[Lingtyp] Morphological marking of non-adjacent adnominal modifiers?
Christian Lehmann
christian.lehmann at uni-erfurt.de
Sun Aug 20 02:34:30 UTC 2023
Ken Hale (1976) says that Walbiri is a case in point. I quote his
examples in Lehmann 1982
<https://www.researchgate.net/publication/248224763_Universal_and_typological_aspects_of_agreement>,
section 8.2.4.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Am 19.08.2023 um 10:55 schrieb Larry M Hyman:
>
> I have a question whether anyone knows of a case where all but an
> immediately adjacent adnominal modifier are marked with special
> morphology.
>
> In Bantu languages a common situation is that only a subset of
> (postposed) adnominal modifiers phrase with the head noun, e.g.
> possessive pronouns and nouns. In the Tiania dialect of Central Kenya
> Bantu language Kimeru, all immediate adnominal modifiers phrase with
> the head noun except demonstratives and some quantifiers (which makes
> sense). However, in cases of multiple postposed modifiers, there is a
> superhigh boundary tone (S%) separating each modifier (see especially
> (34) below). S is marked with the double acute accent mark ̋ ,
>
> I am wondering if this is only a phonological phrase phenomenon or
> whether anyone knows of a language where non-adjacent adnominal
> modifiers have special (segmental) morphological marking? Importantly,
> the morphology shows that the second, third etc. modifiers are not
> appositional (*books three, new ones’). Applying an analogy to the
> verb phrase, I think of them as “oblique”, e.g. ‘books three of new’,
> but there is no morphological evidence of this, only the S% boundary
> tone that is used in other contexts to mark the end of a phonological
> phrase, e.g. o-ko-or-er-a mó-re̋mi % me-bukɔ ‘we have just bought the
> farmer % bags’.
>
> Here is an extract from a handout of a talk I recently gave on the
> subject at a workshop in Berkeley on Definiteness in the Niger-Congo
> noun phrase organized by Peter Jenks and Mark Van de Velde.
>
> (28) Perhaps the structure of the NP (DP) can help us. In the case of
> quantifiers, they generally come last, whether they agree with the
> noun or not. It seems reasonable, therefore, for them to be phrased
> separately. Here again from (10a) is the summary table of modifier
> combinations in the noun phrase.
>
>
>
> DEM
>
>
>
> POSS
>
>
>
> ADJ
>
>
>
> NUM
>
>
>
> QUANT
>
> DEM
>
>
>
>
>
> √
>
>
>
> √
>
>
>
> √
>
>
>
> √
>
> POSS
>
>
>
> *
>
>
>
>
>
> √
>
>
>
> √
>
>
>
> √
>
> ADJ
>
>
>
> *
>
>
>
> (√)
>
>
>
> √
>
>
>
> √
>
>
>
> √
>
> NUM
>
>
>
> *
>
>
>
> (√)
>
>
>
> √
>
>
>
>
>
> √
>
> QUANT
>
>
>
> *
>
>
>
> *
>
>
>
> *
>
>
>
> *
>
>
>
> (29) Word order generalizations (ignoring appositional cases)
>
> a. demonstratives must come first
>
> b. quantifiers must come last
>
> c. possessive pronouns tend to be preceded only by
> demonstratives
>
> d. the two cells marked (√) are acceptable if emphasis is
> placed on the ADJ or NUM
>
> e. the unmarked word order therefore would appear to be
>
> NOUN + DEM + POSS + { ADJ, NUM } + QUANT
>
> **
>
> (30) a. DEM + POSS ma-úkú yáa̋ yáákwa ‘these books
> of mine’ (note S on DEM)
>
> b. DEM + ADJ ma-úkú yáa̋ mɛɛ́ro ‘these new books’
>
> c. DEM + NUM ma-úkú yáa̋ yátháto ‘these three books’
>
> d. DEM + QUANT ma-úkú yáa̋ yɔ́ɔnthɛ˚ ‘all three books’
>
> Note in (30b) that the S augment does not appear on an
> adjective if it is preceded by a demonstrative, hence class 6 /mɛɛ́ro/
> from /ma-ɛ́ro/ vs./ma-úkú ya̋mɛɛ́ro/ from /ya̋-ma-ɛ́ro/. Would be two
> determiners.
>
> **
>
> (31) a. POSS + ADJ ma-úkú yáákwa̋ ya̋mɛɛ́ro ‘my new
> books’ (note S on POSS)
>
> b. POSS + NUM ma-úkú yáákwa̋ yátháto ‘my
> three books’
>
> c. POSS + QUANT ma-úkú yáákwa̋ yɔ́ɔnthɛ˚
> ‘all my books’
>
> (32) a. ADJ + POSS ma-úkú ya̋mɛɛ̋ro yáákwá ‘my new
> books’ (note S on ADJ)
>
> b. ADJ + ADJ ma-úkú ya̋mɛɛ̋ro ya̋manɛ́nɛ ‘big new books’
>
> c. ADJ + NUM ma-úkú ya̋mɛɛ̋ro yátháto ‘three
> new books’
>
> d. ADJ + QUANT ma-úkú ya̋mɛɛ̋ro yɔ́ɔnthɛ˚ ‘all
> new books’
>
> (33) a. NUM + POSS ma-úkú yátha̋to yáákwá
> ‘my three books’ (note S on NUM)
>
> b. NUM + ADJ ma-úkú yátha̋to ya̋mɛɛ́ro ‘three
> new books’
>
> c. NUM + QUANT ma-úkú yátha̋to yɔ́ɔnthɛ˚
> ‘all three books’
>
> **
>
> (34) No case has been found where two modifiers join together in the
> same phonological phrase, whether with the head noun or not. Instead,
> each non-final modifier gets the HS% tone. This is illustrated in the
> following pragmatically unnatural, but logically grammatical series of
> five modifiers:
>
> Noun Dem
>
>
>
> Poss
>
>
>
> Adj
>
>
>
> Num
>
>
>
> Quant
>
> [ ma-úkú
>
>
>
> yáa̋ ]_PhP
>
>
>
> [ yáákwa̋ ]_PhP
>
>
>
> [ ya̋mɛɛ̋ro ]_PhP
>
>
>
> [ yátha̋to ]_PhP
>
>
>
> [ yɔ́ɔnthɛ˚ ]_PhP
>
> cl6-book
>
>
>
> these
>
>
>
> my
>
>
>
> new
>
>
>
> three
>
>
>
> all
>
> ‘all these three new books of mine’ A nested structure
> is also possible:
>
> [ [ [ [ [ ma-úkú
>
>
>
> yáa̋ ]_PhP
>
>
>
> yáákwa̋ ]_PhP
>
>
>
> ya̋mɛɛ̋ro ]_PhP
>
>
>
> yátha̋to ]_PhP
>
>
>
> yɔ́ɔnthɛ˚ ]_PhP
>
>
> --
> Larry M. Hyman, Distinguished Professor of the Graduate School
> & Director, France-Berkeley Fund, University of California, Berkeley
> https://linguistics.berkeley.edu/~hyman
>
> _______________________________________________
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--
Prof. em. Dr. Christian Lehmann
Rudolfstr. 4
99092 Erfurt
Deutschland
Tel.: +49/361/2113417
E-Post: christianw_lehmann at arcor.de
Web: https://www.christianlehmann.eu
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