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mechamcal, photocopying, recordmg or otherwise, without the pnor permiSSIOn of the publisher. Except m the USA, thts book IS sold subJect ro the condmon that It shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, re-sold, h1red out, or otherwise cm:ulated Without the pubhsher's prior consent many form of bmding or cover other than that tn whtch It IS published and Without a s1milar conditiOn mdudmg this condition being Imposed on the subsequent purcl\aser. Brtltsh Library Catalogumg m Pubilcatmn Data Stassen, Leon
Companson and umversal grammar: an essay in umversa! grammar, J. Grammar, Comparative and general I. Tn:le 415 P201 ISBN 0-631-14058-1
Ltbrary of Congress Catalogmg m Publtcahon Data Stassen, Leon. Companson and umversal grammar.
Bibliography: p. Includes index. 1. Companson (Grammar) 2. Grammar, Comparauve and general. I. T1de. P255.S7.1 1985 415 84-28247 ISBN CHi31-14058-1 (hb. bdg.)
Typeset by Freeman Graph1c, Tonbndge, Kent Prmted m Great Bntam by T.J. Press Ltd, Pad&tow, Cornwall
BIBLIO.II)(:A
< ;-,-;_ ',\t
f"~"-'7, typical instances of the comparative m the languages of my sample will include those expressions which have a semantic function of the type exemplified by English expressions like john is taller than Bill or Harry is more cunning than brave. Fortunately, 11 turns out that a semantic definition of this kind can be used in practice without serious difficulties; there is a considerable amount of unanimity among grammarians of various languages with respect to the question of what counts as a comparative in their respective subjectwlanguages. In th1s conr.ecllon, let me add that a semantic or cognitive definition will be employed in this study not only m the definition of the notion ~comparative construction', but also m referring to several other nonons, such as 'separative construcnon' (chapter 2), 'temporal chaining' (chapter 3) and 'consecutive cham' (chapter 4}. The term 'separative construction', for instance, must always be taken to refer to any type of construction in a natural language which has the semantic function of indicating the source of a movement, regardless of whether this functiOn is expressed formally by mfAI"-"" of a preposition, a postposition, a case affix or some other syntactic or morphological device. It would, of course, be perfectly feas•ble to set up a typology of the various ways in which this 'separative'
meaning is formally encoded in natural languages. However, such a typology, interesting though it may be in its own nght, hes beyond the descriptive scope of the present investigation.
16
A Cross-lmguistic Typology of Comparattves 1.3.3
The construe/ton of a typology
Once the relevant data have been estabh~hed across the sample by means of some language·mdependent cntcrion of identification, one 1s m a posttion to start the actual work of typological investigation, vtz. the construction of a typology. At this stage, the languages in the sample are classified Into a number of categories, on the basis of differences and similariu~ in the way in whtch the parameter of the typology is formally
expressed by them. Accordmgly, the typology reflects the attested variation of hnguistic encoding among languages with respect to the basic hngm~tlc propeny under dtscussion.
Now, it might be thought that, once the set of relevant data has been assembled, the construction of d typology can be a fairly straightforward procedure. One mtght argue that the classific.ttion of languages mto categories, and the classification of constructions into types, should be the result of a mechamcal application of a series of decisions, which are motivated by empJCically attested dtfferences and similarities in the encoding properties of the languages under observation. In reality, however, such a 'bhnd', mechanical procedure seldom yields interestmg results. It must be kept m mind that the construction of a typology IS not a goal m itself; the whole business of constructing typologies derives its rheorettcal s1gmficance from the fact that these typologies function as 'the raw material for principled inquiry and explanation' (Sanders, 1976: 15). Thus, rhe adequacy of a typology depends on the extent to which it 'generates significant questions that are clear, explicit and likely to be productively answerable' (Sanders, ibid.). In other words, the categorization in which a typology results should be theoretically fertile. Given this central function of typologies, it will be clear that a typological categorizatiOn of languages or construction types must necessarily mvolve an evaluation of the theoretical significance and relevance of the criteria on whteh the division rests. In particular, It wt\1 be the case that not every observable formal difference between languageCparatc categories. In other cases, however, one m1ght dectde that thts observed dtfference in word order 1s only a concomitant fact which has nothi11g to do with the central explanatory questiOn at issue. In that case, the researcher may choose to 1gnore this d1fference, and hence he will (other things being equal) lump prepo~ItiOnal J.nd po~tpo~itwnal IJ.ngu.:tges together mto one single typological category. While m some cases 'blind' apphcation of formal dtvision procedures can lead to typologies that are too detailed for our explanatory purpo~e, the oppo!.>ite situatiOn may also be encountered. That ts, one may also arrive at a situation in which a typology that is based on formal distinctiOns ts not mformative enough. Again, an example may help to illustrate this case. Suppose that our cro&&-linguisttc data on a certain construction type give nse to a division of constructions mto two groups with formally distinct characteristics: m one group, a certain relevant NP in the construction is m the nominative case, whereas in other constructions this same NP is put into an oblique case, marked by some adposition. Now, it is conceivable that a categorization on the bas1s of th1s observable formal difference does not go far enough for our explanatory purposes; it might be the case that it is of theorerical sigmficance for us to know whether the adpo~ition in the ~econd group of constructions is a locative marker, an ablative marker, a dattve marker, an mstrumental marker, and so on. In such a case, purely formal differences are no longer of any use, since notions like 'locanve' or 'ablative' can be defined cross~ltngUistically only m semantic terms. In other words, it is not only the case that observable formal differences are not always relevant to our division of languages and constru..::non typeb; there are also cases in which such dtffercnce3 are not suffictcnr, .md where they must be supplemented by further div1~ional cntena of a • semantiC nature. Thus, in the end, typologies must be looked upon as data of an explanatory linguistic theory. Since it is a well-known fact of general methodology that, m all branches of sctence, data-gathenng 1s a proM cedure which is at least partially mfluenced by theoreucal consideration~, it will come as no surpnse that the constructton of hngUJstic typologtes will necessarily be guided by JUdgements (or premomttonb) of theoretical relevance and sigmficance.
