There are 5 messages in this issue.
Topics in this digest:
1a. Re: Grammatical complexity
From: Jyri Lehtinen
2a. Re: Possible case system
From: H. S. Teoh
2b. Re: Possible case system
From: James Kane
2c. Re: Possible case system
From: Adam Walker
3a. Re: Phonological alternation
From: Jeffrey Daniel Rollin-Jones
Messages
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1a. Re: Grammatical complexity
Posted by: "Jyri Lehtinen" [email protected]
Date: Thu May 23, 2013 7:33 am ((PDT))
> The Basque case system is another such can of worms. The usual paradigms
> given mask a whole bunch of complications, and various analyses disagree on
> things as simple as whether the genitive should be considered a case at
> all! I'm currently reading a great book about Basque (_Standard Basque, a
> progressive grammar_, by Rudolf de Rijk) and have practically given hope on
> the whole question of case in that language. It's a mess beyond belief :P .
Once you look a bit there are loads of this kind of complications. An
example of what deserves be called a case, although in the old view was
only considered an adverb derivation, is the Mari comparative case. It's
used productively to indicate adverbial phrases that in English would use
prepositions such as "like" or "similar to", but also things such as what
is wanted or received in exchange for giving or selling something or to
indicate the language that is used. When I look at the grammar I get the
idea that the only reason this and some other forms didn't use to be called
cases is that they didn't fit semantically into the group of the "old
cases" (nominative, accusative, genitive, dative and three local cases).
Alhoniemi opens the door into the case paradigm also on the other side in
his grammar of Mari and considers a couple of postpositions as perfectly
regular functional extensions to the cases. Phonetically these are separate
words but they function as if they were cases. They have less specific
meanings as other postpositions in the language and some postpositions
require the noun to take one of these case like postpositions before they
can be applied themselves (similar to adpositions requiring a specific
case).
-Jyri
Messages in this topic (16)
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2a. Re: Possible case system
Posted by: "H. S. Teoh" [email protected]
Date: Thu May 23, 2013 10:44 am ((PDT))
On Mon, May 20, 2013 at 06:00:29PM -0500, Adam Walker wrote:
> On Mon, May 20, 2013 at 2:21 PM, neo gu <[email protected]> wrote:
>
> > On Mon, 20 May 2013 13:17:14 -0500, Adam Walker <[email protected]>
> > wrote:
> >
> > >I have been tinkering with what will eventually become the case system for
> > >Gravgaln (now that verbs are stabilizing) and here's what I came up with
> > >last night:
> > >
> > >John-ak ate the cake-ev.
> > >John-ak ate.
> > >John-ev fell.
> > >John-ak fell. (because he threw himself down)
Sounds like an active-stative system.
> > >John-ak gave Tom-il the book-ev.
> > >John-ak gave Tom-il Bob-ev.
> > >
> > >John-ak killed Bob-ev.
> > >John-ev was killed.
> > >
> > >John-ak killed Bob-ev knife-azh.
> > >John-ak killed Tom-azh.
> > >John-ak killed Bob-ev Tom-azh.
> >
> > Does that translate as "John made Tom kill Bob"?
> >
>
> It **could** mean that. It could also mean that John hired Tom to
> kill Bob, or tricked him into doing it, or simply handed him the
> poisoned tart knowing he would give it to Bob. Tom was the tool that
> John used to accomplish Bob's death.
Makes sense, -azh is an instrumental case, I'd venture to guess.
> > >John-ev hairbrush-on is missing.
> > >Fifth grade teacher-ev-on is tired.
> > >Bob-ak killed Tom-ev cat-on.
This is just tail-marking for possessives, right? I like it!
> > >So, is this an Active-Stative alignment I'm working on here? A
> > >slightly wonky Active-Stative System? Something else entirely?
> > >Seriously flawed in some way I don't see yet?
> > >
> > >Adam
> >
> > I agree that it's Active-Stative, specifically Fluid-S. The only
> > wonky thing is with the possessives; it seems you're marking the
> > case for the possessum on the possessor. -on could be interpreted as
> > a sort of construct state. Although I'm not sure what's happening
> > with the Fifth grade teacher.
To me, -on looks just like tail-marking, so yeah, a kind of construct
case.
But I also don't understand what's going on with the fifth grade
teacher.
> Yes, well, I'm not entirely sure that I have given good data there.
> It seemed perfectly rational at the time I wrote out my examples last
> night. It seemed less so when I typed them in my email today, and
> still less so now. The possessives may be just plain wrong. Or I may
> just have incomplete data there, or mostly correct data with an error
> or two.
[...]
The possessives make total sense to me -- it's just tail-marking or
construct case -- except for the 5th grade teacher, of which I'm not
sure what the double-marking signifies.
Or is there some kind of totally different selection criteria going on
here, where agentive/animate nouns receive preferential case marking?
T
--
Nothing in the world is more distasteful to a man than to take the path
that leads to himself. -- Herman Hesse
Messages in this topic (10)
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2b. Re: Possible case system
Posted by: "James Kane" [email protected]
Date: Thu May 23, 2013 12:47 pm ((PDT))
>>>
>>> John-ev hairbrush-on is missing.
