‘Speak’ and co.

[bradrn]

Most if not all languages have some basic verbs which cover the semantic domain of ‘speaking’. English has four of them: ‘say’, ‘tell’, ‘speak’ and ‘talk’. I think the division here is something like the following:

• ‘Say’ is transitive, and focusses on the words which were said
• ‘Tell’ is transitive, and focusses on the person the message is being directed to, as well as what was said to them
• ‘Speak’ is ambitransitive, and focusses on the speech act itself
• ‘Talk’ is ambitransitive, and focusses on the broader discourse between two or more people

But other languages divide it up differently. For instance, French (to the extent that I know about it) seems to have only two basic verbs: dire and parler. From what I can tell, the difference seems to be one of transitivity — former covers ‘say’ and ‘tell’, while the latter covers ‘speak’ and ‘talk’.

This isn’t very different to English, though. I’m making this thread because I’m curious to know what other languages do here. What other interesting lexical divisions are out there?

(By the way, this has long been a sore spot in my conlanging. It’s obvious when I’m copying the peculiarly restricted domain of one of these English verbs, but I find it very difficult to think of any other way to do it. I’m hoping that learning about other languages might give me some inspiration here.)

[zompist]

But other languages divide it up differently. For instance, French (to the extent that I know about it) seems to have only two basic verbs: dire and parler. From what I can tell, the difference seems to be one of transitivity — former covers ‘say’ and ‘tell’, while the latter covers ‘speak’ and ‘talk’.

There's at least two more, causer and raconter. These are pretty close to 'talk' and 'tell' respectively. E.g. on raconte une histoire, you tell a story; on cause avec les amis, you talk with friends.

There are differences though: for "tell me!" you'd say dis-moi; for "can apes talk?", les singes, ils parlent?

(P.S. Your French teacher would have you say "Les singes, parlent-ils ?" but she's from 1845.)

[bradrn]

But other languages divide it up differently. For instance, French (to the extent that I know about it) seems to have only two basic verbs: dire and parler. From what I can tell, the difference seems to be one of transitivity — former covers ‘say’ and ‘tell’, while the latter covers ‘speak’ and ‘talk’.

There's at least two more, causer and raconter. These are pretty close to 'talk' and 'tell' respectively. E.g. on raconte une histoire, you tell a story; on cause avec les amis, you talk with friends.

I feel that raconter is a great deal narrower than ‘tell’: it specifically covers English ‘recount’, ‘narrate’. Causer I haven’t encountered yet, but it also seems very narrow in range.

Even so, this just establishes that, in this regard, French is even more English-like than I thought. There must be other semantic divisions here, surely?

(P.S. Your French teacher would have you say "Les singes, parlent-ils ?" but she's from 1845.)

Firstly, I don’t have a French teacher (probably why I’m learning so slowly). Secondly, I know already…

[Richard W]

There's a lot of overlap in Bradn's division, which I fear makes for problems in comparing languages.

I think 'tell' focuses on the message, rather than needing a recipient, as in Tell the truth!

Critically, 'say' needs an object of the thing said, though it can be expressed as indirectly as, "As I was saying, he's perfectly capable of putting two and two together and making five." Apart from that requirement, 'say' can be used almost where 'tell' is used; the only limitation is that it doesn't seem to stretch to performances, as in 'tales told'. (I am assuming that 'tale' in 'to tell a tale' is not to be regarded as a cognate accusative.)

There seems to be a restriction on the use of 'speak' to convey what is said. Speak the news! seems OK, but not Speak that the Devil is bad.

How are we variously excluding sing, chant, utter, chat and recount?

Am I being pedantic to ask how 'talking to plants' is covered?

[bradrn]

There's a lot of overlap in Bradn's division, which I fear makes for problems in comparing languages.

Yes, you’re absolutely correct. A one-line definition can’t possibly hope to be comprehensive, especially when the verbs have large overlap in the first place. (And especially when written quickly at 2am!)

But I think you’re missing the point a bit. I’m not hugely interested in the precise details of the definitions: just the broad strokes of how other languages generally express the notion of ‘speaking’. If I get interested in the little details, I can always look them up myself afterwards.

I think 'tell' focuses on the message, rather than needing a recipient, as in Tell the truth!

This sentence is an odd one, actually. In almost all other situations, tell requires an object, which is a recipient: tell me the truth. I’m not entirely sure precisely where the recipient can be omitted, but I’m inclined to treat tell the truth as a fixed expression. (It sounds less acceptable with other nouns: Tell ?(us) the story!.)

Critically, 'say' needs an object of the thing said, though it can be expressed as indirectly as, "As I was saying, he's perfectly capable of putting two and two together and making five."

