Download Typology 6: Parts of speech

th
7 Summer School of the German Linguistic Society/
7. Sommerschule der DGfS
Walter Bisang, Mainz
[email protected]
Typology 6
___________________________________________________________________________
Parts of speech
1. Introduction
Croft’s (2000) approach:
1. Noun, verb and adjective are not categories of particular languages.
2. But noun, verb and adjective are language universals — that is, there are typological
prototypes ... which should be called noun, verb and adjective.
Croft (2000) first argues against two other approaches (cf. § 2):
- the lumping approach: If two or more word classes do not behave in a morphosyntactically
different way in a particular language there is no need to distinguisch those word classes –
they are just lumped into one word class.
- the splitting approach: Distributional analysis shows that there can be a large number of covert
grammatical and/or semantic categories.
2. Parts of speech are not grammatical categories of individual languages
2.1. The „lumping“ approach
Hengeveld’s (1992: 58) functional approach to the definition of four parts of speech:
A verbal predicate is a predicate which without further measures being taken, has a
predicative use only.
A nominal predicate is a predicate which, without further measures being taken, can
be used as the head of a term.
An adjectival predicate is a predicate which, without further measures being taken,
can be used as a modifier of a nominal head.
An adverbial predicate is a predicate which, without further measures being taken,
can be used as a modifier of a non-nominal head.
without further measures being taken = without the obligatory presence of additional
morphemes in order to use the lexical item in a particular function (predicative, term, head,
modifier).
If in a language „further measures“ need not be taken to use lexical items in more than one of the
above parts of speech, then that language lacks those part-of-speech distinctions – it is flexible
with regard to these distinctions.
2
Quechua is flexible with regard to the adjective/noun distinction (Schachter 1985, Hengeveld
1992: 63, Croft 2000: 68):
(1) Lexical items denoting thing/property in an argument position:
a. rikashka:
alkalde-ta
b. rikashka:
hatun-ta.
see:PST:1SG mayor-ACC
see:PST:1SG big-ACC
‚I saw the mayor.‘
‚I saw the big one.‘
(2)
a.
Lexical items denoting thing/property in the position of a noun modifier:
chay alkalde runa
b. chay
hatun runa
that mayor man
that
big
man
‚that man who is mayor‘
‚that big man‘
Chinese is flexible with regard to the adjective/verb distinction (Schachter 1985: 69, Hengeveld
1992: 63, Croft 2000: 69):
(3) Lexical items denoting event/property in the predicate position:
a. neige nühaizi liaojie.
b. neige nühaizi
piaoliang.
that girl
understand
that
girl
beautiful
‚That girl understands.‘
‚That girl is beautiful.‘
(4) Lexical items denoting event/property in the position of a noun modifier:
a. liaojie de
nühaizi
c. piaoliang de
nühaizi
understand ATTR girl
beautiful ATTR girl
‚a girl who understands‘
‚a beautiful girl‘
Schachter (1985) uses the following terms do describe the lumping of adjective/noun and
adjective/verb:
- adjectival-noun language
- adjectival-verb language
In some languages adjectives form a closed class. Thus, in Igbo there is a small number of 8
adjectives whose morphosyntactic behaviour is different from that of nouns and verbs (Dixon
1977).
(5)
dimension
ukwu '
big'
nta '
small'
colour
age
quality
ojii '
black, dark'
ohuru5 '
new' oma '
good'
oca '
white, light'
ocye '
old'
ojoo5 '
bad'
Problems with the lumping approach:
- The „lumping“ approach tends to ignore small syntactic categories.
- Even if a given lexeme does not show any difference of marking in two or more word classes
there are usually enormous semantic differences:
(6) Tongan (Tchekhoff 1981:4; Hengeveld 1992: 1992: 66; Croft 2000: 77):1
a. na’e si’i
’ae
akó.
PST small ABS school:DEF
‚The school was small.‘
b.
