[Lingtyp] Query: 'Deceased referent' markers

[Christian Döhler]

Hi Pattie,

Komnzo in Southern New Guinea has a form /kwark/ [kwarək], which I 
translate as 'deceased, late'. I analyse /kwark/ as an adjective. While 
most adjectives can either precede or follow the modified noun, there 
are three adjectives which may only follow the noun, and /kwark/ is one 
of them. You find a brief mention of these three in the grammar (here 
<https://langsci-press.org/catalog/view/212/1408/1325-1>) in §3.1.5, and 
a search in the pdf for "kwark" will bring you a couple of example 
sentences.

/Kwark /occurs with kinterms and proper names. It is always used with 
humans. I found one corpus example with a dog. It is very frequent 
(ubiquitous) when talking about someone who has passed away.

Here is one example:

    /nzwamnzrm fof ... oromanä fof ... oroman kwarkä./
    nzwa\m/nzrm                fof        (.)     oroman=ä         
    fof        (.)    oroman    kwark=ä
    1SG:PST:DUR/dwell     emph   (.)     old.man=ASSOC.PL    emph (.)   
    old_man   deceased=ASSOC.PL
    ‘We stayed with the old man ... with the late old man.’
    [tci20130911-03 MBR #72-73]

Best,
Christian

Am 26.09.24 um 12:14 schrieb Epps, Patience L via Lingtyp:
>
> Dear all,
>
> I'm writing regarding a phenomenon that appears to be widely attested 
> in Amazonian languages, which my project collaborators and I have been 
> calling a 'deceased referent marker'. We are wondering about the 
> extent to which a comparable phenomenon exists in other languages of 
> the world - from a preliminary survey, it appears to have very few 
> close correlates elsewhere.
>
> The Amazonian-type DRM construction involves using a particular 
> linguistic marker (which can usually be identified as more grammatical 
> than lexical, though it's not always an easy distinction to make) 
> within the noun phrase when making direct reference to a deceased 
> referent. This is reminiscent of what occurs in some European 
> languages (e.g. English /the *late* John, /Portuguese /o *finado* 
> João/), but tends to be less lexical and is ubiquitous in discourse, 
> rather than being highly optional and/or limited to more formal 
> registers. In some languages, the DRM is a distinct etymon with no 
> other functions; in others, it overlaps with other functions (most 
> frequently that of a nominal past marker). It is always used with 
> humans (primarily proper names and kin terms), while some languages 
> also allow use with non-human referents. In spite of these variations, 
> there seem to be close parallels in how the construction is formulated 
> and how it is used discursively across many Amazonian languages.
>
> An example from Nadëb (Naduhup family, NW Brazil):
>
> /ee *makũuh* ỹ              haw'ëëh              doo            paah/
>
> father  DRM                       1sg        raise            
>           NMLZ                    PST
>
> 'It was my late father who raised me (there).'
>
> In defining the Amazonian 'type' of DRM, we are focusing on resources 
> that a) consist of a morphological element (affix or clitic hosted by 
> the noun); or b) if arguably more lexical, have a ‘deceased referent’ 
> function that is relatively distinct from other 
> meanings/morphosyntactic expressions and/or appears ubiquitously in 
> DRM contexts. We are excluding other kinds of linguistic strategies 
> for referring to the deceased, including naming prohibitions, 
> necronyms (passing on the deceased's name to a child), more 
> pragmatically optional periphrastic strategies (e.g. 'my dead 
> relative', 'my relative who died recently', etc.). We are also 
> excluding (though we're interested, for comparative purposes) other 
> types of nominal morphology relating to the deceased, e.g. a marker 
> that occurs with a kin term X to mean ‘one whose X has recently died’ 
> in Kayardild (Australia): /kangku-kurirr/ (father’s.father-DEAD) ‘one 
> whose father’s father has recently died’ (Evans 1995: 197).
>
> We'd be very grateful for information about comparable phenomena in 
> languages outside South America.
>
> All best,
>
> Pattie Epps
>
>
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-- 
_____________________________________________________
Christian Döhler
Berlin-Brandenburgische Akademie der Wissenschaften
Jägerstraße 22/23, 10117 Berlin, Raum 15
https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9659-5920
wiss. Mitarbeiter im DFG Projekt Open Text Collections
https://opentextcollections.github.io/
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