Person Prefixes Research Articles

The first person prefixes in South Ethio-Semitic

AbstractSouth Ethio-Semitic (SES) is a genealogical branch of Ethio-Semitic (ES), a subgroup of Semitic found almost entirely in Ethiopia and Eritrea. The paper considers two features characteristic of several South Ethio-Semitic languages. Firstly, the Prefix Conjugation displays a common 1sg/1plprefix in various SES languages. Secondly, an innovative 1plsuffix is often employed in the Prefix Conjugation. In forms with 1sg/1plsyncretism, this suffix takes over the functional load of the plural marker. Both features are innovative in SES, and their absence from a number of languages in each of the main subbranches suggests areal diffusion rather than a shared innovation going back to the Proto-SES level. In former studies, it has been suggested that the innovative 1plsuffix was borrowed from Cushitic and that its introduction has triggered the 1sg/1plsyncretism. This hypothesis is critically reassessed in the present paper, which considers in detail various patterns of 1sg/1plsyncretism and various patterns of its interaction with the 1plsuffix, and offers a tentative reconstruction of their emergence and spread in the languages in question.

Allomorphy of personal prefixes of nominal possession of the mundurukú language (Tupian)

Allomorphy of personal prefixes of nominal possession of the mundurukú language (Tupian)

Agreement system in Chiru

Author(s): Awan, Mechek Sampar | Abstract: Chiru is a Northwestern Kuki-Chin language spoken in twelve villages in Manipur and one village in Assam, Northeast India. The language displays verb stem alternation. Person marking occurs either with prefixes or suffixes. For prefixes, there are two sets with a very slight difference: Either the first person prefixes include a vowel that copies the vowel of the following root or they include the vowel /a/. Otherwise, both sets have a second person prefix that always remains /a/, and a third person prefix that always has the copy vowel. This difference in person markers surfaces in the distinction between intransitive S marking vs. transitive A marking. The object is marked by a single prefix nV- that indexes any speech act participant.

The Nishnaabemwin restructuring controversy: new empirical evidence

The categorical deletion of unstressed vowels from iterative feet differentiates serial theories of phonology from parallel theories. Of at least equal importance is whether language learners acquire rhythmic syncope. A potentially illustrative case comes from the recent development of Nishnaabemwin (Algonquian), which extended unstressed vowel reduction until it approximated categorical rhythmic syncope. In response, an entire generational cohort reportedly carried out a dramatic restructuring by innovating a novel set of person prefixes and losing the surface alternations. However, the original reports are subject to some dispute. To shed further light on the status of rhythmic syncope in Modern Nishnaabemwin, this paper details three surveys of the first cohort of speakers born during the near-syncope period. The surveys indicate that, despite familiarity with the original system, the entire generational cohort uniformly adopted the innovative system.

The Marking System in the Dialect of Lamalera

Marking is a universal linguistic phenomenon. Marking is the giving of a marker either free or bound, either in front or back on a morphological form. The Dialect of Lamalera (DL) is one of 35 dialects in the Lamaholot Language family. The Lamalera dialect has apronominal marker attached either to the front in a number of certain categories of words or back in other categories. Interestingly, the DL is almost entirely in all categories of words. Provision of markers on anumber of categories triggers conformity to the word category often referred to as agreement verbs, personal clitics, subject markers, personal (prefixes, suffixes), agreement markers, or subject verb agreements. This paper will only examine the alignment in the DL with out comparing it with dialect or other languages cross language.

Clause Typing and Feature Inheritance of Discourse Features

AbstractThe aim of this article is twofold. First, we claim that δ‐features (discourse features), as well as ϕ‐features, can be inherited from C to T (Richards 2007, Chomsky 2008), as shown bywh‐agreement on T in Ojibwe (Algonquian). Our analysis supports Miyagawa's (2010) hypothesis that discourse and agreement features are two sides of the same coin, which can be distributed differently crosslinguistically. Second, we propose that although ϕ and δ typically bundle together on a single C head, this is not the case in all languages and in fact will vary parametrically. Ojibwe clause typing is partitioned between agreement/ϕ‐features on independent order (i.e., plain matrix) C and discourse/δ‐features on conjunct order (e.g., embedded) C. This parameter, that certain features may or may not bundle on C, captures a significant cluster of properties in Ojibwe: Initial Change, lack of person prefixes in the conjunct order in contrast with the independent, as well as the availability of long‐distance agreement. Our proposal supports the idea that much crosslinguistic variation reduces to the distinct feature structures making up functional heads, such as v,D, and C, rather than to primitives.

