compounding and attributive modification

Mon Jan 30 15:47:33 UTC 2006

Dear Andrew,
I'm hereby sending a paper on Otomi (Mesoamerican: Otomanguean). This 
language has no adjectives, but nominal compounding is one of its most 
common strategies to encode property. The paper is coming out in the IJAL 
sometime this year, but I thought it might be useful for you in the event 
you're interested in seeing another language that has a somehow similar 
pattern to the one you were discussing.
Enrique

>From: Andrew Koontz-Garboden <andrewkg at csli.stanford.edu>
>Reply-To: Andrew Koontz-Garboden <andrewkg at csli.stanford.edu>
>To: LINGTYP at listserv.linguistlist.org
>Subject: Re: compounding and attributive modification
>Date: Mon, 30 Jan 2006 05:56:56 -0800
>
>Thanks very much, Martin!  Very interesting.  And yes, I agree that
>findings like the ones you report from Bauer could not be taken as
>evidence for a particular synchronic description.  I had just thought
>that if such mismatches hadn't been reported, then it would be odd to
>report one.  But, as you point out, I guess we don't always know
>whether an NA order is really an IHRC or an attributively modified
>noun.
>
>I'll certainly take a look at the Bauer paper, and I definitely do
>want to know more about the morphosyntax of the NAdj/ModHead languages
>(e.g., if they independently have internally headed relative clauses).
>  Hopefully Bauer's paper will shed light on this.
>
>Thanks again,
>
>Andrew
>
>
>
>On 30/01/06, Martin Haspelmath <haspelmath at eva.mpg.de> wrote:
> > There's a paper by Laurie Bauer (in the 2-volume handbook "Language
> > typology and language universals, ed. by Haspelmath et al., 695-707) on
> > "Compounding" in a typological perspective, where he investigates this
> > and related questions in a world-wide sample of 36 languages.
> >
> > He finds that there seems to be a unidirectional implication from AdjN
> > order to ModHead order in compounds: his sample has only a single
> > language (from South America) with AdjN and HeadMod order (p. 697):
> >
> > NAdj & HeadMod 10
> > NAdj & ModHead 11
> > AdjN & HeadMod 1
> > AdjN & ModHead 9
> >
> > Thus, Ulwa's pattern (NAdj & ModHead) is actually the majority pattern
> > in Bauer's sample. But note that such typological data cannot be used
> > for or against a particular synchronic description anyway, because Bauer
> > cannot claim to have looked only at "real" adjectives, to the exclusion
> > of "apparent" adjectives that "in reality" are internally headed
> > relative clauses. Maybe "in reality" all 11 languages in Bauer's sample
> > are like Ulwa...
> >
> > Martin
> >
> >
> >
> > Andrew Koontz-Garboden wrote:
> >
> > >Hello.  Does anyone know of any literature that addresses the
> > >relationship between headedness in compounds and headedness in
> > >noun/adjective attributive modification?  (Or, save that, does anyone
> > >simply have any idea/hunch whether there's any relationship?)  What I
> > >have in mind is the following.  In the compound in (1a), the head is
> > >man (ie, a frogman is a kind of man).
> > >
> > >(1)
> > >a.  frogman
> > >b. the white house.
> > >
> > >Similarly for (1b), which is a kind of house.
> > >
> > >In the attributive construction in (2), the head is "dog" (i.e., an
> > >ugly dog is a kind of dog).
> > >
> > >(2) an ugly dog
> > >
> > >Someone suggested to me that there might be a relationship between
> > >headedness of compounds like those in (1) and attributive
> > >constructions in (2).  So, the question I pose is:  if compounds are
> > >right-headed, do attributive constructions tend also to be, and vice
> > >versa?  Similarly for left-headedness?
> > >
> > >Among the reasons I ask is that in Ulwa, a Misumalpan language I'm
> > >working on, there is a mismatch in headedness of constructions like
> > >those in (1) and (2), as shown in (3), a kind of woman, and (4), a
> > >kind of man.
> > >
> > >(3) was sirau
> > >    water maiden
> > >   `mermaid'
> > >
> > >(4) al yuuhka
> > >   man tall
> > >  `a tall man'
> > >
> > >
> > >I have independent reasons for actually believing that what look like
> > >attributive constructions (ie, (4)) may instead be internally headed
> > >relative clauses.  I'm wondering if the mismatch in headedness between
> > >compounding and attributive modification can be taken as a(n) (perhaps
> > >weak) argument.  So, if anyone knows of any literature that addresses
> > >this question (or has evidence one way or another), I'd be grateful.
> > >
> > >Thanks,
> > >
> > >Andrew Koontz-Garboden
> > >
> > >--
> > >Andrew Koontz-Garboden
> > >Department of Linguistics
> > >Margaret Jacks Hall, Bldg. 460
> > >Stanford University
> > >Stanford, CA 94305-2150
> > >
> > >andrewkg at csli.stanford.edu
> > >http://www-csli.stanford.edu/~andrewkg/
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > >
> >
> >
> > --
> > Martin Haspelmath (haspelmath at eva.mpg.de)
> > Max-Planck-Institut fuer evolutionaere Anthropologie, Deutscher Platz 6
> > D-04103 Leipzig
> > Tel. (MPI) +49-341-3550 307, (priv.) +49-341-980 1616
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >

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