>>> Fifth grade teacher-ev-on is tired.
>>> Bob-ak killed Tom-ev cat-on.
To me it seems like the -on is tail marking in that it marks the teacher as:
fifth grade its teacher i.e. fifth grade's teacher. Teacher is then also in the
stative case (or whatever) because it is the subject of the stative verb.
Maybe it would make more sense if the suffixes were in the reverse order,
teacher-on-ev. But then this is inconsistent as in the first and third examples
the hairbrush and the cat aren't marked as stative, instead their possessors
are which I think doesn't quite make sense.
James
On 24/05/2013, at 5:42 AM, "H. S. Teoh" <[email protected]> wrote:
>
>>>> John-ev hairbrush-on is missing.
>>>> Fifth grade teacher-ev-on is tired.
>>>> Bob-ak killed Tom-ev cat-on.
Messages in this topic (10)
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2c. Re: Possible case system
Posted by: "Adam Walker" [email protected]
Date: Thu May 23, 2013 12:58 pm ((PDT))
Yes, I need to try to reconstruct what my brain was doing when I produced
those examples. More and more, I'm thinking they just don't make sense. I
**think** I was intending some sort of animacy effect where John and Tom
are marked as Patient-NonvoluntaryExpiriencers and their Possessums are
marked in the Possessed/Construct/Whatev case, while in the other example
Teacher get's both markings because it it the Experiencer AND the
Possessum, but the lack fo any marking on fifthgrade is... and the other
bit.... Yeah. It's just weird/broken/REDO!
Adam
On Thu, May 23, 2013 at 2:46 PM, James Kane <[email protected]> wrote:
> >>>
> >>> John-ev hairbrush-on is missing.
> >>> Fifth grade teacher-ev-on is tired.
> >>> Bob-ak killed Tom-ev cat-on.
>
> To me it seems like the -on is tail marking in that it marks the teacher
> as: fifth grade its teacher i.e. fifth grade's teacher. Teacher is then
> also in the stative case (or whatever) because it is the subject of the
> stative verb.
>
> Maybe it would make more sense if the suffixes were in the reverse order,
> teacher-on-ev. But then this is inconsistent as in the first and third
> examples the hairbrush and the cat aren't marked as stative, instead their
> possessors are which I think doesn't quite make sense.
>
>
> James
>
> On 24/05/2013, at 5:42 AM, "H. S. Teoh" <[email protected]> wrote:
>
> >
> >>>> John-ev hairbrush-on is missing.
> >>>> Fifth grade teacher-ev-on is tired.
> >>>> Bob-ak killed Tom-ev cat-on.
>
Messages in this topic (10)
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3a. Re: Phonological alternation
Posted by: "Jeffrey Daniel Rollin-Jones" [email protected]
Date: Thu May 23, 2013 12:26 pm ((PDT))
Apologies for taking ages in getting back to you; I've had a heavy few weeks.
Very informative, thanks!
Jeff.
Sent from my iPhone
On 16 May 2013, at 12:28, Jyri Lehtinen <[email protected]> wrote:
>>
>> Well originally the weak gradation of all of */p t k/
>> was stop > voiced fricative, i.e. */β ð ɣ/. In the
>> oldest written records these are spelled with
>> - /β/ = <whatever contemporary Swedish might use
>> for v / V_V>
>> - /ð/ = <dh>
>> - /ɣ/ = <gh>
>
> Actually in the oldest written language you find both <dh gh> and <d g>
> for /ð ɣ/ and often in free variation within the same text. Later the <h>
> was dropped from both <dh> and <gh> (I think indeed around the same time on
> both sides of the Gulf of Bothnia) and eventually also the remaining <g>
> for old /ɣ/ since all dialects lost this sound. <d> was spared for the weak
> grade of /t/ despite most dialects had developed this sound into /r/ of /l/
> or lost it altogether. The modern pronunciation of this element is a
> mixture of dialectal influence (obviously varying across the country) and
> spelling pronunciation. /ð/ has recently been attested only in a small
> patch on the western coast and in Kven in the northern Norway.
>
> The old preferred spelling for both the original /v/ and the weak grade of
> /p/ was <w>. This seems to have lasted quite long and even today a way to
> make typesetting look old is to substitute <w> for <v> and use blackletters.
>
> You do actually find alternation between /r l n/ and whatever is your
> reflex for /ð/ in the infinitive suffix. This is, however, only
> assimilation with the last stem consonant:
>
> ui-da "swim"
> pur-ra "bite"
> tul-la "come"
> men-nä "go"
>
> This alternation is not very productive and is rather connected with the
> already large amount of allomorphy this suffix has:
>
> pala-ta "return"
> juos-ta "run"
> piirtä-ä "draw"
>
> But if anything, this all shows how unstable /ð/ can be and that you can
> have a lot of fun with it.
>
> -Jyri
Messages in this topic (12)
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