LINGUIST List: Vol-32-2629. Thu Aug 12 2021. ISSN: 1069 - 4875.
Subject: 32.2629, Books: The Life Cycle of Adpositions: Givón
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Date: Thu, 12 Aug 2021 21:56:43
From: Karin Plijnaar [karin.plijnaar at benjamins.nl]
Subject: The Life Cycle of Adpositions: Givón
Title: The Life Cycle of Adpositions
Publication Year: 2021
Publisher: John Benjamins
http://www.benjamins.com/
Book URL: https://benjamins.com/catalog/z.236
Author: T. Givón
Electronic: ISBN: 9789027259844 Pages: Price: U.S. $ 135.00
Electronic: ISBN: 9789027259844 Pages: Price: U.K. £ 76.00
Electronic: ISBN: 9789027259844 Pages: Price: Europe EURO 90.00
Hardback: ISBN: 9789027208828 Pages: Price: U.S. $ 135.00
Hardback: ISBN: 9789027208828 Pages: Price: U.K. £ 76.00
Hardback: ISBN: 9789027208828 Pages: Price: Europe EURO 95.40
Abstract:
Adpositions are used, universally, to mark the roles of nominal participants
in the verbal clause, most commonly indirect object roles. Practically all
languages seem to have such markers, which begin their diachronic life as
lexical words -- in this case either serial verbs or positional nouns. In many
languages, however, adpositions also seem to have extended their diachronic
life one step further, becoming verbal affixes. The main focus of this book is
the tail-end of the diachronic life cycle of adpositions. That is, the process
by which, having arisen first as nominal-attached prepositions or
post-positions, they wind up attaching themselves to verbs. Our core puzzle is
thus fairly transparent: How and why should morphemes that pertain
functionally to nominals, and begin their diachronic life-cycle as nominal
grammatical operators, wind up as verbal morphology? While the core five
chapters of this book focus on the rise of verb-attached prepositions in
Homeric Greek, its theoretical perspective is broader, perched at the
intersection of three closely intertwined core components of the study of
human language: (a) the communicative function of grammar; (b) the balance
between universality and cross-language diversity of grammars; and (c) the
diachrony of grammatical constructions, how they mutate over time. While
paying well-deserved homage to the traditional Classical scholarship, this
study is firmly wedded to the assumption, indeed presupposition, that Homeric
Greek is just another natural language, spoken before written, designed as an
instrument of communication, and subject to the same universal constraints as
all human languages. And further, that those constraints--so-called language
universals--express themselves most conspicuously in diachronic change.
Lastly, in analyzing the synchronic variation and text distribution of
prepositional constructions in Homeric Greek, this study relies primarily on
the theory-laden method of Internal Reconstruction.
Linguistic Field(s): Linguistic Theories
Syntax
Subject Language(s): Greek, Modern (ell)
Written In: English (eng)
See this book announcement on our website:
http://linguistlist.org/pubs/books/get-book.cfm?BookID=155774
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LINGUIST List: Vol-32-2629
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