35.2932, Calls: Exploring Possession Across Indigenous Central and South America: Expanding Perspectives Through Underdescribed Languages

Tue Oct 22 22:05:12 UTC 2024

LINGUIST List: Vol-35-2932. Tue Oct 22 2024. ISSN: 1069 - 4875.

Subject: 35.2932, Calls: Exploring Possession Across Indigenous Central and South America: Expanding Perspectives Through Underdescribed Languages

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Date: 21-Oct-2024
From: Jacob Menschel [jmensch2 at uni-koeln.de]
Subject: Exploring Possession Across Indigenous Central and South America: Expanding Perspectives Through Underdescribed Languages

Full Title: Exploring Possession Across Indigenous Central and South
America: Expanding Perspectives Through Underdescribed Languages

Date: 17-Jan-2025 - 17-Jan-2025
Location: University of Warsaw, Poland
Contact Person: Jacob Menschel
Meeting Email: jmensch2 at uni-koeln.de

Linguistic Field(s): General Linguistics; Language Documentation;
Typology

Call Deadline: 21-Nov-2024

Meeting Description:

Possessive constructions have garnered recent scholarly attention,
both from theoretical (e.g. Heine 1997; Haspelmath 2017) and
typological (e.g. Aikhenvald & Dixon 2013; van Rijn 2016a; 2016b)
perspectives, including areal and microvariational studies (e.g.
Chappell & Lü 2022; Wagner-Nagy 2020). Crosslinguistic variation in
possessive constructions has been noted early on, with examples such
as alienability splits in Oceanic languages described by Lévy-Bruhl
(1914). In the realm of Amazonian languages, possessive constructions
have been extensively examined in descriptive accounts, both in
reference grammars and dedicated writings (Krasnoukhova 2011; Labrada
2023; Overall, Vallejos & Gildea 2018; van der Voort 2009). Addressing
recent developments related to possessive constructions, our workshop
seeks to investigate variation within possessive constructions –
primarily across hitherto un(der)described indigenous American
languages. While Amazonian languages will be a central focus, the
workshop also aims to explore possessive constructions beyond the
Amazon, extending to other languages from Central and South America.
By doing so, we aim to uncover new broader cross-linguistic patterns
and enrich our understanding of possession in typologically and
geographically distinct language families from this part of the world.

The framework employed in this workshop is fundamentally anchored in
linguistic description, thereby providing a solid foundation for
exploring complex theoretical paradigms. Its primary aim is to
investigate possession in languages that have little or no prior
detailed description of their possessive systems. By focusing on new
data, this workshop seeks to uncover fresh insights and not yet
well-described patterns. Some questions that will be addressed in this
workshop include:
 • How is the possessive construction expressed? What does the
construction depend on (e.g. the nature of the possessor, the
possessive relationship, or the possessed)?
 • Are there any non-possessive functions associated with possessive
markers?
 • Does the language express alienable vs. inalienable possessive
constructions?
 • Does the language have classifiers in possessive constructions?
 • What are other means for establishing predicative possessive
constructions (e.g. verbs like ‘have’, copula constructions, an
intransitive verb ‘exist’)?
 • Do any of such patterns correspond to areal, genetic, or
macrotypological tendencies?
 • What insights can be drawn about the historical development and
diffusion of the possessive constructions described?
 • Are there sociolinguistic factors contributing to variation in
possessive constructions?
 • How does language contact shape and potentially alter the
possessive constructions in the language?
 • Do possessive constructions reflect indigenous perspectives on
ownership and the conceptualization of 'belonging' (e.g., land,
language)?

We look forward to engaging discussions that contribute to our
understanding of possessive constructions in South and Central
America. We are planning a potential publication of either a special
issue (e.g. of Journal of Language Diversity) or an edited volume
(e.g. John Benjamins, De Gruyter) through the contents of this
workshop. Anonymized abstracts should be sent to both
k.wojtylak at uw.edu.pl and jmensch2 at uni-koeln.de by 21 November 2024.

Workshop length: Full day
Presentation format: Hybrid
Presentation length: 30 minutes (20min for presentation, 10min for
questions)
Fee: free of charge

Invited speakers: Alexandra Aikhenvald, Justyna Olko, John Sullivan

Convenors:
 - Dr Katarzyna (Kasia) Wojtylak
Assistant professor at the University of Warsaw. Kasia focuses on the
typology of languages of Northwest Amazonia, especially the Witotoan
and Boran language families. She’s worked on language contact and the
nature of relationships between the zones in the world with the
highest concentrations of both biodiversity and linguistic and
cultural diversity.
 - Jacob Menschel
Researcher at the University of Cologne, conducting language
documentary work with the Andoke language isolate of Southern
Colombia, as well as contact-related investigations related to
Northwest Amazonia and further typological studies on Amazonian
languages.

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