18
A Cross-lmguzstrc Typ()/ogy of Comparatives Apart from tha~ m.lJHT mt:thodologJCal i!lMIC in the con~truct10n of
typologies, there are a few other pomts which need comment here. One que~tion concerns the admzsszbtlity of diachrontc and etymologtcal data in the construction of a typology. For a number of languages, rt can be established that changes in the1r encodmg properties have occurred m the course of their history; m such cases, one may argue about the 'true' typological status of those languages. One way to settle such a dispute is simply to bamsh all references to diachronic data from the typology; usually, such a strategy is motivated on the grounds that diachronic data are available for only a small subset of natural languages, so that no systematic use of this type of data can be made. Moreover) a decision to exclude all diachromc data is in line with the strict separation of synchronic and diachronic linguisncs, wh1ch was advocated by de Saussure and has been a longstanding article of faith in structuralist linguiStiC theory. In my opmwn, there 1s not much to be gained from an a prion rejection of diachromc data in typologtcal hnguistic research. On the contrary, I clunk that one might argue that such a reJection could even have harmful effects on the overall adequacy of a typology. In recent Universal Grammar, the insight has gained ground that natural languages are, with regard to their structural properties, often compromises betvleen various mterfering strategies, the balance between which may vary from language to language, and from one developmental stage of a language to another. s Diachronic change is one of the results of such a change m balance; another phenomenon which may be explained by taking this point of v1ew 1s the fact that many construction types in natural languages have 'hybrid' features, and can therefore be subject to 'multiple analyses, (Hankamer, 1977). If we accept this perspective, diachronic data are a valuable clue m findmg explanations for typological distinctions; they illustrate areas of linguistic structure where categones may blend into one another, and they can, therefore, be seen as indications of the underlying principles which are assumed to determine the distnbution of attested and non-attested language types. Related with this point is a second problem in the construction of typologies, which has to do with the indeterminacy of categortzation which one may encounter for some languages. I thmk we can safely assume that, in any linguistiC typology, one will come across at least a few instances of languages wluch cannot be categorized into one single class in a fully straightforward fashion. One of the causes of this mdeterminacy may be the fact that the language in questiOn has undergone (or is in the process of undergoing) diachronic change; another possibility IS that the language, in Its synchronic encoding
Introduction
19
pnK:cJurc, turns out to be J 11ttix' of two or more cru:oding po~~ibilitics. In such cases, I thmk the best way to act lS to accept this indeterminacy as an empirical fact, rather than to try forcing the language into one single category. Cases of indeterminate category status should, I feel, be treated as data in the same way as cases where the category status is straight~ forward; and the explanation one has for the typology as a whole should be able to handle not only the dear cases, but should also indicate why indeterminacy is possible. In this respect, I think there is a parallel with the view on idiolect vanation which is put forward by Eliott, Legum and Thompson (1969). These authors claim that Idiolect variation among native speakers (and, as a result of this, divergence of judgements of grammaticality) should be looked upon as a primary concern for linguistiC theory, rather than as a mere nuisance factor. ln therr view, cases of indeterminate grammaticality are empirical facts, which deserve explanation as much as those cases in which such indeterminacy is absent.
1.3.4
The evaluatton of universals
As I stated earlier, a first step in explaining the data which a linguistic typology offers us involves the formulation of implicational universals. In implicational statements, the defining characteristics of a particular typological option are linked causally or functionally to some mdependent characteristic of the languages in question; in this way, a correlation is formulated between the typological properties of a set of languages and some additional property, which serves as the basis of prediction for the observed typological features. As is generally the case in scientific inquiry, no sure-fire rules can be given as to the way m which such linguistic correlations are to be discovered. It is true that one may invoke a number of discovery techniques in th1s process (such as the use of a computer in testing a broad range of correlational possibihties); but, at least for the time being, one is forced to conclude that the procedure for discovering implicational universals is, in the words of Popper (1934), still very much a matter of •art, not science. Therefore, let us assume without further elaboration that the research project has resulted in the establishment of a set of implicational universals, which are intended to predict the typological variation that we have encountered in the sample. Obviously) such universals are, at this stage, nothing more than hypotheses about assumed regularities; they should be validated by·testing them against the facts of each separate language. At this point, we need to answer an rmportant question: what are the criteria of falsification for a universal? Or, to phrase this problem
20
A Cross-lingutstic Typology of Comparatives
in a slightly different way: how many counterexamples are we allowed to tolerate, before we must reject a universal as false? Regrettably, I thmk we have to admit that, for the moment, there
is no
linal and generally applicable answer to this question. Practice in recent Universal Grammar has shown that practically no universal of any significance is completely free of exceptions; by their very nature, lingu6ti< universals formulate tendencies rather than laws. From this general fact, it follows that universals, tf they are to have any theoretical funn and BJake, 1981; 36). 6 Of course, 1t may turn out later that my results are more m line WJth certain theorettcal alternatives than with others, but it 1s not my aim here to bring such deos1ons about. What I want to do is to estabhsh some charactensttcs of the comparative construction wh1ch must be incorporated tnto any theory of grammatical structure. This attirude, whach has been practised m the majonty of recent universalist studtes, ts
a healthy one, I think; It IS the best posSible guard agamst theoretical myopia, and it frees the empmcal work from the dogmatism which bas marred quite a large amount of recent theoretical linguistic discussion. It goes without saymg, of course, that I do not want to advocate the
po>ttion that universaltst grammar should be opposed to the formulation of theories, and that it should confine itself to mere data-gathering. Like all other forms of scientific actiVity, typological linguistic studies are a waste of time if they do not lead to theoretical progress, and the only way to achteve this goal is by means of the testing of theories. I do feel. however, that linguistic theories ha~re of late reached the point of nearsterihty, due to the fact that their empmcal baSis IS kept too narrow. Therefore, I agree wholeheartedly w1th Comrie's (1978b) dictum that, first and foremost, 'hnguisua. 1s about languages,' instead of being mainly about the techmcalines of grammatical models. 1.4 Outline of the following chapters In the following chapters, I will present the results of a typologtcal
mvesngation of the ways in which the concept of comparison of mequaltty is encoded in natural languages. Chapter 2 contains a discus· Sion of the cnteria which have been employed in establishing a typology of comparative constructions, and presents the actual typology of comparatrve opttons which results from the application of these criteria. In chapter 3, three candidates for the function of determinant of the typology of comparative constructions are considered; the conclusion ts that, of these three parameters, the parameter of temporal chatntng is the most promising. Consequendy, chapter 4 deals with the construction of a new typology, m which the various ways of codifying temporal chaining are laid down. In chapter 5, a set of impltcational universals is defined, in wluch the categones in the second typology are explicitly matched with the categories that have been attested in the typology of comparative constructions.
The chapters in part two of this study (i.e., chapter 6 to chapter 10)
IntroductiOn
23
lont.untbt• t•mtnrl(a/ data upon wh11.h tlu.· lll\IL'~t1g.lt1on n·-.t~. In ca~.:h of the~e chapters, one of the umver~~tls wh1ch have been formulated in
chapter 5 as examined for tts empmcal validrty, by re,-,ring It against the actual facts of the relevant languages in the sample. As a general conclusion, it can be said that the set of proposed tmphcational universals can be shown to be confirmed to such a degree that they may rightfully be considered to express valid correlatiOns. Fmally, in part three we take a closer look ac the explanatory value of the proposed set of universals. Smce this set of universals is found to be wannng m this respect, a new model for the explanation of comparativetype choice is d~veloped, in whtch the anginal set of universals has been incorporated. In the final chapter of part three, the empirical and explanatory adequacy of thts new model is put to the test> and found to be superior to the earlier model of comparative-type choice developed in chapter 5.
2 The Typology of Comparative Constructions
In th1s chapter, 1 will apply the methods of Typological Universal Grammar in the construction of a cross~linguisttc typology of comparative constructions. First, r will discuss the definitiOn of the concept 'comparative construction', and deal with some practical limitations and decision~ which I have made in my investigation. Next, I will present an outline of the criteria whtch have been used in the categorization of comparative constructions into types. The last sections of this chapter wtll be devoted to a discussion of each of the individual categories that have been established m the typology~ and a presentation of a few cases in which such a categonzation seems to be indeterminate.