’i ’ene
si’í.
in 3SG:POSS childhood:DEF
‚in his childhood‘
c.
tamasi’ i si’i iate au.
na’ e ako ’ ae
PSTstudy ABS child
little LOC 1SG
‚The little child studied at my house.‘
3
In Tongan lexical items have multiple conventional meanings which can be described in terms
of different parts of speech.
2.2. the splitting approach
Problem with the splitting approach: There is no way to stop splitting.
Property words in English can be defined in part by their occurrence in the simple, comparative
and superlative degree (Table from Croft 2000: 79):
(7) Croft 2000: 79
Class I:
Suppletive degree forms:
Class II: Inflectional degree forms:
Class III: Periphrastic degree forms:
good/better/best
bad/worse/worst
tall/taller/tallest
small/smaller/smallest
loquacious / more loquacious / most loquacious
Distributional analysis does not tell us whether to treat the obove three classes as three parts of
speech or as three subclasses of one part of speech.
3. Croft’s (1991) Conceptual Space Model
3.1. Preliminary remark on constructions
Construction Grammar aprroach: Constructions are defined as linguistic items contributing their
own independent meaning to an utterance.
- The syntactic function of a lexical item is defined by its position (slot) within a construction:
- The semantics of a word is determined by a combination of its own lexical meaning plus the
meaning contributed to it by the function of the position within that construction.
3.2. Croft’s (1991) Conceptual Space
1 By far the best account of parts of speech in Tongan is by Broschart (1997). Unfortunately, I
don’ t have time to present his innovative approach here.
4
Croft’ s conceptual space is constructed on the basis of typological methods by examining crosslinguistic and within-language distributional patterns of relevant constructions. The conceptual
space presented here must be seen as a small part out of a much more complex space for language
and languages in general.
In the horizontal dimension of the conceptual space for parts of speech as presented in table 1
below, we find the pragmatic functions or propositional acts of REFERENCE, MODIFICATION
and PREDICATION. The relevant constructions are those by which the pragmatic functions are
encoded. The name of these constructions is given in italics in table 1. The pragmatic functions
located horizontally in the representation of the conceptual space are correlated vertically with the
semantic classes (ontological categories) of those words which fill the relevant roles in the
relevant constructions, i.e. OBJECTS, PROPERTIES and ACTIONS. The systematic pattern of
variation that can be seen from cross-linguistic research is based on morphosyntactic markedness
(cf. Croft’ s refinement of the Prague School definition in 1990: 90-93, 1991: 53-55). Croft (1991)
describes the markedness correlation between semantic classes and pragmatic functions as
follows:
There is an unmarked correlation between the semantic class of object and the function
of reference so that a word denoting an object is unmarked in the function of reference
but marked in other functions. A similar pattern holds between properties and
modification and between actions and predication. (Croft 1991: 55)
The lexical items that denote objects and are unmarked in object reference constructions belong
to the syntactic category labelled „nouns“ in English. The syntactic categories of adjectives and
verbs are defined in an analogous way.
REFERENCE
MODIFICATION
object reference:
object modifier:
genitive, adjectivalizations,
PP’ s on nouns
object predication:
predicate nominals
PROPERTIES property reference:
deadjectival nouns
property modifier:
property predication:
predicate adjectives
ACTIONS
action modifier:
participles,
relative clauses
OBJECTS
UNMARKED NOUNS
action reference:
action nominals,
complements,
infinitives, gerunds
PREDICATION
UNMARKED ADJECTIVES
action predication:
UNMARKED VERBS
Table 1: Croft’ s conceptual space for parts of speech and function-indicating morphosyntax
(From Croft 1991: 67 and Croft 2000: 89)
The example of English:
Objects
Reference
Modification
UNMARKED
NOUNS
genitive, adjectivalizations
Predication
predicate nominals
5
Properties
Actions
deadjectival
nouns
action nominals
complements
infinitives
gerunds
UNMARKED
ADJECTIVES
predicate adjectives
participles,
relative clauses
UNMARKED
VERBS
Table 2
Objects
Properties
Actions
Reference
Modification
VEHICLE
vehicle’ s, vehicular,
of/in/etc. the vehicle
whiteness
destruction,
to destroy
Predication
be a/the vehicle
be white
WHITE
destroying,
destroyed
DESTROY
Table 3
4. Transcategoriality in Late Archaic Chinese
4.1. Introduction
PHL‚beautiful‘
(8) mei is interpreted as a predicative stative verb (= adjective) (Lunyu 3.25):
zi
wei Shao
jin
mei.
