[Lingtyp] IF and WHEN in the future

[Jess Tauber]

In Yahgan, a recently extinct genetic isolate from Tierra del Fuego, which
I've studied for the past quarter century, 'if' is tu:la (colon marks
tenseness of the vowel preceding it) between the pronoun and the verb.
'When' is da:ra following the verb. In studying the syntactic structures of
this language from texts, I discovered that the default was for
right-to-left temporal development. And the pair tu:la/da:ra may be
etymologically connected via ancient augmentative/diminutive shifting
(something relatively common along the Pacific Coast of the Americas in a
number of different language families). The orders can be reversed- so for
example proclitic we: is used modally to denote higher probability
situations, while enclitic le: denotes lower probability modality.

Jess Tauber

On Sat, Jun 11, 2022 at 11:33 AM Juergen Bohnemeyer <jb77 at buffalo.edu>
wrote:

> Dear Sergey — The difference between temporal clauses and conditional
> clauses is that the former, but not the latter, carry a presupposition to
> the effect of realization of the described state of affairs. So for
> example, (i), but not not (ii), presupposes realization of the trip to
> Buffalo.
>
> (i) When I go to Buffalo, I’ll give you a ride.
> (ii) If I go to Buffalo, I’ll give you a ride.
>
> Now, it’s philosophically murky as to what it means for the realization of
> a future event to be presupposed. Somehow this seems to translate to the
> speaker presenting the trip as a plan the realization of which is not in
> doubt.
>
> Note that this contrast isn’t restricted to the future:
>
> (iii) When I went to Buffalo, I gave you a ride.
> (iv) If I went to Buffalo, I gave you a ride.
>
> The question is of course what’s the point of a past conditional?
> Apparently, the most likely interpretation is an epistemic one: the speaker
> is presenting the reality of the trip as uncertain. In contrast, (iii)
> presupposes that the trip happened.
>
> On to German!
>
> (v) Wenn ich nach Buffalo fahre, nehm ich Dich mit. ‘When(colloquially:
> /if) I go to Buffalo, I’ll give you a ride.’
> (vi) Falls ich nach Buffalo fahre, nehm ich Dich mit. 'If I go to Buffalo,
> I’ll give you a ride.’
>
> The two readings can be distinguished, but to my intuition, (vi) is much
> more likely to occur in written registers than in colloquial ones. In
> colloquial registers — and most likely in those — (v) can be used both with
> and without the presupposition.
>
> Another relevant difference between the two languages is that _wenn_ is
> again mostly only colloquially used with past time reference, but is
> replaced by _als_ in more formal registers. I believe Dutch has the same
> contrast: _wanneer_ means ‘when’ with future time and generic reference,
> _toen_ means ‘when’ with past time reference.
>
> HTH! — Juergen
>
> > On Jun 11, 2022, at 10:59 AM, Sergey Loesov <sergeloesov at gmail.com>
> wrote:
> >
> > Dear colleagues,
> >
> > In Babylonian Akkadian corpora of the 1st millennium BC the
> conjununction kī is claimed to mean both ‘if’ and ‘when’ in the future-time
> clauses. Some people believe that clause-initial kī is ‘if’, while kī as a
> preverb is ‘when’. The evidence does not always confirm this claim. One
> immediately thinks about the German wenn, which is assumed to say both ‘if’
> and ‘when’ in the future. What shall we make of it? Is it possible that
> language does not oppose a future condition and a future temporal clause?
> If yes, how come?
> >
> > Best,
> >
> > Sergey
> >
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> --
> Juergen Bohnemeyer (He/Him)
> Professor, Department of Linguistics
> University at Buffalo
>
> Office: 642 Baldy Hall, UB North Campus
> Mailing address: 609 Baldy Hall, Buffalo, NY 14260
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> Email: jb77 at buffalo.edu
> Web: http://www.acsu.buffalo.edu/~jb77/
>
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>
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