Language Typology and Syntactic Description, Volume I: Clause Structure, Second edition
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Lgg Typology, Synt Description v. I - Clause structure
To marks its np as the addressee of speak, about marks its np as the subject
matter of the talk. Although the former order is preferred, both are possible, and it is clear that order does not mark the roles of these nps. Many languages make far more extensive use of np-marking, using it to mark almost all np functions, including subject–object or their counterparts. One example of this is Tagalog, which will be discussed below. Here we shall discuss an even more extreme example, Warlpiri, a Pama-Nyungan language of Central Australia (Hale (1973); Simpson (1991)). In English, principles of order and arrangement not only indicate the functions of nps, but the nps themselves are also identified by means of such principles, since their constituent parts appear in a definite order, which can be described by phrase-structure rules, as explained in any reasonable introduction to generative grammar. In Warlpiri, both the functions and the constituency of nps are usually indicated by np-marking. The one major principle of word order for Warlpiri simple clauses involves the ‘auxiliary element’. This expresses the verbal categories of tense and mood (and also carries person–number markers for some of the verbal arguments, as we shall see in the next subsection), and comes in first or second position, depending on its phonological shape (Hale (1973:311–14); Simpson (1991:65)). The order of all other elements is free. Furthermore, there is no requirement that the constituents of an np be contiguous; they must merely share the same endings. 144 Avery D. Andrews The following three strings are therefore fully synonymous, and may be regarded as three versions of the same sentence: 6 (12) a. Kurdu-ngku ka maliki wita-ngku wajili-pi-nyi child-erg pres dog(abs) small-erg running-attack-nonpast b. Wajili-pi-nyi ka wita-ngku maliki kurdu-nkgu c. Maliki ka kurdu-ngku wajili-pi-nyi wita-ngku ‘The small child is chasing the dog’ The auxiliary ka indicates that the tense is present. It is supplemented by the tense-ending on the verb, which shows nonpast tense. The ergative ending -ngku on wita ‘small’ and kurdu ‘child’ marks these as comprising one np that bears a function. The absence of any ending on maliki shows that this belongs to a different np, which can bear p function (we will see below that the absence of marking is also a characteristic of s function). This unmarked form is called the ‘absolutive’. The endings thus indicate how the np components are to be grouped together, and what function the resulting nps are to have. There are twenty-one more arrangements of the words of (12), with the auxiliary in second position, and they are all grammatical and mean the same thing as (12). There are two further observations to be made. First, -ngku is not a subject marker, because it is not normally used for nps in s function. Rather, single arguments of one-argument verbs are normally in the absolutive case, with no marker: (13) Ngarrka ka purla-mi man(abs) pres shout-nonpast ‘The man is shouting’ If we assume that the case marking directly reflects grammatical relations, we would have to deny that Warlpiri had a subject relation: rather, we would have to say that it had one grammatical relation covering a function, and another covering p and s functions. In fact, although they are not directly marked by the case forms, Warlpiri does seem to have subject and object grammatical functions, as we shall see in 3.1.4 below. The second observation is that Warlpiri can group the members of an np into a single overt constituent, and in this case the ending need only appear on the last word of the np: 6 Warlpiri, like many languages, lacks systematic indication of definiteness. The articles in the translations are arbitrarily chosen as ‘the’. This will also be the case in the treatment of other languages, unless there is specific indication that definiteness is relevant. The major functions of the noun phrase 145 (14) a. Wita kurdu-ngku ka maliki wajili-pi-nyi small child-erg pres dog(abs) running-attack-nonpast ‘The small child is chasing the dog’ b. Wita ka kurdu-ngku maliki wajili-pi-nyi small(abs) pres child-erg dog(abs) running-attack-nonpast ‘The child is chasing the small dog’ The position of ka after wita kurdu-ngku in (14a) indicates that these two words form a constituent, and that they are therefore taken together as an np despite the difference in endings. In (14b), where ka appears between wita and kurdu-ngku, these two words do not form a constituent, so wita has to be construed with maliki, and the sentence means ‘the child is chasing the small dog’. Warlpiri requires a somewhat more abstract kind of analysis than that which we have so far required for English: English nps can be identified as units in a ‘surface constituent structure’ directly reflected in the linear order of elements. In Warlpiri we need at least two levels of analysis: overt constituent structure, relevant for auxiliary placement and a few other things, and a deeper level at which ‘functional’ units such as nps are recognized even if their constituent elements are scattered throughout the overt structure. Download 1.59 Mb. Do'stlaringiz bilan baham: |
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