1 / 57

Linguistic Cycles: Introduction

Linguistic Cycles: Introduction. Elly van Gelderen 19 September 2007 – IHR cluster. Cycles. Negative (neg): neg indefinite/adverb > neg particle > (neg particle) Definiteness demonstrative > definite article > Case/non-generic > class marker Agreement emphatic > pronoun > agreement

yorick
Download Presentation

Linguistic Cycles: Introduction

An Image/Link below is provided (as is) to download presentation Download Policy: Content on the Website is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use and may not be sold / licensed / shared on other websites without getting consent from its author. Content is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use only. Download presentation by click this link. While downloading, if for some reason you are not able to download a presentation, the publisher may have deleted the file from their server. During download, if you can't get a presentation, the file might be deleted by the publisher.

E N D

Presentation Transcript

  1. Linguistic Cycles: Introduction Elly van Gelderen 19 September 2007 – IHR cluster

  2. Cycles Negative (neg): neg indefinite/adverb > neg particle > (neg particle) Definiteness demonstrative > definite article > Case/non-generic > class marker Agreement emphatic > pronoun > agreement Auxiliary A/P > M > T > C Clausal pronoun > complementizer PP/Adv > Topic > C

  3. One Macroparameter à la Baker? a Macro-Cycle or Micro-Cycles? Synthetic Analytic/isolating

  4. Background on the Cycle/Spiral • de Condillac, Tooke, A.W. von Schlegel, von Humboldt, Bopp • more recently: Tauli 1958 and Hodge 1970 • Grammaticalization literature: word > clitic > affix > 0 (from Hopper & Traugott 2003) • Formal approaches

  5. Cognitive Economy (or UG) principles help the learner, e.g: Phrase > head (minimize structure) Avoid too much movement XP Spec X' X YP Y …

  6. The Subject Cycle (1) demonstrative > third person pron > clitic > agrmnt (2) oblique > emphatic > first/second pron > clitic > agrmnt Basque verbal prefixes n-, g-, z- = pronouns ni ‘I’, gu ‘we’, and zu ‘you’. Pama-Nyungan, inflectional markers are derived from independent pronouns. Iroquoian and Uto-Aztecan agreement markers derive from Proto-Iroquoian pronouns Cree verbal markers ni-, ki-, o-/ø = pronouns niya, kiya, wiya.

  7. Subject vs Agreement Theta XP/X fixed lang Full pron yes XP no Hindi/Urdu, Japanese Head pron yes X no French, (English) Agrmnt =PAL yes X yes Arabic, Navajo Agreement no X yes Hindi/Urdu, English

  8. English: in transition (a) Modification, (b) coordination, (c) position, (d) doubling, (e) loss of V-movement, (f) Code switching Coordination (and Case) (1) Kitty and me were to spend the day. (2) %while he and she went across the hall. Position (3) She’s very good, though I perhaps I shouldn’t say so. (4) You maybe you've done it but have forgotten. (5) Me, I was flying economy, but the plane, … was guzzling gas

  9. Doubling and cliticization (1) Me, I've tucking had it with the small place. (2) %Him, he .... (3) %Her, she shouldn’t do that (not attested in the BNC) (4) *As for a dog, it should be happy. CSE-FAC: uncliticized cliticized total I 2037 685 (=25%) 2722 you 1176 162 (=12.1%) 1338 he 128 19 (=12.9%) 147

  10. Loss of V-movement and Code switching (5) What I'm go'n do? `What am I going to do' (6) How she's doing? `How is she doing‘ (7) *Hij went away Dutch-English CS (8) Die buren went away

  11. Standard to Colloquial French (a) Modification, (b) coordination, (c) position, (d) doubling, (e) loss of V-movement, (f) Code switching (1) et c'est elle qui a eu la place. and it was her who has had the place (2) *Je et tu ... (3) *je lis et ecris (4) Moi, j’ai pas vu ça. (5) Et toi, tu aimes le rap? (6) on voit que lui il n'apprécie pas tellement la politique one sees that him he not-appreciates not so the politics (LTSN corpus, p. 15-466)

  12. More doubling, loss of V-movement and code switching (1) une omelette elle est comme ça Swiss Spoken an omelette she is like this (2) c'est que chacun il a sa manière de ... Swiss Spoken it is that everyone he has his way of (Fonseca-Greber 2000: 335; 338). (3) Alors pourquoi moi aussi je n'aurais pas le droit d'enfumer les autres quelques minutes dans un bar? Then why me also I not-have not the right to fill-with-smoke the others some minutes in a bar (4) tu vas où Colloquial French 2S go where (5)nta tu vas travailler Arabic-French you you go work (from Bentahila and Davies 1983: 313).

