From larryt at COGS.SUSX.AC.UK Thu Jun 5 00:08:14 2003 From: larryt at COGS.SUSX.AC.UK (Larry Trask) Date: Wed, 4 Jun 2003 20:08:14 EDT Subject: Sum: Borrowing of French Message-ID: ----------------------------Original message---------------------------- A few days ago I posted a question about the borrowing of the French color term 'brown' into practically all of the other Romance languages. My purpose was to find out why this word has spread so far and seemingly so rapidly, sometimes even displacing other words in the process. In the end, I didn't find out much about this, but I did learn a great deal about the word, in French and in other languages. As a word for 'chestnut', competes in French with the inherited word . Most sources agree that originates in the local speech of the Lyon area, where it is described as "pre-Roman". But apparently there is a second story on the table, which sees the French word as borrowed from Italian 'a certain large edible chestnut', from medieval Latin 'stone, rock'. Well, maybe. My estimated date of first use as a color term in French was wrong. We have (not really a color term) in 1706, attestations of as "un nom et un adjectif de couleur très courant" from 1750 (_Dictionnaire historique de la langue française_), and a firm date of 1765 as the first attestation of the word as a color term (_Le Robert_ and Dauzat, in the Encyclopédie, of all places). Perhaps, then, this is more a learned word than a popular one, in origin? On the other hand, the word is rare as a color term in French texts until well into the 19th century, and apparently it's less common than until well into the 20th century. And its status as an established color term is called into question by expressions such as "la redingote d'un brun marron" (Balzac 1837), where it seems clear that is the basic color term and is no more than a modifier, as in English 'chestnut brown'. Interestingly, the color term has never crossed the Atlantic. The word is not used as a color term in Canada. One suggestion is that pressure from English 'brown' has favored retention of the inherited and disfavored acceptance of the innovating term. English 'maroon' is first recorded in a 1791 translation of an important French book on dyeing. Presumably chestnut dye is dark red, rather than brown, accounting for the distinctive sense of the English term. But I am told that 'maroon' does indeed mean 'brown' in many extraterritorial Englishes. Now to Spanish. I am told that Mark Davies's 100-million-word Spanish corpus shows no instances of the color term in the 18th century, and only about 16 in the 19th century, all of these occurring in just three authors: Leopoldo Alas (in 1876), Amós de Escalante (in 1866), and Felipe Trigo (in 1890 and in other works). This information is consistent with a very late establishment of as a color term in Spanish. But I'm still amazed that Corominas doesn't even enter the word in his etymological dictionary. However, contrary to my surmise, is widely used for 'brown' in American Spanish, or at least in South America. One respondent expressed surprise at this, since Quebec generally maintains closer ties with France than Spanish America does with Spain. For Portuguese, I am assured that is used in Brazil, just as in Portugal. For Romanian, I am assured that is today the ordinary and only word for 'brown', apart from eyes and hair, but so far I don't know when the word became established in Romanian. For the other Romance languages, I have no new information. So, I'm still puzzled. Especially given the information suggesting that became established as a basic color term only rather late in French, why has it recently proved so irresistible to all the other Romance-speakers in the world -- except to the French-speakers in Canada? Apart from the odd English case, I haven't discovered any non-Romance languages which have accepted the word, except for Basque, into which the Spanish form has very recently been borrowed as -- apparently not recorded in writing before 1977. Maybe the story is bigger than . I note that French 'gray' has also been borrowed very widely into the other Romance languages, and this time into at least three others: Basque, Greek and Turkish. My thanks to Richard Coates, Radu Daniliuc, Isabel Forbes, Lee Hartman, Steve Long, Ricardo Paderni, Marc Picard, Jean-François Smith, John Charles Smith, Laura Wright and Roger Wright. Larry Trask COGS University of Sussex Brighton BN1 9QH UK larryt at cogs.susx.ac.uk From johncharles.smith at st-catherines.oxford.ac.uk Thu Jun 12 11:05:23 2003 From: johncharles.smith at st-catherines.oxford.ac.uk (John Charles Smith) Date: Thu, 12 Jun 2003 07:05:23 EDT Subject: ISHL Nominations Message-ID: ��:� v��,j �� \� Y\��Y�H �\� ܚY�[�[ H �X�Z] Y �CB�� \� \˜�Z] � P�U T�S�T˓� �ԑ �P˕R� � H T� S�� \� ] B� T� �T��ˑQ K� Y� [�H �[\ H �ܝ�\� ] �X�� H \� \�[�� H XZ[ B��[X[� ] �[�\�] \� ��\�[� H� �Y[ � \�� [�\� ��[ \�\� �\ ܝ ܈ �ۜ�[ B� H ��[Y[� ] [ۈ و [�\� XZ[ ��ܘ[H Y� [� �X�K ] �[ �H \� �X�] Y [� B� H ^ [�] [ۜ� [�H \�H �� XY [�� [ �H �[[ݙY ]] �X] X�[ K� Y� ۈ CB�� \� [� [�H Y ] H �۝ �X�] [ۜ� [�H �X�Z]�H [� � H Y�\� [�H �[ ]�CB� � �[[ݙH \� \�Yܘ\ X[�X[ K� �[�[ K [�H � �[ �H X� H � �۝ X� CB�]] ܈ و \� Y\��Y�H �H \�[�� H �ܛX[ ��\ H� �[�� [ۈ و [�\� XZ[ B� ��ܘ[K�B�B�KKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKH Y\��Y�H �\]Z\�[�� [�\� \ �ݘ[ � [�\�H KKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKCB�S� ST ԕ S� QT��Q�H �Ԉ S QSP�T�� ш CB�S� T��U SӐS ��QU H �Ԉ T� ԒP�S S��RT� P��B�B� X\� ��Y[� � [� �� XY�Y\� B�B��]�\�[ ��] [ۜ� [� H �! ��Y] H �[ �[ �X�[� \� YX\� [� ] H B��\�[�\�� YY] [�� H [ \�[�� H �� [� Y�[� P� H �� H �[ B��H Z�[� ۈ �� [ � � �[ \�H �X�[��Y\ˈ H ]�H �� X\� ��H B� H T� ��Z[�] [�� [Z] YK � � ]�H XY H H �� [�� B��Z[�] [ۜ΃B�B�JH �U T�H �T�Q S� ��ӑ�T�S��H T�P� Ԉ �܈ � �CB�B� [ H �[\ �[ B [�]�\��] H و �[� \��\�K � �\� � \�� ]� �X[ [�CB�B�ZJH QSP�T� ш V P�U U�H ��SRU QH � �\��H [� [ � JCB�B�X\�XH X[�� ]H B [�]�\��] H و �[ Y�ܛ�XK ]�\� K�ːK CB�B�ZZJH QSP�T� ш ��RS�U S�� SRU QH � �\��H [� [ � LJCB�B�X[ �� H �� B ]\� �[ X[� �] [ۘ[ [�]�\��] K �[��\��K ]\� �[ XJCB�B��] \�H ��Z[�] [ۜ� H ��\ ��] [ۈ و H ��Y] d�� [Z] Y\�B��[ �H \� �� ΃B�B�V P�U U�H ��SRU QCB�B��T �\�Y [� � [� \�X� ܜ� و H � H �ۙ�\�[��N�B� �X\� ܘ]�[�� \ �[ [ۜ� �\��ۜ�[�SXY \�� CB�B��ܛY\� �ۙ�\�[��H \�X� ܎�B� [�H �� \� \� �� [� Y�[ CB�B��Xܙ] \�N�B�� \� \� �Z] � �ܙCB�B�� \� Y[X�\�΃! B��[��H �ܛ�X�� H �\ \�K [� [ � CB��] �X�[�Z� �]ٛ�[� [�K [� [ � �B�X\�XH X[�� ]H ]�\�K [� [ � CB�B��RS�U S�� SRU QCB�B�� Z\��B�X\� [� XZY [� � �ܙK [� [ � CB�B�� \� Y[X�\�΃B�[�� [� �[Y[�Y H �Z�YY�[ K [� [ � �B��ۘ�\ �[ۈ ��\ [�H ��\ [�H Y^ X��K [� [ � CB�X[ �� H �� S�K �[��\��JK [� [ � LK�B�B�X��ܙ [�� H ��Y] d�� ۜ� ] ] [ۋ [� ]�Y X[ Y[X�\�� X^H [ �� B�XZ�H ��Z[�] [ۜˈ � �[ [�[ۙH �\� � � �� [ ^H X\�H ] B�� H �Xܙ] \�H �� \� \˜�Z] � �] �� X˝Z�H [� H �\��[� B� �\�Y [� و H ��Z[�] [�� [Z] YH \�� [�K�Y K�]JH B�ۛ�� \� ��ۈ \� ��X� K [� [� [�H ]�[� �Y�ܙH MH �[ K� [�H B��Z[�] [ۜ� ��[ �\]Z\�H H �� \� H �X�ۙ \� [� H �ۜ�[� B�و H ��Z[�YK [ و � �H � �[ �H Y[X�\�� و H ��Y] K�B�B�H �� ܝ�\� � �YZ[�� [�H [� �� [� Y�[��B�B�[ �� \� \� B�B�� \� \� �Z] B��Xܙ] \�K T� B�KH B�� \� \� �Z] B�ٙ�X�X[ �[ �� [� ] ܃B�� ] \�[�I�� Y�K � �ܙ � H �R� R�B� [ �� N �H ��M� �� Y�JH � ��M� \�X�H � ��M! ͎ �^ From johncharles.smith at ST-CATHERINES.OXFORD.AC.UK Thu Jun 12 15:56:55 2003 From: johncharles.smith at ST-CATHERINES.OXFORD.AC.UK (John Charles Smith) Date: Thu, 12 Jun 2003 11:56:55 EDT Subject: ISHL Nominations (again) Message-ID: ----------------------------Original message---------------------------- Several colleagues have complained that the earlier version of this message was, variously, 'gibberish', 'garbage', and 'Linear B'! I don't know what went wrong, as the text sent to HISTLING was definitely not garbled. But I'm trying again, with apologies: a) to those of you who couldn't read the message first time round; b) to those of you who are getting a second copy of the text. Best wishes to all, JCS. IMPORTANT MESSAGE FOR ALL MEMBERS OF THE INTERNATIONAL SOCIETY FOR HISTORICAL LINGUISTICS Dear Friends and Colleagues, Several positions in the Society will fall vacant this year, and at the Business Meeting to be held during the Copenhagen ICHL a vote will be taken on