2.1
The definition of the concept 'comparative construction'
In the preceding chapter (see section 1.3.2), the conclusion was reached that the basiS of a cross-linguistic syntactic typology should be defined in language-independenr terms. Accordingly, I proposed a semantic definttion of the notion 'comparative construction', which I repeat here for • convemence:
Definitzon: a construction m a natural language counts as a comparative construction (and will therefore be taken into account in the typology) if that construction has the semantic function of assigning a graded (i.e. non-identlc.tl) position on a predicative scale to two (possibly complex) obrects. Thus, a case of comparison of inequality rmmmally involves three things: a gradable predzcative scale, whtch represents the property on which the comparison is made, and two concepts, one of which represents the standard against which the other is measured and found to he unequal. The conceptual content of a comparative construction is elegantly phrased hy Small (1929: 12-11), who writes:
-.
...........
~
The Typology of Comparatrue Constructions
.!5
the speaker who uses compartson as a means of mdtcatmg the Intensity of a gJVen quality man object castl> about in hts mind for a second obje(t well known to the hearer which has that same quahty, perhaps m a greater or lesser degree. If he JS fortunare enough to htt upon a ~cond ObJeCt that, to the best of h1s JUdgement, ha!. the qu~hty m exactly the same degree as the object he IS dt.!.CU!>Mng, he may md1cate the mtensity of the qualtcy b)· equating the first object wtth the secor·d, thus: john ts as tall u the gate·poSt, or, The dog runs a.!o rapidly J~ the b1rd fl1cs. Instead of a second obJect of companson the speaker may also refer to a seco·1d rondttton of the first object ttself, thus: john 1s JUSt as accurate as he was m the
r1fle match a year ago. Th1~ wa.y of pomnng out the mtensny of a gi\'Cn J.ttr&bute may be termed the compamcm of equality. Should the hypothctic.1l speaker be unable to h1t upon J. ~ccond obJect or condltlon that exactly matche!t the firSt tn the qnabty observed, or !:>hould he desire to contrJ.St the fir!:>t ob1ect with the second, he w1ll call up to the: aucnnon of the hearer another ob1cct havmg the same quahty, but e1ther m a h1gher or a lower degree of mtens1ty. Thuo,: John IS taller than Maryi Dog!:> J.rc fncndbcr than cats; The patient JS now weaker than he was; I he poet wrote more Vlv&dly than the arust pamted. Tins sort of thmg may be~t be referred to a~ the compmtson of mcqualtty.
In what follows, we will be concerned exclus1vely with cases of the comparison of mequahty. Hence, I will usc the term 'comparative construction' or 'comparative' for the more accurate, but also more cumbersome term 'coru.truction wh1ch represents the companson of inequality'. Given th1s semantiC defimoon of the comparative, we should be able to identify the croS>·lmguistic codilicatton of thiS concept, thereby cstabh,h· ing the data base of the typology. However, before I can present an exposition of the attested typological vanants of the comparative construction, I must first pomt out a number of complications wh1ch .ue connected with the definitwn of the notton 'comparative consrrucnon', and mention several practical decisions whtch further restnct the M:OJX of the mqulfy. First, I have found it useful to confine my typology co those cases of comparatiVe constructions m whtch two obJects or mdtviduals {typzcolly expressed in the form of NPs) are being graded agam>t each other. The reason for this decision is entirely pracncal; whereas all grammars of the languages in the sample indicate the way m which NP-comparatlve are formed, they do not, in general, prov1de for sutfic1ently reliable clara on constructions in which other elements (say, adJecnves, verbs or clau~es) are involved. Thus, the prototypical sentence for our mve~ngatton will be a sentence along the lines of those in (1), and not of tho•e m (2):
A Cross-itngtllstrc Typology of Comparatwes
26 i/) 11.
/NI,fl\/1,
b.
f'he tree ts taller tha11 the house Jltkc J'aml'la better than J.ucy
(2}
ENGI./Sll:
,,
The general was more cunmng than brave
'
~I he team
b.
plays better than last year The prestdent ts smarter than you think
..
•'
Constructions hke those m (2) will be taken mto account only when we look at ~ome languages in detaiL In particular, they will provide evidence for our analysts of the comparative construcnons m Engltsh and Dutch (st c chapter 9). G1ven thJs hmJtauon to cases of NP-companson, the followmg termm-
ology wtll be adopted throughout the dtscusston. The lmgmsuc coddicaoon of the predicattve scale in a cornparat1ve construction wtll be termed the comparatzve pred:cate or stmply the predicate; in the maJOrity of examples, the comparative predicate wiH have the form of a predicadvely used adJective. Ot the two NPs m the construction, the NP which mdtcates the object that serves as a yardstick for the comparison (that ts, to use Small's terms, 'the second object') will be referred to as the standard NP. The other NP in the constructwn, whtch refers to the objective of the mental operatiOn of companson, will be called the comparee NP, Thus, in a ~entence hke (3), the NP Mary IS the standard !SP, and the NP John the comparee NP: (3)
ENGLJS/1:
John is taller than Mary The predtcat!ve adJeCtive tall, whtch names the scale on wh1ch the comparison takes place, Is the comparative predKate m this parncular comparanve construcnon. As a second prehmmary pomt, it must be realized from the outset that my typology of comparatives may suggest a d1v1sion among languages whtch looks more defimte and neat than tt actually IS, For one thing, I must concede that a number of languages m my sample have comparatives which do not seem to fit neatly mto one of the established categories. These language~ appear to have a 'mtxed comparative', that IS, a comparative m whtch the fundamental characteristics of two typological variants are combmed; I w11l say more about these cases m sectwn 2.5. Another phenomenon wh1ch weakens the strictness of the typology IS the fact that quite a few languages appear to have more than one alternative to express NP-comparbon. An example of a language in whtch thts is the
case
IS
Latm. In this language, the gradmg of two objects
agam~t
each
The 'typoiot,'Y of Comparatwe Constructions othl:r ~,., typtcally expresst:d by mc;1ns of a constructton like the one in (4)~ whtch con tam~ the comp,n..aivc p,trucle (flhlllt:
(4)
LATIN:
est eloquentror quam Cicero C.-NOM is more-eloquent than C.-NOM 'Cato is more eloquent than Cicero' Cato
However, as is noted m Kiihner-Gerth (1955), Latm has also the posstbility of a comparative like the one in (5). In th1s case, the particle quam 1s no longer present, and the standard NP 1s put mto the ablattve case: (5)
LATIN:
Cato
Ctcero-ne
eloquentwr est C.-NOM C. -ABL more-eloquent is 'Cato is more eloquent than Cicero' Faced wtth this double opnon for comparative-type chotec, I have chosen to categorize the languages m my sample in tw"o d1fferent ways. I take 1t that for each language there is a primary comparative construction, whiCh is somehow more 'natural' or 'unmarked' than its posstble alternatives. In the typical case, this primary comparative can be used more widely than any of its alternative options; 1 thus, for example, we will see in section 9.4.1 that the ablative comparative in Latm is restricted m tts use by certain spectfic conditiOns, whereas the quam-comparattve ts not. For this reason, Latin will be classified pnmarily as a language of Type 6 (a so-called Parttcle Comparative), and the ablative comparative wt!l be rated as a secondary comparative option for this language. Later on, I wtll argue that a language i:. not completely free m the choice of tts ~econdary comparanve(s); this choiCe can be shown to be governed by the same principles which determine the selection of its primary comparative form. To conclude these prehmmary remarks, one final pomt needs to be mentiOned. As can be easily observed, 1t would be possible to split up the languages in the sample into tw"o groups, on the basts of the fact that some languages require an overt marking of the predicate in their comparative constructions, whereas other languages do not. Restnctmg ourselves to predicanve adjectives, we find that a ma)onty of the languages under investigation do not use such an overt marking; m these languages, predicanve adjectives m comparatives retain thetr unmarked, 'positive' form. Some languages, however, mark a prediCative adjective m a comparative construction by means of a special affix (e.g., -er m English, German and Dutch, -ior m Latm, -bb m Hungarian, -ago m
BU:MA!i/d LBTRAS E AHTB', c .f}f;
F:Of>C/' f'' l
28
A Cross-linguistic Typology of Comparatives
