Summary of Responses to Mirative question
Carl Rubino
Carl.Rubino at ANU.EDU.AU
Mon May 18 01:18:05 UTC 1998
RE: Summary of Mirative Responses from the list
Dear Funknetters,
As promised I am sending mirative data to you (5 pages only, not a
long file), seeing that my question was received with much interest. First
of all I would like to thank all of you for all your help with my
mirativity question. I profitted immensely from useful discussions and/or
data from David Wilkins (Aranda), David Beck (Bella Coola), Hyo Sang Lee
(Korean), Sherman Fox (ASL), Scott DeLancey, Michael Noonan, Rob Freeman,
Olga Yokoyama (Russian), Cecilia Ford (Nepali), Wallace Chafe (Caddo),
David Parkinson (Inuktitut), Richard Cameron (Spanish), Enrique Sanchis
(Quechua), Guillermo Lorenzo (Jacaru), John Bowden (Makian Dalam), Sasha
Aikhenvald (Tariana), Noel Rude (Sahaptian), and Paul Hopper.
I am working hard to put my paper together, so if any of you has
other suggestions for me (or data on exclamatives/ morphemes or systems
encoding information that is unexpected by the speaker), please let me
know. The data below are partially contributed by FUNKNETters and
Austronesianists, and partially extracted from reference grammars here in
Australia.
SYNTACTIC EXPRESSION - Mirative systems
Andean Spanish (Bolivian highlands) Use of pluperfect
Habian sabido fumar.
(They DO smoke I just found out).
Georgian (Aronson; Tuite) present perfect = surprise
Amerik'eli q'opila!
American.NOM be-PERF:3s
'He has been an American- so he's an American!'
Rapa Nui (Du Feu 1996:91) Double negative strategy
Kai hini 'o koe.
NEG delay NEG 2s
'That didn't take you long!'
Tariana (Aikhenvald, p.c.) (lexicalized)
nu-ka-mhe nu-a-mahka na-i~tu-nipe-nuku
1s-see-ADM 1s-say-REC.P.NON.VIS 3p-steal-NOM-TOP.NON.A/S
'I was unpleasantly surprised by the theft (I didn't see).'
Surigaunun (Verstraelen 1986:257)
pagka-gana sa pagka'un!
NOM-delicious GEN food
'How delicious is the food!'
Tagalog
ang saráp ng pansít
TOP delicious GEN noodles
'How delicious the noodles are!'
CLAUSE COMBINING - CONJUNCTIONS
Karo Batak (Woollams 1996)
..tapi temuéna é dungna ipelawesna kang.
but guest.his that finish.NMS PASS.CAUS.go.he EMPH
'... but in the end, he sent his guest away after all.'
Agrési pemana tentara kerajaan Belanda reh ka.
agression first army kingdom Holland come EMPH
'The first Dutch Police Action came after all.'
Koasati- differentiates y- 'but' contrary to expectation, from -tikabut
statement must be contrary to expectation (Kimball 1991)
My grandmother said, their hair used to be braided-Y-, but contrary
to what one might think, they ysed to be able to keep on in such a way.'
They looked for a doctor-tika but where unable to find one.
Tukang Besi (Donohue 1995:425)
io and padahal (loan from Indonesian)
MORPHOLOGICAL EXPRESSION
Jacaru (Peru) (Lorenzo, p.c.)
tz'iq ampra-j-ilii
left hand-SURP-so
'so it is his left hand!'
Quechua- (Cuzco, Sanchis p.c.)
jamu-sqa 'he unexpectedly came'
Washo-
di métiwe iti/.a?yi? i I'm starting to get grey hairs.'
? í.yel máma?.á?yi i He is getting big (in my absence)
Manipuri (Chelliah 1997:296)
má ngerang skul cet-pe-jat-le.
he yesterday school go-NOM-TYPE(NOM)-INTERROG
'Could it be that he went to school yesterday?!'
Korean (Lee 1993)
uchepu o-ass-kuna
postman come-ANT-UNASSIM
'The postman has come.' (He comes every day)
uchepu-ka o-ass-ne
postman-NOM come-ANT-FR(factual.realization)
'The postman has come (surprisingly).'
Korean system -ne vs. -kun vs. declarative -ta (noteworthy, provoking or
intriguing, question, command or proposal) (Lee 1993)
-ne -kun
more factual info, definitive less definitive info.
immediate (just perceived) info past /immediate info.
unexpected / unassimilated unassimilated
speaker confident about truth of info. speaker not always confident
about truth
Bella Coola (Nater 1984:126)
7nts+su. Surprise, it's me!
tic+su t'ayc ti+staltmc You might not have expected it, but
he is a chief.
Kugu Nganchara (Australia, Smith and Johnson, ms)
thana nganhca nga'a kamba minha piki-ku
3pNOM 1pexcNOM fish cook animal big-EXCL
'They and we cooked fish in ashes, and even pig too!'
Ilocano- (Rubino 1997)
Nag-bassit=en
PF.AF-small=CONTR
'How small!'
Caddo- Chafe 1995:357 hus- prefix; Chafe 1976:82 was- prefix.
hús-ba-?a=sa=yi=k'awihsa?
ADMIR-1ST.BENEF.IRREALS-name-know-PROGRESSIVE
My goodness he knows my name!
was-sa-náy-?aw > wásánáy?aw
he is not likely to sing
was-ba-?a-sa-yik-?awi-hah > wásba:sáyk'awihah
my goodness, he knows my name!
Paamese (Vanuatu, Crowley 1982:229-232)
Tahosi=visi Ostrelia mari+aute=visi
3s.REAL.good.EXTREME Aus. big.place.EXTREME
'It was really good!' 'Australia is a really big place!'
