Studies in Language. International Journal sponsored by the Foundation “Foundations of Language” - Online First

This paper seeks to answer three questions: (1) What is the difference between grammatical and lexical indications of information source? (2) What qualifies an element for grammaticalization as an evidential? (3) How can we identify grammatical evidentials and instances of evidential grammaticalization? The answers proposed are as follows: (1) The difference between grammatical and lexical indications of information source is a difference between indications conventionalized as discourse secondary and indications conventionalized as potentially discourse primary. (2) A candidate for grammaticalization as an evidential must (i) have propositional scope, (ii) belong in the conceptual domain of information source, (iii) be frequent enough to pass the threshold for conventionalization, and (iv) be discourse secondary, but not by convention. (3) Grammatical evidentials and instances of evidential grammaticalization can be identified based on focusablity, addressability and modifiability.

In Beserman, a new converb grammaticalizes from the possessive locative form of the locative noun in (o)ń-ńig. We show that the constructions with the converb have a clausal structure, while the constructions with the locative noun are mostly noun phrases, even if they include an indication of the agent and patient of the situation encoded by the locative noun. Semantically, the two types of constructions are also different. In the converb constructions the situations encoded by the main and the embedded clause must overlap, while with locative nouns this is not necessarily the case. The temporal reference of locative nouns is habitual/iterative, while converbs often have episodic (non-habitual) interpretation. The original locative noun denotes a reference to a fixed location where the situation usually takes place. In the constructions with the converb this meaning is bleached and generalized as an action which takes place in any possible location.

In Mabaan, a Western Nilotic language, there is a binary inflectional voice contrast in the morphology of verbs. In addition to a morphologically unmarked basic voice, there is a fully productive applicative voice, which is morphologically marked. This applicative voice may be called circumstantial in order to distinguish it from another applicative voice, which is derivational, namely benefactive. The circumstantial voice turns an adjunct into an object, making an intransitive verb transitive and a transitive verb ditransitive. In a main clause, however, a transitive verb needs to be detransitivized via antipassive derivation in order for an adjunct to become object through the circumstantial voice. In some types of subordinate clauses, by contrast, any verb can get the circumstantial voice, whatever its transitivity, derivational status and meaning. This voice is obligatory in relative clauses when the relativized constituent is an adjunct and in some types of adverbial clauses.

The present study answers the following questions: why the semantic roles of agent or patient are often unmarked; why other semantic roles, such as benefactive, stative locative, goal, or source, are unmarked when used with some verbs and marked when used with other verbs; and why semantic relations such as ‘associative’, ‘instrumental’, ‘reason’, ‘purpose’, and others often referred to as ‘adjuncts’ are usually marked. The study, based on Sino-Russian idiolects spoken in the Far East of Russia, proposes that at an early stage in the formation of grammatical systems by adult speakers, if a noun phrase fulfills the role of one of the participants in the minimal participant structure of the event, the semantic role of the noun phrase is not marked. If the noun phrase does not fulfill the role of one of the participants in the minimal participant-structure of the event, the role of the noun phrase must be marked.

An OSV word order that deviates from the canonical SVO word order is typically viewed as derived through movement. This theory has been widely supported by psycholinguistic studies showing that the displaced constituents are mentally reactivated at the gap positions. However, some cognitive-functionalists have proposed an alternative account: in a topic-prominent language like Chinese, topic is the basic unit of a sentence that delimits the frame within which the main predication holds. The present study adopts the cross-modal antecedent priming technique to test whether the sentence-initial object is structurally associated with the verb in native speakers’ online processing. Results of two experiments show that the sentence-initial object is not associated with the verb whatsoever, neither lexically nor structurally, shedding light on the typological characteristics of Chinese as a topic-prominent language. However, the processing of the antecedent object was shown facilitated at the post-quantifier position.

This paper gives a corpus-based descriptive account of the phasal polarity system (still, already, not yet, and no longer) in the Arabic vernacular of Tunisia. The aim is to broaden the empirical foundations for cross-linguistic research in this domain, and to narrow the gap between typologically oriented and philological research on Arabic varieties. Like many languages ( van Baar 1997 : 118), Tunisian Arabic has autochthonous expressions for the three concepts still, not yet, and no longer. still is primarily expressed via a construction < ‘has not ceased’. Despite its conceptual transparency, this appears to be a cross-linguistically uncommon source. not yet is expressed via the inner negation of still, and no longer via a construction < ‘has not repeated’. For already, northern sedentary varieties have borrowed from French (replacing an older autochthonous expression), whereas southern Bedouin varieties have a “gap” in their system. The description further includes notes on the synchronic and diachronic variation of individual items, and functions of these outside the realm of phasal polarity.

Despite a longstanding tradition of studies in Sanskrit compounds, a description that enables comparisons in cross-linguistic perspective has not yet been worked out. The present article follows classificatory criteria introduced by Bisetto & Scalise ( 2005 , 2009 ) and sketches a typology of compounds in the most archaic variety of Sanskrit, Early Vedic, as transmitted by the RigVeda. Analyzing compounds on the basis of the grammatical relations holding between their constituents provides a classification into coordinate, subordinate, and attributive compounds, with the endocentric/exocentric divide cutting across all classes. In order to identify the position of Early Vedic compounds on the syntax-morphology continuum, the article investigates the degree of cohesiveness at the level of morphology, prosody, syntax, and semantics. With this respect, the RigVeda offers a varied picture where relics of archaic, less cohesive forms occur side-to-side with more productive and word-like ones.