Basque) or a special adverb (more in English, plus in French). I have not been able to find a principled way to account for this phenomenon of morphologic•! marking; that is, I have not succreded in finding an explanatory prmctple on the basis of which the presence or absence ol th1s marking can be predicted. 2 Hence, I will assume that the phenomenon of comparative~markmg IS Irrelevant to our typology of comparative constructions, and that it must be explained eventually in terms of (as yet unknown) regular~ ties which are independent of those that detennme the choice of a particular type of comparative construction. Therefore, I wtll not mdicate systematically whether or not a given language requires morphological marking of the comparative predicate; I will, however, refer to the comparative morpheme of mdividuallanguages at various
points in the dtscussiOn. 2.2 Parameters in the typology of In the following ;ecttons, I wtll dtscuss the parameters of my typology ol comparatives, that IS, those features of comparative constructions wh1ch constitute the basts of a categorization mro typeS. As I observed m sectton 1.3.3, the choice of such parameters is not completely theory-independent: objecnvely poShlble parameter> will always have to be weighed agamsr one another for their theorencal relevance and ut1iity. In my case, tlus evaluatiOn of possible starting points for a cross-linguistic typology of comparatives has led to a categorization in which the encoding of the standard NP (and the variation which can be observed in that encoding) is taken to constitute a highly significant factor. 2.2.1
Case assignment of the standard NP
Wnh regard to the encodmg of the standard NP in comparatives, a first dichotomy mvolves a split between derived-case comparatives and fixedcase comparattves. The parameter upon which this first distinction IS
based has to with the procedure by whtch grammatical case is assigned to standard NPs. In one group of constructions, this case assignment appears to be non-unique; that is, the standard NP is not put into one single case in all the instances of the comparative construction. Instead, the standard NP appeares to derive its case assignment from the case mto wh1ch the comparee NP m the construction has been put. Thus, if the comparee NP in the construction happens to function as a sub1ect, and IS therefore put mto the nominanve case, the standard NP in that construenon w11l also have nominative case; 1f the comparee NP IS 10 rhc
The Typology of Comparatrve Constructions
29
accusative case, they standard NP wJII also be marked for accusative, and so on. In short, we can observe here a parallehsm in case assignment to the two NPs m the construction, to the effe~t that the case assignment of the comparee NP appears to determine the case a~stgnment of the standard NP. Comparative constructions in which this ~ituation obtains will be termed instances of derived case. In contrast to this, other comparative con~tructions are more singleM minded, in that they employ one particular case form for the standdrd NP. That is, these constructions put the standard NP into one and the same obltque case form in all instances of companson, no matter what the case form of the comparee NP in the construction may be. In other words, the case assignment to the standard NP IS independent of the case assignment to the comparee NP in th1s type of construction. Comparatives
which exhibit this feature will be called instances of fixed case. The opposition between instances of denved case and fixed case can be illustrated by the two comparative constructions in Latin, which we briefly mentioned above. The Latin quamMcomparative can be shown to be an instance of derived case. Thus, tn sentence (6) the standard NP (that is, the NP following quam) IS marked for nommat1ve case, whereas 111 (7) the standard NP has received accusative marking: (6)
LATIN: • Brutum ego amo non mtnus quam tu love-lSG than you-NOM B.-ACC I-NOM not less 'I love Brutus no less than you (Jove Brutus)
(7)
LATIN: • Brutum ego amo quam te non mtnus B.-ACC I-NOM not less love-!SG than you-ACC '!love Brutus no less than (I love) you'
The variation in case marking of the standard NP m the~e two Latm sentences corresponds with a difference in interpretation. The Hrst sentence tn the pair must be translated as 'I love Brutus no less than you love Brutus', while the other sentence means 'I love Brutus no less than I love you'. Thus, m the first sentence it is the subJect NP ego (marked by nominative case) which must be interpreted as the comparee NP, and the scale on which the comparison is based can be phrased as 'the vanous degrees of intensity With which people love Brutus'. In the second sentence, the direct object NP Brutum (marked for al''! l o!!t.llll"
tln·
l'Olllp.m.T
NP, wlu.:n·,,.., tlw othrr
dauM·
hown to fail as an explanatory framework. For one thing, It can be observed that the set of umversals stated in (1) does not exhaust all the theoretically possible cases of combmations of word-order types. It IS a generally accepted fact m Umversal Grammar that natural languages are distributed over three maJor word-order types, vtz. SOY, YSONOS and SYO; these three word-order types are correlated to comparative types m the statements (Ia), (!b) and (ld), respectively. In addition, however, statemem (lc) clauns that a speafic comparative type, viz. the Locative Comparative, 1s correlated with either SOY or VSO word order. Now, given that at least some comparatiVe types can be correlated to two word-order types to the exclusion of the third, we may expect there to be other comparative types for which a correlation with a dtfferent combmation of word-order types can be ancsted. As It is, however, our data show that It is only the SOV-VSO comb1nauon whtch correlates wtth an empirically documented comparative type; there are no comparatt\'e types for which a cho1ce for either SOY or SYO, or a choice for either SYO or YSO, IS prescribed. As It Mands, the set of word-order-based umversals formulated above offers no pnncipled account for this empmcally attested exclusiOn of theoretically poss1ble combinanons of word-order types, and Its explanatory value is considerably weakened by this fact. As a second pomt, It can be !!een that the set of word-order-based umversals covers only four classes of comparative type~ out of six; for the ConJomed Comparative and the vanous mamfestattons of Parnclc Comparatives no correlation whatsoever wtth a parncular type of basic word order can be established. One might argue here that the Particle Comparative is only a mmor class, 1f a das~ at all. But even if we grant this, we are still faced With the uncomfortable situation that the correlation of comparative type to word-order type breaks down m more than 35 per cent of our pnmary cases of comparative constructions; this situation gets even worse once secondary options are taken mto account. l\1oreover, by accepting word order as the primary determmant of the typology of comparatives, one highly typical and Important variant m that typology, VIZ. the ConJOmed Comparative, Js left without any explanation of Its occurrence at all. Constderauons of this kind suggest that the relation between basic word-order types and certain comparative types, while undoubtedly real, should nevertheless be thought of as bcmg of a more mdtrect nature. They suggeM that we should be able to track down a new typological
56
A Cross-lingutstic Typology of Comparatives
parameter whrch intermediates between these two typologies. Of this intermedtate parameter, it should be required that It lead to a typology m which each category IS correlated both to a certain comparative type and, at the same tlme, to a certain word-order type (c.q. a combination of word-order types, or a lack of defimte word-order type). In this way, a word-order-based umversal of comparative-type choice such as (1 a) If a language has a Separattve Comparattve, then it has baste SO V word order
should be replaced by the syllogi;m (2), wh1ch clearly illustrates the concomitant status of word-order type in comparative-type choice: (2) a. Languages with a Separative Comparative belong to type A in the typology of X. b. Languages of type A in the typology of X typically have SOV word order. c. Therefor"' languages wtth a Separative Comparative typically have SOV word order. Thus, the establishment of a new determmant parameter for the typology of comparatives enables us (at least in principle) to maintain the empirical1y attested correlations between word-order types and certam comparative types, while at the same time the drawbacks of a d1rect correlation between these two typologies stand a chance of being eliminated. In the new model, the problems with which the set of wordorder-based universals confront us are transformed into issues regardtng the correlations between word-order types and the variants of the new intermediate typology. Hence, the explanatory value of this new parameter can be examined from two different sides. On the one hand, the new typology should be able to make correct predictions about the attested characteristiCS of the typology of comparative constructions. In addition, the new parameter should abo be able to incorporate the set of word-order-based umversals in a prinCipled, unproblematic fashion.