master
say Shao(style.of.music) perfectly beautiful
'
The master said that Shao-style music [i.e. the music of the cultutral hero Shun]
is perfectly beautiful.'
(9) mei is interpreted as an attributive stative verb (= adjective) (Lunyu 9.12):
you
mei
yu
yu
si.
there.is beautiful jade/gem
PREP
here
'
There is a beautiful gem here.'
(10) mei is interpreted as a transitive verb with putative meaning (Zuo, Xiang 25):
jian
Tang Jiang er mei
zhi.
see/meet Tang Jiang and beautiful OBJ:3
'
He saw Tang Jiang and thought her to be beautiful.'
(11) mei is interpreted as a noun (Lunyu 6.14):
Song Zhao
zhi
mei
Zhao.Duke.of.Song ATTR beauty
‚the beauty of Zhao, duke of Song‘
(12) DEFINITION OF TRANSCATEGORIALITY:
A language is transcategorial if its lexical items are not determined in the lexicon
with regard to the occurrence within a particular slot of a word-class indicating
construction.
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4.2. Argument structure construction and transcategoriality
The the constructions to be discussed are the intransitive argument structure construction (INT)
and the transitive argument structure construction (TR):
(13) INT:
NPS
(14) TR:
NPA[ctor]
V
V
(NPS)
NPU[ndergoer] (with two overt arguments)
One feels intuitively that verbs like sha ’kill’ and shi ’eat’ are transitive and that verbs
like lai ’come’ and ku ’weep’ are intransitive; but when one looks for some sort of
formal criterion on which to base this distinction, it turns out to be very elusive. Both
types of verbs can take objects, including the formally marked objective pronoun zhi.
(Norman 1988: 91)
Two types of intransitive verbs:
(15)
Vtr:
events:
Vintr:
events:
actions (with two arguments):
Vtr
actions (with one argument):
Vintr[+dyn]
states:
Vintr[-dyn]
properties:
Vintr[-dyn]
The interpretation of an intransitive verb in the V-slot of the transitive argument structure is
regular, there is the causative interpretation for [+dyn] intransitive verbs and the causative or
putative interpretation for [-dyn] intransitive verbs:
(16)
Causative interpretation:
Vintr[-dyn]´ (NPS) —> NPA [CAUSE [BECOME Vintr[-dyn]´ (NPU(S))]]
Vintr[+dyn]´ (NPS) —> NPA [CAUSE Vintr[+dyn]´(NPU(S))]
(17)
Putative interpretation:
Vintr[-dyn]´(NPS) —>
NPA [CONSIDER/TREAT AS Vintr[-dyn]´(NPU(S))]
Examples with Vintr[-dyn]: xiDo ’be small’, dà ’be big’
(18) With causative interpretation (Han Feizi 8.2):
Bi
da ke xiao xiao
bu
ke
da
ye
nose big can small
small
NEG can big
EQ
’If a nose is big, one can make it smaller, if it is small, one cannot make it bigger.’
(19) With putative interpretation (Meng 7 A 24.1):
Kong Zi deng
Dong Shan
er xiao Lu, sheng Tai Shan er
Confucius ascend East Mountain and small Lu ascend Tai Shan and
7
xiao
tianxia.
small beneath.the.heavens/the.world
’Confucius ascended the Eastern Mountain and Lu appeared to him small [and he
considered Lu to be small], he ascended the Tai Mountain and all beneath the
heavens appeared to him small.’
