[Lingtyp] genifiers (gender markers/classifiers)

Tue Mar 21 20:18:05 UTC 2017

Agreed. Surely a classifier is a structural/functional element that indicates the class to which some associated element belongs, and gender is one of the types of classes to which that element might belong. 

David

> On Mar 21, 2017, at 1:44 PM, E. Bashir <ebashir at yahoo.com> wrote:
> 
> Sebastian Nordhoff's comment is on the mark, in my opinion.
> 
> Elena Bashir
> 
> 
> From: Sebastian Nordhoff <sebastian.nordhoff at glottotopia.de>
> To: lingtyp at listserv.linguistlist.org 
> Sent: Tuesday, March 21, 2017 2:39 PM
> Subject: Re: [Lingtyp] genifiers (gender markers/classifiers)
> 
> Dear all,
> as someone who has not worked extensively on either of these concepts, I
> still have to say that the term "genifier" strikes me as odd. My first
> thought upon seeing the subject of the mail was "OK, this will be about
> making something a gender, or a gene, or a knee-like thing maybe, let's
> see". I was misled by terms such as "intensifier", used to make
> something more intense, and certainly also, albeit more on phonological
> grounds, by "gentrification", which is a widely debated topic where I live.
> 
> The attempt to blend "GEnder" and "classiFIER" is not successful in my
> view, as "-fier" is not really the important formative here; "class" is.
> 
> If there is a desire for a blend, I would rather go for "Clender" or
> "Clander", which would not lead to misparsings/misinterpretations as the
> one I had.
> 
> As a final note, a "classifier" does something to an X, while "gender"
> is a property of an X.
> 
> (1)  /ladida/ is of gender X
> (2) ?/ladida/ is of classifier X
> (3) ?/-dada/ is a gender
> (4)  /-dada/ is a classifier
> 
> It is unclear to me whether the two concepts "gender" and "classifier"
> do actually have a superordinate concept. Possibly, one has to use
> "gender marker" and "classifier", or "noun class" and "gender" as
> subordinate concepts to arrive at a good superordinate concept.
> 
> Best wishes
> Sebastian
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> On 03/20/2017 04:05 PM, Martin Haspelmath wrote:
> > Dear typologists,
> > 
> > Cross-linguistic terminology (comparative concepts) should be both clear
> > and conform to the tradition, in order to preserve continuity with the
> > older literature.
> > 
> > In the case of the terms "gender" and "classifier", it seems that these
> > two goals cannot be achieved simultaneously without coining a new term
> > ("genifier").
> > 
> > There is quite a bit of general literature on gender/classifiers (e.g.
> > Dixon 1986; Grinevald 2000; Aikhenvald 2000; Seifart 2010; Corbett &
> > Fedden 2016), but none of these works provide clear definitions of these
> > terms, and the more recent literature (e.g. Corbett & Fedden, and also
> > Seifart & Payne 2007) actually emphasizes that there is no reason to say
> > that gender markers and classifiers are distinct phenomena in the
> > world's languages.
> > 
> > Thus, it seems to me that we need the new term "genifier", perhaps
> > defined as follows:
> > 
> > A *genifier system* is a system of grammatical markers which occur on
> > nominal modifiers, predicates or anaphoric pronouns, and each of which
> > expresses (i.e. normally reflects, but sometimes contributes) a broad
> > property other than person and number of the controlling noun (i.e. for
> > nominal modifiers: the modificatum, for predicates: an argument, for
> > anaphoric pronouns: the antecedent).
> > 
> > The alternative to coining a new term, it seems to me, would be to
> > extend the meaning of the term "gender" or of the term "classifier" in
> > such a way that there would be no more continuity with the earlier
> > literature.
> > 
> > Given the above definition of genifier, we can perhaps define "gender"
> > and "numeral classifier" as follows (as arbitrary subcategories of
> > genifiers, defined just to preserve continuity with the older literature):
> > 
> > A *gender system* (= a system of gender markers) is a system of
> > genifiers which includes no more than 20 genifiers and which is not
> > restricted to numeral modifiers.
> > 
> > A *numeral classifier system* is a system of genifiers which is
> > restricted to numeral (plus optionally other adnominal) modifiers.
> > 
> > I wonder if the above definitions have any obvious defects, i.e. any
> > cases that everyone would call gender or numeral classifier and that
> > wouldn't fall under the definitions, or cases that fall under them and
> > that nobody would call gender or numeral classifier.
> > 
> > Note that the new term "genifier" also has the advantage that the whole
> > domain can be called *genification* (rather than the cumbersome "noun
> > classification/nominal classification", which is also vague because
> > there are all kinds of "classes" or "classifications" of nouns which
> > have nothing to do with genifiers).
> > 
> > Any comments?
> > 
> > Thanks,
> > Martin
> > 
> > *************************
> > 
> > References
> > 
> > Aikhenvald, Alexandra Y. 2000. /Classifiers: A typology of noun
> > categorization devices/. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
> > Corbett, Greville G. & Sebastian Fedden. 2016. Canonical gender.
> > /Journal of Linguistics/ 52(3). 495--531.
> > Dixon, R. M. W. 1986. Noun classes and noun classification in
> > typological perspective. In Colette Grinevald Craig (ed.), /Noun classes
> > and categorization/, 105--112. Amsterdam: Benjamins.
> > Grinevald, Colette G. 2000. A morphosyntactic typology of classifiers.
> > In Gunter Senft (ed.), /Systems of nominal classification/, 50--92.
> > Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
> > Seifart, Frank. 2010. Nominal classification. /Language and Linguistics
> > Compass/ 4(8). 719--736.
> > Seifart, Frank & Doris L. Payne. 2007. Nominal classification in the
> > North West Amazon: Issues in areal diffusion and typological
> > characterization. /International Journal of American Linguistics/ 73(4).
> > 381--387.
> > 
> > 
> > 
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