proposals to fill these vacancies. I have now heard from the ISHL Nominating Committee, who have made the following nominations: i) FUTURE PRESIDENT/CONFERENCE DIRECTOR (for 2007) Lyle Campbell (University of Canterbury, Christchurch, New Zealand) ii) MEMBER OF EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE (to serve until 2009) Maria Manoliu (University of California, Davis, U.S.A.) iii) MEMBER OF NOMINATING COMMITTEE (to serve until 2011) Malcolm Ross (Australian National University, Canberra, Australia) With these nominations, the composition of the Society's Committees will be as follows: EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE Co-Presidents and Directors of the 2005 Conference: Thomas Cravens & Joseph Salmons (Wisconsin-Madison) Former Conference Director: Lene Schoesler (Copenhagen) Secretary: John Charles Smith (Oxford) Other Members: Rosanna Sornicola (Naples), until 2005 Vit Bubenik (Newfoundland), until 2007 Maria Manoliu (Davis), until 2009 NOMINATING COMMITTEE Chair: Martin Maiden (Oxford), until 2005 Other Members: Ans van Kemenade (Nijmegen), until 2007 Concepcion Company Company (Mexico), until 2009 Malcolm Ross (ANU, Canberra), until 2011. According to the Society's constitution, individual members may also make nominations. Should anyone wish to do so, could they please let both the Secretary (johncharles.smith at stcatz.ox.ac.uk) and the current President of the Nominating Committee (harold.koch at anu.edu.au) know as soon as possible, and in any event before 15 July. Any nominations would require a proposer, a seconder, and the consent of the nominee, all of whom should be members of the Society. I look forward to seeing you in Copenhagen. All good wishes, John Charles Smith Secretary, ISHL -- John Charles Smith Official Fellow and Tutor St Catherine's College, Oxford, OX1 3UJ, UK tel. +44 1865 271700 (College) / 271748 (direct) / 271768 (fax) From gd116 at HERMES.CAM.AC.UK Sun Jun 15 18:07:32 2003 From: gd116 at HERMES.CAM.AC.UK (Guy Deutscher) Date: Sun, 15 Jun 2003 14:07:32 EDT Subject: Origin of nominalising morphology. Message-ID: ----------------------------Original message---------------------------- Dear Histling-ers, I have a question about the origin of nominalizing morphology, which I hope someone can help with. What prompts the question is the wish to understand how infinitives develop in language. Half of the answer to this is well known. As Martin Haspelmath, for example, has shown, the markers of infinitives often come from allative and purposive markers (as in English 'to'). But there is another half. In order for those allative or purposive markers to appear before a verb, the verb usually has to have some nominalizing affix. In other words, to get the infinitive, we need to start with some 'action nominal' or participle of some kind. But where does the morphology which takes a verb and turns it into an 'action nominal' come from in the first place? One would expect that it arises by grammaticalization, and ultimately from some lexical source. But what are these sources? In Indo-European, if I understand correctly, the sources of various nominalizing suffixes are mostly obscure. For the I-E participle in -wos/-us, for example, Szemerenyi tentatively suggests that it may be derived from a verbal root *wes- 'stay'. But obviously, one cannot rely on such etymologies. Similarly, if you take the English participle in -ing, then you can certainly go back with it to a stage where it was still more nominal in nature (as it still is in the German cognate -ung). But the actual etymology for the suffix is not so clear. Do people know of examples where one can actually observe the emergence of nominalizing morphology on verbs, or at least reconstruct it transparently? There are, of course, plenty of clear examples for the emergence of morphology that derives abstract nouns from *other nouns*. (English suffixes in friend-ship or child-hood derive originally from noun-noun compounds). In theory, therefore, one way for nominalizing morphology to reach verbs would be by extension of such affixes from nouns to verbs. But again, are there examples where one can actually see such a process in action? Many thanks, Guy Deutscher. From gwhitta at GWDG.DE Mon Jun 16 12:22:55 2003 From: gwhitta at GWDG.DE (Gordon Whittaker) Date: Mon, 16 Jun 2003 08:22:55 EDT Subject: Origin of nominalising morphology. In-Reply-To: Message-ID: ----------------------------Original message---------------------------- Guy, You pose a very interesting question, which I hope will provoke a fruitful discussion. As for the parallel of English -ing with German -ung, you should be careful to distinguish two English morphemes. Only the abstract noun suffix -ing is cognate with the German equivalent in -ung. Unless I am mistaken, the participial suffix -ing ~ -in' is the result of the falling together of an original participial -end (as in German) with the -ing nominal suffix. If I am wrong here, I am sure someone can clarify the issue. Best, Gordon *************************** Prof. Dr. Gordon Whittaker Seminar fuer Romanische Philologie Humboldtallee 19 37073 Goettingen Germany tel.: 0551-39 41 88 (office) tel./fax: 05594-89 333 (home) *************************** From paoram at UNIPV.IT Mon Jun 16 12:23:28 2003 From: paoram at UNIPV.IT (Paolo Ramat) Date: Mon, 16 Jun 2003 08:23:28 EDT Subject: R: Origin of nominalising morphology. Message-ID: ----------------------------Original message---------------------------- Etymologizing on morphological markers has always been a hard job! What is for instance the possible origin of *-yo- as suffix of comparatives, as in Lat. _melior_? We have simply to register that PIE had a comparative formed with *-yo. I do not think that hypotheses like that of Szemerenyi may ever be falsified/proved. What is sure is that infinitives represent in the IE lgs. -but not in PIE !- nominal forms from verbale roots: Vedic _ya:tave_ "for going" is clearly a dative of the Infin. _ya:tu_ from the root _*ya:-_"go"; and we know that _-tu-_ was a suffix for forming abstract verbal nouns( 'nomina actionis'; cf. Lat. _motus_ ,etc.). But where this -tu- is deriving from is impossible to reconstruct. For ancient IE lgs. I'm not aware of good examples. ----- Original Message ----- From: Guy Deutscher To: Sent: Sunday, June 15, 2003 8:07 PM Subject: Origin of nominalising morphology. > ----------------------------Original message---------------------------- > Dear Histling-ers, > > I have a question about the origin of nominalizing morphology, which I > hope someone can help with. What prompts the question is the wish to > understand how infinitives develop in language. Half of the answer to this > is well known. As Martin Haspelmath, for example, has shown, the markers > of infinitives often come from allative and purposive markers (as in > English 'to'). But there is another half. In order for those allative or > purposive markers to appear before a verb, the verb usually has to have > some nominalizing affix. In other words, to get the infinitive, we need to > start with some 'action nominal' or participle of some kind. But where > does the morphology which takes a verb and turns it into an 'action > nominal' come from in the first place? One would expect that it arises by > grammaticalization, and ultimately from some lexical source. But what are > these sources? In Indo-European, if I understand > correctly, the sources of various nominalizing suffixes are mostly > obscure. For the I-E participle in -wos/-us, for example, Szemerenyi > tentatively suggests that it may be derived from a verbal root *wes- > 'stay'. But obviously, one cannot rely on such etymologies. Similarly, if > you take the English participle in -ing, then you can certainly go back > with it to a stage where it was still more nominal in nature (as it > still is in the German cognate -ung). But the actual etymology for the > suffix is not so clear. Do people know of examples where one can actually > observe the emergence of nominalizing morphology on verbs, or at least > reconstruct it transparently? There are, of course, plenty of clear > examples for the emergence of morphology that derives abstract nouns from > *other nouns*. (English