ACQUIRING AND EXPRESSING TEMPORALITY IN HEBREW: THE CASE OF A T/(M/A) LANGUAGE

1. ACQUIRING AND EXPRESSING TEMPORALITY IN HEBREW:THE CASE OF A T/(M/A) LANGUAGE Ruth A. Berman – Tel Aviv University Journée d’études -- Temporalité: Typologie et Acquisition CNRS, Centre Pouchet, Paris - mars 2010

2. OUTLINE OF TALK • Typological Features of Hebrew: Tense without Aspect • Early Child Grammar: Developmental strategies • Narratives -- Oral and Written: Anchor tense, Tense-shifting [Frogs] Setting the narrative scene [Fable] • Later Language Development: From Dichotomy to Diversity

3. HEBREW TYPOLOGY5 Tense-Modal Forms, Full/Defective Consonantal Roots,in 3 (out of 7) binyan Verb Patterns

4. INTERACTION WITH INFLECTIONAL AND DERIVATIONAL MORPHOLOGY Inflections: Rich system of SV Agreement marking for: Gender (Masculine > Feminine) Person (1st > 2nd > 3rd) Number (Singular > Plural) Derivational Morphology: Verb-Pattern alternations expressing valence-changing relations (causative, reflexive, reciprocal, middle voice, passive voice, etc.), e.g., šavar ~ nišbar ‘break’ Trans ~ Intrans šaxav ~ hiškiv ‘lie ~ lay down’ raxac ~ hitraxec ‘wash’ Trans ~ Reflexive

5. MULTIFUNCTIONALITY[Berman, 2000, 2004; Berman & Neeman, 1994; Berman & Nir-Sagiv, 2004]

6. MULTIFUNCTIONALITY[continued][Berman, 2000, 2004; Berman & Neeman, 1994; Berman & Nir-Sagiv, 2004]

7. EARLY ACQUISITIONAL STRATEGIES: Form / Function Inflectional Variation I. Ambiguous “bare” stems (ber,pes,sim,xabek,šon) Multifunctional l- markedInfinitives (ledaber,lišon) Non-alternation of forms II. a. Infinitives: requests, orders b. Benoni ‘intermediate’ present tense: Reportative function, simple clauses III. Past:Immediate change-of-state verbs Later, in narrative contexts IV. Future: as Tense, not only Imperative V. Infinitives: Complements in Extended Preds: carix ledaber, roce le-exol, holex li-šon ‘must to-talk, want to-eat, go(es) to-sleep’

8. LATER ACQUISITIONS Derivational Morphology Valence-changing Verb Patterns: • Initial non-alternation • Favoring of “basic” P1 pattern • Some use of active transitive P3, P5 patterns • Added reliance on intransitive P2, P4 patterns • Occasional use of passive patterns Complex Syntax: halax habayta ledaber ita ‘(He) went home to-talk to her’ tipes al ha-ec lexapes ta cfardéa ‘(He) climbed (on) the-tree to-look-forthe frog’

9. ORAL (“Frog Story”) NARRATIVESAges 3, 4, 5, 9, adults • “Anchor tense” – evidence of narrative mode • Tense-shifting – from local to global • Background / Foreground distinctions: Past Tense ~ Benoni [Berman & Neeman, 1994] (no Imperfective ~ Perfective) • “Tense/Aspect shifting becomes discursively functionalonly once a dominant narrative tense is established in late preschool age, around 5 to 6 years”[Berman & Slobin, 1994: 601]

10. NARRATIVE SETTINGS (Written Fables)Sandbank, A. (2004) “Writing a narrative text: A developmental and cross-linguistic study” Hebrew original: štey pradot halxu ba-dérex ‘two mules went=walked on-the-way’ nos’ot masa al gaban ‘bear(ing):Fm,Pl (a) load on their backs’ Spanish original: Caminaban dos mulas ‘walked:Impfv, Pl two mules’ llevando su carga ‘carrying their load’

11. HEBREW STRATEGIES IN RECONSTRUCTED SETTINGS More stative than active verbs across age-groups relative to Spanish, e.g., • pa’am axat hayu štey pradot, hen halxu ba-ya’ar [Itay, 7;3] ‘once (there) were two mules, they walked in-the forest’ • sipurenu hu al štey pradot masa co’adot be-mas’an [Ido, adult] ‘our tale it [-is] about two pack mules marching with their load’

12. ALTERNATION OF VERB h-l-x ‘go, walk’ Benoni: 1. štey pradot holxot ba-švil ‘Two mules go/are walking on the way’ Adverbs: 2. yom exad halxu štey pradot le-tiyul ‘One day went two mules for (a) walk’ Repetition: 3. hem halxu ve halxu ‘They walked and walked’

