Encoding of source in verbs of perception

[Eva Lindström]

Dear all,

Kuot (iso:kto), non-Austronesian, New Ireland, PNG, has 3 items for 'to
smell':

1. *ie* neutral as to quality/type of smell (verb class2, both itr
'something smells' and tr 'someone smells something')
2. *kuf* 'smell good' (verb class1, itr 'something smells good' - food,
flowers, etc)
3. *nor-* 'smell unpleasantly of fresh fish' (adj., but adjectives are
predicates in Kuot, can be used of bits of fish lying around after gutting,
or smell attaching to hands after handling; not used of rotten fish other
unpleasant smells)

No part of the stem *nor-* relates to any word for fish.

(In addition, the nominalisation of the adj. 'hot', ie 'heat' can be used
in the sense 'smell' of urine or faeces in the sun.)

Eva


On 20 March 2014 14:01, Anvita Abbi <anvitaabbi at gmail.com> wrote:

>  Dear All,
>  South Asian languages abound in expressive morphology that represent
> five senses of perception [called *panchendriya* in Sanskrit]i.e., of
> smell, sight, touch, hearing and taste. . Hence, constructions such as
> the following are very common across  all languages especially those
> belonging to Tibeto-Burman.
>
> Tamil: *g*ә*m g*ә*m* ‘aroma’ (smell)
>
> Mizo: * ol**E**p ol**E**p* ‘sticky’ (touch)
>
> Meitei: *ts*ә*nap ts*ә*nap* ‘sticky’ (touch)
>
> Hindi : *c*ә*m c*ә*m* ‘glittering’ (sight)
>
> In many South Asian languages the expressive morpheme is a root form and
> nouns and verbs can be formed from it, e.g. Hindi
>
> *c*ә*m **c*ә*m-aya                                       c*ә*m c*ә*m-ah*
> *әʈ   *
>
> *'*glitter-pst  ‘glittered’ (V)                  glitter-nmlz  ‘glitter’
> (N)
>
> (*Reduplication in South Asian languages: An Areal, Typological and
> Historical Study*. 1991)
>
> In Present Great Andamanese there are more than 18 words for smell. The
> ambivalence of noun and verb allows one to use all in verb forms. There is
> no generic name for the smell of fish as each fish emits different smell
> and hence distinct word. Thus: /*etlapharom/ *'smell of Bam fish' (Bam is
> a local fish) but /*meritutceleoi*/ 'smell of parrot fish' etc. Various
> kinds of stones, corals and shells have different names for the smell they
> emit. (*Dictionary of teh Great Andamanese Language. 2012.* Ratna Sagar.
> Delhi)
>
> Anvita Abbi
>
>
>
>
> On Tue, Mar 18, 2014 at 6:12 PM, Steffen Haurholm-Larsen <
> steffen.haurholm-larsen at isw.unibe.ch> wrote:
>
>> Dear subscribers,
>>
>> It has been observed that such concepts as SEE, HEAR, TOUCH, TASTE and
>> SMELL are in some languages encoded together in just a couple of verbs
>> while other languages have more (see Åke Viberg's "Verbs of Perception" in *Language
>> Typology and Universals: An International Handbook *(2001)).
>> Furthermore, there may be a distinction between 'experience' and 'source'
>> and for the latter, the source may be included in a peripheral NP, e.g. 'my
>> hands smell *of fish*'.
>>     But how common is it for the source NP to be lexically encoded in the
>> verb? In Garifuna, an Arawak language spoken in Central America
>> traditionally by a fishing people, there are two verbs for the emission of
>> (bad) smell: *hingi*- 'stink' and *hase*- 'smell of fish'. Is it common
>> for languages to encode culturally salient NP smell sources (or other
>> source NPs) into verbs of perception?
>>
>> Best,
>>
>> Steffen Haurholm-Larsen
>> Universität Bern
>>
>
>
>
> --
> Prof. Anvita Abbi
> Centre for Linguistics
> School of Language, Literature and Culture Studies
> Jawaharlal Nehru University
> New Delhi 110067
> www.andamanese.net
> President: Linguistic Society of India
> URL: http://www.jnu.ac.in/FacultyStaff/ShowProfile.asp?SendUserName=anvita
>
>
>
>
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