suffixes in friend-ship or child-hood derive > originally from noun-noun compounds). In theory, therefore, one way for > nominalizing morphology to reach verbs would be by extension of such > affixes from nouns to verbs. But again, are there examples where one can > actually see such a process in action? > > Many thanks, Guy Deutscher. From larryt at COGS.SUSX.AC.UK Mon Jun 16 22:33:33 2003 From: larryt at COGS.SUSX.AC.UK (Larry Trask) Date: Mon, 16 Jun 2003 18:33:33 EDT Subject: Origin of nominalising morphology. In-Reply-To: Message-ID: ----------------------------Original message---------------------------- --On Sunday, June 15, 2003 2:07 pm +0000 Guy Deutscher wrote: > I have a question about the origin of nominalizing morphology, which I > hope someone can help with. What prompts the question is the wish to > understand how infinitives develop in language. > But where > does the morphology which takes a verb and turns it into an 'action > nominal' come from in the first place? One would expect that it arises by > grammaticalization, and ultimately from some lexical source. But what are > these sources? > Do people know of examples where one can actually > observe the emergence of nominalizing morphology on verbs, or at least > reconstruct it transparently? I think we can reconstruct the origins of nominalizing morphology in Basque with some confidence. Basque has no infinitive, but it has a gerund which is of very frequent use. The gerund can appear in any NP slot in a sentence, and it can take any required nominal case-marking. For example, it can take the allative case-suffix <-ra> to express purpose: (1a) Etxe-ra joan nahi du-t aita ikus-te-ra house-ALL go want AUX-1SgERG father see-GER-ALL 'I want to go home to see my father.' It is clear that the modern gerund is of recent origin. For one thing, the formation of the gerund exhibits considerable regional variation, though the gerund is always formed by adding a suffix to the stem of the verb. The western dialect Bizkaian uses only the suffix <-te>. Most varieties use both <-te> and <-tze>, which are in complementary distribution, depending on the nature of the verb stem. A west-central area uses <-keta>. An eastern variety uses <-(e)ta>. And old Bizkaian exhibits an apparent suffix <-zaite>, long extinct. Now, these gerund-forming suffixes are identical in form to ordinary noun-forming suffixes in the language, as follows. The suffix <-te> commonly forms nouns of duration: 'hunger' --> 'famine' 'rain' --> 'rainy spell' The suffix <-tze> commonly forms nouns of abundance: 'people' --> 'crowd, multitude' 'money' --> 'riches, treasure' The suffix <-keta> has several functions, including 'abundance' and 'duration', but most commonly it forms nouns of activity: 'bull' --> 'bull-running' (as in Pamplona) 'word' --> 'speech, conversation' The eastern <-(e)ta> is quite possibly a variant of <-keta>, since <-keta> has a frequent variant <-eta>. The archaic <-zaite> appears to consist of <-te> attached to another suffix; I won't pursue it here, but in fact there is little difficulty in seeing this as <-te> attached to the noun-forming suffix <-tza> (the extra /i/ would be expected here) (compare the universal agent suffix, which is <-le> or <-tzaile>, according to the nature of the verb-stem). So, there are good reasons for supposing that the modern gerund has been constructed by adding to the verb-stem a noun-forming suffix meaning variously 'duration', 'abundance' or 'activity'. All these look semantically good. Now, there is one possible technical objection. The noun-forming suffixes just mentioned form ordinary nouns, with ordinary nominal properties. But the gerund is wholly verbal in nature: it takes subjects and objects with ordinary case-marking; it takes adverbs; and in short it has only verbal properties. It can't take nominal modifiers or specifiers like adjectives or determiners. This looks awkward. (What is nominalized is the entire gerund phrase, though any required case-marking appears on the gerund itself.) But there's a wrinkle. In northern (French) Basque, the gerund exhibits one nominal property: in certain circumstances, the direct object of a gerund stands, not in the absolutive case, like an ordinary direct object, but in the genitive case. So, my example (1a) above appears as follows in northern Basque, where the allative case-suffix is <-rat> and the /k/ in 'see' is aspirated: (1b) etxera joan nahi dut aitaren ikhusterat Here 'father' takes the genitive case-suffix <-en> (the /r/ is purely phonological), and the whole thing appears to be literally something like "...for the seeing of my father". This observation strongly suggests that the gerund was once an ordinary noun, with ordinary nominal properties, and that its acquisition of verbal properties is a secondary development. I've written about this here: R. L. Trask. 1995. 'On the history of the non-finite verb forms in Basque'. In José Ignacio Hualde, Joseba A. Lakarra and R. L. Trask (eds), Towards a History of the Basque Language, Amsterdam: John Benjamins, pp. 207-234. I hope this is the sort of thing you're looking for. Larry Trask COGS University of Sussex Brighton BN1 9QH UK larryt at cogs.susx.ac.uk From doncoop at mindspring.com Mon Jun 16 22:35:47 2003 From: doncoop at mindspring.com (Donald Cooper) Date: Mon, 16 Jun 2003 18:35:47 EDT Subject: Infinitive Message-ID: Dear Dr. Deutscher: After seeing the first round of responses to your query, I suggest that it may be useful to you to turn to The Syntactic Development of the Infinitive in Indo-European by Dorothy Disterheft, which was published in 1980 by Slavica Publishers. It emphasizes the material from Vedic, Avestan, Old Irish, and Hittite. The book is a revision of her UCLA dissertation. The syntactic emphasis provides an important context for the interpretation of the morphological evidence of the early forms, which otherwise may be ambiguous, as one of my teachers, Cal Watkins, used to emphasize. Sincerely, Donald S. Cooper, Ph.D. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From EvolPub at AOL.COM Mon Jun 16 22:48:54 2003 From: EvolPub at AOL.COM (Tony Schiavo) Date: Mon, 16 Jun 2003 18:48:54 EDT Subject: Book Announcement: Pennsylvania Dutch (1872) Message-ID: ----------------------------Original message---------------------------- Evolution Publishing is pleased to announce publication of the following historically significant reprint: Pennsylvania Dutch A Dialect of South German S. S. Haldeman, A. M. Originally published in 1872 by the Reformed Church Publication Board in Philadelphia, PA, this historically significant reprint gives a brief but thorough explication of Pennsylvania Dutch--a German dialect spoken in the Pennsylvania towns of Easton, Reading, Allentown, Harrisburg, Lebanon, Lancaster, and York. Out of print for many years, the work represents one of the earliest scientific treatments of the Pennsylvania German dialect and offers a snapshot of the language as it existed in the 19th century. Included in the volume is a history of how a dialect of German came to be spoken in Pennsylvania, the phonology of the dialect, a vocabulary of peculiar words, syntax, and comparisons to other German dialects. Also included are several pages of PA Dutch phrases and sentences, examples of PA Dutch words adopted into English, and samples of "broken" English spoken by the PA Dutch. May 2003 ~ 69 pp. ~ clothbound ~ ISBN 1-889758-55-8 ~ $28.00 Evolution Publishing is dedicated to preserving and consolidating obscure records of languages and dialects spoken in North America with the goal of making them more accessible and readily available to the academic community and the public at large. For further information on this and other titles: http://www.evolpub.com/Americandialects/MidAtlbooks.html Evolution Publishing evolpub at aol.com From XHighwire at aol.com Tue Jun 17 16:11:57 2003 From: XHighwire at aol.com (XHighwire at aol.com) Date: Tue, 17 Jun 2003 12:11:57 EDT Subject: Origin of nominalising morphology. Message-ID: ----------------------------Original message---------------------------- In a message dated 6/15/03 2:13:21 PM, gd116 at HERMES.CAM.AC.UK writes: << As Martin Haspelmath, for example, has shown, the