[Algonquiana] Prehistoric Language contact ?

Thu Nov 20 18:21:10 UTC 2014

Yes. Trade languages and their aboriginal use, I'm aware of. But I'm 
squeamish about accepting the notion that a handful of foreign terms 
borrowed into an unrelated language can have such a far-reaching effect 
phonologically on that language. Perhaps my imagination is limited. I 
will keep gnawing.

Michael

Quoting John Steckley <John.Steckley at humber.ca>:

> Michael:
>
> Another potential source of that influence could be trade languages
> or lingua franca.  When I worked on Gabriel Sagard's dictionary and
> discovered the presence of the dialects of Wendat plus St. Lawrence
> Iroquoian, I found that the St. Lawrence Iroquoian came in the form
> of a trade language, with certain key items--awls, grapes,
> beads--highlighted.  Trade languages existed in a variety of areas in
> pre- and post-contact Aboriginal North America.  In addition to what
> I found with the St. Lawrence Iroquoian example, there was Mobilian
> (which included Algonquian and Iroquoian entries) in the southeast,
> and, of course, Chinook on the West Coast.  Being fluent in a trade
> language used between Iroquoian and Algonquian speakers could cause
> there to be some phonetic influences.
>
> John
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Algonquiana
> [mailto:algonquiana-bounces at listserv.linguistlist.org] On Behalf Of
> Michael McCafferty
> Sent: November 20, 2014 12:55 PM
> To: algonquiana at listserv.linguistlist.org
> Subject: Re: [Algonquiana] Prehistoric Language contact ?
>
> Thank you so much, Ives, for your comments and, at least for me,
> clearing away some of the fog.
>
> What I just cannot wrap my head around, though, is how a sound in one
> language can influence the sound system of totally unrelated language.
> All I can get at is that women from one language group married into
> or were captured by another group speaking an unrelated language, and
> in learning the unrelated language use sounds that were in their
> native language that over time get adopted into the sound system of
> their husbands. Is this the mechanism for this transfer?
>
>
> Michael
>
>
> Quoting "Goddard, Ives" <GODDARDI at si.edu>:
>
>> On Eastern duals.
>>
>> This subject was broached if incompletely treated in my 1967 papers
>> (NMC Bull. 214:9-10, 104-105, with a reference to the issue having
>> been earlier raised by Siebert in AA 42:331-333 and to his having told
>> me that he no longer thought it was an Eastern archaism).  An Ottawa
>> parallel for the formation of the Eastern AI triplural is cited, but
>> more information on this would be welcome.  (I haven?t
>> looked.)  In Delaware these marked plurals are commonly made as
>> collectives, and many examples are to be found in O?Meara?s Munsee
>> dictionary (his label is  ?emphatic?), as if built on the causative
>> finals PEA *h and *r.  See entries for kchíiw and matáhkeew.  Western
>> Abenaki also appears to have the longer forms as marked (used for an
>> indefinite number) but not as consistent triplurals.  I recall that
>> the duals are used in Micmac for the people in a boat (always a
>> countable number).  The comparative evidence shows this dual-triplural
>> contrast gradually emerging and firming up within the Algonquian
>> languages, becaming fully grammaticalized as such in the languages
>> furthest from the Iroquoians.
>>
>> Independently, Unami Delaware has a dual-triplural contrast in
>> imperatives, at least for some speakers: mi:tsí:t:am ?let?s eat (I and
>> you sg.)? vs. mi:tsí:t:amo:kw ?let?s eat (I and you pl.).
>>
>> The nasalized vowel.
>>
>> On the other hand, it seems likely that the nasalized reflex of PEA
>> *a: in Mahican, SNEA, and Abenaki reflects the influence of Mohawk,
>> which has a nasalized vowel of exactly the same odd quality as what
>> these languages seem usually to have (PAC 39:282 and n. 74).
>> Penobscot Eastern Abenaki has (mostly) denasalized this vowel but
>> retained this caret-vowel-like quality.  There will be a little more
>> on this in my eventual ?Loup? paper in PAC 44.
>>
>> Ives
>>
>> From: Algonquiana
>> [mailto:algonquiana-bounces at listserv.linguistlist.org] On Behalf Of
>> Conor Quinn
>> Sent: Wednesday, November 19, 2014 4:59 PM
>> To: John Steckley
>> Cc: ALGONQUIANA at LISTSERV.LINGUISTLIST.ORG
>> Subject: Re: [Algonquiana] Prehistoric Language contact ?
>>
>> Dia dhaoibh, a chairde!
>>
>> If I'm not mistaken, the notional dual contrast is found in most
>> (all?) of Eastern Algonquian, and definitely at least as far south as
>> Western and Eastern Abenaki.
>>
>> It's a tricky pattern, because the "duals" are actually just the
>> familiar verbal plurals of the rest of Algonquian.  E.g. they reflect
>> the various plural person markings (among them reflex of PA *-aki
>> (with Idp) or the EAlg version of PA *-wa·-t, i.e. *-h?ti?-t).  While
>> the more-than-dual plurals are limited to AI stems, with an added
>> stem-extensional element---most but not all arising historically from
>> transitivization (= TA), then reciprocalization (= AI again)---which
>> then takes the same pluralization morphology as the "dual".
>>
>> So the contrast looks like it emerges from a notion of a minimal
>> plural (= just the general Algonquian plural morphology) vs. an
>> extended/non-minimal plural (= this new stem-extensional element added
>> in).
>>
>> What's particularly striking about these systems is that they're not
>> in fact strictly dual vs. strictly (more-than-two) plural.  The
>> familiar-Algonquian-type simple plurals generally do get a dual
>> reading...but if the stems inherently imply more-than-two -type
>> participants---e.g. if they incorporate a number 'three' or above, or
>> refer to collective/mass action---they very often do not use the
>> stem-extensional element, and so superficially have a "dual"
>> pluralization pattern.
>>
>> As far as I know, the only place where there's a completely strict
>> dual vs. plural distinction is in the Mi'gmaq motion verbs, where
>> -ie/-a' and -a'si (roughly, 'go..., change...') are systematically
>> replaced with -a'ti for dual, and -(i)ta' for plural.
>>
>> Apropos of the original question, I think Ives might have suggested a
>> possible Iroquoian contact influence in one of his two papers on the
>> "intrusive nasal" reflex of PEA *a?.  But I might be thinking of some
>> other source; and it's always struck me as a little tenuous given that
>> the N. Iroquoian languages I'm aware of systematically have
>> contrastive nasalization only in vowels other than /a/.  So the
>> contact effect would be oddly indirect/abstracted.
>>
>> David Pentland and I have both independently noted some possible cases
>> of lexical borrowing. Off the top of my head, 'eel' and 'great horned
>> owl' in the northeastern-area Algonquian languages (i.e.
>> Mi'gmaq gat(ew)-, PsmMl ka?t(e); Penobscot tiht?k?li, PsmMl
>> tihtiko?l) may have Iroquoian links. I don't have the relevant
>> Iroquian material at hand, though, and David likely has a more
>> extensive list.
>>
>> Hope that helps!
>>
>> Till later, keep safe and sane.
>>
>> Slán,
>> bhur gcara
>>
>>
>> P.S.  Is the Denny article the one that suggests PA *?entiy- 'conifer'
>> as a possible loan from/with Siouan?  And points out the
>> calque-cognacy (functional equivalence) of *wiki-wa·-hm- with t?i-pi?
>>  If not, who wrote that?
>>
>
>
>
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