteristic of a situation to event description as a whole. Alternatively, a grammaticalization scenario from manner complements to event/propositional complements has been suggested: manner complements originally have a propositional frame, which is foregrounded concurrently with the loss of the manner meaning, giving rise to both eventive and propositional interpretations. This article is aimed at testing both hypotheses. We study several large Old Russian manuscripts, starting from the first available documents of the 11th century, and show that at the earliest documented period Old Russian kako/kakъ could be used in all types of complement clauses. It could introduce eventive, propositional, manner and irrealis purposive-like complements. Accordingly, the evolution of the subordinator kak in complementation involves a narrowing of its functional domain. We classify Old Russian texts based on the period and trace the gradual loss of particular functions during the centuries. Thus, we show that the Russian data supports the second grammaticalization scenario.
{"title":"Diachronic evolution of the subordinator kak in Russian","authors":"N. Serdobolskaya, I. Kobozeva","doi":"10.1515/ling-2021-0213","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1515/ling-2021-0213","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000 In Russian, the subordinator kak ‘how’ is both a manner question word and an eventive complementizer. The Russian linguistic tradition explains the colexification of the two functions in terms of a semantic shift from manner as characteristic of a situation to event description as a whole. Alternatively, a grammaticalization scenario from manner complements to event/propositional complements has been suggested: manner complements originally have a propositional frame, which is foregrounded concurrently with the loss of the manner meaning, giving rise to both eventive and propositional interpretations. This article is aimed at testing both hypotheses. We study several large Old Russian manuscripts, starting from the first available documents of the 11th century, and show that at the earliest documented period Old Russian kako/kakъ could be used in all types of complement clauses. It could introduce eventive, propositional, manner and irrealis purposive-like complements. Accordingly, the evolution of the subordinator kak in complementation involves a narrowing of its functional domain. We classify Old Russian texts based on the period and trace the gradual loss of particular functions during the centuries. Thus, we show that the Russian data supports the second grammaticalization scenario.","PeriodicalId":47548,"journal":{"name":"Linguistics","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":1.1,"publicationDate":"2024-04-15","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"140698998","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Transitive causative change of state (TCoS) verbs elicit scalar readings, distinguishing them between: upper-bounded verbs (e.g., dry), denoting a culminating change of state, and lower-bounded verbs (e.g., wrinkle), denoting a change from a zero to a non-zero value (or from one value to another) regarding the property described by the semantic core of the verb. In their eventive reading, transitive experiencer object (TEO) verbs (e.g., calm down, delight) also denote causative eventualities able to yield scalar inferences. This study investigates whether TEO verbs are also associated with a minimum or maximum standard degree, proposing a similar subdivision of TEO verbs into lower-bounded items (delight) and upper-bounded items (calm down). In a forced-choice selection experiment we tested the impact of the standard degree (bound) of the semantic core of Spanish TEO verbs on the availability of lower-bounded or upper-bounded readings comparing them to TCoS verbs. Results revealed that the factor bound was significant to the extent that both lower-bounded TEO and TCoS predicates yielded the response compatible with a lower-bounded reading significantly more often than predicates that possess a maximum degree, supporting the distinction between lower and upper bounded items. Further, a significant effect of verb type was also observed, differentiating a change of state on the mental (TEO) versus the physical (TCoS) levels.
{"title":"Spanish lower and upper bounded change of state verbs: focusing on transitive experiencer object verbs","authors":"Paola Fritz-Huechante, Elisabeth Verhoeven","doi":"10.1515/ling-2021-0143","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1515/ling-2021-0143","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000 Transitive causative change of state (TCoS) verbs elicit scalar readings, distinguishing them between: upper-bounded verbs (e.g., dry), denoting a culminating change of state, and lower-bounded verbs (e.g., wrinkle), denoting a change from a zero to a non-zero value (or from one value to another) regarding the property described by the semantic core of the verb. In their eventive reading, transitive experiencer object (TEO) verbs (e.g., calm down, delight) also denote causative eventualities able to yield scalar inferences. This study investigates whether TEO verbs are also associated with a minimum or maximum standard degree, proposing a similar subdivision of TEO verbs into lower-bounded items (delight) and upper-bounded items (calm down). In a forced-choice selection experiment we tested the impact of the standard degree (bound) of the semantic core of Spanish TEO verbs on the availability of lower-bounded or upper-bounded readings comparing them to TCoS verbs. Results revealed that the factor bound was significant to the extent that both lower-bounded TEO and TCoS predicates yielded the response compatible with a lower-bounded reading significantly more often than predicates that possess a maximum degree, supporting the distinction between lower and upper bounded items. Further, a significant effect of verb type was also observed, differentiating a change of state on the mental (TEO) versus the physical (TCoS) levels.","PeriodicalId":47548,"journal":{"name":"Linguistics","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":1.1,"publicationDate":"2024-04-05","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"140740572","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Through intriguing paths of change, manner expressions may give rise to both quotatives and a diverse range of complementizers. These paths of change are still far from mapped or fully understood, but after years of relative ignorance, they have recently been the subject of increased interest. In this paper, we introduce a special issue the aim of which is to add to the growing knowledge and understanding of the development of manner expressions into complementizers or quotatives. Centering our discussion on Saxena’s diachronic hypothesis from 1995, we first briefly go through a number of central studies of the issue. Subsequently, we summarize the main findings of the contributions to the special issue: (i) additional evidence of the development of manner expressions into complementizers or quotatives; (ii) an emphasis on the variation found in examples of this development; (iii) a number of developmental paths that do not conform to Saxena’s hypothesis (but also a couple that might be compatible with it). In the final part of the paper, we introduce each of the individual contributions to the special issue.