3.2 Spatial relations as a possible detem1inant
If we accept the lme of reasoning outlmed in the preceding section, our next problem IS of course to find out what this assumed new 'intermediate' parameter m1ght be. At this point, the system of the ways m which spatial relations are encoded in natural languages readily presents itself. As we observed in the foregomg chapter, the relation between spatial expression.!! and comparattves is most conspicuous in the case of
In Search of a Determinant Factor '
57
the various types of adverbial comparatives, but there is also a natural way m which the Exceed Comparative can be viewed as spatially derived. In short, one might venture the hypothesis that the typology of compa ratives ts the way 1t is because comparative constructions in natural language; tend to borrow their linguiStic mantle,tlon from the codtficatton of certain types of spatial notions. If we mvesttgatc this hypothesis for ItS value as an e>.piJ.nat1>ry framework, we can conclude that it IS certatnly satisfactory frorr1 a conceptual point of view. The idea that spatldl relations consntutc a more fundamental concept than comparbon IS not ltkely to meet wtth senou~ dh.agreement among lingmsts or psychologists. There are, how¥ ever, a number of ob1ecttons again~t this hypothesis whtch have to do with the formal way m which the parameter~ of spattal rclatton' and compan~on appear to be connected. First, it should be observed that the hypothesis, as it stands, does not offer a full matchzng of the types in the two rypologi"', While a relatton between spabal expressions and comparatl'\oes is ev1dent in the case of fixed-case comparatives, no such matching can be made m the case of derived-case constructions. Now, it mtght be argued that this tmperfect matchmg is Just a fact of life; one might mJ.IIltain that, apparently, some languages choose a spatial model in their encodmg of comparison, while other languages Simply do not. I think one has to admit that there IS, at present, no way to prove that such a p~ition is mconecr. I do feel, however, that, as long as the force~ behmd the phenomenon of linguistiC variation are still largely a mystery, one should aim at the formulation of universal theories which cover all the different hnguisnc mambtahOns of a given parameter, mstead of only a subset. As a second, and perhaps more damaging, objection, we can note that the hypothesiS, in its above formulation at least, falls short of the Criterion of exhaustiveness whtch I thscu..ed in sectron 1.2. Even for those languages in whieh a direct modelhng of comparison on spatial relations is evtdent, the hypotheSI• offers no restricted framework: it docs not answer the que!:ltlon of why it IS that some of these languages select a separative rel.ttiOn as their structural template of compari~on~ whtlc others prefer an allative or a locative relation. GIVen the plausible assumption that, in prmciple, all of these language~ have the means to encode all of these different spatial notions, we mru.t conclude that the '1ocalist' hypothesis advanced above 1~ not con~tramed enough to enctble us to make precise pred1ctlons vf the choice of comparative type m a given language. Notwi:h~tanding these objections, however, it remam~ an undemable and h1ghly !.ignificant fact that there IS a clo~e connection between the
A Cmss-lmguJSttc Tyf>ology of ComparatiVes
58
t:xpn·,..,wn of . . p.111.1l Jrl.111on.., .mtl romp.m . . on m .1 l.1r~c nwnlll'r of unrela1ed !Jngu.ag;t'-!1. Faced With thl:, ~mmgly par~1dox~e.1l !1-JtnatJon, I have adopted the followmg lmc of argumentation. I a"ume that the mental act of companson 1~, In ib cogmtive representation, indeed based upon ~patlal concepts; a further elaboranon of thi!. assumpnon w1ll be gwen 10 section 11.3. However~ a~t far as the linguistic codification of the concept of compartc;on 1!. concerned, I wtll defend the position that It is not ~panal location wh1ch IS the dctermmant factor m this encodmg, but rather the notion of temporal rhatnmg. Agam, I may pomt out here that locahst authors (e.g., Lyons (1977: 719)) have claJmed the ex~stence of a
progresstve degree of abstracuon m the order of 'spatial location', •temporal locaoon' and •absttact locaoon' (such as grammatical funcnons, <xJstent!ality, posse~~1v1ty and causanvity). GIVen this framework, the <entral cla1m of this study can be pbra,.d as tbe statement that comparative constructiOns m natural language~ are one more case of 'ab&tract locanon'. 3.3
Temporal chaining as the determinant of comparative types
\~a cogmt1ve
nouon, temporal chainmg can be defined as the process by whtch the mmd establishes 'the relation between two events, A and B, as overlappmg, preceding or following each other' (Traugott, 1975: 208). The rt.-sult of the mappmg of tht!. process onto a language system is a temporal cham, 1.e., a semannc configuration m wh1ch t"WO tensed
proposmons (representmg states or events} are presented succcsstvely. We will see m chapter 4 that, semantically, temporal chains can be d1v1ded mto two classes. In one class of cases, temporal chams must be mterpreted as staung that the events or states m questiOn occur at the same pomt m time; these temporal chains w1ll be referred to as stmultaneous (temporal) chams. The other class, m which the events or states refcncd tom the ch.ain must be taken to occur or ohtam one after tbe otherwdl be called consecutwe (temporal) chams. In addmon, I ac;sume that thts c;emantac or cognitive temporal chaining is mirrored formally by a range of syntactic consttucnons m which sentences or pred1ca~ are hnearly ordered w1th respect to one another. Thus, syntactic temporal chammg will be assumed to be the formal hngutstlc correlate of the semantic chammg of propositions; syntactiC chams represent the formal way~ m wh1ch the cogmnve process of temporal chaming IS encoded m natural language. Natural languages may vary m the ways m which they choose to encode temporal chaming, anJ hence It 1s possrble co con~truct a typology of syntactic chams. One
In Search of a Determinant Factor
59
of the h!.'M-known ,md m.110r w.tyl't m which tcmpor.tl ..·h.unmg can be torm.lhLcd 111 n.nur.tl l.mguagc& it:~ the .1pplic.1t1on ul the &trm:tur.tl procedure of coordmation of sentences or prediCates. However, ab we &ball see, coordination IS by no means the only option m syntactiC chaming constructions across languages. The central aim of th1s study IS to provtde evtdcnce for the positiOn that temporal channng must be 1dencified as the determinant of com para· nve-rype chmce m natural languages. Thus, I w1ll argue: that the chotce of .a particular comparative type for a language L can be predicted from the type (or types) of temporal chainmg which that language permits, and
that the attested occurrence of comparanve types across languages
1s
determined by the theoretically possible types of temporal chams m natural langiiages. As will become clear in chapter 4, the possibility of having certain types of temporal chammg m a given language is in Its turn pamally constrained by the basic word-order pattern of that language. As a result, the correlations between comparative types and word-order types can be accounted for. Thus, I will argue for umversal statements of the followmg general kind:
(3)
Languages wrth a comparative construction of type A must have a temporal charning construCtiOn of type X. Smce languages With a temporal chatnrng construction of type X typrcally have the word-order optton W, languages With a comparatrve of type A typrcally have the word-order option W.
