[Lingtyp] Relativization

Mon Mar 26 15:16:03 UTC 2018

I'm afraid that the discussion of Koyra Chiini relatives confirms my doubts about the value of crosslinguistic coding into a handful of values for each feature.

Yes, Koyra Chiini has a relative-clause initial morpheme (KCh kaa) that gaps the coindexed NP ("headNP [Rel…[gap]…") and usually attracts postpositions and if so gaps the PP ("headNP [Rel-Postp…[gap]…"). However, resumptive PPs are also possible ("headN [Rel…[3Sg/3Pl Postp]…]"). Non-3rd person heads (unlike 3rd persons) are optionally resumed even in subject position: ("you(headNP) [Rel you…]" meaning 'you who…'). The only preposition, instrumental-comitative nda, cannot precede the relative morpheme (# headNP [[nda Rel]…]]), instead it remains in place with a resumptive pronoun, or it encliticizes to the Rel morpheme in the fashion of English where-to/of/upon… .

The major question is whether the KCh Rel morpheme is a "pronoun" as opposed to an invariant 'that/when…' complementizer or a pluralizable relative noun. In Koyra Chiini, kaa can be either a relative morpheme with the limited (pro-)nominal features mentioned above, or a 'that/when…' complementizer, and some textual occurrences can be read (or at least translated) either way. In other Songhay languages, the corresponding morpheme can function as either a 'that/when…' complementizer or a nominal relative morpheme. In the latter function, it optionally takes the nominal plural suffix, e.g. Koyraboro Senni ka? with optional indefinite plural ka?-ya?. Since a head NP (with obligatory number marking) is normally present, the option to (redundantly) pluralize the relative morpheme is only occasionally implemented, but KS ka? is clearly noun-like rather than pronoun-like. As in KCh it can also be an invariant 'that/when' complementizer. Songhay languages  vary as to whether a coindexed clause-internal nonsubject NP is realized as a gap, as a pronoun with full person/number marking, or as an invariant "3Sg" pronominal.

As a grammarian I regularly wince at typological codings, even if packaged as humble "comparative concepts," and I question the value of world-wide typological distributions based on them. By the way, the situation is worse with "internally-headed relatives."

________________________________
From: Lingtyp <lingtyp-bounces at listserv.linguistlist.org> on behalf of Martin Haspelmath <haspelmath at shh.mpg.de>
Sent: Monday, March 26, 2018 9:56:54 AM
To: lingtyp at listserv.linguistlist.org
Subject: Re: [Lingtyp] Relativization

I wouldn't say that the Koyra Chiini form is "arguably" a relative pronoun, because it's a question of definition, not of argumentation. (People sometimes say that they "disagree" with terminological choices, but I think the verbs "adopt" or "reject" are better suited when it comes to talking about other people's terminological choices.)

As Matthew noted earlier, in the WALS chapter by Comrie & Kuteva, the "relative pronoun strategy" is clearly defined as one involving an element that can be flagged for its syntactic role (" a clause-initial pronominal element [which] is case-marked (by case or by an adposition) to indicate the role of the head noun within the relative clause", http://wals.info/chapter/122<https://eur03.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=http%3A%2F%2Fwals.info%2Fchapter%2F122&data=02%7C01%7C%7C40c053f747114afaa68e08d593228d9d%7C84df9e7fe9f640afb435aaaaaaaaaaaa%7C1%7C0%7C636576698970504650&sdata=nfxhM5cq6o8PawPAbTUj8vKScG3tVMZtb0P%2FX3Q8XRM%3D&reserved=0>).

Likewise, in the APiCS chapter by Michaelis et al., "a relative-clause marker is regarded as a relative pronoun if it has different subject and object forms ..., or if it can be combined with an adposition" (http://apics-online.info/parameters/92.chapter.html<https://eur03.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=http%3A%2F%2Fapics-online.info%2Fparameters%2F92.chapter.html&data=02%7C01%7C%7C40c053f747114afaa68e08d593228d9d%7C84df9e7fe9f640afb435aaaaaaaaaaaa%7C1%7C0%7C636576698970504650&sdata=dqOqRJlsfFb36jC%2BG%2BhS027m81Ciw1%2FWobvpiLxE0XY%3D&reserved=0>).

Because of these authoritative uses, I would reject (but not argue against) a terminological use (in typology) according to which relative pronouns are said to include relativizers that vary for ("pronominal") features like gender and/or number but do not indicate syntactic role. (And if there were an "IPA of morphosyntax", as suggested here<https://eur03.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fdlc.hypotheses.org%2F1000&data=02%7C01%7C%7C40c053f747114afaa68e08d593228d9d%7C84df9e7fe9f640afb435aaaaaaaaaaaa%7C1%7C0%7C636576698970504650&sdata=vwjM8PkJzdNs05Cq7hi3lI5jMEE9UeKxCn8%2FyAv1U0k%3D&reserved=0>, it should have the same meaning as in the WALS and APiCS chapters.)