If lexemes denoting objects occur in the V-slot they are treated like the intransitive verbs in
(16) and (17), that is, they are interpreted either in terms of cusativity or in terms of putativity.
In my paper (cf. reader), I analyze six semantic classes of nouns.
(18) - lexemes denoting representatives of human relations (family or hierarchy)
- lexemes denoting instruments/man-made objects
- lexemes denoting sense organs
- lexemes denoting places and buildings
- lexemes denoting first and second person
- lexemes denoting numbers and measures
In the present handout, I shall only look at lexemes denoting representatives of human
relations (family or hierarchy):
The interpretation of lexemes denoting representatives of human relations in the V-Slots of the
intransitive and the transitive constructions follows the same principles as outlined in (10) and
(11). The details are summarised in (15) below.
(19) N:
person/function
INT: a. NPS behaves like a (true) N, NPS is a (true) N
b. NPS becomes a (true) N
TR a. NPA CAUSE NPU[S] to Vintr (be/behave like a [true] N)
b. NPA CONSIDER NPU[S] to Vintr (be/behave like a [true] N)
The syntactic basis of the following famous example from Lunyu (the Analects of Confucius) is
the intransitive argument structure construction. In both of its slots, i.e., in the argument-slot as
well as in the V-slot, we find the same word denoting an object. The interpretation of this
lexeme in the V-slot is ‚to behave like a true prince, minister, etc.‘.
(20) INT: to behave like a (true) N (Lunyu 12.11):
[Context: Duke Jî&ng of Qí asked Confucius about government. Confucius replied:]
jun
jun,
chen
chen,
fu
fu,
N:prince V:behave.like.a.prince N:minister V:minister N:father V:father
zi
zi. gong yue: shan zai! xin
ru
N:son V:son duke say good EXCL believe/indeed
jun
if N:prince
bu
jun,
chen
bu
chen,
fu
bu
fu,
NEG V:prince N:minister NEG V:minister N:father NEG V:father
zi bu
zi, sui
you su,
wu de
er shi zhu.
N:son NEG V:son even.if have millet I get and eat OBJ:3.QUEST
’Let the prince behave like a prince, the minister like a minister, the father like a
father and the son like a son. The duke said: How true! If, indeed, the prince does
not behave like a prince, the minister does not behave like a minister, the father
does not behave like a father and the son does not behave like a son, even if I have
millet [i.e. food], shall I manage to eat it?’
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In the transitive argument structure construction, the causative vs. putative interpretation seems
to depend to a certain extent on the hierarchical status between the subcategory denoted by the
lexeme in the V-slot and the subcategory denoted by the lexeme in the actor-slot:
(20)
a. the lexeme in the actor-slot is higher than the lexeme in the V-slot:
=> causative interpretation
b. the lexeme in the actor-slot is lower than the lexeme in the V-slot:
=> putative interpretation (the lower person considers the higher
person to be a true higher person; the lower person treats the
higher person like a higher person, i.e. with due reverence)
The following two examples constructed by Gassmann (1997: 74) are to illustrate this:
(21)
a. The lexeme in the actor-slot is higher than the lexeme in the V-slot:
jun
chen
zhi
N:prince V:make.minister
OBJ:3s
’The prince made him his minister/employed him as his minister.’
b. The lexeme in the actor-slot is lower than the lexeme in the V-slot:
chen
wang
wang
minister V:consider.king N:king
’The minister considers/treats the king as a real king [with reverence].’
In a constellation in which the higher person is the undergoer of a person-denoting lexeme
occurring in the V-slot, we get the meaning of ’to behave towards the higher position as N’, ’to
serve to the higher position in the function of N’ (Gassmann 1997:75).
