Studies in Language. International Journal sponsored by the Foundation “Foundations of Language” - Volume 34, Issue 4, 2010

This paper explores the polyfunctionality, grammaticalization, and typological relevance of applicatives in Ainu. Applicatives are derived by the valency-increasing prefixes which are generally defined here as instrumental e-, dative ko-, and locative o-. The referential range of the respective constructions stretches over several semantic roles and the exact role is attributed to the interaction between the semantics of the prefix and verb. The typologically unusual properties of Ainu applicatives include the ability of e- applicatives to add the roles of Theme and Content, the ability of the so-called unaccusative intransitives to host applicative prefixes e- and ko-, the possibility of e-ko- and ko-e- double applicatives, the absence of non-applicative paraphrases for some applicatives, and the possibility of applicative object incorporation.

This paper is set within the context of semantic typology, focusing on the collection of semantic data during fieldwork on under-described languages. The study explores central issues of meaning and translation through the example of the investigation of the lexical meaning and part of speech of property-denoting expressions in West Chadic languages, which demonstrated that these expressions are inchoative verbs. It focuses on identifying the various points where the meaning of translation equivalents intruded into the semantic analysis, thus obscuring the meaning of the expressions under investigation. The paper addresses the ambivalent nature of translations, the role of contextual information, and the (dis)advantages of different methods. It shows how the interaction of various sources of information enables us to move beyond translation equivalents towards a semantic analysis, and eventually to semantic comparisons.

Several Mande languages, viz. Jula of Samatiguila, Ko Mende, Jowulu, Yaba Southern San, and Tura, have person–number agreement on clause linking markers whose primary function, etymologically and often also synchronically, is to introduce reported discourse. Interestingly, in some of these languages the controller is not necessarily the subject of the main clause. This kind of agreement, which as such is already typologically unusual, is even more remarkable in Mande, since Mande languages have very little morphosyntactic agreement of any kind. I argue that agreement on clause linking markers in Mande is due to the fusion of originally predicative quotatives with their pronominal subjects. The agreement with non-subject controllers is semantic in origin in that a non-subject controller is necessarily also the source of the reported discourse.

It has often been argued that languages with no morphological marking of core arguments (referred to here as zero-marking languages) should prefer SVO word order. This correlation is tested here by studying the effects of word order, genealogical relatedness, and areal diffusion on the distribution of zero marking with multiple logistic regression. The possible confounding areal and genealogical factors are studied in multiple ways. The results, based on data from 848 languages, suggest that zero marking (morphological simplicity) correlates with SVO (syntactic simplicity), regardless of its areally and genealogically biased distribution. It is argued that this word order preference is affected by functional motivations and language contact.