A codificação das relações gramaticais nos complementos oracionais do Apinaje

The coding of grammatical relations in languages of the Jê family displays great morphosyntactic complexity manifested in main, as well as in subordinate clauses. In Apinaje, the coding of core arguments in simple clauses combines a nominative pattern, manifested by means of independent pronouns, and an absolutive pattern, expressed by person prefixes attached to verbs. Additionally, a certain class of verbs marks core arguments with oblique postpositions, thus displaying a noncanonical pattern; complement-taking verbs belong in this category. In the context of complementation, the ergative alignment will occur depending on the correferenciality conditions between main and subordinate clause subjects.

The Role of Agency and Animacy in the Alignment System of Wichí

The alignment system of Wichí (Matacoan), coded by pronominal affixes on the verb, depends in part on semantic factors–in particular, agency– rather than valency. Generally the choice of subject prefix paradigms is lexically determined: verbs with particular semantic characteristics call for a particular paradigm. Additionally, in some cases other third person prefixes may be replaced by a more agentive one, modifying the meaning of the predicate. Agency, a relational property, strongly correlates with animacy, an inherent property of nominals; the interaction of the two properties in Wichí is investigated.

Descrição e análise do prefixo {e-} intr da língua Wayoro (Ayuru, tronco Tupí)

Evidências de que os verbos que apresentam o prefixo {e-} são monoargumentais, na língua Wayoro, são o uso dos prefixos pessoais absolutivos como marcadores do único argumento exigido pelo verbo e a possibilidade de coocorrência desses prefixos pessoais com o morfema causativo/transitivizador {mõ-~õ-} 'causativo', tal como ocorre com verbos intransitivos típicos da língua. O comportamento das construções intransitivas com prefixo {e-} pode ser associado a propriedades de sentenças anticausativas, reflexivas e médias. Em várias línguas, os valores anticausativo, reflexivo e médio podem ser expressos por um único morfema intransitivizador. Em Wayoro, os verbos intransitivizados por meio do prefixo {e-}podem apresentar valor anticausativo, quando o sujeito do verbo intransitivizado é [- animado], ou valor reflexivo, quando o sujeito do verbo é [+ animado]. Os verbos com prefixo {e-} inerente têm propriedades relacionadas à voz média (eventos espontâneos, eventos naturalmente recíprocos etc.).

Phases and templates in Georgian agreement

Abstract. This paper proposes a new analysis of person and number agreement in Georgian, which combines the locality-based syntactic account of Béjar (2000) with the discontinuous bleeding mechanism proposed by Noyer (1997). Following Béjar (2000, 2003); Béjar and Rezac (2003), we argue that phi-feature checking and realization is sensitive both to locality and to markedness of features. Contra these previous approaches, however, we propose that the morphological realization of these checking relations is constrained by a morphological template which restricts the number of positions-of-exponence available in the Georgian verb, in the spirit of analyses proposed in Noyer (1997); Carmack (1997); and Hale (2001), and, in a way, by Harris (1981). Our central claim is that the cyclic, phase-dependent nature of Spell-Out interacts with the positions available in the template to produce the complex patterns of blocking observed, without recourse to extrinsic rule-ordering or a presyntactic level of paradigmatic structure (see, e.g. Stewart 2001). This approach easily accounts for the number sensitivity of the first person prefixes, and naturally extends to predict the forms of the inverse paradigm, given certain syntactic assumptions about the location of arguments in the tree structure in the relevant constructions. We also treat the agreement patterns of complex verbs, containing both the verb stem and a dummy auxiliary. We claim that these forms are distinct from the simplex forms in lacking a phase boundary which is present in the simplex forms.