In chapter 4 I shall g1ve a survey of the ways m wh1ch temporal chaming is structurally reahzed 111 natural languages, and followmg that I shall present a definitive statement of the universal.;; of comparative-type choice which I defend. Before domg so, however, It may be inreresting to advance a number of prehmmary reason• for thinkmg that temporal chaming might be the proper candidate for the mtervening parameter 111 our model. In particular, I want to quote here a number of facts whiCh seem to pomt to a possible formal relat1onshap between comparatives
and coordinations.
3.4
Preliminary data
Preliminary md1cat10ns that temporal chammg may be the appropnate candidate for the functwn of determinant factor m comparative-type choice stem from a vanety of sources. Fust, we can note that by postulatmg temporal chaining as a typological determmant, we can explam the occurrence of at least two of the maJor classes of compara-
60
A Cross-linguistic Typology of Comparatives
nvcs in a natural and direct fashion. These categories of comparative constructions appear as syntactic temporal chains even in surface structure: the ConJoined Comparative is structurally a case of sentential coordination, while at least some cases of the Exceed Comparative have the surface form of a :.enalizatlon, which ts a maJor syntactic chaining type 1n these languages. 1 Funher preliminary evtdence for the crucial role of temporal chammg in the choiCe of comparative type can be derived from a number of ISolated facts about the morphology of the comparatiVe constructions m various languages. At first sight, these facts may appear to be nothmg more than oddities, but they fall into a pattern once we assume a relatton between comparative formation and the formation of coordinated (1.e., a spectal type of chaining) constructions. On the one hand, we can note that, for a number of languages with a Particle Comparative, the comparative particle seems to be a lexical item that is also in use as a marker of (some type of) coordination between sentences. In Javanese, the element karo not only marks the standard NP in comparatives, but also occurs freely as the coordinating particle 'and'. Cp.: (4)
JAVANESE:
a.
Enak daging karo iwak is-good meat than fish 'Meat is better than fish'
7.
Bapaq menJang mg-desa karo simboq menJang ing-desa uga father go to -field and mother go to -field too 'Father went to the field, and mother went to the field too'
In Toba Barak, the comparative particle asa is also in use as an adverb tal consecutive marker, with the meaning 'and after that' or 'too': (5)
TOBA BATAK:
a.
Dumejak utang~na asa torop di obuk more-many debt -his than crowd of hair 'He has more debts than hairs on his head'
b.
Ningon dapot ho do i , asa gabe ho first have-got you EMPH this then rich you 'First you must have this, then you will be rich'
A similar siruatton as in Toba Batak may be claimed for the English comparauve particle than (see Small, 1923: 8; see, however, Joly, 1967 for a different opmton)) and possibly also for Standard Dutch, where the comparative parttcle dan is homonymous - and perhaps diachronically related- to the sentential consecutive marker dan •then'. Cp.:
In Search of a Determinant Factor (6)
STANDARD DUTCH:
a.
Jan is grater dan Piet J. is taller than P. 'Jan is taller than Piet'
b.
Eerst ga ik , dan gaat Jan first go I then goes J. 'Ftrst I will go, then Jan will go'
Furthermore, we observe that in Bari (Spagnolo, 1933: 266) the comparative particle na gwon functions as the adversative sentential coordinator 'but': (7)
BARf:
a.
Nan ktta bya na gwon do yeye7u I work more than you think 'I work harder than you think'
b.
SOromundi kata , na gwon kala 'bayin groundnuts exist but teeth exist~not 'We have groundnuts, but no appetite'
The situation m Bari is identical to that in Basque and Ilocano, where the comparative particles (baino and ngem, respectively) also function as the adversative coordinator 'but': 2 (8)
BASQUE:
a.
Jakes
b.
Ethorri da , bainan ez gogotik come-PCP. PERF he~is but not voluntarily 'He has come, but not out of free will'
(9)
ILOCANO:
a.
Nainimbag dattoy ngem datta good this than that 'This IS better than that'
b.
Nasayaat ti porion -ko, ngem daan bassiten good~one is carriage~my but already oldish 'My carriage is fine-looking, but It is already somewhat old'
baino lodi-ago da J.-NOM than fat -PRT he-is 'He is fatter than Jakes'
Lastly, the use of the coordinator but as a comparative particle can be attested both in older variants of English and in at least some dialects of modern American English. Sentence (10) is a !me from a play by Wilham
A Cross-lml{ursttc Tyfwlogy of Comparatwes
62
~h,tkc'lptoll •love m modem d1alects, from the Shetland Islands to Cornwall, from Ireland to the United States'. Example (14a) was observed in a number of West-English dialects, and example (14b) in an American dialect: (14)
NON-STANDARD ENGWH:
a. b.
I know better nor that lt'srichernoryou'lleverbe
Joly further mentions cases In which the po>Itive diSJUnebve irem or IS used as a comparative particle m Engbsh dialects. The use of or as a comparative marker appears to have been Widespread m Northern British dialects from about 1250 onwards. andean snll be found today m ScottiSh dialects:
(IS)
SCOTTISH ENGl.ISH:
tattle Der no a thing at I leek better ir a rosn there not a thmg that I hke better or a roast(?) potato 'There is nothmg !like better than a roast potato' Speaking of Scotland, we should mention that ScottiSh Gaehc use> the negative coordination na 'nor' as the parncle of companson> a feature which is normal for Celnc languages. Cp.: (16)
SCOTTISH GAEUG:
h baine Calum na Seumas IS fa1rer C than S. ~Cal urn is fauer than Sewnas' (17)
MIDDLE WELSH: (Strachan,
!909: 133)
Na werthu na ellwng nor sell-FliT. !SG nor release-FUT. !SG 'I will neither sell it nor Jet it go' Fmally, the situation in Latvtan's primary comparative 1s completely parallel to that m Gaehc: (18)
LATVIAN: (Endzelin, 1922: 233)
a.
Meitas
vecakas ne
mate
daughters older than mothers 'The daughters are older than the mothers'
Man nau ne tes ne mat I have nor father nor mother '1 have neither father nor mother'
A Cross-linguistic Typology of Comparatives
64
Not Only do the comparative particles of various languages appear to exhtbit relations to sentential coordinative (i.e., chaining) markers, but we also find cases where the obligatory morphological marking on the comparative predicate seems to be related to coordinatlllg items. For mstance, in Hmdi (whtch has a Separative Comparative if the standard NP is overtly expres.!led) the predicate in a comparative construction m which there is no overt standard NP must be preceded by the element aur. This item is also commonly employed as the connective element 'and' between dauses and phrases: (19)
HINDI:
a.
Ap aur bare haim you PRT big are 'You are bigger'
•
Usne bang/a sikhi
thi
aur hindi
he Bengali learning was and Hindi 'He learned Bengali and Hindi' A very similar situation is found in Goajiro, a language whJCh we discussed in section 2.5. In Goajiro, the item au/aka 'and, too' is reportedly (see Holmer, 1949) very often found accompanying the predicate in comparative constructions: (20)
GOAJIRO:
a.