{"title":"Introduction: the development of manner expressions into complementizers or quotatives","authors":"C. Gentens, Kasper Boye","doi":"10.1515/ling-2024-0019","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1515/ling-2024-0019","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000 Through intriguing paths of change, manner expressions may give rise to both quotatives and a diverse range of complementizers. These paths of change are still far from mapped or fully understood, but after years of relative ignorance, they have recently been the subject of increased interest. In this paper, we introduce a special issue the aim of which is to add to the growing knowledge and understanding of the development of manner expressions into complementizers or quotatives. Centering our discussion on Saxena’s diachronic hypothesis from 1995, we first briefly go through a number of central studies of the issue. Subsequently, we summarize the main findings of the contributions to the special issue: (i) additional evidence of the development of manner expressions into complementizers or quotatives; (ii) an emphasis on the variation found in examples of this development; (iii) a number of developmental paths that do not conform to Saxena’s hypothesis (but also a couple that might be compatible with it). In the final part of the paper, we introduce each of the individual contributions to the special issue.","PeriodicalId":47548,"journal":{"name":"Linguistics","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":1.1,"publicationDate":"2024-03-25","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"140209918","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
The English alternative embedded passive (AEP), or “needs washed” construction, is a noncanonical morphosyntactic feature found in some American and British Englishes. It involves a matrix verb surfacing immediately before a participle. Previous research has described this construction as only licit with matrix need, want, and like; however, isolated examples of the AEP with additional matrix verbs have surfaced. These rarely attested instances raise questions regarding the basic description of the construction and how matrix verb availability is constrained, as well as whether the AEP is truly the same feature across AmE and BrE varieties. This paper utilizes a large-scale grammaticality judgement survey to obtain as exhaustive a set of AEP matrix verbs as possible. Results show that far more verbs can be used in the AEP than previously attested. Acceptance is constrained by lexical semantics, verbal syntax, and verb productivity. This alternative view of the AEP as a more generalized phenomenon nevertheless shows a strong link between AmE and BrE varieties, as the constraints are nearly identical across the nations. The findings illustrate how attention to rarely attested or non-attested data can inform morphosyntactic and dialectological research.
{"title":"An alternative view of the English alternative embedded passive","authors":"Daniel Duncan","doi":"10.1515/ling-2023-0170","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1515/ling-2023-0170","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000 The English alternative embedded passive (AEP), or “needs washed” construction, is a noncanonical morphosyntactic feature found in some American and British Englishes. It involves a matrix verb surfacing immediately before a participle. Previous research has described this construction as only licit with matrix need, want, and like; however, isolated examples of the AEP with additional matrix verbs have surfaced. These rarely attested instances raise questions regarding the basic description of the construction and how matrix verb availability is constrained, as well as whether the AEP is truly the same feature across AmE and BrE varieties. This paper utilizes a large-scale grammaticality judgement survey to obtain as exhaustive a set of AEP matrix verbs as possible. Results show that far more verbs can be used in the AEP than previously attested. Acceptance is constrained by lexical semantics, verbal syntax, and verb productivity. This alternative view of the AEP as a more generalized phenomenon nevertheless shows a strong link between AmE and BrE varieties, as the constraints are nearly identical across the nations. The findings illustrate how attention to rarely attested or non-attested data can inform morphosyntactic and dialectological research.","PeriodicalId":47548,"journal":{"name":"Linguistics","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":1.1,"publicationDate":"2024-03-25","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"140209927","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
This article analyzes the diachrony of the Basque marker bait-, which is a verbal prefix in subordinate clauses, but also has other functions: for example, it appears in independent clauses and indefinite pronouns. In subordinate clauses, it is used in two ways. First, it co-occurs with clause-initial conjunctions in reason, manner or result clauses or with pronouns in relative clauses. Secondly, it is used on its own, in relative, reason, result and complement clauses (with a limited group of verbs, such as emotive factive predicates or predicates of happening). The article combines evidence from a corpus study (6822 examples from 16th- to 20th-century texts) and internal reconstruction to (1) determine if and in what way the subordinator bait- and the affirmative bai ‘yes’ can be diachronically related, and (2) try to establish diachronic relations between the functions of bait-. It is proposed that the missing link between the subordinator and the affirmative particle might be a manner expression bai which had anaphoric functions. The marker bait- emerged as a reanalyzed form of the manner expression, which then gradually and through various pathways spread to different types of subordinate clauses and was reanalyzed as a subordinator.