Thus, from a typological point of view, the relativizers of Koyra Chiini and Coast Tsimshian are clearly relative pronouns.

Martin

On 26.03.18 15:27, Dryer, Matthew wrote:

In Koyra Chiini (Heath 1999: 192), the relative word is arguably a relative pronoun since it can occur with a postposition.

Coast Tsimshian has a construction which could be analysed as involving a relative pronoun in that relative clauses are marked with a word that varies for the grammatical relation of the head in the relative clause, gu if it is the A, in if it is the S or P (Mulder 1994: 142).

Heath, Jeffrey. (1999) A grammar of Koyra Chiini: The Songhay of Timbuktu. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.

Mulder, Jean Gail. (1994) Ergativity in Coast Tsimshian (Sm’algyax). Berkeley: University of California Press.

Matthew

From: Lingtyp <lingtyp-bounces at listserv.linguistlist.org<mailto:lingtyp-bounces at listserv.linguistlist.org>> on behalf of Bernard Comrie <comrie at linguistics.ucsb.edu<mailto:comrie at linguistics.ucsb.edu>>
Date: Monday, March 26, 2018 at 3:40 AM
To: "lingtyp at listserv.linguistlist.org<mailto:lingtyp at listserv.linguistlist.org>" <lingtyp at listserv.linguistlist.org<mailto:lingtyp at listserv.linguistlist.org>>
Subject: Re: [Lingtyp] Relativization

Dear Jeff:

Some thoughts on your post.

The chapters in WALS are necessarily very brief, so often it will be necessary to look at other literature.

As many people have noted, including me back in an early publication on European-type relative clauses (Comrie 1998: 79), the European-type relative clause has recently (e.g. through colonialism) spread through contact to languages outside Europe. These are of course not independent instances of the development of this kind of relative clause.

I went into somewhat more detail on possible independent candidates for European-type relative clauses in Comrie (2006). If you compare this article with WALS, please note that the publication details are misleading; some points discussed in the 2006 article that came up during preparatory work on WALS did not find their way into the final version of WALS.

Regarding your specific question on Acoma: I'll need to check, as I don't have the relevant data immediately to hand.

Best,

Bernard

References

Comrie, B. 1998. Rethinking the typology of relative clauses. Language Design 1: 59-86.

Comrie, B. 2006. Syntactic typology: just how exotic ARE European-type relative clauses? In Ricardo Mairal and Juana Gil (eds.): Linguistic Universals, 130-154. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

On 2018/3/18 17:26, Jeff Siegel wrote:

Greetings:

In the description of relativization in WALS (features 122A and 123A), the relative pronoun strategy is shown to stand out “as being typically European since it is not found in Indo-European languages spoken outside Europe, and is exceptional more generally outside Europe” (Comrie & Kuteva 2013). This strategy is defined as follows:

“[T]he position relativized is indicated inside the relative clause by means of a clause-initial pronominal element, and this pronominal element is case-marked (by case or by an adposition) to indicate the role of the head noun within the relative clause.” (Comrie & Kuteva 2013)

The only language outside the European area shown to use this strategy is Acoma, Keresan language of New Mexico.

Could anyone lead me to examples of the relative pronoun strategy used in other languages outside Europe? Also, could anyone provide such examples from Acoma or related languages? (I can’t seem to find any in the descriptions of Keresan languages that I have examined.)

Reference:

Bernard Comrie, Tania Kuteva. 2013. Relativization on Subjects. In: Dryer, Matthew S. & Haspelmath, Martin (eds.). The World Atlas of Language Structures Online. Leipzig: Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology.
(Available online at http://wals.info/chapter/122<https://eur03.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=http%3A%2F%2Fwals.info%2Fchapter%2F122&data=02%7C01%7C%7C40c053f747114afaa68e08d593228d9d%7C84df9e7fe9f640afb435aaaaaaaaaaaa%7C1%7C0%7C636576698970504650&sdata=nfxhM5cq6o8PawPAbTUj8vKScG3tVMZtb0P%2FX3Q8XRM%3D&reserved=0>, Accessed on 2018-03-19.)

Many thanks,

Thanks,

Jeff

Emeritus Professor Jeff Siegel

Linguistics, School of Humanities, Arts and Social Sciences

University of New England

Armidale, NSW 2351

Australia

https://www.une.edu.au/staff-profiles/bcss/jsiegel<https://eur03.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.une.edu.au%2Fstaff-profiles%2Fbcss%2Fjsiegel&data=02%7C01%7C%7C40c053f747114afaa68e08d593228d9d%7C84df9e7fe9f640afb435aaaaaaaaaaaa%7C1%7C0%7C636576698970504650&sdata=OEEA1Yuv4vq4QYkJWLKU1RXkccY0L7XZ40dYMV98oiw%3D&reserved=0>

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Bernard Comrie
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E-mail: comrie at linguistics.ucsb.edu
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Department of Linguistics
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Martin Haspelmath (haspelmath at shh.mpg.de<mailto:haspelmath at shh.mpg.de>)
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