[Lingtyp] A query on comparative correlative clauses

Fri Dec 6 11:56:55 UTC 2024

Dear Theodor and all,

For what it's worth, the type of construction you describe does not seem to
exist in Australian languages (not that the absence of evidence should be
taken as evidence of absence). I suspect that the meaning of 'the Xer...the
Xer...' *could *be expressed with certain conditional constructions
(especially the 'whenever' type), but I have also struggled to find any
examples or mentions from the languages I've looked at -- though of course
I'm more than happy to be proven wrong!

Here are some of the conditional examples I was thinking of. In Mparntwe
Arrernte, conditional relations can be expressed with a combination of
sequential marking (*-tyenhenge*) and modal marking (*peke* 'maybe'), or
with the conjunction (*nhenge* 'remember this referent from before >
whenever'). Note that this link with comparative correlatives isn't made by
the grammar writer - this is pure speculation on my part. In general,
conditional sentences cannot be construed as having a comparative
correlative meaning at all.

Mparntwe Arrernte (Wilkins 1989: 245, 122)
*the utyene are-tyenhenge, or perne-tyenhenge peke;
tanthe-rl-anthe-rliwe-me *
1sgA sore see-SBSQNT or rub-SBSQNT maybe spear-SPORAD.rdp-npp
‘Whenever I look at, or rub against, my sore, it hurts.’
EL: ??'the more I look or rub against my sore, the more it hurts'

*nhenge tyerrtye mape lthekelth-ile-lhe-tyekenhe, kele itne ine-mer-ante
kwete diabetes.*
REMEMB people pl(grp)(S) stretch-CAUS-REFL-VbNEG O.K. 3plA get-HYPO-ONLY
still diabetes
‘Whenever people don’t exercise, then they are very likely to get diabetes.’
EL: ??'the more that people don't exercise, the more likely they are to get
diabetes'

If you were to look for comparative correlative constructions in Australian
languages, you might start with comparative constructions like the
following. However, it's likely that comparatives won't have the 'causal'
dimension you're looking for. Here, the construal shouldn't be 'the less
compassionate he is, the less I feel sorry for him', but that the two
events of lacking compassion are similar in the mind of the speaker.

Wardaman (Merlan 1994: 313, 498)
*wonggo yi-nga-na-n gurlurrg gija narnaj gurlurrg-marla-wagbawun*
neg IRR-1SG-AUX-PRES sorry *as *self-ABS sorry-INCH-lacking-ABS
'I can't be sorry for him* just as* he isn't compassionate.' / 'I'm unable
to feel sorry for him *just as* he can't be/become sorry.'

Best,
Ellison Luk

On Fri, 6 Dec 2024 at 05:51, David Gil via Lingtyp <
lingtyp at listserv.linguistlist.org> wrote:

> Dear Theodor, all,
>
>
>
> In dialects of Malay/Indonesian, as well as closely related Minangkabau,
> comparative correlatives are formed with the construction "makin X makin
> Y", where "makin" means something like 'increasingly'.  Numerous examples
> can be found in the Gil et al (2015) corpus by searching for "makin"; here
> is one such example from Minangkabau:
>
>
>
> makin jauah talampok nyo sesuatu, makin tinggi nilai nyo
>
> increasingly far INVOL:shut 3 one:thing increasingly high value 3
>
> 'The further something is covered, the higher its value'
>
>
>
> Best,
>
>
>
> David
>
>
>
> Gil, David, Uri Tadmor, John Bowden and Bradley Taylor (2015) *Data from
> the Jakarta Field Station, Department of Linguistics, Max Planck Institute
> for Evolutionary Anthropology*, 1999-2015. [
> https://archive.mpi.nl/islandora/object/lat%3A1839_00_0000_0000_0021_10DE_A
> ]
>
> On Fri, Dec 6, 2024 at 5:29 AM Maria Koptjevskaja Tamm via Lingtyp <
> lingtyp at listserv.linguistlist.org> wrote:
>
>> Dear all,
>>
>> I am posting a query from our student Theodor Brus, who is looking for
>> data and information on comparative correlative clauses across languages.
>>
>> "Hello! My name is Theodor Brus and i am writing my bachelor thesis this
>> spring at the Department of linguistics at Stockholm University. I want to
>> do a typological study of comparative correlative clauses (CCs). Sag (2010,
>> p. 526) defines comparative correlative clauses as ‘monotonic relations
>> between two differentials’. However, there is often a causative function in
>> one direction, the first element is the reason for the state of the second
>> element. The following examples illustrate this point.
>>
>> ‘The worse I feel, the less inclined I am to get to work’
>>
>> ‘The more the sun shone, the happier people got’
>>
>> What I am looking for are glossed sentences from any language that have a
>> free translation which corresponds to an English CC. I would also
>> be grateful for pointers to descriptions and discussion of these phenomena
>> in various languages.
>>
>> Please send your replies to me, brus at ling.su.se All responses will be
>> grossly appreciated and acknowledged.
>>
>> Sag, I. A. (2010). ENGLISH FILLER-GAP CONSTRUCTIONS. *Language*, *86*(3),
>> 486–545. http://www.jstor.org/stable/40961690”
>>
>> Kind regards,
>> Maria Koptjevskaja Tamm
>>
>>
>> Prof. Maria Koptjevskaja Tamm
>> Dept. of linguistics, Stockholm university, 106 91, Stockholm, Sweden
>> Editor-in-chief of “Linguistic Typology”
>> President-Elect of Societas Linguistic Europaea
>> www.ling.su.se/tamm
>> tamm at ling.su.se
>>
>>
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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: dapiiiiit at gmail.com
> Mobile Phone (Israel): +972-526117713
> Mobile Phone (Indonesia): +62-082113720302
>
>
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