  13. Source of renewals: emphatic (1) ‘a:ñi ‘añ s-ba:bigǐ ñeok I 1S-IMPF slowly speak-IMPF `I was speaking slowly’. (Zepeda 1983) (2) shí éiyá Elly yinishyé I TOP Elly 1S-called `I am called Elly'.

  14. Italian: Venice (1) Ti te magni sempre you you eat always (2) Nissun (*el) magna Nobody he eats (both from Poletto 2004) Trentino (3) Nisun l'ha dit niente nobody he-has said nothing `Nobody said anything' (4) Tut l'è capita de not everything it-has happened at night (both from Brandi & Cordin 1989:118)

  15. Why does `person’ start the cycle? Definiteness Hierarchy 1/2 > 3 > definite > indefinite/quantifier Another instance: Mexican Spanish, overt Subject: 1sg 24.4% 2sg 12.5% 3sg 8.2% (Lopez, 2007) Poletto (2000): SCL replaces features on a verb; different positions. Or: external/pragmatic?

  16. Subject Cycle TP TP (=HPP) DP T’ DP T’ pron T VP pron pron-T VP … … Urdu/Hindi, Japanese Coll French, CVC TP [DP] T’ (=LMP) [pron] pron-T VP Navajo, Spanish, Arabic

  17. Negatives

  18. Two Negative Cycles I Indefinite phrase > negative = Jespersen’s Cycle Negation weakens and is renewed. For instance: (1) I can’t do that > (2) I can’t see nothing II Verb > negative (3) is-i ba-d-o she-NOM disappear-PF-PST `She disappeared' (Binyam 2007: 7). (4) ‘is-i dana ‘ush-u-wa-nni-ko she-NOM beer drink-PRES-not_exist-3FS-FOC ‘She does (will) not drink beer.’ (Binyam 2007: 9).

  19. Negative Cycle in Old English450-1150 CE a. no/ne early Old English b. ne (na wiht/not) after 900, esp S c. (ne) not after 1350 d. not > -not/-n’t after 1400

  20. Old English: (1) Men ne cunnon secgan to soðe ... hwa Man not could tell to truth ... who `No man can tell for certain ... who'. (2) Næron 3e noht æmetti3e, ðeah ge wel ne dyden not-were you not unoccupied. though you well not did `You were not unoccupied, though you did not do well'.

  21. Negative Concord is related: (1) ænig monn ne mæg tuæm hlaferdum hera any man not may two lords serve (Northumbrian c950) (2) ne mæg ænig twæm godum ðeowigan not may any two gods serve (Mercian C10) (3) Ne mæg nan man twam hlafordum þeowian not may no man two lords serve (Corpus c1000) (4) Ne mayg nam man twam hlaferden þeowiannot may no man two lords serve (Hatton c1150) Matthew 6.24

  22. Indefinites > Negatives in Scandinavian (1) er-at maðr svá góðr at galli né fylgi, is-NEG man so good that blemishes not belong né svá illr, at einugi dugi nor so bad that nothing is-fit-for `Nobody is so good that he doesn't have faults nor so bad that he is not good for anything' (Hávamál, 133). (2) Þat mæli ek eigi that say-1S I not, `I am not saying that' (Njalssaga, 219) Changes: ne > zero eigi >ikke > ‘ke

  23. Weakening and Renewalin Modern Norwegian (3) Trøtt...jeg? Ha'kke tid tired ... me? have-not time, `Me, tired? I don't have the time'. (website) (4) for jeg merket ikke aldri at noen hadde kjærestebesøk because I noticed not ever that someone had visitors (website)

  24. The verbal negative cycle (1) wo mei you shu Chinese I not be book `I don't have a book'. (2) YaoShun ji mo ... Old Chinese Yao Shun since died `Since Yao and Shun died, ...' (Mengzi, Tengwengong B, from Lin 2002: 5) (3) yu de wang ren mei kunan, ...Early Ch wish PRT died person not-be suffering `If you wish that the deceased one has no suffering, ...' (Dunhuang Bianwen, from Lin 2002: 5-6).