Deixis and alignment: Inverse systems in indigenous languages of the Americas (review)

Reviewed by: Deixis and alignment: Inverse systems in indigenous languages of the Americas Denis Creissels Deixis and alignment: Inverse systems in indigenous languages of the Americas. By Fernando Zúñiga. Amsterdam: John Benjamins, 2006. Pp. 309. ISBN 9027229821. $180 (Hb). The treatment of inverse systems constitutes a particularly challenging issue in morphosyntactic typology. They are crucial for the discussion of typological hierarchies, which have been a major concern for typologists in the last decades, but their status in alignment typology is controversial. This book includes detailed descriptions of the relevant subsystems of five Amerindian languages or language groups, and a thorough discussion of the theoretical implications of the data presented for a general typology of direction marking and its interactions with other morphosyntactic phenomena. The book includes: an introduction; two chapters addressing general issues in the study of alignment, hierarchically based morphosyntactic mechanisms, and direction (Ch. 1, 'Alignment and direction'; Ch. 2, 'A theory of direction'); five chapters devoted to case studies (Ch. 3, 'Algonquian languages'; Ch. 4, 'Kutenai'; Ch. 5, 'Sahaptian languages'; Ch. 6, 'Kiowa-Tanoan languages'; Ch. 7, 'Mapudungun'); a conclusion (Ch. 8); three appendices on Algonquian paradigms, analysis of Kiowa personal prefixes, and optimality-theoretic syntax of inverses respectively; references; and language, author, and subject indices. The central part of the book provides precise and detailed descriptions of a variety of systems involving direction marking. The morphological intricacies that often make it difficult to choose [End Page 492] between two alternative analyses of the same data are presented as clearly as possible, but without any oversimplification. The accounts given by other linguists are thoroughly analyzed, and when the data allows for alternative interpretations (which is often the case), the competing analyses are carefully compared. After summarizing the basics of alignment typology as exposed in works such as Comrie 1981, Dixon 1994, Harris & Campbell 1995, and Dixon & Aikhenvald 2000, Ch. 1 discusses the way the classic model of alignment can accommodate various types of splits, and in particular the proposals to recognize a 'hierarchical type' (Nichols 1992) or an 'inverse type' (Klaiman 1992) as distinct from the basic types commonly recognized. The indexability hierarchy (Bickel & Nichols 2007)—also known as Silverstein's hierarchy, the empathy hierarchy, the animacy hierarchy, and so on, and omnipresent throughout the book—is described as involving an invariant core 'SAP [speech-act participant] > 3rd person pronouns > [+human] > [+animate] > [-animate]', but allowing for considerable crosslinguistic variation in further details, for example, the possibility to rank SAPs relative to each other as 1 > 2 or 2 > 1, or to leave them unranked. Most importantly, a single language may exhibit distinct variants of an indexability hierarchy with respect to different construction types, as discussed in detail for Algonquian: contrary to the commonly received opinion, the 2 > 1 ranking accounts for one particular aspect of Algonquian indexation systems only (access to prefix slot), but is contradicted by some aspects of the behavior of suffixed person marks. Direction is defined as reflecting 'the alignment between the indexability hierarchy and a relational hierarchy where A's outrank O's' (28), and Zuñiga insists that direction marking (direct vs. inverse) is a possible manifestation of the indexability hierarchy, logically independent from other possible manifestations such as access to marking slots or access to syntactic function. The emphasis on the necessity to clearly distinguish these notions in analyzing the morphosyntax of individual languages, and to consider the question of their interactions not as a theoretical but as an empirical and typological issue, is certainly one of the strongest points of this book. Some confusion may arise, however, from the fact that 'direction' is not always used in conformity with the clear and precise definition formulated on p. 28—which is somewhat surprising, given that, in general, Z is very careful with terminology. On p. 31, DIRECTION is defined as 'dynamic actional deixis', that is, the deictic status of couples of entities encoded as the A and P arguments of transitive verbs: 'he-me', 'you-us', and so on. The concept of DIRECTION2 (formulated on p. 31) involves no reference to any hierarchy, and the relationship between direction2 (defined on p. 31) and direction1 (defined on p. 28...

