DPs and Demonstratives

[Rankin, Robert L]

I'm aware of article copying on Arabic adjectives, but I don't think there is anything like that operating in Siouan.  It would at least have to be demonstrated.  Modern Omaha does have some strange article use, but it's different from the 19th century variety in this respect.  The common pattern as far as I can tell is DEM N-DET, so the other pattern needs a special translation if it's going to be correctly rendered.
 
Bob

________________________________

From: owner-siouan at lists.colorado.edu on behalf of Bryan Gordon
Sent: Thu 2/23/2006 12:29 PM
To: siouan at lists.colorado.edu
Subject: Re: DPs and Demonstratives


On 2/22/06, Rankin, Robert L <rankin at ku.edu> wrote: 

	The DEM-DET NOUN just isn't possible as a single constituent in Kaw, and, I suspect in Dhegiha generally, at least in Dorsey's day.  And I never recorded anything like that either in the '70's.  So I think Rory's original statement that these are "appositives" or renewed-mention constructions must be what is responsible for what he got over the phone with DEM-DET preceding the N.  I'd render it "That one, the man" or "That one, the woman", etc. in English, where "man/woman" clarifies what "that one" is referring to.


Although apposition is certainly something that should be looked at here, I would issue a word of caution about using this sort of English translation. In Arabic and Hebrew, for example, in which there is definiteness concord on adjectives in NP's, teaching grammars often tell non-Semitic-speakers to think of constructions like

ha+bayt ha+gadol
the+house the+big

as "the house, the big one." This encourages an appositive conception in the learner's mind. But these constructions are NOT necessarily appositive; they are simply what is required by Semitic morphosyntax.

- Bryan Gordon



	"That man" or "that woman" would, I think, have to be [[DEM] [wo/man DET]] or [[wo/man] [DEM-DET]], with the latter possibly having appositive-like properties also.
	
	Bob
	
	________________________________
	
	From: owner-siouan at lists.colorado.edu on behalf of ROOD DAVID S
	Sent: Tue 2/21/2006 6:21 PM 
	To: siouan at lists.colorado.edu
	Subject: RE: DPs and Demonstratives
	
	
	
	
	Well, dem-det before the noun is absolutely impossible in Lakota, which is
	the only one of these languages I know even a little about.  But then, 
	the order we have is always det-dem anyway.  The evolution of the Dhegiha
	articles must be quite different from that of the Lakhota ones.
	
	David S. Rood
	Dept. of Linguistics
	Univ. of Colorado
	295 UCB 
	Boulder, CO 80309-0295
	USA
	rood at colorado.edu
	
	On Tue, 21 Feb 2006, Rory M Larson wrote:
	
	> >  The "comma-like" pause (which probably entails pitch changes as well as 
	> > just a pause) is exactly what I would expect if this is a two-part
	> > construction.
	>
	> David,
	>
	> I was just on the phone with one of our speakers.  I couldn't quite get her 
	> to offer nu' s^e'akHa for 'that man' on her own, but when I suggested it
	> she enthusiastically said that that sounded even better than the
	> constructions she had offered.  I got her to say it for me, and also wa?u' 
	> s^e'dhiNkHe.  Her pronunciation was as I seemed to recall.  I believe there
	> is a slight pause/vowel prolongation/drop in volume and maybe pitch,
	> between the noun and the following dem-det pair.  I was wondering how it 
	> would sound if the noun were not accented on the last syllable, so I tried
	> nu'z^iNga ('boy'), mi'z^iNga ('girl'), and s^iN'gaz^iNga ('child').  On
	> these, she preferred placing the dem-det pair before the noun, as 
	> s^e'dhiNkHe nu'z^iNga, etc.  Again, there seemed to be a slight pause
	> between dem-det and N.  I don't know that I have ever seen this
	> construction in the historical literature.
	>
	> Rory 
	>