Serial postpositions in the Udmurt language and function words in the Kazakh language (comparative analysis)

Abstract

Postpositions in many languages have evolved from significant words through grammaticalization. In the Udmurt language, as in many other Finno-Ugric languages of Russia, they are divided, separated into two groups: serial and non-serial postpositions. In the Kazakh language, function words are divided into two groups: function words and postpositions. The subject of our study was serial postpositions of the Udmurt language and function words of the Kazakh language, since in the essence of these categories of words there are similar features. The conclusion suggests itself - these two categories of words, although they are denoted by different terms, clearly show a striking typological similarity. In both languages, these categories of words occupy a middle position between nominals (mostly nouns) and postpositions. Nouns have their own independent lexical meaning, have the ability to decline, take possessive suffixes, and the postpositions have lost their original (lexical) meaning, so they perform only grammatical functions, just like case affixes, only, unlike the latter, they are a separate word and do not adjoin nominal basis. This circumstance can be explained from the point of view of the morphological (typological) classification of languages - both languages belong to agglutinative languages.