-se negative expectation, contrast, event contrary to expectation +
Uniqueness (alone)
kaiko=se=suk ko+doo
2s=neg.exp.SUB 2sREAL.stay
'Are you staying on your own now?'
Kove torongo=s velah
2sREAL.COP drunk.neg.exp ong
'You are still drunk (rather than being sober)!'
Aranda (Alice Springs, Aus). Wilkins 1986:582.
Lhwerrpe-k-itanye, unrip-irre-me
winter-DAT-SURP hot-INCH-NPP
'Even though it's winter, it's getting hot.'
Also used where unexpected behavior of speaker is affecting the
speaker in a negative way... Even though there were all those women around,
the man took all his clothes off (how disgusting!)
Acehnese (Durie 1985:259, 268).
meu=ji=jak lon=seutot
if=3=go 1=follow
'If he goes, I'll follow.' (p. 259)
meu=i=kap=keuh
SURPR=3=bite=2
'If it didn't go and bite you!'
Kannada (Sridhar 1990:230)
eraDu nimiSadalli eNTu mayli o:DibiTTa
two minutes.LOC eight mile run.pp.pf.pst.3sm
'He ran eight miles in two minutes!'
'The umbrella accidentally poked the girl in her side.'
PARTICLES
Sarangani Manobo- DuBois 1976:56
Nekeabat=ka kedi te osa. Surprisingly you got the pig.
Chrau (Thomas 1971:88)
Anh vlam de co sipai. I met (surprise!) the rabbit!
Neh deh de la-u! She gave birth to a coconut!
Kankanaey (Allen 1978:86-87)
Manlalaba baw adis Lola.
launder SURP EMPH Lola
'Oh, I see Lola is doing the laundry!'
Ey, niliw-ak gayam di!
EXCL forgot-I SURP that
'Oh no! I forgot it!'
Kilivila (Senft, p.c.)
ina sopa!
mother lie! what a lie!
Akha (Thurgood 1986:218)-
nja 'nonpast, nonexpected event'
njá 'past, nonexpected event' (high tone)
nja 'to be able to'
REFERENCES:
Allen, Janet. 1978. Kankanaey Adjuncts. Studies in Philippine Linguistics
2:1:82-102.
Chafe, Wallace. 1976. The Caddoan, Iroquoian, and Siouan Languages. Hague:
Mouton.
Chafe, Wallace, and Johanna Nichols (eds.). 1986. Evidentiality: The
Linguistic Coding of Epistemology. Norwood, New Jersey: Ablex Publishing
Corporation.
Chelliah, Shobhana Lakshmi. 1992. A study of Manipuri Grammar. PhD
Dissertation, Australian National University.
Crowley, Terry. 1982. The Paamese Language of Vanuatu. Canberra: Pacific
Linguistics B-87.
DeLancey, Scott. 1997. Mirativity: The grammatical marking of unexpected
information. Linguistic Typology 1:33-52.
Donohue, Mark. 1995. The Tukang Besi Language. PhD Thesis, Australian
National University.
Du Bois, Carl. 1976. Sarangani Manobo. Manila: Summer Institute of Linguistics.
Du Feu, Veronica. 1996. Rapa Nui. London: Routledge.
Du Houx, Yves. 1992. Le verbe grec ancien. Louvain, Belgium: Linguistiques
de Louvain.
Durie, Mark. 1985. A Grammar of Acehnese. Dordrecht, Holland: Foris
Publications.
Jacobsen, William H., Jr. 1964. A grammar of the Washo Language. UC
Berkeley Dissertation.
Kimball, Geoffrey. 1991. Koasati Grammar. Univ. of Nebraska Press.
Lee, Hyo Sang. 1993. Cognitive constraints on expressing newly perceived
information, with reference to epistemic modal suffixes in Korean.
Lipski, John M. 1994. Latin American Spanish. New York: Longman Publishing.
Mosel, Ulrike and Even Hovdhangen. 1992. Samoan Reference Grammar. Oslo:
Scandinavian University Press.
Nater, H. F. The Bella Coola Language. Ottawa: Canadian Ethnology Service
Paper no. 92, National Museum of Man, Mercury Series.
Porter, Doris. 1979. Northern Kankanay Morphology. Studies in Philippine
Linguistics 3:2:20-62.
Rubino, Carl. 1997. Reference Grammar of Ilocano. PhD Dissertation,
University of California, Santa Barbara.
Sridhar S. N. 1990. Kannada. London: Routledge.
Senft, Gunter. 1986. Kilivila. Berlin: Mouton.
Smith, Ian, and Steve Johnson. 1985ms. Kugu Nganhcara. manuscript,
Australian National University.
Thomas, David. 1971. Chrau Grammar. Honolulu: Oceanic Linguistics Special
Publications no. 7.
Thurgood, Graham. 1986. The nature and Origins of the Akha Evidentials
System. In Chafe and Nichols (eds.) 214-222.
Verstraelen, Eugene. 1986. Elementary Analysis of Surigaunun Dialect.
Philippine Quarterly of Culture and Society 14:232-262.
Walrod, Michael. 1979. Discourse Grammar in Gaddang. Dallas: Summer
Institute of Linguistics.
Wilkins, David. 1986. Particles/clitics for criticism and complaint in
Mparntwe Arrente (Aranda). Journal of Pragmatics 10:575-596.
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Dr. Carl Rubino
Research Centre for Linguistic Typology
F-Block OAA
Australian National University,
Canberra, ACT 0200, AUSTRALIA
Phone: +61 2 6249 2053 (office)
Fax: +61 2 6249 0332
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