Yes, this is the critical point, which I didn’t emphasise enough.

There seems to be a restriction on the use of 'speak' to convey what is said. Speak the news! seems OK, but not Speak that the Devil is bad.

Speak the news sounds very weird and archaic to me, if not totally unacceptable. But speak the truth sounds much better (though quite formal). I’m not sure precisely what the restriction is.

I think that, in the modern spoken language, we can say that speak is canonically intransitive, except in the special case of languages (I can speak English).

How are we variously excluding sing, chant, utter, chat and recount?

Simply because their semantic range is much narrower and they’re far less frequent.

Am I being pedantic to ask how 'talking to plants' is covered?

OK, change ‘people’ to ‘entities’ in my definition.

[Richard W]

But I think you’re missing the point a bit. I’m not hugely interested in the precise details of the definitions: just the broad strokes of how other languages generally express the notion of ‘speaking’. If I get interested in the little details, I can always look them up myself afterwards.

I'm not so sure that that would work in practice.

I think that, in the modern spoken language, we can say that speak is canonically intransitive, except in the special case of languages (I can speak English).

I wonder if this special case is a calque from Romance. Some languages use an oblique case.

My limited Thai uses two words. The general word for 'say' and 'speak' is pʰûːt, but 'tell (an assertion)' is bɔ̀ːk. There is another word for 'say' around, wâː, but that has largely been grammaticalised as a conjunction or final element of compound conjunctions (very like French que) or is used as an introductory quotative.

The first word has a Khmer look-alike or false friend phu:t 'to lie'.

[bradrn]

But I think you’re missing the point a bit. I’m not hugely interested in the precise details of the definitions: just the broad strokes of how other languages generally express the notion of ‘speaking’. If I get interested in the little details, I can always look them up myself afterwards.

I'm not so sure that that would work in practice.

Hmm, what do you mean?

My limited Thai uses two words. The general word for 'say' and 'speak' is pʰûːt, but 'tell (an assertion)' is bɔ̀ːk. There is another word for 'say' around, wâː, but that has largely been grammaticalised as a conjunction or final element of compound conjunctions (very like French que) or is used as an introductory quotative.

OK, this is the kind of thing I wanted to know, thanks!

Doing a bit more searching, I found a Thai frequency list which lists only pʰûːt in the top 50 verbs by frequency. Using the SEAlang dictionary, it also seems to have a much wider semantic range compared to bɔ̀ːk (51 subentries vs 12).

[Richard W]

But I think you’re missing the point a bit. I’m not hugely interested in the precise details of the definitions: just the broad strokes of how other languages generally express the notion of ‘speaking’. If I get interested in the little details, I can always look them up myself afterwards.

I'm not so sure that that would work in practice.

Hmm, what do you mean?

I mean that teasing out that information may be difficult.

Doing a bit more searching, I found a Thai frequency list which lists only pʰûːt in the top 50 verbs by frequency. Using the SEAlang dictionary, it also seems to have a much wider semantic range compared to bɔ̀ːk (51 subentries vs 12).

A lot of the 51 subentries are collocations, though perhaps idiomatic.

When I mentioned that wâ tended to be a conjunction, I forgot to mention that grammaticalisation is a known fate of verbs meaning 'to say'. One Egyptian grammar (I can't find which) mentioned it as being a widespread phenomenon seen in 'African' languages, and indeed it has been incorporated in the tense formation in at least one Cushitic language.

[bradrn]

I'm not so sure that that would work in practice.

Hmm, what do you mean?

I mean that teasing out that information may be difficult.

Sure, but that’s lexicology…

Doing a bit more searching, I found a Thai frequency list which lists only pʰûːt in the top 50 verbs by frequency. Using the SEAlang dictionary, it also seems to have a much wider semantic range compared to bɔ̀ːk (51 subentries vs 12).

A lot of the 51 subentries are collocations, though perhaps idiomatic.

Well, I think collocations are quite important. Besides, if a word exists in more collocations, I feel that that’s at least some indication of a larger semantic range.

(You’ll note that I’ve been discussing stuff in this thread very loosely in general… often I strive for precision, but it’s not so important here.)

When I mentioned that wâ tended to be a conjunction, I forgot to mention that grammaticalisation is a known fate of verbs meaning 'to say'. One Egyptian grammar (I can't find which) mentioned it as being a widespread phenomenon seen in 'African' languages, and indeed it has been incorporated in the tense formation in at least one Cushitic language.

Yes, the ‘speak’→quotative pathway is a well-known one. The Cushitic development sounds familiar for some reason, but I can’t remember where I would have seen it.

