Language Typology and Syntactic Description, Volume I: Clause Structure, Second edition
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Lgg Typology, Synt Description v. I - Clause structure
Parts-of-speech systems 29 There are, in fact, some languages in which there is regularly the possibility of ambiguity between reciprocal and reflexive meanings because the same forms can be used to express both. A case in point is French, as the following example illustrates: (77) Ils se flattent they refl/recip flatter ‘They flatter themselves’ each other’ An unambiguously reciprocal meaning may, however, be conveyed by adding to (77) the phrase l’un l’autre ‘one another’, as in: (78) Ils se flattent l’un l’autre they refl/recip flatter the.one the.other ‘They flatter one another’ Languages that lack reciprocal pronouns, like those that lack reflexive pro- nouns, typically express equivalent meanings through the use of special affixes on the verb. In Ilocano, for example, reciprocal verbs contain the prefix ag- and the infix -inn- (which is inserted after the first consonant of the verb stem): for example agsinnakit ‘hurt one another’ (cf. sakit ‘hurt’), agtinnulong ‘help one another’ (cf. tulong ‘help’). Demonstrative pronouns are pronouns like English this, that, these, and those in: (79) This resembles that Do you prefer these or those? Such pronouns are treated in depth by Comrie and Thompson in vol. iii, chapter 6, and will only receive brief mention here. Demonstrative pronouns are widely attested. There are, however, languages in which demonstrative and third per- son personal pronouns are not distinguished. This is the case, for example, in Southern Paiute (see Sapir (1930)), where words consisting of a demonstrative morpheme followed by a third person morpheme do double duty as demon- strative and personal pronouns: for example a ŋ a (a- (that) + - ŋ a (third person singular animate)) ‘that one, he’; i ŋ a (i- (this) + - ŋ a) ‘this one, he’; ar¨ı (a- + -r¨ı (third person singular inanimate)), ‘that one, it’, etc. (In addition to demon- strative pronouns, many languages have morphologically related demonstrative articles. For some discussion of these, see section 2.2.) Indefinite pronouns are pronouns like English someone, something, anyone, anything. In many languages (including English) these forms are rather transpar- ently analysable as consisting of two morphemes, one expressing the meaning of indefiniteness, the other the meaning ‘person’ or ‘thing’: for example Akan 30 Paul Schachter and Timothy Shopen obi (o- (human prefix) + bi (indefinite stem)) ‘someone’, ebi (e- (nonhuman prefix) + bi) ‘something’; or French quelq’un (quelqu’ (some) + un (one)) ‘someone’, quelque chose (quelque (some) + chose (thing)) ‘something’. Some languages have distinct indefinite-subject pronouns which are used to indicate an unspecified human subject. The English equivalent may have they, you, one, people, etc., according to the context. Some examples, from French (80), and Hausa (81), respectively, are: (80) a. On dit qu’il pleut indef says that-it rains ‘They say that it’s raining’ b. On ne sait jamais indef neg knows never ‘You/One never can tell’ (81) a. Kada a yi haka shouldn’t indef do thus ‘You/One shouldn’t do that’ b. Yana so a zo he. is wanting indef come ‘He wants people to come’ Relative pronouns are pronouns like English who and which in: (82) The man who wrote that was a genius The book which he wrote was brilliant Many languages do not have relative pronouns, but instead make use of personal pronouns in forming relative clauses, as in the following example from Akan: (83) Mihuu obi a ɔ w ɔ aka no I. saw someone rel snake has. bitten him ‘I saw someone whom a snake had bitten’ cf. ɔ w ɔ aka no snake has. bitten him ‘A snake has bitten him’ Another common way of forming relative clauses involves deletion of the rel- ativized nominal from the relative clause, as in the following example from Tagalog: (84) Sino ang bata-ng pumunta sa tindahan? who top child-link went obl store ‘Who is the child who went to the store?’ For still other relativization strategies, see Andrews in vol. ii, chapter 4. |
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