markers of infinitives often come from allative and purposive markers (as in English 'to'). But there is another half. In order for those allative or purposive markers to appear before a verb, the verb usually has to have some nominalizing affix. In other words, to get the infinitive, we need to start with some 'action nominal' or participle of some kind. But where does the morphology which takes a verb and turns it into an 'action nominal' come from in the first place? >> Just to get basic for a moment. We might postulate a breakthrough moment when verbs are turned into nouns or adjectives, i.e., when actions and processes became abstracted enough to deserve "noun" or "adjective" status. Up to some point, "someone" was always eating and running. Then it occurred to some speakers that eating and running were ideas in themselves that could be referred to independent of who and how many were acting and when, especially by making a verb a noun. And I suppose that this might be seen as a later development, unless grammar fell full-blown into the human brain. On the other hand, infinite verbs -- being without person, number, and mood marked -- seem simpler and logically more likely to be closer to the core forms, don't they? And of course one obvious way to create a verbal is to just give the verb a noun ending -- like the way nouns are commonly made into adjectives. But the substantive noun matches neither the participle or infinitive forms of , or even (though it does match the 1st, ind, passive voice, ). So it seems appropriate to conclude -- as everyone has -- that there was often some less direct development of the infinitive in between. But going back to one question mentioned above -- <> -- why would we need an infinitive, if we already had made a participle. In fact, why use infinitives in English at all when you can turn any verb into a participle (and have lost the inflective infinitive ending from OE)? "Allative and purposive" meaning can easily be injected into participle constructions without making a infinitive. He "runs to score" means he "runs in order to score" which means "he runs so that he will score." Perhaps the infinitive developed as some form of shorthand? Do I say something different when I say "running is fun" versus "to run is fun"? Is some social nuance or ease of articulation or special usages in some languages enough to explain the infinitive in light of participle? Even ellipses filled in with the typical infinitive in English can be filled with either, it seems. (Mary held the door open > Mary held the door [to keep it] open > Mary held the door [keeping it] open). (As far as I know, though the infinitive serves other functions than they do in English, none could not be served just as well as by participle forms, in IE languages at least. Going even farther, when Brian Joseph, e.g., notes the striking change in Hellenistic Greek towards the "increased use of finite complementation in place of infinitival forms" - my presumption is that this change did not produce a reduction in expression or meaning.) So, my (tangent) question is, why infinitives in the first place? Regards, Steve Long From Julia.Ulrich at DEGRUYTER.COM Tue Jun 17 16:12:44 2003 From: Julia.Ulrich at DEGRUYTER.COM (Julia Ulrich) Date: Tue, 17 Jun 2003 12:12:44 EDT Subject: Modality in Contemporary English, edited by Roberta Facchinetti et al (2003) Message-ID: ----------------------------Original message---------------------------- NEW from Mouton de Gruyter! >From the series Topics in English Linguistics Series Editors: Bernd Kortmann and Elizabeth Closs Traugott MODALITY IN CONTEMPORARY ENGLISH Edited by Roberta Facchinetti, Manfred Krug, and Frank Palmer 2003. xvi, 396 pages. Cloth. Euro 98.00 [D] / sFr 157.00 / approx. US$ 108.00 ISBN 3-11-017686-6 (Topics in English Linguistics 44) This book offers original theoretical accounts and a wealth of descriptive information concerning modality in present-day English. At the same time, it provides fresh impetus to more general linguistic issues such as grammaticalization, colloquialization, or the interplay between sociolinguistic and syntactic constraints. The articles fall into four sections: (a) the semantics and pragmatics of core modal verbs; (b) the status of emerging modal items; (c) stylistic variation and change; (d) sociolinguistic variation and syntactic models. In addition to distinguished newcomers, contributors include well-known specialists in the field. The book is of considerable value to students and teachers of English and Linguistics at undergraduate and graduate levels worldwide. Roberta Facchinetti is Associate Professor at the University of Verona, Italy. Manfred Krug is Associate Professor at the University of Freiburg, Germany. Frank Palmer is Professor Emeritus at the University of Reading, UK. FROM THE CONTENTS: Frank Palmer Modality in English: theoretical, descriptive and typological issues THE SEMANTICS AND PRAGMATICS OF CORE MODAL VERBS: Paul Larreya Irrealis, past time reference and modality Richard Matthews Modal auxiliary constructions, TAM and interrogatives Gregory Ward, Betty J. Birner, and Jeffrey P. Kaplan A pragmatic analysis of the epistemic would construction in English Stéphane Gresset Towards a contextual micro-analysis of the non-equivalence of might and could THE STATUS OF EMERGING MODAL ITEMS Philippe Bourdin On two distinct uses of go as a conjoined marker of evaluative modality Keith Mitchell Had better and might as well: on the margins of modality? Heidi Verplaetse What you and I want: A functional approach to verb complementation of modal want to Carita Paradis Between epistemic modality and degree: the case of really STYLISTIC VARIATION AND CHANGE Geoffrey Leech Modality on the move: the English modal auxiliaries 1961-1992 Nicholas Smith Changes in the modals and semi-modals of strong obligation and epistemic necessity in recent British English Maurizio Gotti Shall and will in contemporary English: a comparison with past uses Roberta Facchinetti Pragmatic and sociological constraints on the functions of may in contemporary British English SOCIOLINGUISTIC VARIATION AND SYNTACTIC MODELS Jennifer Coates The role of epistemic modality in women's talk Stephen J. Nagle Double modals in the southern United States: syntactic structure or syntactic structures? Graeme Trousdale Modal verbs in Tyneside English: evidence for (socio)linguistic theory To sign up for our FREE ELECTRONIC NEWSLETTER, please visit our website at www.degruyter.com. To order, please contact SFG-Servicecenter-Fachverlage GmbH Postfach 4343 72774 Reutlingen, Germany Fax: +49 (0)7071 - 93 53 - 33 E-mail: deGruyter at s-f-g.com For USA, Canada and Mexico: Walter de Gruyter, Inc. 200 Saw Mill River Road Hawthorne, NY 10532, USA Fax: +1 (914) 747-1326 E-mail: cs at degruyterny.com Please visit our website for other publications by Mouton de Gruyter: http://www.degruyter.com __________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ Diese E-Mail und ihre Dateianhaenge ist fuer den angegeben Empfaenger und/oder die Empfaengergruppe bestimmt. Wenn Sie diese E-Mail versehentlich trotzdem erhalten haben, setzen Sie sich bitte mit dem Absender oder Ihrem Systembetreuer in Verbindung. Diese Fusszeile bestaetigt ausserdem, dass die E-Mail auf zum Pruefzeitpunkt bekannte Viren ueberprueft wurde. This email and any files transmitted with it are confidential and intended solely for the use of the individual or entity to whom they are addressed. If you have received this email in error please notify the sender or the system manager. This footnote also confirms that this email message has been swept for the presence of computer viruses. From phonosemantics at EARTHLINK.NET Tue Jun 17 23:33:09 2003 From: phonosemantics at EARTHLINK.NET (Jess Tauber) Date: Tue, 17 Jun 2003 19:33:09 EDT Subject: Origin of nominalising morphology Message-ID: ----------------------------Original message---------------------------- Just throwing in a fuzzily thought out note. Might the appearance of an array of different nominalization patterns have something to do with different ways of laying out non-main clauses, for instance more hierarchically versus serially organized, and the nature of their