[willm]

I’m not quite fluent in Mandarin, but I’m decent, so I’ll give this a shot. Off the top of my head, I can think of four relevant basic verbs. 说/說 (shuō) is the most common; by default it takes 话/話 (huà) “speech, words” as its direct object, just meaning “to talk”. It can also be followed directly by whatever someone is saying. 谈/談 (tán) and 讲/講 (jiǎng) can also take 话/話 (huà) as a direct object and mean “to talk, to chat”… my impression is that with 话/話 (huà), 说/說 (shuō) just means “to talk”, as in the basic action, whereas 谈/談 (tán) and 讲/講 (jiǎng) imply more of a discussion or conversation. 谈/談 (tán) and 讲/講 (jiǎng) can also take a topic discussed as well as words like “story” or “opinion” as direct objects. The collocation for “to tell a story” is 讲故事/講故事 (jiǎng gùshi) specifically. 讲/講 (jiǎng) is also usually used for speaking a language. 告诉/告訴 (gàosu) is the only verb of the four that can take the person addressed as its direct object, so I think of it as equivalent to “to tell” for most purposes. 告诉/告訴 (gàosu) is also the other verb (besides 说/說 (shuō)) that can be followed by what someone has said. I believe the person addressed generally gets different prepositions/coverbs with 说/說 (shuō) on the one hand and 谈/談 (tán) and 讲/講 (jiǎng) on the other: respectively 对/對 (duì) “towards, facing” versus 和 (hé), 跟 (gēn), or 与/與 (yǔ) “with, and”.

Hopefully this all makes sense.

[Ares Land]

There's at least two more, causer and raconter. These are pretty close to 'talk' and 'tell' respectively. E.g. on raconte une histoire, you tell a story; on cause avec les amis, you talk with friends.

I feel that raconter is a great deal narrower than ‘tell’: it specifically covers English ‘recount’, ‘narrate’. Causer I haven’t encountered yet, but it also seems very narrow in range.

Even so, this just establishes that, in this regard, French is even more English-like than I thought. There must be other semantic divisions here, surely?

Causer is narrower and I think a bit dated -- still current, but usage is narrower than it used to be.

raconter is narrower than tell but wider than 'recount'. If you want a bit of gossip, raconte ! is I think the best equivalent to tell me!

[bradrn]

I’m not quite fluent in Mandarin, but I’m decent, so I’ll give this a shot. Off the top of my head, I can think of four relevant basic verbs. 说/說 (shuō) is the most common; by default it takes 话/話 (huà) “speech, words” as its direct object, just meaning “to talk”. It can also be followed directly by whatever someone is saying. 谈/談 (tán) and 讲/講 (jiǎng) can also take 话/話 (huà) as a direct object and mean “to talk, to chat”… my impression is that with 话/話 (huà), 说/說 (shuō) just means “to talk”, as in the basic action, whereas 谈/談 (tán) and 讲/講 (jiǎng) imply more of a discussion or conversation. 谈/談 (tán) and 讲/講 (jiǎng) can also take a topic discussed as well as words like “story” or “opinion” as direct objects. The collocation for “to tell a story” is 讲故事/講故事 (jiǎng gùshi) specifically. 讲/講 (jiǎng) is also usually used for speaking a language. 告诉/告訴 (gàosu) is the only verb of the four that can take the person addressed as its direct object, so I think of it as equivalent to “to tell” for most purposes. 告诉/告訴 (gàosu) is also the other verb (besides 说/說 (shuō)) that can be followed by what someone has said. I believe the person addressed generally gets different prepositions/coverbs with 说/說 (shuō) on the one hand and 谈/談 (tán) and 讲/講 (jiǎng) on the other: respectively 对/對 (duì) “towards, facing” versus 和 (hé), 跟 (gēn), or 与/與 (yǔ) “with, and”.

This is a bit dense, let me see if I’ve understood it:

• shuō: the most basic verb, ‘say, speak, talk’. Can be followed by direct speech. The recipient gets duì ‘towards’.
• gàosu: ‘tell’. Takes recipient as direct object. Can also be followed by direct speech.
• jiǎng: ‘speak, tell’. Never followed by direct speech or recipient. Can take a kind of speech as direct object: ‘tell a story’, ‘speak a language’.
• tán: ‘talk, chat’. The most restricted of these verbs.

[willm]

• shuō: the most basic verb, ‘say, speak, talk’. Can be followed by direct speech. The recipient gets duì ‘towards’.
• gàosu: ‘tell’. Takes recipient as direct object. Can also be followed by direct speech.
• jiǎng: ‘speak, tell’. Never followed by direct speech or recipient. Can take a kind of speech as direct object: ‘tell a story’, ‘speak a language’.
• tán: ‘talk, chat’. The most restricted of these verbs.

Yes, I think that's all true. I think tán is more common than jiǎng for the meaning "to chat", though it can be used in fewer situations.