13. VERBh-l-x ‘go, walk’ + REFLEXIVE DATIVE[thanks to Prof. Hava Shyldkrot] Reflexive Dative: 4. štey pradot halxu lahen ‘Two mules walked to-them(selves)’ =s'en allaient Reflexive Dative + Adverb: 5. halxu lahen štey pradot le’itan ‘’Walked to-them(selves) two mulesat-leisure’ = s'en allaient lentement Verb-Pattern Alternation: 6. štey pradot hithalxu lahen ba-derex ‘Two mules walked-to-fro to-them(selves) on-road’ = se promenaient 7. pa’am hilxu lahen štey pradot be-derex ha-melex ‘Once walked-about to-them(selves) two mules on the royal road’ = s'en sont allées

14. RHETORICAL OPTIONS • Alternative means of expression • Non-grammaticized • Hence non-obligatory • Individual stylistic choice • Maturely literate use of language • Yields rich temporal texture

15. LATER LANGUAGE DEVELOPMENT: PERSONAL-EXPERIENCE NARRATIVES Ages 9, 13, 17, adults [Berman & Nir-Sagiv, 2004]

16. LATER LANGUAGE DEVELOPMENTVerb-Pattern Alternations • Age-related increase in variety of 7 patterns: Children’s texts confined mainly to 2 or 3, adolescents -- wider variety, adults – most • Decrease with age in basic P1 pattern (activity verbs, transitive and intransitive), markedly in narratives and among adults • Concomitant increase in use of two typically intransitive (change-of-state, middle voice) patterns: children – under 10%, adolescents -- 20%–25%, adults -- 1/3 of all verbs • Reflects shift to more patient-oriented construal of events • Effect of genre: intransitive patterns more in expository than narrative texts

17. LATER LANGUAGE DEVELOPMENTEXTENDED TEXTS: SUMMARY[Berman 2008; Berman & Nir-Sagiv 2007; Reilly et al 2002] Early Inter-Genre Distinctiveness Narratives (Personal-experience): Past tense, Perfective aspect Expository discussions: Extended Present + Irrealis (modals, future) Subsequent Shifts From temporal dichotomy to divergence From agent to patient orientation From deontic to epistemic modality

18. NARRATIVE TEMPORALITY • As in all domains, age-related variety of means • Clearer distinction between “story-time” / “story-telling time” • SettingandCodaas privileged discourse sites for background, generalizations • Effect of genre – narrative / expository • Effect of typology – Hebrew reliance on verb-pattern morphology

19. WRAP-UP Discourse context Typological imperatives Developmental route

20. DISCOURSE CONTEXT • Discourse-embedded use of language: beyond the isolated sentence • Parallel data-bases for cross-linguistic comparisons: Hickmann, 2003; frog-story research, “Spencer” project, Sandbank’s fables • Different (sub)genres ~ rhetorical modes Evaluation – personal-experience accounts Setting and coda – in fiction, fables Narration / description – encyclopedic texts Expository discussion – propositional attitudes

21. IMPACT TARGET-LANGUAGE TYPOLOGY[Berman, 1993; Berman & Neeman, 1994; Berman & Slobin,1994; Kupersmitt, 2006; Sandbank, 2004] • Language-Specific Forms: Grammaticized T/M/A (English, Spanish) • Narrative Discourse Functions: Foreground/ Background: Local / Global Agent-Patient Orientation Introducing and Concluding Narratives • Hebrew-Specific Strategies: Tensealternations -- Present vs Past Valencyalternations --Verb-Pattern Morphology VerbSemantics (Aktionsarten) halxu ~ pas’u Copulas, existentials, stative predicates

22. TYPOLOGY • Children – like adults – make do with and increasingly exploit the repertoire of expressive devices available in their language • Where distinctions not grammatically marked, hence less accessible, alternative options may be sought elsewhere, as in verb semantics (stative ~ dynamic) or voice and valency alternations • In latter case, not grammatical imperative but rhetorical options, reflecting expressive richness in temporality as in other domains (e.g., clause-combining)

23. DEVELOPMENT • From “child speaker” to “nativespeaker” to “proficient speaker-writer” [Slobin, 1990, 2004] • Early emergence of different forms for marking grammatical T/M/A • Increased bi-directional expansion of form/function relations • Increasing variety and flexibility in using linguistic forms for “textual temporality” • Later, school-age language: long developmental route “from emergence to mastery” [Berman, 2004]