query: associative plurals via noun-verb disagreement

[David Mead]

Hi David G.

Here are two examples taken from page 143 of 
Esser's grammar of Mori Bawah (Sulawesi, 
Indonesia).  The plural marker meN- preceding the 
verb in these cases indicates 3 or more.  The 
plural pronoun, a clitic following the verb, indicates 2 or more.

men-tahane='ira
pl-go.thither.upward-3pl
‘they are on their way up’

me-ramai='ira=mo              i       Laengko
pl-come.hither-3pl-perf       pn     Laengko
‘Laengko and those with him are already coming’

Although Esser does not provide the clinching 
example, if you wanted to indicated that just 
Laengko was coming, you would say:

ramai=o=mo              i       Laengko
come.hither-3sg-perf   pn    Laengko

To round out the picture, you could also say 
ramai'iramo  i  Laengko  that is, with pural 
pronoun but without plural marker on the 
verb.  This sentence has two interpretations: as 
dual ("Laengko and his companion are coming") or, 
as is common, use of the plural to indicate 
respect toward a singular indiidual ("the respected Laengko is coming").

Reference:

Esser, S.J. 1927–1933. Klank- en vormleer van het 
Morisch [Phonology and morphology of Mori]. 2 
volumes. (Verhandelingen van het Bataviaasch 
Genootschap van Kunsten en Wetenschappen, 67/3 & 
67/4). Leiden: Vros (1927); Bandoeng: Nix (1933).

Yours,

David M.

At 11/13/2008 07:22 PM +0100, David Gil wrote:
>Dear fellow Austronesianists,
>
>I am interested in the cross-linguistic distribution of a construction
>type in which an associative plural meaning, eg. 'John and his
>associates', results from a singular noun triggering plural number
>agreement on the verb, as illustrated in the following examples from
>Roon (a SHWNG language spoken in the Cenderawasih bay of New Guinea):
>
>(1) Amos-i i-berif
>     Amos-PERS 3SG:ANIM-laugh
>     'Amos is laughing'
>
>(2) Amos-i su-berif
>     Amos-PERS 3DU:ANIM-laugh
>     'Amos and his friend are laughing'
>
>(3) Amos-i si-berif
>     Amos-PERS 3PL:ANIM-laugh
>     'Amos and his friends are laughing'
>
>Example (1) shows ordinary agreement, with a singular subject triggering
>singular verb agreement.  However, examples (2) and (3) illustrate how
>an associative plural interpretation is derived via disagreement, with
>the still-singular subject occurring in construction with dual- and
>plural-subject marked verbs respectively.  We might therefore call the
>construction in (2) and (3) an Associative Plural via Disagreement, or
>ASPD.
>
>My question is: how common is this ASPD construction in the languages of
>the world?  I would be very grateful for examples of other languages,
>Austronesian or otherwise, that have ASPDs.  I would also appreciate any
>pointers to discussion of this construction in the literature.  At
>present I am familiar with just two:  Grev Corbett's 2000 book on
>Number, where he cites similar examples from Haruai (Papuan), Maltese,
>and the Talitsk dialect of Russian, and Daniel and Moravcsik's chapter
>on associative plurals in the World Atlas of Language Structures, where
>they cite Plains Cree as having a similar construction.
>
>A major challenge in typology is to collect negative data, ie. reliable
>reports that a certain language lacks a particular construction (as
>opposed to it simply not being mentioned in a couple of grammar books).
>Thus, I would also greatly appreciate definitive reports that
>such-and-such a language does *not* have ASPDs.  (Whereas for languages
>with no verbal number agreement, the absence of ASPDs is a logical
>necessity, for languages with verbal number agreement, the absence of
>ASPDs becomes a substantive and interesting fact about the language.)
>For starters, English, even though it has verbal number agreement, lacks
>an ASPD: you can't say *'John are laughing' to mean 'John and his
>friends are laughing', as in (3) above. The same is true also for
>Tagalog, with its optional plural number marking on the verb in the
>actor-topic voice.  So if the language(s) you are familiar with have
>verbal number agreement but lack an ASPD, please let me know too!
>
>Thanks and best wishes,
>
>David
>
>--
>David Gil
>
>Department of Linguistics
>Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology
>Deutscher Platz 6, D-04103 Leipzig, Germany
>
>Telephone: 49-341-3550321 Fax: 49-341-3550119
>Email: gil at eva.mpg.de
>Webpage:  http://www.eva.mpg.de/~gil/
>
>
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