relations with the main clause? ...Jess Tauber --- phonosemantics at earthlink.net From krasukh at iling.msk.su Thu Jun 19 10:52:38 2003 From: krasukh at iling.msk.su (krasukh) Date: Thu, 19 Jun 2003 06:52:38 EDT Subject: For HISTLING, "Origin of nominal morphology" Message-ID: ----------------------------Original message---------------------------- Dear friends! The question about etymology of affixes, mentioned by Guy Deuts- cher, is very important. One can remember, that Franz Bopp has estab- lished the agglutination theory. According Bopp, any affix is from origin a word: aorist suffix *-S- is the verb *ES- "be", flexion of Nominative *-S is demonstrative pronoun usf. But lingustics could ne- ither reiect nor approve this these. I can say, that the verbal ending of 1 sg. *-M has the same origin, as the personal pronoun *ME, and en- dings of 3 sg *-T (Injunctive), *-TI Present), *-TU (Imperative) are identical with the nominal suffixes *-T, *-TI, *-TU (Laroche 1975). But not each suffix or flexion has so apparent etymology. The trans- formation of separate word in the connective word and then in the grammatical affix is good attested in Germanic and Romance langua- ges: Fr. CHEZ (< CASA), -MENT, German -LICH (Eng. -LY), -HEIT (-HOOD), -TUM (-DOM). But Proto-Language doesn't allow to find the clear atymo- logy for each soffix or desinence. We cannot say exactly: Is the suf- fix of verbal nouns *-TER-, *-MEN- of the same origin, as root *TER- "move", *MEN- "think, remember"? But we haven't the necessity to find their origin. More important is the circumstance, that the full grade athematic variants of these suffixes builds the Nomina agentis, and Nomina concreta, zero grade athematics - Nomina actionis and Nomina abstracta, and thematic variants means verbal adjectives, - inactives and/ or modal (more exactly - Krasuchin to appear in Akten der Arbeit- stagung der Indogermanischen Gesellschaft "Indogermanisches Nomen"). Thus we can describe the programm of research of desinences and gram- matical affihes: "Not etymology, but etiology". About the suffix of Perfect Participle *-UOS-. I think, that it is connec- ted with adjectives in *-U-, meant the result of action: OInd TAUTI "grow" - Greek TAUS MEGAS (Hes.)"great < grown". Sincerely, Konstantin Krasukhin Professor of General and Comparative Linguistics, Institute of Linguistics, B.Kislovsky per, 1/12, 125009, Moscow, Russia, fax (7 095)290-05-28, e-mail krasukh at iling.msk.su From cil17 at cil17.org Fri Jun 20 12:40:36 2003 From: cil17 at cil17.org (cil17 at cil17.org) Date: Fri, 20 Jun 2003 08:40:36 EDT Subject: REMINDER - XVII International Congress of Linguists 2003 in Prague Message-ID: ----------------------------Original message---------------------------- ------------------------------------------------------- REMINDER REMINDER REMINDER REMINDER REMINDER ------------------------------------------------------- XVII International Congress of Linguists Prague, Czech Republic July 24-29, 2003 Organized by Faculty of Mathematics and Physics Charles University in Prague Center for Computational Linguistics and Institute of Formal and Applied Linguistics in cooperation with Institute of Czech Language Academy of Sciences, Czech Republic Under the auspices of Comité International Permanent des Linguistes ------------------------------------------------------- XVII International Congress of Linguists 2003 in Prague On July 24 - 29, 2003, Prague will host the XVII International Congress of Linguists (CIL). The Congress is organized by the Centre for Computational Linguistics and the Institute of Formal and Applied Linguistics at the Faculty of Matematics and Physics, Charles University in Prague, in cooperation with the Institute of Czech Language, Academy of Sciences, Czech Republic, under the auspices of the Comité International Permanent des Linguistes (CIPL) and with the patronage of The Mayor of the City of Prague, The Rector of the Charles University and The President of the Academy of Sciences. The President of the Congress is Prof. František Daneš, the Chairman of he Scientific Committee is Prof. Ferenc Kiefer and the Chairperson of the Local Arrangement Committee is Prof. Eva Hajičová. There will be four plenary sessions, each with two invited speakers: 1. Typology (Prof. A. Aikhenvald and Prof. P. Sgall), 2. Endangered languages (Prof. T. Tsunoda and Prof. D. Whalen), 3. Methodology of linguistics (Prof. E. Bach and Prof. S. Poplack), 4. Language and the mind (Prof. W. Klein and Prof. M. Tomasello). There will be ten parallel sessions focused on the following topics: language planning, languages in contact, comparative linguistics, computer service and linguistics, language and field work, techniques for language description, syntax and morphology, phonetics and phonology, lexicology, sociopragmatics. ------------------------------------------------------ The final list of accepted papers, posters and workshop contributions, as well as all necessary information for registration, can be found on the Congress web page http://www.cil17.org. ------------------------------------------------------ Centre for Computational Linguistics MFF UK, c/o Mrs Anna Kotěšovcová, Malostranské nám. 25, 118 00 Praha 1, Czech Republic, e-mail cil17 at cil17.org, fax ++420-2-2191 4304). From vbubenik at MORGAN.UCS.MUN.CA Fri Jun 20 12:42:58 2003 From: vbubenik at MORGAN.UCS.MUN.CA (Vit Bubenik) Date: Fri, 20 Jun 2003 08:42:58 EDT Subject: Origin of nominalising morphology. In-Reply-To: Message-ID: ----------------------------Original message---------------------------- Re: On Sun, 15 Jun 2003, Guy Deutscher wrote: > ----------------------------Original message---------------------------- > Dear Histling-ers, > > I have a question about the origin of nominalizing morphology, which I > hope someone can help with. What prompts the question is the wish to > understand how infinitives develop in language. Akkadian -- the earliest recorded Semitic language -- with its plethora of infinitives (10 according to von Soden) and verbal adjectives might be a good starting point. The basic infintive para:sa-um and the factitive infinitive purrus-um/parrus-um share their vocalic patterns with primary nouns and adjectives: ata:n-um "donkey (female)" (but in Akkadian this nominal pattern is isolated) and dunnun-um "fortified", kubbur-um "thick, fat", kuSSur-um "crippled", sukkuk-um/tummum-um "deaf", respectively. Here the question of priority, i.e. whether the nominal pattern is imposed on the verbal one or vice versa, will bring us to the chicken-or-egg argument. But the story is different with non 'non-basic' infinitives: the causative infinitive s'u-prus-um/s'a-prus-um (Assyrian) has no adjectival counterpart (there is only an isolated Old Babylonian/poetic s'a-lbub-um "wild"); the passive infinitive na-prus-um has been related to the vocalic pattern of nomina loci as ma-s'kan-um "place" (and other nouns such as na-ra:m-um < na-r?am-um "beloved"); its -u- can be traced back to words such as ma-qlu:-um "burning". Assuming some satisfactory solution of the initial n- (infinitive) vs. m- (nomen loci) one might argue for the priority of the nominal patter. In Biblical Hebrew the basic infinitive qa:To:l (Proto-Semitic a-a:, cf. Akkadian para:s-um) shares its vocalic pattern with primary adjectives: ?a:do:m "red", ka:Ho:l "blue", ya:ro:q "green" (and some other nouns); here again the question of priority is elusive. But there is another half. In order for those allative or > purposive markers to appear before a verb, the verb usually has to have > some nominalizing affix. In other words, to get the infinitive, we need to > start with some 'action nominal' or participle of some kind. But where > does the morphology which takes a verb and turns it into an 'action > nominal' come from in the first place? One would expect that it arises by > grammaticalization, and ultimately from some lexical source. But what are > these sources? ... In theory, therefore, one way for > nominalizing morphology to reach verbs would be by extension of such > affixes from nouns to verbs. But again, are there examples where one can > actually see such a process in action ? Here are some observations on Hittite which possesses