Au/aka Rupeta mulia'u hulia Rafae/a PRT R. big than R. 'Roberto is taller than Rafaela'
b.
Au/aka etka ci
ta -melei
and dog this me-with 'And this dog is mine' In Tajik (Rastorgueva, 1963), the conjunction kham 'and, too' is at least phonetically identical to the marker of comparative predicates: (21)
TA}lK:
a.
Ruy-ash az
barf kham safed ast
face-her from snow PRT wh1te IS 'Her face IS whiter than snow'
Shumo na -rafted
man kham
na -raftam you not-go-PAST. l.SG I and/too not-go-PAST. !SG 'You d1d not go and neither did I'
In Search of a Determmant Factor
65
An identical situation obtams in OssetiC {Abaev, 1964): (22)
OSSETJC:
a.
Deu-e7 chuyz-der you-from good -PRT 'Better than you' Stalite serttwtoJ , meJ der skastt stars began-shine moon and/too rose 'The stars began to ~hme, and the moon came up'
Lastly, we note that tn Tarml (Beythan, 1943; Asher, 1982) the standard NP in comparatives is commonly followed by the suffix -um. Thi'> suffix is also the connective particle in conJunctiOns. Cp.: (23)
TAMIL:
a.
Agarar-il -um periyar antanar kings -from-PRT Brahmans are-great 'Brahmans are greater than kmgs' Agarar-um penyar -um kings -PRT Brahmans-PRT 'Kings and Brahmans'
All these facts, then, suggest that 1t mtght be worthwhile to take a look at coordinated (and other types of chaining) constructions as a possible determinant of comparative-type chotec. But, of course, the actual proof of whether such a determmmg relation exJ~ts must be given by examining the predictions which follow from such an a~:'.umption for the languages in the sample. I will turn to this matter in part two of this study, after an exposition of the syntactte types of temporal dummg (chapter 4) and the final statement of the universals which I propose (chapter 5).
4 Types of Syntactic Chaining
4.1
Introduction
A~ h•.h been noted by theoretical hngut!)t!>, comparatlVt' lmgut~t!>, Jnd gucmmarran~ of smgle exonc languagec;, syntactic chammg of a scnes of e consJ~tmg of the particle nil followed by a verbal noun. Thu'::> we have: (1)
IGBO:
Ha no n'oce nil Crt nn they ~at down PR. f eatmg food 'They :io.lt .md ate/They s.tt eaung' In the consecutive acuon con'::>tructiOn m Igbo, the fir::.t verb m the sencs may agam be m any tense, but all to1lowmg verbs have to be put mto the :>o~c..aHed N.arrar1ve Form. Jn the regular case, th•~ form conMSts of a verb stem With obligatory low tone and a verbal suffix -if-d. Thm. we get:
Types of Sy11t,u tsc ( :lwmmg (2)
J(;Jj();
() 1111
c,l!,lJt' g/m-e
ilgu
he took gun k1li~NAI{R kop.mJ 'He took a gun and killed the leopard' We can conclude, then, that m Igbo Simultaneous action and consecutive actton are formally kept apart m surface structure. In this particular language, syntactiC dtfferenttauon between the two chammg types takes place by repre.!>entmg non~first pred1cates m a cham by means of fonnally different verbal formatwns. As we shall see m the followmg sect10ns, other languages may employ d1ffercnt procedures to mark thts differen~ tlatwn; but smce the actual mechamcs of symacnc simultaneous and consecunve chammg m spec1fic languages are largely beyond the scope of th1s study, we wtll not pur~ue rlus matter further here. Oppo.Jmulraneous and consecut.JVe chammg 1:. not matched by a syntactiC oppotl tlltn.tl pro~o.nhll\' to two lorm,t!ly ary condltton on consecutive cham&, there to as~ume that Jt ts not a sufficient conditiOn. As the ltterarurc on consecuttve chatnmg IS
71
..,how!-., v.mou~ .H1tho1.., :-.t.Hc th.lt .111 ,1dd1tton.11 ..,l'lll.llll!L l.:ondttton ~hould be tmpo~cd: the event~ tn tht: Cwcham should not only be temporally ordered, but m addltlon they should be concetved of as 'parncularly closely related' (Welmers, 1973: 367). The exact nature of th1~ 'clo~e relationship' IS hard to pm down, but 1t seems that, somehow, consecutive ordenng 1mphe:. more than JUSt a mere temporal successiOn; It must also be the case that the ordered event~ in the cham should be
concerved of as successive stages m the progress of one complex 'total event'. Condus1on~ to th1:. effect can be denved from statements such as the one m Crazzolara (1933: 136), who states of the so-called Narrative Mood m Nuer: 'a IS used for connecnng successwe particulars of an event or transaction' (my ttahcs). Another example of an author who stresses the requirement that the events in a consecutive cham should be taken as the constituent particulars of one complex acnon ts Labourer (1934). In descnbmg the so-called In1uncttve Form m Mandmka, th1s author remarks that the verbal construction at l~ue 'marks ... that the performance of the actiOn or the acqmsJtJon of the state ts subordmated to the performance of another acnon or the acquiSition of another state' (p.202; my translation}. In connection wtth this additional condition of coherence between the successr"e events m a C-cham, It 1s also a rellmg fact that, m many languages, the pnmary examples of consecutive chammg tend to be constructions m whtch the first predicate m the cham descnbes a motion. Apparently, the k.tnd of temporal successton whtch has the property of being con~ecuttve i\ typically mmared by a movement, whiCh, so to speak, 'tnggers' the sequence of events of whtch the consecutJve series consists. Thus, an mmal movement appears to be preemmently appropnate to set up a context m whtch followmg events can be naturally interpreted as bemg contmgent upon one another; many of the examples of C-chams wh1ch we will encounter are of the kind Illustrated by the English sentences 'He went out and closed the door' or 'He ~tood up and left.' It must be admitted that there n;mam\ a cert.lm vaguenes'l m the above dcfi111t10n of consecutive chammg~ even tf we accept the additional reqlllrement of relatwnshlp or coherence between the evenrs m such a cham. Therefore, m add1t10n to pmtulatmg po~mve condmons, we may also employ a negative strategy to get a clearer picture of what must be counted as a consecutlve cham m a gtven language. We may contrast com.ecut1ve chains wtrh other type~ of con~tructiom which al~:oo express a temporal ordering between events, and which can therefore be assumed to be semantically cognate to C-chams. A first construction which comes read!ly to mmd m thJs connectiOn IS the final or purpostve comtruction. From a semantiC pomr of view,
72
A Cross-lmgutstic Typology of Comparatives
construcuons of thib type are meant to express that, of two successive events, the first event is/was performed With the purpose of brmging about the second event. Typical English examples of this final construenon include sentences m whtch the second event in the chain is encoded in the form of an infimtive, preceded by the conjunction to or in order to. Cp.: (8)
ENGLISJI:
a. b.
