Grammaticalization Quickie Thread

[bradrn]

That description is a little vague. Could you perhaps give some examples of how this ablaut system occurs in practice?

[Ahzoh]

That description is a little vague. Could you perhaps give some examples of how this ablaut system occurs in practice?

CaCaC- > -CCaC- (class 1/3 transitive)
CaCaC- > -CCuC- (class 2 transitive)

CaCuC- > -CCaC- (class 1/3 dynamic intransitive)
CaCuC- > -CCuC- (class 2 dynamic intransitive)

CaCiC- > -CCaC- (class 1/2 stative intransitive)
CaCiC- > -CCiC- (class 3 stative intransitive)

My current speculation is a realis versus irrealis system that involves 4 morphemes:

Set 1:
general irrealis suffix that causes a-colouring

Set 2:
dynamic irrealis suffix that causes u-colouring
stative irrealis suffix that is neutral

set 3:
dynamic irrealis suffix that causes a-colouring
stative irrealis suffix that is neutral (shared with set 2)

So at least Class 1 could be explained as arriving just from having an ordinary irrealis modal suffix that colours all vowels to become /a/

Classes 2 and 3 could be explained by having irrealis modal suffixes that are different depending on if the verb is a dynamic one or a stative one, but then the question becomes "why"

[Oxygenman]

• ‘Adjective-noun agreement’ is mostly something you find in languages with a noun class (or gender) system. Noun class is distinctive in that it is not overt but marked on other parts of speech, and adjectives are just one of the other elements of the sentence where it can be marked.
• Suffixaufnahme is related to case concord, which is when case is marked on multiple elements of the noun phrase. It’s not really true that the noun gets case and everything else agrees with the noun: rather, noun case marks the semantic role of the whole noun phrase. It can be marked on the noun alone, at the beginning or end of the NP, or distributed through the NP (i.e. case concord).
• You haven’t mentioned it, but I see ‘agreement’ most commonly used for agreement of the verb with its arguments, most commonly in person and number. This is a different thing yet again. Most notably, the line between this sort of agreement and subject/object pronouns is very blurry: it often happens that its presence is dependent in some way on other components of the clause being unexpressed.

Since these are all different, their diachronic development will be different too. Thus, you might get case concord by overextending a nominal casemarker to other elements of the NP, and Suffixaufnahme follows straightforwardly from that. (I don’t know if this has actually happened, but it seems the obvious pathway to me.) Whereas verbal agreement will often result from incorporating a pronoun into the verb, which naturally gives it quite different characteristics.

Following on the above, I'm confused how a language that derives its adjectives from nouns would develop and handle adj-noun agreement.

Is it simply a question when the adjective was derived relative to the development of the gender/agreement system?

For example, consider a hypothetical language:

• two genders, one set ending in -o the other in -a.
• at some point the suffix -l developed to indicate a similitive meaning.
• The proto-word for "child" is bam and the proto-word for "person" is tak.
• Once the gender system develops "child" is bamo and "person" is taka.
• adjectives follow nouns they modify.

If one wanted to say a "child-like person" in this language, assuming gender developed *before* the adjective suffix would the phrase be bamola taka, where the adjective retains some trace of its source-noun's gender? If gender developed *after* the adjective suffix, would the phrase be bamla taka , thus not showing any trace of the gender eventually assigned to the nouns from which the adjective derived bamo? Or does this involve some other process?

[bradrn]

If one wanted to say a "child-like person" in this language, assuming gender developed *before* the adjective suffix would the phrase be bamola taka, where the adjective retains some trace of its source-noun's gender? If gender developed *after* the adjective suffix, would the phrase be bamla taka , thus not showing any trace of the gender eventually assigned to the nouns from which the adjective derived bamo? Or does this involve some other process?

I can see a language going with either option. It doesn’t even need to depend on the order of diachronic development, I think — a language could change from one option to the other.

In more detail, I think there’s two questions involved in this construction:

1. Do all nouns take a gender suffix?
2. Do all adjectives take a gender suffix?

For an example of a complex combination of these, consider (written) French, which marks gender on many but not all adjectives (2), but never does so on nouns (1). French has several suffixes which create adjectives from nouns. One of them is -en ‘from a country’: for instance australien, américain. The adjective thus produced varies for gender and number like other adjectives: thus un homme australien, une femme australienne, des personnes australiennes.

On the other hand, the suffix -aire ‘relating to’ produces an adjective which varies for number but not for gender. Thus from banque ‘bank’ we get bancaire ‘relating to banks’: but we see that compte bancaire ‘bank account’ uses the same form as carte bancaire ‘bank card’, despite one being masculine and the other being feminine.