two infinitives (in -anzi and -anna) and the verbal noun in -war (e.g. esu-war "being", sesu-war "sleeping"). This suffix is also found with two primary nouns asa-war "fence" and parta-war "war"; the difference, however, appears in their oblique cases (e.g. the genitive of the infinitive is -mas [esu-mas "essendi" in Latin] vs. the nominal suffix -nas [partau-nas "of the wing"]). I am not sure what to make out of this. The other two infinitives have solid IE counterparts in *-ti > zi [tsi] and PP adjectival/partcipial *-no. Vit Bubenik From gd116 at HERMES.CAM.AC.UK Mon Jun 23 10:58:11 2003 From: gd116 at HERMES.CAM.AC.UK (Guy Deutscher) Date: Mon, 23 Jun 2003 06:58:11 EDT Subject: Open ended summary on nominalising morphology Message-ID: ----------------------------Original message---------------------------- Dear Histling, A few days ago, I raised the question of the sources for nominalising morphology on verbs. I had expected - rather naively in retrospect - to find lexical sources that grammaticalise *directly* on verbs. But it seems that nominalising morphology on verbs does NOT arise in this way. Instead, at least in all the examples I have found out about, nominalising affixes seem to reach verbs by *extension* of already grammaticalised affixes from nouns. Here are a few examples. According to Barry Blake, in Australian languages, case markers can be added to verbs, and at a later stage, these case markers are reanalysed as nominalising morphology. (He has an article on this 'Nominal Marking on verbs, some Australian cases', in Word 50 (1989):299-317.) Larry Trask shows that suffixes forming abstract nouns from other nouns must have been extended to verbs in Basque. (His article on this is 'On the history of the non-finite verb forms in Basque. In José Ignacio Hualde, Joseba A. Lakarra and R. L. Trask (eds) (1995), Towards a History of the Basque Language, Amsterdam: John Benjamins, pp. 207-234.). Nominal classifiers, it seems, are also often extended to verbs, where they assume a nominalising function. (Examples can be found in A. Aikhenvald: 'Classifiers', OUP 2000, p. 332). Vit Bubenik points out that in Semitic, some verbal nouns are clearly modelled on adjectival and nominal patterns. That must mean that adjectival/nominal patterns were extended to verbal roots. It seems, therefore, that in all these cases, affixes which had grammaticalised *somewhere else* are later extended to verbs. If this is universally valid, then it is an interesting point in itself. But it then raises a deeper question. How does the extension of such affixes from nouns to verbs - surely, a mighty conceptual leap - actually take place? I had always thought that the 'bridging context' between nouns and verbs was precisely verbal nouns. But we cannot use verbal nouns to explain the emergence of verbal nouns in the first place... Thanks to all who answered, Guy Deutscher. From Julia.Ulrich at DEGRUYTER.COM Tue Jun 24 02:41:29 2003 From: Julia.Ulrich at DEGRUYTER.COM (Julia Ulrich) Date: Mon, 23 Jun 2003 22:41:29 EDT Subject: New in Paperback: Studies in the History of the English Language (Edited by D. Minkova, R. Stockwell) (2003) Message-ID: ----------------------------Original message---------------------------- New from Mouton de Gruyter! Now available in Paperback! STUDIES IN THE HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE A MILLENNIAL PERSPECTIVE Edited by Donka Minkova and Robert Stockwell 2003. vi, 496 pages. Paperback. Euro 36.95 / sFr 56,- / approx. US$ 37.00 ISBN 3-11-017591-6 The 19 papers in this volume are a selection from a UCLA conference intended to take stock of the state of the field at the beginning of the new millennium and to stimulate research in English Historical Linguistics. The authors are predominantly U.S. scholars. The fields represented include morphosyntax and semantics, grammaticalization, discourse analysis, dialectology, lexicography, the diachronic study of mixed language texts, phonology and metrics. >From the contents I. MILLENNIAL PERSPECTIVES >From etymological to historical pragmatics Elizabeth Closs Traugott Mixed-language texts as data and evidence in English historical linguistics Herbert Schendl Dialectology and the history of the English language William Kretzchmar Origin unknown Anatoly Liberman Issues for a new history of English prosody Thomas Cable Chaucer: Folk poet or littérateur? Gilbert Youmans / Xingzhong Li A rejoinder to Youmans and Li Thomas Cable II. PHONOLOGY AND METRICS The history of English r Blaine Erickson Vowel variation in English rhyme Kristin Hanson Lexical diffusion and competing analyses of sound change Betty Phillips Dating Criteria for Old English poems Geoffrey Russom How much shifting actually occured in the historical English vowel shift? Robert Stockwell Restoration of /a/ revisited David White III. MORPHOSYNTAX / SEMANTICS Pragmatic uses of SHALL future constructions in early Modern English Maurizio Gotti Explaining the creation of reflexive pronouns in English Edward Keenan Word order in Old English prose and poetry: The position of finite verb and adverbs Ans van Kemenade The "have" perfect in Old English: How close was it to the Modern English perfect? Jeong-Hoon Lee Reporting direct speech in early Modern slander depositions Colette Moore The emergence of the verb-verb compound in twentieth century English and twentieth century linguistics Benji Wald / Lawrence Besserman IV. ENVOY A thousand years of the history of English Richard Bailey To sign up for our FREE ELECTRONIC NEWSLETTER, please visit our website at www.degruyter.com. To order, please contact SFG-Servicecenter-Fachverlage GmbH Postfach 4343 72774 Reutlingen, Germany Fax: +49 (0)7071 - 93 53 - 33 E-mail: deGruyter at s-f-g.com For USA, Canada and Mexico: Walter de Gruyter, Inc. 200 Saw Mill River Road Hawthorne, NY 10532, USA Fax: +1 (914) 747-1326 E-mail: cs at degruyterny.com Please visit our website for other publications by Mouton de Gruyter: http://www.degruyter.com __________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ Diese E-Mail und ihre Dateianhaenge ist fuer den angegeben Empfaenger und/oder die Empfaengergruppe bestimmt. Wenn Sie diese E-Mail versehentlich trotzdem erhalten haben, setzen Sie sich bitte mit dem Absender oder Ihrem Systembetreuer in Verbindung. Diese Fusszeile bestaetigt ausserdem, dass die E-Mail auf zum Pruefzeitpunkt bekannte Viren ueberprueft wurde. This email and any files transmitted with it are confidential and intended solely for the use of the individual or entity to whom they are addressed. If you have received this email in error please notify the sender or the system manager. This footnote also confirms that this email message has been swept for the presence of computer viruses. From bjwald at EARTHLINK.NET Wed Jun 25 11:00:13 2003 From: bjwald at EARTHLINK.NET (Ben Wald) Date: Wed, 25 Jun 2003 07:00:13 EDT Subject: Open ended summary on nominalising morphology In-Reply-To: Message-ID: ----------------------------Original message---------------------------- on 6/23/03 6:58 AM, Guy Deutscher at gd116 at HERMES.CAM.AC.UK wrote: > It seems, therefore, that in all these cases, affixes which had > grammaticalised *somewhere else* are later extended to verbs. If this is > universally valid, then it is an interesting point in itself. But it then > raises a deeper question. How does the extension of such affixes from > nouns to verbs - surely, a mighty conceptual leap - actually take place? I > had always thought that the 'bridging context' between nouns and verbs was > precisely verbal nouns. It is not clear to me how large a CONCEPTUAL leap this is. The reason such a doubt occurs to me is that many years ago when I was looking at English 0-derivation (not to change the subject) in both directions, from noun to verb and verb to noun, cf. "sleep", "smoke", "burp", "reform", "attack", "defeat", "surprise" etc -- I was surprised to find that many examples where I expected the derivation to be V > N were attested as Ns centuries before they were attested as Vs (and sometimes vice-versa). I'll be the first one to admit that the OED, despite the massive effort, misses and overlooks a lot -- and the ways in which any dictionary falls short of the