  25. from V > ASP Early Mandarin (1) dayi ye mei you chuan, jiu zou le chulai coat even not wear, then walk PF out `He didn't even put on his coat and walked out' . Mei(you) is still aspectually marked since it marks bounded events unlike bu in Modern Chinese: (2) wo bu jide ta I not remember he `I don't remember him' (Li & Thompson 1981: 415).

  26. Yes/No markers: (1) ta chang qu bu he often go not `Does he go often?' (2) hufei kan-wan-le nei-ben shu meiyou Hufei read-finish-PERF that-CL book not `Has Hufei finished the book?' (Cheng et al. 1996: 43; 41)

  27. Uralic languages The origin of the negative auxiliary "may well be related to the verb `is' (i-)" (Simoncsics 1998: 594) and more precisely to a negative copula (Honti 1997: 173). Southern Sami (1) Idtjim (manne) daejrieh NEG-PST-1S (I) know `I didn't know‘ (from Bergsland 1994: 44).

  28. Renewal: N. Sami and Finnish (1) In leat goassege dahkan dan N. Sami NEG-S-1 be never do-PART it-ACC `I have never done that' (Trosterud p.c.). (2) En ole koskaan maistanut sellaisia leipiä NEG have never tasted such bread `I have never tasted such bread' (from Sollid 2002). (3) e-i-kö Pekka ole kaupungi-ssa NEG-3S-Q P. be-PRES town-INE `Isn't Pekka in town?' (Brattico & Huhmarniemi 2006).

  29. Arabic, Berber, and Amharic: (1) lam yuhibba Zayd al qiraa St. Arabic NEG-PST 3MS-like Zayd the reading `Zayd did not like reading' (Shlonsky 1997: 95) (2) Omar ma-kteb-sh l-bra Mor. Arabic Omar NEG-write.PST.3M-NEG the-letter `Omar didn’t write the letter'. (Benmamoun 2000: 81) (3) ur ssex (sha)Tamazight Berber NEG drink-Perf.1S NEG `I don’t drink‘ (4) ur kshimegh (ara) Taqbaylit NEG entered.past.1S NEG `I didn’t enter'. (Ouali 2003)

  30. Cycle: Berber ur/wer and Arabic la are related and older (Lipiński 1997:455) The renewed ma < `what‘ and -sh < shay'un `thing'. and ara etc < `thing’

  31. The Linguistic Cycle, e.g. the Negative Cycle HPP XP Spec X' na wihtX YP not> n’t … Late Merge

  32. English relatives in OE and ME OE se þe > þe or þæt: (1) scyldwiga … se þe wel þenceþ shield-fighter … the that well thinks/judges `(Every sharp) shield fighter, who judges well' (Beowulf 287-9). (2) as theo the duden with Godd al thet ha walden. `as those who did with God all that they wanted’. (Ancr. R. III 492)

  33. New relatives (1) a laide de Dieu notre Seigneur, Qui vous douit bonne vie et longue. `With the help of God, our Lord, who gives us a good and long life' (Bekynton, from Rydén, p. 131). (2) be the grace of God, who haue yow in kepyng `by the grace of God, who keeps you' (Paston Letters 410).

  34. Wh-cycle a. CP b. CP þat C' (=SIP) C’ (=HPP) se/þam C TP C TP (þe/þat)  that  c. CP wh- C' C TP renewal that ...

  35. From P > C PP CP P DP > C TP after after [u-phi] [3S] (u-phi) [ACC] [uACC] In English, no phi, but Germanic C-agreement.