(22)The higher person is object of a person-denoting lexeme in the V-slot
(Zuo, Xiang 22.6):
ran
ze
chen
wang hu?
be.so then V:behave.like.a.minister king QUEST
’Since this is so, will you serve the king as a minister.’ [to behave like/be a (true) N
towards NPU]
One more example with nouns referring to animals (a typical example of the Chinese Legalist’ s
way of arguing):
(23) niu‚N: ox/ V: consider as an ox‘/yang‚N. sheep/ V: consider as a sheep‘
(Gongsun Longzi, cf. Graham 1957: 161):
yang you jiao, niu you jiao,
sheep have horn ox have horn
niu
zhi
er
V:consider.an.ox OBJ:3s although
yang ye yang
zhi
er
niu ye wei
sheep EQ V:consider.a.sheep OBJ:3s although ox EQ not.yet
ke.
be.possible
‚Sheep have horns and oxen have horns. To consider [something] an ox although it
is a sheep and to consider [something] a sheep although [it] is an ox is inadmissible.‘
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4.3. The pragmatics of word-class assignment
Some lexemes are more versatile than others. The reason for this may be explained along the
following line of argumentation:
1.
Lexemes denoting concrete items stereotypically imply the occurrence in a N-slot.
Lexemes denoting abstract items are more or less versatile:
(24) CONCRETE ITEMS > ABSTRACT ITEMS (> means: implies stronger
N-inference than)
A more elaborate hierarchy (animacy hierarchy):
(25) 1ST/2ND PERSON > PROPER NAMES > HUMAN > NONHUMAN > ABSTRACTS2
2.
The above hierarchies are to be interpreted in terms of I-implicatures (Inference of
stereotype) as defined by Levinson (1987, 1991).
3.
As we know since Grice (1975), implicatures can be flouted. Flouting does not explain
everything, but it may explain why we find pronouns and proper names in the V-slot.
Most instances of 2nd person pronouns occurring in the V-slot have to do with the
violation of politeness. Represenatives of the nobility who do not behave properly and thus
do not deserve to be addressed with the pronouns due to their status are addressed with the
common pronouns HUor ru '
you, Germ. du'
.
Proper nouns or geographic terms in V-slots are used in rhetorically highly marked
situations. In (26), the speaker of the sentence uses the proper name Wu Wang '
King Wu'to
refer to his own death by murder.
(26)
Zuo (Ding 10):
Gong Ruo yue er Wu wang
wo hu?
Gong Ruo say you Wu king
I QUEST
'
Gong Ruo said: "Do you want to deal with me as the King of Wu was dealt
with?'[King Wu was murdered. +> '
Do you want to kill me?'
]
5. The case of Classical Nahuatl (omnipredicativity) (Launey 1994)3
Point of departure:
2There
are no 3rd person pronouns for actors in Old Chinese. Sometimes, we find demonstratives in this function.
3 In order to avoid printing problems, I deviate from the orthography adopted by Launey (1994). I write long vowels
twice.
10
(27) Launey (1994: 29):
chooca in
piltoontli.