Athapaskan: a Structural Overview

In this structural overview, I will focus on the morphology with a brief discussion of phonology and syntax for the reason that Athapaskan, as a "polysynthetic" language, has a very complex morphological structure of the verb. In terms of the number of segments, Athapaskan is one of the richest in the inventory of the consonants, which include three series of obstruents (plain, aspirated, and glottalized). Particularly rich is the inventory of affricates, which include, for most Athapaskan languages, three sets (dental, lateral, and palatal). The major lexical categories include verbs, nouns, and postpositions. Minor categories include deictic-demonstratives, numerals, locatives, adverbials, etc. Nouns and postpositions are morphologically identical in that they inflect with the same set of personal prefixes, marking a possessor for nouns and object for postpositions. But nouns and postpositions are different syntactically because only nouns function as a subject or direct object, whereas postpositions play other syntactic functions often incorporated into the verb. The verb morphology is characterized by a complex prefix structure as well as stem variation marking not only tense /aspect I mode, but also such other features as number and what are known to be the characteristics of the so-called 'classificatory' verbs. Athapaskan verbs are known for more or less a dozen prefix positions, although not all of these positions are filled for a particular verb. The classificatory verb system, which includes half a dozen or more alternating stems, is the most interesting and intriguing morphosemantic characteristic of the Athapaskan language, which would be particularly interesting to interpreters and translators. The syntactic structures involving the third and fourth person pronominal prefixes have been the most lively theoretical issue. Athapaskan is a verb-final language and a verb alone often represents a sentence. Typically the subject noun phrase and verb phrase are the first and last constituents of the sentence where other constituents, e.g. adverb, a postpositional phrase (indirect object) and direct object noun phrase occur between these two constituents. Relative clause and direct I indirect discourse are the best known noun phrase and verb phrase complementations, whereas topicalization and extraposition are the two best known movement rules in Athapaskan.

The Conjunct Order in Algonquian

AbstractThis article examines the conjunct order found in Algonquian languages and attempts to characterize the difference between the conjunct and the independent orders in formal terms. Most of the examples are drawn from Passamaquoddy-Maliseet and Montagnais. Specific morphological properties of the two orders are considered: the ability to take person prefixes, the richness of agreement features, and the phonological conditioning of stem-initial vowels. A weak word order effect is observed in Montagnais, and the overall distribution of the two verb paradigms is examined. All of these facts are related to the hypothesis that verbs bearing conjunct morphology move to Comp, while independent verbs remain in Infl. This operation is motivated by the dependence of a conjunct clause on a higher verb or noun, as in subordination or relativization. In some cases, the dependency may derive from the adjunct status of the conjunct clause itself. The overall picture is one of a configurational language type, with superficial differences reducible to parametric variation.

An Outline of Achehnese Phonology and morphology

It is a remarkable fact that of the Achehnese language, one of the most important languages of Sumatra, no grammatical description has ever appeared in print that meets minimum requirements. The only grammar extant is K. H. van Langen's Handleiding voor de beoefening der Atjehsche taal (The Hague, 1889). But notwithstanding Van Langen's laudable effort under difficult conditions, his work does not do justice to the language. There are two main objections. First, it is based on the written language. This is (or was in Van Langen's time) exclusively written in Arabic script, which clearly represents an earlier stage of the Achehnese language when certain phonemes had a different value and certain finals existed which have now been dropped. But Van Langen based even his transliteration in Latin characters on these archaic and obsolete Arabic spellings. The second objection is that the author never realized that Achehnese is an inflecting language, and treated certain personal prefixes as indicating a passive voice and a gerund instead of flexional elements of the verb. One aspect of his work is, however, still useful: the chrestomathy which forms a part of it, written in Arabic script, with a transliteration and a translation of some of the texts.

