[Lingtyp] Summary numeral in the world languages

Thu Sep 7 13:42:28 UTC 2023

Dear Joe,

Mwotlap (Oceanic, Vanuatu) has several inclusory constructions that meet
these criteria:

   - COORDINATIVE construction
   *Wilson **kōyō* Mika <W. 3dual M.>
   “Wilson and Mika”
   → equivalent of coordinator, with humans
   e.g. *imam kōyō tita* "Dad and Mum", etc.

   - EXPLICATIVE construction
   *Kōyō** Mika* <3dual M.>
   "he and Mika"
   → {semi-anaphora}: the first member of the couple is strictly anaphoric
   (must have been already mentioned in recent context, and activated), and
   the new information is about the second member of the group (namely
   *Mika*).

   - RECOGNITIONAL construction
   *Wilson **kōyō* <W. 3dual> “Wilson and Z [his wife / his son / his
   colleague…]”
   → {recognitional use}, no anaphora:
   the whole group [Wilson+Z] is new information in the context,
   but the identity of Z must be retrieved by contextual information, or
   inference.

______
The coordinative construction always involve the 3rd dual pronoun *kōyō*.

The recognitional construction is always 3rd person,
but it may involve other numbers than just the dual:

   - TRIAL:
   *Wilson kēytēl *<W. 3trial>
   “Wilson and his two fellows / his two children”  (cardinality =3 people).
   - PLURAL:
   *Wilson kēy *<W. 3plural>
   “Wilson and his group / family”  (cardinality >3 people).

The explicative construction can involve other persons than just a 3rd
person,
and other numbers than just a dual:

   - e.g. 2nd dual:
   *Kōmyō yē? *<2dual who>
   “you and who?” ~ “Who were you with?”.
   - 1incl. trial:
   *Ēntēl Mika *<1inc:trial M.>
   “you + I + Mika”,   as in “Let's go with Mika.”

_________
In my Mwotlap grammar (2001 dissertation
<http://alex.francois.online.fr/AFpub_books_e.htm#01>), I initially
described these constructions as types of "associative non-singular"
[*Non-singulier
associatif* in F2001: 384 ff
<https://marama.huma-num.fr/data/AlexFrancois_These_DescriptionMwotlap.pdf#page=385>].
They all involve an NP followed by a 3rd person pronoun of a non-singular
number (Dual, Trial or Plural), where the pronoun encodes the cardinality
of the whole group, and the NP always is a subset of the group.

I understand that Tahitian shares with Mwotlap several (all?) of these
constructions, as well as many other Oceanic languages.  Frank
Lichtenberk's 2000 paper on “Inclusory pronominals” is a key reference (I
used the term *inclusory* in a 2005 paper
<https://marama.huma-num.fr/data/AlexFrancois_LingTyp-Mwotlap_2005.pdf#page=6>),
even though Frank's constructions were a bit different from Mwotlap.
_________
In all cases, the associative phrase forms an argument constituent.
When it's the subject, it triggers agreement with a non-singular verb:

(1)   *Tita    *so    ni-kuk.
        Mum     IRR    *3sg*-cook
       “Mum will do the cooking.”
(1')   *Tita    kēytēl * so    kuk.
        Mum      *3trial   *     IRR    (*NSG*:)cook
       “*Mum and her two (friends/children+)* will do the cooking.”
________
Finally, another subtype of the explicative construction involves
possessive suffixes (cf. pp.477-481
<https://marama.huma-num.fr/data/AlexFrancois_These_DescriptionMwotlap.pdf#page=477>
of
the grammar):

(2)   Na-ha-*mōyō*  yē ? –  Na-ha-*mamyō*  wōlōmgep vitwag.
        Art-song-*2dual*   who —     Art-song-*1ex:dual*   boy
 Indef
       “Who is that song about? — It's a song about me and another boy.”
       [liter.  “it is *our*-song a boy”]

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>
–PSL <https://www.psl.eu/en>–Sorbonne nouvelle
<http://www.univ-paris3.fr/lattice-langues-textes-traitements-informatiques-cognition-umr-8094-3458.kjsp>
Australian National University
<https://researchprofiles.anu.edu.au/en/persons/alex-francois>
Personal homepage <http://alex.francois.online.fr/>
_________________________________________

---------- Forwarded message ---------
From: David Gil <gil at shh.mpg.de>
Date: Thu, 7 Sept 2023 at 11:20
Subject: Re: [Lingtyp] Summary numeral in the world languages
To: <lingtyp at listserv.linguistlist.org>

Dear all,

in response to Pun Ho Lui's query, a couple of posts have mentioned the
well-known inclusory constructions.  However, the prototypical case of an
inclusory construction is one in which the clause contains an NP whose
reference is WHOLLY INCLUDED in some other numeral or number marking, e.g.
(schematically)

JOHN TWO WENT
'John and his associate went'

However, what Pun Ho Lui seems to be asking for is examples where the
numeral or number marking "summarizes", or is coextensive with (rather than
wholly including in its reference) some kind of list, or conjunction, of
referring expressions, e.g.

JOHN BILL TWO WENT
'John and Bill the two of them went'

Thus, while "summary numeral" constructions might fall within the
definition of "inclusory", most inclusories do not qualify as summary
numerals.

(BTW, as evidenced by the English rendition of the second example 'John and
Bill the two of them went', summary numerals are "almost" acceptable in
standard English, and I suspect are fine in some colloquial varieties of
English.)

