[Lingtyp] questions about adverbs

[Jussi Ylikoski]

Dear Aminata,



The following source and my examples take us away from the adverbs of the Wolof type, but Kamil Stachowski's (2014) thesis Standard Turkic C-Type Reduplications at http://info.filg.uj.edu.pl/zhjij/~stachowski.kamil/store/pub/stachowski_k-standard_turkic_c_type_reduplications.pdf might be of interest. As the title tells us, his study is on reduplication, but on pages 20 and 22 he fleetingly refers to Finnish and Estonian analogues, which probably (implicitly but seldom explicitly) are usually regarded as a kind of reduplication and compounding.


However, now that I am able to look at my native language from a Wolof perspective, it might also be possible to think that Finnish expressions like upouusi 'extremely new', supisuomalainen 'extremely Finnish' could consist of adverbial intensifiers of adjective; in fact, non-standard spellings like upo uusi and supi suomalainen also occur and suggest this alternative interpretation.



Best regards,



Jussi


________________________________
Saatja: Lingtyp <lingtyp-bounces at listserv.linguistlist.org> Alex Francois <alex.francois.cnrs at gmail.com> nimel
Saadetud: kolmapäev, 17. juuni 2020 17:01
Adressaat: Majigeen Aminata <aminatamajigeen at yahoo.com>
Koopia: Lingtyp at listserv.linguistlist.org <lingtyp at listserv.linguistlist.org>
Teema: Re: [Lingtyp] questions about adverbs

dear Aminata,

Thanks for an interesting query.

Mwotlap, an Oceanic language of northern Vanuatu, has several strategies for intensifying its stative predicates (adjectives).
Some are general strategies, that apply to any adjective: for ex. meh 'too much' can combine with any predicate (too big, too heavy...)
But Mwotlap also has a whole set of lexically-specific intensifiers, very similar to what you describe for Wolof:

  *   thus the intensifier len̄ [lɛŋ] is only used with two adjectives meaning 'big, large', namely liwo and kēkēn
→ kēkēn len̄  "super-large"
  *   the intensifier ton̄ton̄ [tɔŋtɔŋ] only goes with the stative verb sis 'swell, be full'
→ sis ton̄ton̄ "chock-full"
  *   the intensifier tewiwi [tɛwiwi] goes with yeh 'remote'
→ yeh tewiwi  "really far"
  *   etc.

I guess I would call them lexically-specific intensifiers.
I found 69 of them in Mwotlap;  you can find a list in my grammatical description (p.266-267<http://alex.francois.online.fr/data/AlexFrancois_These_DescriptionMwotlap.pdf#page=266>, reference below), under the label intensifs spécifiques.

  *   François, Alexandre. 2001. Contraintes de structures et liberté dans l'organisation du discours. Une description du mwotlap, langue océanienne du Vanuatu. PhD dissertation in Linguistics, Université Paris-IV Sorbonne.  (link<http://alex.francois.online.fr/AFpub_books_e.htm#01>)

When their etymology can be reconstructed, these intensifiers may originate in a former noun, or adjective, or verb:

  *   gagah 'ribs'
→ newkah gagah  'rib-skinny' = 'very skinny'
  *   lam  'ocean'
→ nōqōqō lam   'ocean-deep' = 'very deep'
  *   mēlēglēg  'dark'
→ nemyēpyēp mēlēglēg  'dark-blurry' = 'very blurry'
  *   mōdō  'orphan'
→ nemgaysēn mōdō  'orphan-sad' = 'really sad'
  *   yeyey  'quiver'
→ tamayge yeyey   'quiver-old' = 'very old'
  *   lawlaw  'shiny'
→ nēmnay lawlaw   'shiny-smart' = 'very smart, brilliant'
  *   …

Some languages would use ideophones for such intensifying uses.  But I don't believe that the Mwotlap intensifiers qualify as ideophones.

These words are indeed – as Ekkehard rightly points out – reminiscent of the lexically-specific intensifiers of English, such as brand new, chock full, boiling hot... French also has rouge sang (intensely red), and phrases like fier comme Artaban, riche comme Crésus...

best
Alex
________________________________

Alex François

LaTTiCe<http://www.lattice.cnrs.fr/en/alexandre-francois/> — CNRS–<http://www.cnrs.fr/index.html>ENS<https://www.ens.fr/laboratoire/lattice-langues-textes-traitements-informatiques-et-cognition-umr-8094>–Sorbonne nouvelle<http://www.univ-paris3.fr/lattice-langues-textes-traitements-informatiques-cognition-umr-8094-3458.kjsp>
Australian National University<https://researchers.anu.edu.au/researchers/francois-a>
Academia page<https://cnrs.academia.edu/AlexFran%C3%A7ois> – Personal homepage<http://alex.francois.online.fr/>

________________________________



On Wed, 17 Jun 2020 at 13:06, Majigeen Aminata <aminatamajigeen at yahoo.com<mailto:aminatamajigeen at yahoo.com>> wrote:
Dear all,

I am currently working on what are called “adverbs” (see words un bold) in wolof literature. Wolof, spoken in Senegal (West Africa) has specific words that only work with some colors: white, black, red and each word-adverb match only with its color, they are not commutable.

weex tàll: extremely white (it can't be whiter)

ñuul kukk: extremely black (it can't be more black)

xonq coyy: extremely red (it can't be more red)

Others words adverbs go with state verbs and are specific to them as well. They are not commutable.

baax lool: extremely nice (it can't be nicer)

bees tàq: really new (nobody has ever used it)

dëgër këcc: extremely hard (it can't be harder)

diis gann: really heavy (very difficult to carry)

fatt taraj: extremely blocked (it can't be more blocked)

fess dell: extremely full (it can't be fuller)

forox toll: really acidic (it can't be more acidic)

gàtt ndugur: really short (he can't be shorter)

jeex tàkk: completely finished, ...

In Wolof they are called intensifiers but this term does not convince me because it can be confusing. They do not intensify the verbs. These words mean that the state or action of the verb is at its end of completude. I would like to know if there are languages ​​that work like that and what is the terminology used for this kind of construction. Can someone also recommend me new documentation on the definition of the concepts of verbs, adverbs, adjectives… in African languages?

Thanks and regards.

Aminata

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