[Lingtyp] modal particle ?

[Alex Francois]

dear Christian,

Your Cabecar examples remind me of Japanese constructions with *koto (ga)
aru.*

One typical combination involves *koto* 'fact, event' + *aru* '*Exist*',
preceded by an embedded clause (expanding on *koto*, on its left).

   - If the embedded clause is in the past, it encodes an *experiential
   perfect*:
   (in questions) “Has it ever happened that <Clause>?”
   (in statements) “It has already happened that <Clause>”

*Chūgoku=ni  it-ta    koto (=ga)  ar-u?*

China=OBL       go-Past     fact (=Sbj)      EXIST-Npast

“Have you ever been to China?”


*Chūgoku=ni  it-ta    koto (=ga)  ar-u          (yo).*

China=OBL       go-Past     fact (=Sbj)      EXIST-Npast   DECL

“I've been to China (at least once).”



   - If the embedded clause is in the present, it encodes an *experiential
   present*  [if this is a thing]:
   (in questions) “Does it ever happen that <Clause>?”
   (in statements) “It does happen that <Clause>”

*Chūgoku=ni  ik-u      koto (=ga)  ar-u?*

China=OBL       go-NPast     fact (=Sbj)      EXIST-Npast

“Do you ever travel to China?”


*Chūgoku=ni  ik-u      koto (=ga)    ar-u        (yo).*

China=OBL       go-NPast     fact (=Sbj)      EXIST-Npast   DECL

“I travel to China every now and then.”


The negative counterpart would replace *aru* with its negation *nai*
 'Neg:Exist':

*Chūgoku=ni  it-ta    koto (=ga)  na-i               yo.*
China=OBL       go-Past     fact (=Sbj)      NEG:EXIST-NPast  DECL
“I've never been to China.”


*Chūgoku=ni  ik-u    koto (=ga)    na-i               yo.*
China=OBL       go-NPast     fact (=Sbj)      NEG:EXIST-NPast  DECL
“I never go to China.”


Also, if you use *dekiru* 'be possible, be able', you get a potential:


*Chūgoku=ni  ik-u     koto (=ga)  deki-ru          (yo).*
China=OBL       go-NPast    fact (=Sbj)      be.possible-NPast  DECL
“It's possible to go to China. / I~you~s.he can go to China.”


and a predicate *dekita* in the past encodes an event that was able to
materialize after all:


*Chūgoku=ni  ik-u     koto (=ga)  deki-ta         (yo).*
China=OBL       go-NPast    fact (=Sbj)      be.possible-Past  DECL
“I was (finally) able to go to China.”


Those constructions encode meanings of aspect & modality.
The noun *koto* encapsulates a potential state of affairs [SoA, the event
of 'going to China'] and then the main predicate ["exist", "not.exist",
"be.possible"...] situates that SoA with respect to our reference world:

   - Either that SoA "exists" (has reality in this world)
   → Experientials  [this has happened / happens at least once]

   - or it does not exist in this world
   → Negative experiential  [this has never happened / this never happens];

   - or that SoA exists as a potential extension of this world
   → Potential  [this can happen (in the future)]
   - or it exists as an extension of a past situation, after there was
   doubt on its possibility
   → past Potential  [this finally managed to happen]


Could it be that Cabecar *ta *works in a similar way?

Your translations seem to suggest so:  ‘Does it happen that you speak with
him?’;  ‘animals have weeping and howling.’; ‘It happens that the tiger
transforms itself into a person.’; ‘Have you managed to learn Cabecar ?’...

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: Christian Lehmann via Lingtyp <lingtyp at listserv.linguistlist.org>
Date: Tue, 3 Sept 2024 at 11:29
Subject: [Lingtyp] modal particle ?
To: <lingtyp at listserv.linguistlist.org>


Allow me to show you another syntactic construction of Cabecar which I find
difficult to conceptualize.

   1.

   ¿Bá kt-ä́ ta ijé ra?

2.sg speak-ipfv exist0 3.ps com

            ‘Does it happen that you speak with him?’

   2.

   ...jé-wá (rö) ji̱-á̱ ta jémi̱ kö́yí-r ta.

d.med-pl tsa weep-ipfv exist0 and howl-mid(ipfv) exist0

            ‘… they [animals] have weeping and howling.’

   3.

   Satala rä jé̠k iá-w-á̱ ta ditsä́ yë́.

tiger tsa rfl transform-caus-ipfv exist0 native trl

            ‘It happens that the tiger transforms itself into a person.’

   4.

   ¿Bá yö́-r ta ditsë́-i ?

2.sg form-mid(ipfv) exist0 native-advr

            ‘Have you managed to learn Cabecar ?’

(TSA is 'thematic structure articulator'.)

For reasons that yet escape me, such sentences mostly – though obviously
not necessarily – have interrogative force. The construction has syntactic
peculiarities which I will not expound because on the one hand they are
complicated and on the other they do not seem to touch my conceptual
question.

Although the aspect is the same in the examples, ex. 1 – 3 have timeless
reference while ex. 4 refers to something achieved. This difference appears
to be conditioned by the verb voice (which in itself I find inexplicable).

All of this is not my question. My question concerns the sentence-semantic
function of the particle *ta* exist0. The (preliminary) gloss is supposed
to remind the decipherer that this is grammaticalized from an erstwhile
existential verboid. In the present construction, it follows a verbal
clause core S and says: ‘S is the case’, ‘S does happen’, ‘there are
occasions where S’; or with past time reference (ex. 4): ‘S did happen /
has happened’, ‘S did materialize’. Although my analysis implies that *ta*
once was the main predicate in this construction, it is now an optional
particle.

The language has a validator (in fact, a whole paradigm of them) in
addition. The validator emphasizes that I am serious about S, that S does
matter. *Ta* is not a validator. It does not appear to be in a paradigm
with anything else. Its closest counterpart in languages closer to home
would be a modal particle of the kind known from Ancient Greek, Russian and
German. However, I ignore the relevant conceptual framework: Is this
sentence modality? Or aktionsart? And what would be an appropriate term for
this function of *ta*?
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