total active vocabulary of any language is worth discussing in more detail some other time. For the moment, however. it brought home to me the realisation that Ns and Vs are SYNTACTICALLY different categories, but not particularly "conceptually" different, esp. when the Ns denote activities (that's the point; does an activity noun presuppose it derives from a verb, one that may no longer be used -- or may have never been attested? And what's an activity, anyway. Are games activities? chess, baseball, etc. Or are they "(routinised) processes"? But then verbs are famous for expressing processes too... The last time I remember making this point about Ns and Vs being SYNTACTICALLY different but only more problematically "conceptually" different it had to do with those Amerindian languages that do not obviously distinguish nouns from verbs in their morphology (and syntax) and thus have led some analysts to offer the Whorfian notion that speakers of those languages conceptualise the world differently along such dimensions as durability (nouny)/fleetingness (verby) of events -- or something like that. From M.Baerman at SURREY.AC.UK Fri Jun 27 14:43:23 2003 From: M.Baerman at SURREY.AC.UK (Matthew Baerman) Date: Fri, 27 Jun 2003 10:43:23 EDT Subject: Syncretism by analogy Message-ID: ----------------------------Original message---------------------------- Dear list members A historiographical-cum-factual query. In Livonian, in place of the expected 1sg present tense ending (zero), you get the 3sg ending -b. Kettunen (1938) says that this was on analogy with the simple past tense paradigm, where 1sg and 3sg fell together as the result of regular sound change. Merits of this particular account aside, what interests me is the nature of the claim, namely, that you can have a pattern of syncretism (in the sense of homophony between cells of an inflectional paradigm) which arose by regular sound change in one paradigm, which is then extended by analogy to other paradigms which had not been affected by that sound change. I get a real sense of dij` vu when I read accounts like the above, one which quickly evaporates when I try to recall specific examples. So my question is: Can anyone think of other examples that have been claimed to work like the above (even unlikely ones)? Or ones that seem like they work that way, even if nobody s ever claimed it? Ones I can think of are: --Old Icelandic: 2sg=3sg in the present extended from consonant-stem verbs to all verbs (Kurylowicz 1949). --Eastern Finnmark Sami dialects: comitative sg=inessive/elative pl extended from nouns to pronouns(Hansson 1996). --Russian: genitive sg=dative/locative sg extended from i-stem nouns to a-stems (Sologub 1983). --Dhasanaac/Dasenech: 1pl=2sg/2pl/3SG fem extended from resonant-final stems to all stems (Sasse 1976, Tosco 2001). many thanks in advance Matthew Matthew Baerman Surrey Morphology Group University of Surrey Guildford, UK --------------------------------------------- This message was sent using UNIS MailSystem. From maxw at COGS.SUSX.AC.UK Sat Jun 28 13:22:31 2003 From: maxw at COGS.SUSX.AC.UK (Max Wheeler) Date: Sat, 28 Jun 2003 09:22:31 EDT Subject: Syncretism by analogy In-Reply-To: <200306270819.h5R8Jm3B013654@maia.csd.sc.edu> Message-ID: ----------------------------Original message---------------------------- Does the original syncretism have to be due to regular SC? As far as principles of morphological change are concerned, one might think it made no difference how the original syncretism came about, provided one could show the analogical extension was subsequent to the original syncretism. In many dialects of Catalan, syncretism 1pl.prs.subj=1pl.prs.ind and 2pl.prs.subj=2pl.prs.ind got established in the default Conjugation 1 before spreading 'by analogy' to the endings of the other conjugations (though in some verbs of Conj II, ind and subj retain distinct stem variants). But the original syncretism doesn't follow from regular SC (but rather, I have argued, from an inadequate and confusing system of vowel contrasts as exponents of the categories ind, subj, and imp in 1pl and 2pl). Of course, the extension here is across arbitrary inflectional classes, but perhaps that is not so different from the Russian case Matthew mentions. Max Wheeler --On Friday, June 27, 2003 10:43 -0400 Matthew Baerman wrote: > ----------------------------Original message---------------------------- > Dear list members > > A historiographical-cum-factual query. In Livonian, in place of the > expected 1sg present tense ending (zero), you get the 3sg ending -b. > Kettunen (1938) says that this was on analogy with the simple past tense > paradigm, where 1sg and 3sg fell together as the result of regular sound > change. Merits of this particular account aside, what interests me is the > nature of the claim, namely, that you can have a pattern of syncretism > (in the sense of homophony between cells of an inflectional paradigm) > which arose by regular sound change in one paradigm, which is then > extended by analogy to other paradigms which had not been affected by > that sound change. I get a real sense of dij` vu when I read accounts > like the above, one which quickly evaporates when I try to recall > specific examples. So my question is: > > Can anyone think of other examples that have been claimed to work like the > above (even unlikely ones)? Or ones that seem like they work that way, > even if nobody s ever claimed it? > > Ones I can think of are: > > --Old Icelandic: 2sg=3sg in the present extended from consonant-stem > verbs to all verbs (Kurylowicz 1949). > --Eastern Finnmark Sami dialects: comitative sg=inessive/elative pl > extended from nouns to pronouns(Hansson 1996). > --Russian: genitive sg=dative/locative sg extended from i-stem nouns to > a-stems (Sologub 1983). > --Dhasanaac/Dasenech: 1pl=2sg/2pl/3SG fem extended from resonant-final > stems to all stems (Sasse 1976, Tosco 2001). > > > many thanks in advance > Matthew > > > Matthew Baerman > Surrey Morphology Group > University of Surrey > Guildford, UK > > > --------------------------------------------- > This message was sent using UNIS MailSystem. ____________________________________________________________ Max W. Wheeler School of Cognitive & Computing Sciences University of Sussex Falmer BRIGHTON BN1 9QH, G.B. Tel: +44 (0)1273 678975 Fax: +44 (0)1273 671320 Email: maxw at cogs.susx.ac.uk ____________________________________________________________ From M.Baerman at SURREY.AC.UK Mon Jun 30 11:01:48 2003 From: M.Baerman at SURREY.AC.UK (Matthew Baerman) Date: Mon, 30 Jun 2003 07:01:48 EDT Subject: Syncretism by analogy Message-ID: ----------------------------Original message---------------------------- > ----------------------------Original message---------------------------- > Does the original syncretism have to be due to regular SC? As far as > principles of morphological change are concerned, one might think it made > no difference how the original syncretism came about, provided one could > show the analogical extension was subsequent to the original syncretism. The nice thing about sound change is that it can produce bizarre patterns, which are not reduceable to any obvious morphosyntactic or semantic natural class. To the extent that these are then extended analogically, it's evidence of the existence of purely morphological classes of values, something argued against by plenty of folk. In the Catalan example, is the case that the indicative form ousts the subjunctive? Matthew Matthew Baerman Surrey Morphology Group University of Surrey Guildford, UK > In many dialects of Catalan, syncretism 1pl.prs.subj=1pl.prs.ind and > 2pl.prs.subj=2pl.prs.ind got established in the default Conjugation 1 > before spreading 'by analogy' to the endings of the other conjugations > (though in some verbs of Conj II, ind and subj retain distinct stem > variants). But the original syncretism doesn't follow from regular SC (but > rather, I have argued, from an inadequate and confusing system of vowel > contrasts as exponents of the categories ind, subj, and imp in 1pl and > 2pl). Of course, the extension here is across arbitrary inflectional > classes, but perhaps that is not so different from the Russian case Matthew > mentions. > > Max Wheeler > > --On Friday, June 27, 2003 10:43 -0400 Matthew Baerman > wrote: > > > ----------------------------Original message---------------------------- > > Dear list members > > > > A historiographical-cum-factual query. In Livonian, in place of the > > expected 1sg present tense ending (zero), you get the 3sg ending -b. > > Kettunen (1938) says that this was on analogy with the simple past tense > > paradigm, where 1sg and 3sg fell together as the result of regular sound > > change. Merits of this particular account aside, what interests me is the > > nature of the claim, namely, that you can have a pattern of syncretism > > (in the sense of homophony between cells of an inflectional paradigm) > > which arose by regular sound change in one paradigm, which is then > > extended by analogy to other paradigms which had not been affected by > > that sound change. I get a real sense of dij` vu when I read accounts > > like the above, one which quickly evaporates when I try to recall > > specific examples. So my question is: > > > > Can anyone think of other examples that have been claimed to work like the > > above (even unlikely ones)? Or ones that seem like they work that way, > > even if nobody s ever claimed it? > > > > Ones I can think of are: > > > > --Old Icelandic: 2sg=3sg in the present extended from consonant-stem > > verbs to all verbs (Kurylowicz 1949). > > --Eastern Finnmark Sami dialects: comitative sg=inessive/elative pl > > extended from nouns to pronouns(Hansson 1996). > > --Russian: genitive sg=dative/locative sg extended from i-stem nouns to > > a-stems (Sologub 1983). > > --Dhasanaac/Dasenech: 1pl=2sg/2pl/3SG fem extended from resonant-final > > stems to all stems (Sasse 1976, Tosco 2001). > > > > > > many thanks in advance > > Matthew > > > > > > Matthew Baerman > > Surrey Morphology Group > > University of Surrey > > Guildford, UK > > > > > > --------------------------------------------- > > This message was sent using UNIS MailSystem. > > > > ____________________________________________________________ > Max W. Wheeler > School of Cognitive & Computing Sciences > University of Sussex > Falmer > BRIGHTON BN1 9QH, G.B. > > Tel: +44 (0)1273 678975 Fax: +44 (0)1273 671320 Email: > maxw at cogs.susx.ac.uk > ____________________________________________________________ > --------------------------------------------- This message was sent using UNIS MailSystem. From maxw at cogs.susx.ac.uk Mon Jun 30 11:02:00 2003 From: maxw at cogs.susx.ac.uk (Max Wheeler) Date: Mon, 30 Jun 2003 07:02:00 EDT Subject: Syncretism by analogy In-Reply-To: Message-ID: ----------------------------Original message---------------------------- Yes, I see your point; viz. that syncretisms caused by sound change provide the paradigm case (pun intended) for showing syncretism extended by analogy. In the Catalan case, the 1pl and 2pl ind=subj cases have the original indicative affix in Conjuagtions II and III, but the original subjunctive (also = imp in 1pl) in Conjugation I. While Catalan varieties were developing/extending these ind=subj syncretisms in 1pl and 2pl, most dialects (including standard Catalan) were developing/extending subjunctive endings in sg and 3pl precisely with the effect of repairing subj=indic syncretism that had occurred in Conjugation I as a result of regular SC in the 3pl generally, and in a few cases in 1-3sg. (Worse, though, seems to have been the situation that the inherited 2-3sg subjunctives in Conjugation I were anti-iconic, i.e. with zero exponent of subjunctive contrasting with /a/ ~ /e/ indicative. For many Catalan varieties the result of all this is that there is ind=subj syncretism where it was not the result of regular SC and ind-subj contrast where syncretism was the result of regular SC. Max _____________________________________________________ Max W. Wheeler Reader in Linguistics School of Cognitive & Computing Sciences University of Sussex Falmer, Brighton BN1 9QH, UK Tel +44 (0)1273 678975 Fax +44 (0)1273 673120 Email _____________________________________________________ -----Original Message----- From: M.Baerman at surrey.ac.uk [mailto:M.Baerman at surrey.ac.uk] Sent: 30 June 2003 10:13 To: HISTLING at LISTSERV.SC.EDU Cc: maxw at cogs.susx.ac.uk Subject: Re: Syncretism by analogy > ----------------------------Original message---------------------------- > Does the original syncretism have to be due to regular SC? As far as > principles of morphological change are concerned, one might think it made > no difference how the original syncretism came about, provided one could > show the analogical extension was subsequent to the original syncretism. The nice thing about sound change is that it can produce bizarre patterns, which are not reduceable to any obvious morphosyntactic or semantic natural class. To the extent that these are then extended analogically, it's evidence of the existence of purely morphological classes of values, something argued against by plenty of folk. In the Catalan example, is the case that the indicative form ousts the subjunctive? Matthew Matthew Baerman Surrey Morphology Group University of Surrey Guildford, UK > In many dialects of Catalan, syncretism 1pl.prs.subj=1pl.prs.ind and > 2pl.prs.subj=2pl.prs.ind got established in the default Conjugation 1 > before spreading 'by analogy' to the endings of the other conjugations > (though in some verbs of Conj II, ind and subj retain distinct stem > variants). But the original syncretism doesn't follow from regular SC (but > rather, I have argued, from an inadequate and confusing system of vowel > contrasts as exponents of the categories ind, subj, and imp in 1pl and > 2pl). Of course, the extension here is across arbitrary inflectional > classes, but perhaps that is not so different from the Russian case Matthew > mentions. > > Max Wheeler > > --On Friday, June 27, 2003 10:43 -0400 Matthew Baerman > wrote: > > > ----------------------------Original message---------------------------- > > Dear list members > > > > A historiographical-cum-factual query. In Livonian, in place of the > > expected 1sg present tense ending (zero), you get the 3sg ending -b. > > Kettunen (1938) says that this was on analogy with the simple past tense > > paradigm, where 1sg and 3sg fell together as the result of regular sound > > change. Merits of this particular account aside, what interests me is the > > nature of the claim, namely, that you can have a pattern of syncretism > > (in the sense of homophony between cells of an inflectional paradigm) > > which arose by regular sound change in one paradigm, which is then > > extended by analogy to other paradigms which had not been affected by > > that sound change. I get a real sense of dij` vu when I read accounts > > like the above, one which quickly evaporates when I try to recall > > specific examples. So my question is: > > > > Can anyone think of other examples that have been claimed to work like the > > above (even unlikely ones)? Or ones that seem like they work that way, > > even if nobody s ever claimed it? > > > > Ones I can think of are: > > > > --Old Icelandic: 2sg=3sg in the present extended from consonant-stem > > verbs to all verbs (Kurylowicz 1949). > > --Eastern Finnmark Sami dialects: comitative sg=inessive/elative pl > > extended from nouns to pronouns(Hansson 1996). > > --Russian: genitive sg=dative/locative sg extended from i-stem nouns to > > a-stems (Sologub 1983). > > --Dhasanaac/Dasenech: 1pl=2sg/2pl/3SG fem extended from resonant-final > > stems to all stems (Sasse 1976, Tosco 2001). > > > > > > many thanks in advance > > Matthew > > > > > > Matthew Baerman > > Surrey Morphology Group > > University of Surrey > > Guildford, UK > > > > > > --------------------------------------------- > > This message was sent using UNIS MailSystem. > > > > ____________________________________________________________ > Max W. Wheeler > School of Cognitive & Computing Sciences > University of Sussex > Falmer > BRIGHTON BN1 9QH, G.B. > > Tel: +44 (0)1273 678975 Fax: +44 (0)1273 671320 Email: > maxw at cogs.susx.ac.uk > ____________________________________________________________ > --------------------------------------------- This message was sent using UNIS MailSystem.