30.671, Books: The Atoms of Person in Pronominal Paradigms: Sonnaert

[The LINGUIST List]

LINGUIST List: Vol-30-671. Mon Feb 11 2019. ISSN: 1069 - 4875.

Subject: 30.671, Books: The Atoms of Person in Pronominal Paradigms: Sonnaert

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Date: Mon, 11 Feb 2019 17:08:54
From: Karijn Hootsen [lot-fgw at uva.nl]
Subject: The Atoms of Person in Pronominal Paradigms: Sonnaert

 


Title: The Atoms of Person in Pronominal Paradigms 
Series Title: LOT Dissertations Series  

Publication Year: 2018 
Publisher: Netherlands Graduate School of Linguistics / Landelijke (LOT)
	   http://www.lotpublications.nl/
	

Book URL: https://www.lotpublications.nl/the-atoms-of-person-in-pronominal-paradigms 


Author: Jolijn Sonnaert

Paperback: ISBN:  9789460932953 Pages: 197 Price: Europe EURO 31.00


Abstract:

In Indo-European languages, pronouns can distinguish up to three persons:
first, second and third person, referring to a speaker, hearer and
non-participant respectively. However, in other languages a fourth person
emerges: the inclusive. It refers to both speaker and hearer. As such, whereas
first, second and third person pronouns have a single referent as their
obligatory or focal referent, the inclusive has two: speaker plus hearer.

This dissertation investigates if other combinations of referents can make up
the focal reference of pronouns. There are three such combinations: (i)
speaker plus hearer, (ii) speaker plus non-participant, and (iii) hearer plus
non-participant. Together with the atomic person referents (speaker, hearer,
and non-participant), this yields a total of six possible persons. The
dissertation argues that of these six, only four are ever lexicalised in
pronominal paradigms. The only complex person is the inclusive, and other
complex persons are unattested. Evidence is adduced from a wide variety of
typologically diverse languages supporting this conclusion.

This gap in personal pronoun paradigms is argued to be a part of a broader
generalisation: the concept formation constraint. This constraint is rooted in
the kite framework of Seuren & Jaspers (2012), an Aristotelian natural logic
theory that maps the concepts of closed lexical fields and the logical
relations that hold between them onto geometrical figures. The author applies
this framework to the lexical field of person, which explains exactly the
observations made: only one out of the three logically possible complex
persons can be referred to with personal pronouns: the inclusive.
 



Linguistic Field(s): Morphology
                     Syntax

Language Family(ies): Indo-European


Written In: English  (eng)

See this book announcement on our website: 
http://linguistlist.org/pubs/books/get-book.cfm?BookID=132913




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