Exploiting word order to express an inflectional category: Reality status in Iquito

Beier, Christine; Hansen, Cynthia; Lai, I-Wen; Michael, Lev

doi:10.1515/lity.2011.004

Cited by 3 publications

(1 citation statement)

References 9 publications

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“…Any consistent form of linear organization can be used to structure discourse. For example, speakers of the Peruvian language Iquito mark the distinction between REALIS and IRREALIS clauses solely by means of word order constraints (Beier et al, 2011). It is easier to identify constituents and process the linguistic expression they are part of when constituents with the same functional specification occupy the same position in a linear structure.…”

Section: Arbitrary Patterningmentioning

confidence: 99%

Word Order

Rijkhoff¹

2015

International Encyclopedia of the Social &Amp; Behavioral Sciences

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The way constituents are ordered in a linguistic expression is determined by general principles and language-specific rules. This article is mostly concerned with general ordering principles and the three main linguistic categories that are relevant for constituent order research: formal, functional, and semantic categories. The general principles appear to be motivated by cognitive considerations, which are deemed to facilitate language processing and which can all be regarded as manifestations of iconicity: nonarbitrary relations between the form and the content of a linguistic expression. Three major iconic ordering principles are the principles of Domain Integrity, Scope, and Head Proximity.

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Section: Arbitrary Patterningmentioning

confidence: 99%

Word Order

Rijkhoff¹

2015

International Encyclopedia of the Social &Amp; Behavioral Sciences

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The role of negation in the grammaticalization of ability verbs

Wilson

Hansen

2019

DIA

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This paper investigates the role of negation in grammaticalization in Iquito, an endangered Zaparoan language of the Peruvian Amazon. Iquito has a verb, pajɨɨni, which has undergone two paths of grammaticalization only in negated clauses. First, pajɨɨni has grammaticalized from “learn” to “be able to.” Subsequently, it is undergoing grammaticalization from an ability verb to a future auxiliary. Given that ability verbs are an uncommon source for future auxiliaries (Bybee et al. 1994), this study provides a detailed case study of this rare path. Our analysis of Iquito demonstrates that grammaticalization paths are not limited to affirmative contexts and may behave differently depending on the polarity of the utterance.

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Routes Towards The Irrealis

Sansò

2020

Trans of the Philol Soc

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Irrealis markers are characterized by the rampant heterogeneity of their distributional patterns and by the tendency to appear as portmanteau morphemes encoding other grammatical categories (e.g. person). These and other characteristics may find an explanation in diachronic terms, by taking into account the sources from which irrealis markers derive. In this paper, the most frequent sources of irrealis markers are identified by means of a diachronic-typological survey based on a 100-language sample: these include lexical verbs such as 'go', 'want' or 'be', former subordinate clauses that come to be used as main clauses through insubordination and deictic expressions that refer to distant elements. Considering the diachrony of irrealis markers allows us to explain some of their properties such as, among others (i) their distribution across the domain of non-actualized situation types, (ii) the primacy of certain non-actualized situation types that happen to work as bridgeheads in the diachronic development from the source to the target irrealis marker, (iii) the frequent co-encoding of person and reality status by means of the same markers, and (iv) the existence of ergativity splits involving irrealis clauses. The diachronic-typological survey conducted in this paper has some implications on the debate on the validity of reality status as a grammatical category with two opposite values of realis and irrealis: it will be argued that the diachronic scenarios leading to the emergence of irrealis markers are not substantially different from those known from the literature on the emergence of modal markers, which makes reality status superfluous as an independent grammatical category.

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Exploiting word order to express an inflectional category: Reality status in Iquito

Abstract: TitleExploiting word order to express an inflectional category: Reality status in Iquito

Cited by 3 publications

References 9 publications

Word Order

Word Order

The role of negation in the grammaticalization of ability verbs

Routes Towards The Irrealis

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