What Algonquian Is Really like

Previous articleNext article No AccessWhat Algonquian Is Really likeCharles F. HockettCharles F. Hockett Search for more articles by this author PDFPDF PLUS Add to favoritesDownload CitationTrack CitationsPermissionsReprints Share onFacebookTwitterLinkedInRedditEmail SectionsMoreDetailsFiguresReferencesCited by International Journal of American Linguistics Volume 32, Number 1Jan., 1966 Article DOIhttps://doi.org/10.1086/464880 Views: 32Total views on this site Citations: 30Citations are reported from Crossref PDF download Crossref reports the following articles citing this article:Christopher Hammerly, Adrian Staub, Brian Dillon Person-based prominence guides incremental interpretation: Evidence from obviation in Ojibwe, Cognition 225 (Aug 2022): 105122.https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cognition.2022.105122Marcin Kilarski A History of the Study of the Indigenous Languages of North America, 129 (Nov 2021).https://doi.org/10.1075/sihols.129Jan van Eijk, Vincent Collette Plains Cree animacy–inanimacy hierarchy, Studies in Language 45, no.44 (Nov 2020): 840–864.https://doi.org/10.1075/sl.20023.colKatharina Haude On discourse-semantic prominence, syntactic prominence, and prominence of expression: The case of Movima, Journal of Pragmatics 154 (Dec 2019): 22–38.https://doi.org/10.1016/j.pragma.2018.08.012Will Oxford Inverse marking and Multiple Agree in Algonquin, Natural Language & Linguistic Theory 37, no.33 (Sep 2018): 955–996.https://doi.org/10.1007/s11049-018-9428-xChantale Cenerini External possessor constructions and Cree relational inflection compared, (Nov 2018): 90–129.https://doi.org/10.1075/slcs.205.04cenElizabeth Ritter Possible and impossible animacy shifts, Theoretical Linguistics 44, no.1-21-2 (May 2018): 71–79.https://doi.org/10.1515/tl-2018-0006Katharina Haude , 199 ( 2018).https://doi.org/10.1075/slcs.199.c8hauSebastian Bank Assessing the typology of person portmanteaus, Morphology 27, no.44 (Aug 2017): 459–495.https://doi.org/10.1007/s11525-017-9305-zPhilippe Schlenker Sign Language and the Foundations of Anaphora, Annual Review of Linguistics 3, no.11 (Jan 2017): 149–177.https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-linguistics-011415-040715Alena Witzlack-Makarevich, Taras Zakharko, Lennart Bierkandt, Fernando Zúñiga, Balthasar Bickel Decomposing hierarchical alignment: Co-arguments as conditions on alignment and the limits of referential hierarchies as explanations in verb agreement, Linguistics 54, no.33 (Jan 2016).https://doi.org/10.1515/ling-2016-0011Martina Wiltschko, Elizabeth Ritter Animating the narrow syntax, The Linguistic Review 32, no.44 (Jan 2015).https://doi.org/10.1515/tlr-2015-0011Heather Bliss Assigning reference in clausal nominalizations, (Jan 2014): 85–118.https://doi.org/10.1075/la.210.04bliHunter T. Lockwood, Monica Macaulay Prominence Hierarchies, Language and Linguistics Compass 6, no.77 (Jul 2012): 431–446.https://doi.org/10.1002/lnc3.345Maria Luisa de Andrade Freitas Hierarquia de Pessoa em Avá Guarani, LIAMES: Línguas Indígenas Americanas 11, no.11 (Jun 2011): 7.https://doi.org/10.20396/liames.v0i11.1494David Beck, Igor Mel'čuk Morphological phrasemes and Totonacan verbal morphology, Linguistics 49, no.11 (Jan 2011).https://doi.org/10.1515/ling.2011.005Marcin Kilarski Algonquian and Indo-European gender in a Historiographic Perspective, Historiographia Linguistica 34, no.2-32-3 (Nov 2007): 333–349.https://doi.org/10.1075/hl.34.2.06kilPHILIPPE SCHLENKER Ontological Symmetry in Language: A Brief Manifesto, Mind <html_ent glyph="@amp;" ascii="&"/> Language 21, no.44 (Sep 2006): 504–539.https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1468-0017.2006.00288.xMichele Loporcaro Crossing Form and Function: First and Second Person Plural Imperatives in the Dialect of Mesocco, Folia Linguistica 40, no.1part21part2 (Jul 2006): 135–154.https://doi.org/10.1515/flin.40.1part2.135Emmanuel Désveaux, Michel de Fornel De l’ojibwa au dakota : pour une analyse transformationnelle des langues amérindiennes, Journal de la société des américanistes 92, no.1-21-2 (Jun 2006): 165–201.https://doi.org/10.4000/jsa.3147Michele Loporcaro Crossing Form and Function: First and Second Person Plural Imperatives in the Dialect of Mesocco, Folia Linguistica 40, no.1-21-2 (Jan 2006).https://doi.org/10.1515/flin.40.1-2.135 Norvin W. Richards The Syntax of the Conjunct and Independent Orders in Wampanoag Richards, International Journal of American Linguistics 70, no.44 (Jul 2015): 327–368.https://doi.org/10.1086/429206Mark Campana The Conjunct Order in Algonquian, Canadian Journal of Linguistics/Revue canadienne de linguistique 41, no.33 (Jun 2016): 201–234.https://doi.org/10.1017/S0008413100016406Ray Fabri The inverse morphology of Plains Cree (Algonquian), (Jan 1996): 17–41.https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-017-3716-6_2George van Driem The Proto-Tibeto-Burman verbal agreement system, Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies 56, no.22 (Feb 2009): 292–334.https://doi.org/10.1017/S0041977X00005528Stephen R. Anderson Syntactically arbitrary inflectional morphology, (Jan 1992): 5–19.https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-011-2516-1_2Georges Van Driem Le Proto-Kiranti revisité morphologie verbale du lohorung, Acta Linguistica Hafniensia 24, no.11 (Jan 1992): 33–75.https://doi.org/10.1080/03740463.1992.10412269Bruce Mannheim Person, number and inclusivity in two andean languages, Acta Linguistica Hafniensia 17, no.22 (Jul 1982): 139–156.https://doi.org/10.1080/03740463.1982.10416044Anne Terry Straus, Robert Brightman The implacable raspberry, Paper in Linguistics 15, no.22 (May 2009): 97–137.https://doi.org/10.1080/08351818209370564Jochen Trommer Direction marking as agreement, ().https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110904758.317