[alice]

(P.S. Your French teacher would have you say "Les singes, parlent-ils ?" but she's from 1845.)

My first French teacher would have us say "Est-ce que les singes parlent?". She was French, btw.

[zompist]

(P.S. Your French teacher would have you say "Les singes, parlent-ils ?" but she's from 1845.)

My first French teacher would have us say "Est-ce que les singes parlent?". She was French, btw.

Sure, the idea was to let you easily read Balzac.

The thing is, written and spoken French have diverged spectacularly, and they don't teach you spoken French in school. Which is fine if you want to read Balzac, or a journal article; not so good if you want to talk to French people, or watch movies, or read comics.

Of course, annoyingly, the French insist on continuing to change the language, thus Ares Land's correction on causer.

I feel that raconter is a great deal narrower than ‘tell’: it specifically covers English ‘recount’, ‘narrate’.

You have to be careful with French/English doublets: they are often far more common and even colloquial in French. "Recount" is pretty niche; raconter is the everyday word for telling a person or a story.

[bradrn]

The thing is, written and spoken French have diverged spectacularly, and they don't teach you spoken French in school. Which is fine if you want to read Balzac, or a journal article; not so good if you want to talk to French people, or watch movies, or read comics.

Est-ce que is ordinary spoken French. (Although a bit formal; I perhaps overuse it.) Simply changing the intonation is of course most common.

I feel that raconter is a great deal narrower than ‘tell’: it specifically covers English ‘recount’, ‘narrate’.

You have to be careful with French/English doublets: they are often far more common and even colloquial in French. "Recount" is pretty niche; raconter is the everyday word for telling a person or a story.

I do know this, of course — after all, I am using French every day (or utilising it, one might say). But it seems that Ares Land basically confirmed my intuitions in this regard.

[zompist]

The words in Quechua (Cusco or Ayacucho) are not exciting:

niy - say, speak
rimay - talk
willay - inform, report, tell (a story)

The first two correspond very neatly to Spanish decir, hablar. It's possible that Spanish influenced Quechua here— they've been in deep contact for 500 years.

[Creyeditor]

Based on my knowledge of acrolectal~mesolectal Papua Indonesian but I think this also holds true roughly for other varieties of Indonesian. I think in Indonesian it mostly on the 'length' or 'kind' of the logical object/the utterance

bilang - roughly means 'to say'. It can take either a recipient or a short utterance as a grammatical object. It can also occur without any overt object. The (implied) utterance is always short, sometimes a single word, sometimes a statement or an explanation. It is relatively informal.
cerita - roughly means 'to tell'. The logical object can be a story or a description or a personal anecdote, even a short joke. The grammatical object can only be something like 'joke' or 'farytale' or absent. Other objects are introduced with the preposition tentang 'about'. This verb can take the middle voice/verbalizing prefix ber-.
bicara - roughly means 'to speak'. Can only have a language as a grammatical object or no object at all. This is used for having conversations or giving speeches or being able to speak a language. This verb can take the middle voice/verbalizing prefix ber-.
mengatakan - very formal. The causative verb form of the word kata 'word'. Roughly equivalent to bilang.
ngomong - roughly 'to speak'. Active verb form of the word omong, which corresponds to a meaning of the English noun 'talk' in the sense of something said. Can take languages as a grammatical object but also conversations or monologues as logical objects.
ngobrol - roughly 'to talk'. Can only be used for conversations. Rather informal. Does not take grammatical objects, AFAIK.

[bradrn]

Based on my knowledge of acrolectal~mesolectal Papua Indonesian but I think this also holds true roughly for other varieties of Indonesian. I think in Indonesian it mostly on the 'length' or 'kind' of the logical object/the utterance

Very interesting, thanks!

A few questions:

1. bilang is the only verb which can be followed by direct or indirect speech, correct?
2. What do you mean by the ‘logical object’ of cerita?
3. What exactly is the difference in usage between bicara and ngomong?
4. To a first approximation, which of these are roughly the most frequent?

[Creyeditor]

1. Indirect speech in the sense of 'I said that ge goes.'? That works with bilang, cerita, menyatakan, ngomong.
2. Logical object is what I used for the kind of utterance that is described by the utterance verb. These can be introduced by embedded clauses or prepositional phrases.
3. ngomong is informal, bicara is not informal (or less informal, though I wouldn't say it's formal).
4. In the speech that I heard, bilang and bicara are most frequent, followed by cerita. Next would be ngobrol and ngomong. I haven't heard mengatakan a lot but this might be due restriction to more formal registers like news reports. I think in Indonesian varieties of Java, ngobrol and ngomong are most common instead of bilang and bicara.