cry
PIV the.child
‚The child cries.‘
(28) Launey (1994: 42):
a. ni-chooca ‚I cry‘
b. ti-chooca ‚you (sg) cry‘
c. ø-chooca ‚s/he cries‘
(29) Launey (1994: 51):
a. ni-piltoontli ‚I am a child‘
b. ti-piltoontli ‚you (sg) are a child‘
c. ø-piltoontli ‚s/he is a child‘
The whole paradigm (Launey 1994: 10 - 11):
(30) a. Forms with event-denoting lexemes
S/A
1s t(i)2s ti)/x(i)3s ø1p
2p
3p
O
b. Forms with object-denoting lexemes:
Reflexive
-neech-n(o)-mitz-m(o)-c-/-qu(i)- -m(o)-
S
Possessive
n(i)t(i)ø-
t(i)-4
-teech-t(o)aM-/x(i)- -ameech- -m(o)ø-quiM-m(o)-
aMø-
-n(o)-m(o)-iit(i)-
-t(o)-am(o)-iiM-
From looking at the data presented in (28) to (30), example 827) may be analysed differently:
(27‘) øi-chooca in
øi-piltoontli
3sS-cry
PIV 3sS-child
‚S/He cries – s/he is a child.‘
Je dis il pleure à propos de la même entité que celle dont (il est acquis qu‘)on
peut dire il est enfant. (Launey 1994: 72)
In the above analysis, chooca and in piltoontli are analysed as two predications. In a similar
way we may analyse examples like the following as consisting of three predications:
(31)
Launey (1994: 37):
ø-qui-cuain
piltoontli
3sA-3s:O-eat PIV the.child
‚The child eats the meat.‘
in
PIV
(31‘) øi-quij-cuain
øi-piltoontli in
‚S/He eats it – it is a child – it is meat.‘
nacatl.
meat
øj-nacatl.
4 The plural forms actually differ from the singular forms, because if S/A is plural, there will be a glottal stop at the
end of the word. In Nahuatl ortography this is reflected by a circumflex on the final vowel (e.g. ê).
Further corroboration of this approach:
1. Free word order (depending on context; focus, topic) and freely omittable „arguments“
st
nd
2. Examples with 1 and 2 person use the person markers twice (Launey 1994: 71 - 72):
(32) In ni-mexìcatl camo
ni-tlaal-ê.
PIV 1sS-Mexican NEG
1s-territory-be.equipped.with/own
‚I being Mexican, I have no territory.‘
(33) N-ameech-tzàtzilia in an-tlamacaz-quê.
1sA-2pO-implore PIV 2pS-high.priest-PL
‚I implore you – who are high priests!‘
3. In copular constructions, the person prefixes occur twice (Launey 1994: 54):
(34) a. ni-tiicitl ni-ye-z ‚I shall be a doctor‘
b. ti-tiicitl
ti-ye-z ‚you (sg) will be a doctor‘
c. ø-tiicitl
ø-ye-z ‚s/he will be a doctor‘
d. ni-tiicitl ni-cat-ca ‚I was a doctor‘
e. ti-tiicitl
ti-cat-ca ‚you were a doctor‘
f. ø-tiicitl
ø-cat-ca ‚S/He was a doctor‘
4. A word like piltoontli cannot be used to call a person. There are two types of vocatives:
(35) Launey (1994: 71):
a. piltoontlé ‚child!‘ [mens’ language]
b. piltoontlí! ‚child!‘ [women’ s language]
On the analysis of ni:
The particle ni is used as a demonstrative or as a relative marker:
(36) Launey (1994: 128):
mo-teeneehua
in.
REFL:3-mention PIV
‚One mentions that.‘
(37) Launey (1994: 123)
... ø-huentli
in ø-qui-chiihua-yâ.
3sS-sacrifice
PIV 3sA-3sO-make-PL
‚the sacrifices they made‘
If one takes these two functions together, in functions as a pivot (PIV), that is, it is the
demonstrative subject or object of one predication and the relative marker of the other
predication (Launey 1994: 129):
cross-refers to in
11
(38) mo-teeneehua
mentioned.‘
REFL-mention
in
PIV
12
ø-huentli
‚This,
which
is
a
sacrifice,
is
3sS-sacrifice
modifies in
Does Classical Nahuatl have any noun/verb distinction?
Of course it does. - There are some properties which we only find with verbs:
1. Only verbs can be marked for aspect.
2. Nouns differ with regard to their referential structure from verbs. Nouns have only one
relation (S-argument) plus a possessor argument, verbs can have an O-argument.
3. It is possible to derive nouns from verbs (nominalisation).
Classical Nahuatl differs from Standard Average European with regard to its omnipredicative
structure.
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