Different-Level Tense Markers in Guaraní

Previous articleNext article No AccessThree Guarani LanguagesDifferent-Level Tense Markers in GuaraníHarry RosbottomHarry Rosbottom Search for more articles by this author PDFPDF PLUS Add to favoritesDownload CitationTrack CitationsPermissionsReprints Share onFacebookTwitterLinkedInRedditEmail SectionsMoreDetailsFiguresReferencesCited by International Journal of American Linguistics Volume 27, Number 4Oct., 1961 Article DOIhttps://doi.org/10.1086/464656 Views: 4Total views on this site Citations: 1Citations are reported from Crossref PDF download Crossref reports the following articles citing this article:Joseph E. Grimes Descriptive Linguistics, (Jan 1977): 55–62.https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4757-1562-0_3

Potawatomi II: Derivation, Personal Prefixes, and Nouns

Next article No AccessPotawatomi II: Derivation, Personal Prefixes, and NounsCharles F. HockettCharles F. Hockett Search for more articles by this author PDFPDF PLUS Add to favoritesDownload CitationTrack CitationsPermissionsReprints Share onFacebookTwitterLinkedInRedditEmail SectionsMoreDetailsFiguresReferencesCited by International Journal of American Linguistics Volume 14, Number 2Apr., 1948 Article DOIhttps://doi.org/10.1086/463984 Views: 10Total views on this site PDF download Crossref reports no articles citing this article.