[Lingtyp] Grammaticalization of past/resultative meaning from "stay"

[Jess Tauber]

Colon marks tenseness of the vowel preceding it.


On Mon, Mar 6, 2023 at 4:34 PM Jess Tauber <tetrahedralpt at gmail.com> wrote:

> In Yahgan, the root ka:gu: (also used prefixally to mean 'to the top, to
> fullness/completion' appears to connote staying in the same state (but
> increasingly so). The (perhaps etymologically related) ka:taka is used both
> lexically and grammaticalized as a verb suffix meaning 'incremental
> progressive' or 'more and more', 'bit by bit', etc.
>
> Jess Tauber
>
> On Mon, Mar 6, 2023 at 4:13 PM Elad Eisen <elad.eisen at mail.huji.ac.il>
> wrote:
>
>> Dear Östen, Wesley, and all,
>> The development (REMAIN > CHANGE OF STATE) seems to be shared by more
>> than one language outside of the Circum-Baltic languages, including not
>> only Spanish *quedar (se) *but also Italian *rimanere*, Arabic *baqiya*,
>> and Neo-Aramaic *pyāša*.
>>
>> Some references and examples can be found in the abstract of a talk I
>> gave, where I suggested a grammaticalization path for the change REMAIN >
>> CHANGE OF STATE:
>>
>> https://drive.google.com/file/d/0ByEYwMlbX_h5ODY5b2o5enlweGRUZFN0bW8xOGpMTjRfQzFj/view?usp=sharing&resourcekey=0-PXh0LtFFyyIXizAWhTywoA
>>
>> Elad
>>
>> Eisen, E. (2019, April 8). From remain to become: a static source for
>> change of state verbs [Conference presentation abstract]. The International
>> Conference for Graduate Students on Diverse Approaches to Linguistics,
>> Jerusalem, Israel.
>>
>> On Mon, 6 Mar 2023 at 14:00, Östen Dahl <oesten at ling.su.se> wrote:
>>
>>> In many or most Circum-Baltic languages (i.e. languages spoken around
>>> the Baltic sea), there has been a development of verbs meaning ‘remain,
>>> stay’ into verbs meaning ‘become’. Thus, in Swedish, “bli” can have both
>>> meanings, although the original one is less often found in contemporary
>>> language. Cf.
>>>
>>> Jag blir här ‘I will stay here’
>>>
>>> Jag blir så trött ’I am getting so tired’
>>>
>>> ”Bli” is also used as a passive auxiliary, e.g.
>>>
>>> Min artikel blev refuserad ‘My paper was rejected’
>>>
>>> This looks like an areal phenomenon going back to medieval times. “Bli”,
>>> which is found in all standard continental Scandinavian languages, comes
>>> from Middle Low German “bliwen”, but it is unclear if “bliwen” could have
>>> the meaning ‘become’. – Spanish “quedar” seems to be a similar case outside
>>> the Circum-Baltic area.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>    - Östen
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> *Från:* Lingtyp <lingtyp-bounces at listserv.linguistlist.org> *För *Wesley
>>> Jones
>>> *Skickat:* den 6 mars 2023 01:38
>>> *Till:* lingtyp at listserv.linguistlist.org
>>> *Ämne:* [Lingtyp] Grammaticalization of past/resultative meaning from
>>> "stay"
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Hello all,
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> There is a construction in Horokoi (a.k.a. Wasembo, [gsp], part of the
>>> Madang branch of TNG) in which a clause chain with the final verb
>>> "stay/exist" can have various past/resultative-like meanings. I am
>>> wondering where else such a construction has been found.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> The form is: [V-SR stay-TAM], where SR means switch reference marking
>>> (same-subject or different-subject). With same-subject marking, it
>>> literally says "I [V] and I stay"; with different-subject, it says "I [V]
>>> and it (impersonal) stays".
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> So far I have found the following meanings for the construction. The
>>> different-subject marking tends to be associated with more distal meanings
>>> (past, far past, anterior).
>>>
>>>    - literal (he *built* a house and it *stayed* [didn't fall down])
>>>    - stative (the food *is dry*, lit. it dries and it stays)
>>>    - copula/stative (you *are* like me, lit. you become and you stay)
>>>
>>>
>>>    - Note that this meaning only occurs when the first verb is
>>>       "become". It does not mean "you became like me" (eventive).
>>>
>>>
>>>    - resultative/stative ([you hit it and] it *is broken*, lit. it
>>>    breaks and it stays)
>>>    - past (I *went*, lit. I go and I stay)
>>>    - far past (they [ancestors] *got* salt from trees, lit. they take
>>>    and it stays)
>>>    - anterior (I *had said* it to you, [then something else happened],
>>>    lit. I say and it stays)
>>>
>>> I have been thinking that this is unusual because "stay" as an auxiliary
>>> usually grammaticalizes into continuative rather than past/resultative.
>>> Heine & Kuteva (2002) mention "sit" > copula, but not this path of "become
>>> and stay" > "become-past" > copula, nor any cases of "stay" (or similar) to
>>> these past-like meanings.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> I've been attributing this pathway to the sequential semantics of the
>>> clause chaining construction (Horokoi does not mark simultaneous vs
>>> sequential in medial verbs, as far as I know). Thus, the sequence "I [V]
>>> and (then) I stay" implies that V is no longer happening and I am staying
>>> in whatever state endures at the end of V's action. But perhaps this is not
>>> right, and I received a comment that this implicature need not hold for the
>>> literal meaning.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> I have received comments that similar constructions are found in Dani
>>> languages, Malay, and some others. I found mention of something very
>>> similar in Mian by Fedden (2020). I have found no cognate constructions or
>>> comparative evidence to shed light on this for Horokoi (presumably Mian
>>> constitutes a parallel innovation because of the vast time depth separating
>>> Madang from Ok).
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Please let me know if you have seen something like this or if you know
>>> of references about this grammaticalization pathway, thank you!
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Wesley Kuhron Jones
>>>
>>> Ph.D. student, University of Oregon
>>> _______________________________________________
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>>> Lingtyp at listserv.linguistlist.org
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>>>
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