{"title":"The diachrony of the Basque marker bait-: from a manner expression to subordinator","authors":"Dorota Krajewska","doi":"10.1515/ling-2021-0198","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1515/ling-2021-0198","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000 This article analyzes the diachrony of the Basque marker bait-, which is a verbal prefix in subordinate clauses, but also has other functions: for example, it appears in independent clauses and indefinite pronouns. In subordinate clauses, it is used in two ways. First, it co-occurs with clause-initial conjunctions in reason, manner or result clauses or with pronouns in relative clauses. Secondly, it is used on its own, in relative, reason, result and complement clauses (with a limited group of verbs, such as emotive factive predicates or predicates of happening). The article combines evidence from a corpus study (6822 examples from 16th- to 20th-century texts) and internal reconstruction to (1) determine if and in what way the subordinator bait- and the affirmative bai ‘yes’ can be diachronically related, and (2) try to establish diachronic relations between the functions of bait-. It is proposed that the missing link between the subordinator and the affirmative particle might be a manner expression bai which had anaphoric functions. The marker bait- emerged as a reanalyzed form of the manner expression, which then gradually and through various pathways spread to different types of subordinate clauses and was reanalyzed as a subordinator.","PeriodicalId":47548,"journal":{"name":"Linguistics","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":1.1,"publicationDate":"2024-03-20","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"140224689","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Using naturally occurring data from Spanish from Madrid, this study is the first to analyze durations of the Spanish word decir ‘to say, to tell’ both as a verb with prepositional meaning and as part of the reformulating construction [es decir] ‘that is to say’ (N = 388). We show that, although it is neither highly grammaticalized nor frequent, [es decir] undergoes phonological reduction to a significantly greater degree than the more frequent lexical source decir ‘to say’. Results of linear mixed-effects models predicting target duration suggest these durational differences cannot be explained due to conditioning factors of the target context controlled in this analysis (speech rate of the target word context, predictability of following words, number of phones, distance from pause). They do not appear to stem from an accumulation in memory of patterns of likelihood of use in those conditioning environments. We propose that [es decir] is stored as a lexical unit that contains as part of the lexical representation shorter word durations relative to the lexical form decir and that this durational shortening is part of the [reformulator] construction.
{"title":"Constructional sources of durational shortening in discourse markers","authors":"Esther L. Brown, Javier Rivas","doi":"10.1515/ling-2021-0096","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1515/ling-2021-0096","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000 Using naturally occurring data from Spanish from Madrid, this study is the first to analyze durations of the Spanish word decir ‘to say, to tell’ both as a verb with prepositional meaning and as part of the reformulating construction [es decir] ‘that is to say’ (N = 388). We show that, although it is neither highly grammaticalized nor frequent, [es decir] undergoes phonological reduction to a significantly greater degree than the more frequent lexical source decir ‘to say’. Results of linear mixed-effects models predicting target duration suggest these durational differences cannot be explained due to conditioning factors of the target context controlled in this analysis (speech rate of the target word context, predictability of following words, number of phones, distance from pause). They do not appear to stem from an accumulation in memory of patterns of likelihood of use in those conditioning environments. We propose that [es decir] is stored as a lexical unit that contains as part of the lexical representation shorter word durations relative to the lexical form decir and that this durational shortening is part of the [reformulator] construction.","PeriodicalId":47548,"journal":{"name":"Linguistics","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":1.1,"publicationDate":"2024-03-20","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"140226125","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
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