  36. Demonstratives (1) demonstrative/adverb > definite article > Case/non-generic > class marker > 0 (2) gife to … þa munecas of þe mynstre give to … the monks of the abbey (Chron. E 656) (3) To frowne vpon th'enrag'd Northumberland (2Henry4, Shakespeare) (4) Oh they used to be ever so funny houses you know and in them days … They used to have big windows, but they used to a all be them there little tiny ones like that. (BNC - FYD 72)

  37. DP Cycle a. DP b. DP dem D'  D' (=HPP) D NP D NP art N  c. DP D' D NP ^ N renewal

  38. Perfective aspect Cycle: (1) adverb > affix > 0 One stage: (2)a. Elizabeth's accession allowed him to receive back his wife (BNC-GTB938) b. a husband who changed his mind to receive his wife back without ceremony (BNC-HTX2122). - Pattern (a) has become more frequent in the recent period (Davies 2005), even with definite nominals: In the 100-million British National Corpus, receive occurs nine times in constructions such as (2a) and four times in constructions such as (2b) (twice with a pronoun and twice with a DP) - The use of pronominal objects, typical for the first order, with these verbs has gone down too.

  39. Other such adverbs evaporate out boost up dissipate away issue out spend down order up (from the library) receive in offer up

  40. Aspect Cycle a. ASPP b. ASPP ASP‘ ASP' ASP VP  ASP VP up V AP up ... up  c. ASPP ASP' ASP VP V AP up

  41. Economy Principles, e.g. van Gelderen 2004 Head Preference Principle (HPP): Be a head, rather than a phrase. Late Merge Principle (LMP): Merge as late as possible. Specifier Incorporation (SIP) Be incorporated if you are a phrase. Null hypothesis of language acquisition (=Faarlund 2005) A string is a word with lexical content. UG Principles: guidance to the child (in acquisition) and the adult (in the derivation)

  42. Late Minimalism and Features • Architecture • Syntax is inert • All is variation in the lexicon • Approaching UG from below • Computational Efficiency : SM and CI interface • Features • uninterpretable = unvalued in the lexicon (Chomsky 2006: 12) • probes value them; removed before CI transfer

  43. Feature Economy: uF as SM perfection; iF as CI perfection Economy of Features (at Sensory Motor interface): Minimize the interpretable features in the derivation Spec > Head > zero semantic > interpretable > uninterpretable (phi on N) (uphi on T) Cycle goes from (a) to (b) to (a) … a) Movement links two positions and is thereby economical (synthetic) = uninterpretable/EPP = PHON Economy b) Avoid syncretism; Iconicity is economical (analytic) = semantic and interpretable features = SEM Economy

  44. and: a. DP > b. DP that/those D' D' [u-phi] D NP D NP [i-loc] N … the N [phi] [u-phi] [phi]

  45. From V > AUX VP TP V DP > T VP wolde [uCASE] would V DP [ACC] [phi] [uphi] [uphi] later loss of uphi

  46. Renewal at the end of the cycle • Newmeyer 2006 notes that some grammaticalizations from noun/verb to affix can take as little as 1000 years, and wonders how there can be anything left to grammaticalize if this is the right scenario. • Late Merge (Feature Economy), however, provides an answer for what the source of the replenishments are, namely lexical elements from lower in the tree. There are also borrowings and creative inventions through SIP. • The Economy Principles do not provide a reason why certain languages/societies are more conservative than others, e.g. why the split infinitive has encountered such opposition by prescriptivists, and has kept to from grammaticalizing more.

  47. Internal and External Change • Jespersen: "the correct inference can only be that the tendency towards ease may be at work in some cases, though not in all, because there are other forces which may at times neutralize it or prove stronger than it". • Von der Gabelentz (1891/1901: 251/256): "Deutlichkeit" ('clarity') and "Bequemlichkeit" ('comfort'). • Chomsky (2006: 9): “The conflict between computational efficiency and ease of communication appears to be resolved, universally, in favor of computational efficiency to satisfy the semantic (CI) interface, lending further support to speculations about its primacy in language design”.

  48. Feature Economy and the Subject Cycle emphatic > personal > agreement [i-phi] [i-phi] [u-phi] [i-Case] [uCase]

  49. The loss of polysynthesis as a cycle? • Old English • Warlpiri • Some Athabaskan

  50. Pronominal Argument Languages, e.g. Navajo (a) optionality of nominals and sentences with more than one nominal are rare. Therefore: nominals are adjuncts, sometimes with a different case system (e.g. Jelinek 1989) (1) bínabinishtin b-í-na-bi-ni-sh-tin 3-against-around-3-Q-1S-handle-IMPF `I teach it to him' (Y&M 1987: 223) (2) (Diné bizaad) yíníshta' Navajo language 1-study `I am studying Navajo'.

More Related