In Spanish the situation appears different (though I don’t actually speak it so take my words with a grain of salt). Here gender is marked on nouns, with a derivational use: thus banco ‘bank’ is differentiated from banca ‘bench’. When deriving an adjective with -aria / -ario, it looks like the derivation makes the noun lose its gender marker, while the resulting adjective (unlike French) is marked for gender: thus Wiktionary lists cuenta bancaria but recibo bancario.

I don’t know any language in which the noun retains its gender marker on derivation, but it seems very likely to me that such a language exists somewhere.

[Richard W]

Would you take ‘actressy’ as an English example?

[Man in Space]

“Princessy”.

[bradrn]

Would you take ‘actressy’ as an English example?

No, because English has no noun classes. Synchronically, I take ‘-ess’ to be a derivational suffix, rather than a class marker.

[Travis B.]

Would you take ‘actressy’ as an English example?

No, because English has no noun classes. Synchronically, I take ‘-ess’ to be a derivational suffix, rather than a class marker.

Agreed. Even though 'ships and countries' usage of she have become largely obsolete in present-day English. It also should be noted that typically noun class is obligatory, whereas English -ess is entirely optional in present-day English (contrast with German -in).

[Lērisama]

Would you take ‘actressy’ as an English example?

No, because English has no noun classes. Synchronically, I take ‘-ess’ to be a derivational suffix, rather than a class marker.

Agreed. Even though 'ships and countries' usage of she have become largely obsolete in present-day English. It also should be noted that typically noun class is obligatory, whereas English -ess is entirely optional in present-day English (contrast with German -in).

Except where it's been lexicalised. I wouldn't say princess is optional.

Edit: yes, this is a shameless and utterly pendantic nitpick

[Travis B.]

No, because English has no noun classes. Synchronically, I take ‘-ess’ to be a derivational suffix, rather than a class marker.

Agreed. Even though 'ships and countries' usage of she have become largely obsolete in present-day English. It also should be noted that typically noun class is obligatory, whereas English -ess is entirely optional in present-day English (contrast with German -in).

Except where it's been lexicalised. I wouldn't say princess is optional.

Edit: yes, this is a shameless and utterly pendantic nitpick

Okay, I would give that -ess is mandatory in places where it is part of a title of royalty or nobility. But you can generally call an 'actress' an actor and a 'waitress' a waiter -- whereas you cannot call a 'Schauspielerin' a Schauspieler or a 'Kellnerin' a Kellner.

[Vilike]

I don’t know any language in which the noun retains its gender marker on derivation, but it seems very likely to me that such a language exists somewhere.

Class shift of nouns (used for augmentatives and diminutives) in Otjiherero (Bantu, Namibia) may either replace the class prefix, or it is retained. In the latter case, the original prefix doesn't vary for number, nor triggers agreement. Examples:

omutí 'tree' (class 3), ]mití 'trees' (class 4)
eműtí '(big) ugly tree' (class 5 with frozen marker of class 3)
okaműtí 'small tree' (class 13 with frozen marker of class 3)
orűmútí 'tall thin tree' (class 11 with frozen marker of class 3)
otűmútí 'tall thin trees' (class 12 with frozen marker of class 3)

Replacing the original marker entirely:

okatí 'stick' (class 13)
orutí 'stick' (class 11)
otutí 'stick' (class 12)

[bradrn]

I don’t know any language in which the noun retains its gender marker on derivation, but it seems very likely to me that such a language exists somewhere.

Class shift of nouns (used for augmentatives and diminutives) in Otjiherero (Bantu, Namibia) may either replace the class prefix, or it is retained. In the latter case, the original prefix doesn't vary for number, nor triggers agreement. Examples:

omutí 'tree' (class 3), ]mití 'trees' (class 4)
eműtí '(big) ugly tree' (class 5 with frozen marker of class 3)
okaműtí 'small tree' (class 13 with frozen marker of class 3)
orűmútí 'tall thin tree' (class 11 with frozen marker of class 3)
otűmútí 'tall thin trees' (class 12 with frozen marker of class 3)

Replacing the original marker entirely:

okatí 'stick' (class 13)
orutí 'stick' (class 11)
otutí 'stick' (class 12)

Thank you!

(To check my understanding here… the bolded part is the root, right? So the class markers would be omu-, emu- etc.)

[Vilike]

Yes, it's the root, o- is the augment before the class prefix proper (except in class 5), didn't want to be that precise here.

[Darren]

Even though 'ships and countries' usage of she have become largely obsolete in present-day English.

This isn't true everywhere. Here it's common, although not ubiquitous, to refer to boats as "she", and other vehicles too.