Another point: in cases where the numeral gloms on to the verb, e.g.

JOHN BILL TWO-WENT
'John and Bill the two of them went'

you end up with a garden variety example of number agreement.  The
more"special" cases of the summary numeral construction are those in which
the numeral or number marking are not targets of agreement but rather
either separate forms or alternatively form a constituent with the listed
NPs, e.g.

[ JOHN BILL TWO ] WENT
'John and Bill the two of them went'

Best,

David

On 07/09/2023 02:41, Rachel Nordlinger wrote:

Dear Joe,

These sorts of constructions are very common in Australian languages and
known as inclusory constructions – see Ruth Singer’s work on the topic,
e.g.
https://rest.neptune-prod.its.unimelb.edu.au/server/api/core/bitstreams/fed14adf-fdcc-579e-8833-62e154eb0e11/content

Best wishes,

Rachel

-- 

Professor Rachel Nordlinger FAHA  (she/her)

Director, Research Unit for Indigenous Language

Linguistics Discipline Chair

School of Languages and Linguistics

University of Melbourne

VIC 3010, Australia

*I acknowledge the Traditional Owners of the land where I live and work,
the Wurundjeri and Boon Wurrung people of the Kulin Nations, and pay my
respects to Elders past and present.*

*From: *Lingtyp <lingtyp-bounces at listserv.linguistlist.org>
<lingtyp-bounces at listserv.linguistlist.org> on behalf of Alexander Coupe
<ARCoupe at ntu.edu.sg> <ARCoupe at ntu.edu.sg>
*Date: *Thursday, 7 September 2023 at 10:36 am
*To: *Pun Ho Lui <luiph001 at gmail.com> <luiph001 at gmail.com>,
"lingtyp at listserv.linguistlist.org" <lingtyp at listserv.linguistlist.org>
<lingtyp at listserv.linguistlist.org> <lingtyp at listserv.linguistlist.org>
*Subject: *Re: [Lingtyp] Summary numeral in the world languages

Dear Joe,

You can add Mongsen Ao (TB, Nagaland) to your list:

            *kiphuɹ nə áwkla khə ajila nət áhlù nə zə̀k*.
            kiphuɹ   nə      [a-úk-la      khə      a-ji-la          nət]NP
   a-hlú                nə        zə̀k
            owner   agt    nrl-pig-f   conj   nrl-dog-f   two
nrl-field
all       send.pst
            ‘An owner sent his dog and his pig to his field.’ (Coupe 2007:
114)

There are more textual examples of this on pp. 207, 216, 217, 237, 239,
322, 325, 388, 469. ‘Two’ seems to be the only numeral that occurs in this
role in my data, and I’m not sure if that’s because of defective sampling,
or because there is a constraint on the use of other numerals in the
summarizing function. The citation form of ‘two’ is *anət*, so the loss of
the prefix suggests that the numeral is somewhat grammaticalized in this
construction.

https://www.academia.edu/1317662/A_Grammar_of_Mongsen_Ao

Best regards,

Alec

*From: *Lingtyp <lingtyp-bounces at listserv.linguistlist.org>
<lingtyp-bounces at listserv.linguistlist.org> on behalf of Pun Ho Lui
<luiph001 at gmail.com> <luiph001 at gmail.com>
*Date: *Wednesday, 6 September 2023 at 2:51 PM
*To: *lingtyp at listserv.linguistlist.org <lingtyp at listserv.linguistlist.org>
<lingtyp at listserv.linguistlist.org>
*Subject: *[Lingtyp] Summary numeral in the world languages

*[Alert: Non-NTU Email] Be cautious before clicking any link or attachment.*

Dear All,

Haspelmath (2007) and Croft (2022) discussed a coordinating construction in
which a numeral “summarizes” the number of referents in a list. There are
different strategies in which the numeral behaves this way, e.g., a free
numeral (1); a dual affix on a coordinand (2); a dual pronoun in apposition
with the list+verb with dual marker (3). These numeral may be mono-syndetic
or bi-syndatic.

*(1)* Zaozou

*ŋu55-mu55 na53 phiɛ33 *

1-PL[EXCL] two father_and_child

“we two (exclusive), my daughter and I.”  (Li, 2020)

(2) Kham

syar sono:h pusum-ni

louse and flea-DL

‘the louse and the flea’ (Watters, 2004)

(3)
*Mapudungu *(iñché) eymi    inchiu   i-y-u

 I          you:SG we:DU eat-IND-1NONSG-DU

  ‘You and I ate.’

Languages with this construction I know are Zaozou, Kham, *Mapudungu, *Alto
Perené*, *Bangla*, *Cantonese*, *Mandarin*, *Papuan Malay*, *Yakut*, *

Inari Saami, Mongolian, Classical Tibetan, Huallaga
Quechua, Wardaman, Khanty, Vedic Sanskrit, Mparntwe
Arrernte, Daga, Mapudungu, Enets, Kham and Hualapai

I am wondering if there are other languages sharing similar constructions.

Thank you.

Warmest,

Joe Pun Ho Lui

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-- 
David Gil

Senior Scientist (Associate)
Department of Linguistic and Cultural Evolution
Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology
Deutscher Platz 6, Leipzig, 04103, Germany

Email: gil at shh.mpg.de
Mobile Phone (Israel): +972-526117713
Mobile Phone (Indonesia): +62-082113720302

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