John stood up to close the wmdow john told that story m order to embarrass me
Semantically spedbng, final conbttuctlons are cognate to C-cham~ m that both construction types imply a successive ordering between events, and also an mt1mate relationship between the events in that success10n. There is, however, also a clear semantic difference, which can be stated m terms of the truth values of comecutivc and final assernons. Informally speaking, we can say that a final cham like (8a) is true even if the second event did not take place m reality; all that is needed for this assertion to be true is that the first event rook place, and that there was some intentiOn on John's part to perform the second action. In contrast, a Cchain like (9}
ENGLISH'
john stood up and closed the wmdow can only be said to be true if the closing of the wmdow by John actually happened. Notwtthstandmg this semanttc difference, the dtviding line between consecutive and final constmcttons is a diffuse one. This relative m~ determinacy ts at least partially due to the fact that, in consecutive constructions too, a purpose-reading is a natural implicatiOn; a C-chain like (9 ), which, stnctly speakmg, must be read as stating only a mere succession of events, is readily mterpreted as a sequence in whrch a spcc1fic mtenn.on on John's part IS present. In other words, C-chams are likely to be interpreted as a series of events m which the first actwn IS goal-oriented, and hence the demarcation between this type of construction and the neighbourmg final construction tends to be blurred. The semantic overlap between the two constructions has ItS parallel m the syntactic encoding of the two constructions which can be observed m a number of languages. For mstance, m Mangarayi (Eades, 1979) we find that there IS one smgle deviCe for the syntactic encoding of temporally successive events; the syntactic construction type 10 question may have a con~ecut1ve or a final mterpretation, depending on the context. Also, m Mandarin {L1 and Thompson, 1978) the serial verb construction which
Types of Syntactic Chainmg we discussed above sentence like (10)
IS
73
subject to this rype of mdetermmacy. Hence, a
MANDARIN' Ta hut '11a
kiin qmqt he return home see parents cHe returned home and saw/to see h1s parents' may have both a consecutive and final read mg. Even m English, we Cflme across a construction m whtch features of final and con!ie to viSit 'I'm going to Maastricht to viSit my parents'
•
De Boerenparti!
groe;de stonnachtig, om even
The Farmers' Party grew
stormily
snel
for equally rap,dly
weer te verdwtJnen again to disappear
'The Fanners' Party underwent a stormy growth, but had an oqually rapid downfall' In v1ew of thiS fluctuating distinction between final and con>ecurivc chaining, I have committed myself to the followmg guide-hoe. for tloo>e languages tn wh1ch a clear syntactic separation can be dernon!:>tmted between chains that have an excluMve consecut1ve mrerpretatton Jnd chams with an exclu&ive final mterpretatton, I have excluded all mstance& of the latter construction from my data base. Final chains have been admitted to the data baoe only for those languages in which no defimte d1~tinct10ns between both types of consuuctions could be made. Thus, for example, the Mandarin construction dlu~trated m (10) ts counted a. consccunonal cham'l have a number of semantiC features m common wtth consecutive chams: both types of constructton tmply a succetmctlOn m the ways In whtch consecutive chams are crov~-hnguJ!On of consecutive chains; as expenment~ by Eve Clark (1973, 1975) have shown, complex 1>entences in whiCh the leftmm.t clause m surface structure expresses the earher action m a successiOn are cons1derably easier to process than sentences in whtch this matchmg ha!!- been thwarted. Hence, the term antenor predtcate covers a JOmt semantic ,md .1rtrapfe (..,ce (29a)). However, when the subjects m the cham are not 1denncal, the antenor predicate must be turned Into a verbal noun, wh1ch IS then put mto the ablanvecase (see (29b)). Cp.: (29)
8URmHASKJ'
a.
Dmm dogaru·su -mt Come-PCP. PAST a;ked ·her-3SG MASC 'He came and made mqume~ about her
7
Xurts
lang
mamntt·tsrnn
11t1lmW
dust-NOM away move·VN-ABL mother-his-NOM yet -su -man saw-h•m-3SG. FEM
'The dust moved away and his mother saw h1m' As J second remark, It should be pomted out that matters are actually somewhat more comphcared than a simple bipartition mto conditional and absolute deranking ;uggem. For some languages (e.g., Lann and Mangaray1), we find that conditional deranking is not only possible if the subjects of the two predicates in the cham are idenncal; m addition, the procedure for condinonal derankmg can also be apphed If the subject of the derankcd prediCate i& tdenncal to some other, non-subJect, NP zn the other clause of the cham. Thus m addition to a case of 'real' condittonal derankmg hke (30a), m wluch there IS subject·ldenmy for borh predicates m the C-chain, Lacm also allm.vs constructton~ ltke (JOb); m thts latter con.!.truction, a predicate has been deranked condmonally on the basts of the fact that its subJect 1~ tdenncal ro rhe tndtrect obJect of the ocher clau~e. Cp.: 7
(30)
LA11N:
a.
Pompetus vtctus P.-NOM
Caesart naves
defeat-PCP. PERf. PAS;. NOM C.-DAT sh1ps·ACC
reddtdtt g1ve back·PER~.IND. 3Mi 'After Pompoms had been defeated, he gave back the ships to Caesar'
Caesar
Pornpew vzcto
C.-NOM P.·IlAT
defeat-P(.I>. PERF
naves PA~). DAT
shlps-ACC
reddtdtt g1ve back-PERF. IND. 3;G 'After Pompetus had been defeated, Caesar gave the shtp; back to h1m'
·-·
11 ..
88
A Cross-linguistic Typology of Comparatives
It must be s.tiJ, however, that this possibility of conditional deranking under Identity wtth a non-subJect IS rather marginal in natural languages. As far as I know, no language permits this type of non-subJect Identity on conditional derankmg while at the same time forbidding condittonal derankmg under subJeCt·tdentlty. On the other hand, there are numerous languages whiCh permit cond1t10nal deranking only if the Identity relatmn holds between two subJects. It must be noted that we will cons1der cases of derankmg like the Latm sentence (30b) as a (marginal) instance of conditional deranking~ anJ nor as an mstance of absolute dcranking. The reason for th1s •s that, m sentences like (30b), there IS at ledst some conditiOn of identity involved, even if this identity does not hold between two subJects. On the other hand, in cases of absolute derankmg no condttion of tdentlty holds between any con~mucnts of the two clauses m the cham.
4.4.2
Directronaltty
In addition to the typological vananon brought about by the presence or absence of subJect-Identity condtbon&, there IS a second structural factor which leJds to a typological subcategonlation of deranked consecutive constructiOns. Tins factor concerns the directzon of the derankmg procedure. That "'• we can d1vide deranked C-chatns inro two typologtcally significant clas~es, on the ba~i~ of whether it is the anterior predtcate or the posterior predtcate wh1ch ts affected by the derankmg procedure. In what follows, I wtll refer to these two options as anterior (consecutzve) derankmg and postenor (consecutrve) deranking, respectively. Now, it can be observed that, in the choice between anterior and posterior consecutive deranking, basic word order seems to play a dcterminmg role. In particular, 1t appears to be the rule that deranktng
languages wrth S0 V word order derank all anterior predtcates m a consecutive cham; that is, they derank all predicates 10 a C~chain except the last one. Thus, the unmarked case for a C-cham in a deranking SOYlanguage IS a constructton in whtch only the last predicate in the cham retains its fin1te form, while all precedmg prcdtcates recetve the form of a participle, a gerund or some orher specifically marked morphological complex. The preference of derankmg SOV~languages for anrer10r consecutive dcranking is illustrated in the examples from Latm, Tamtl and Burushaski quoted above, and in the following sentence from Korean:
l
--Types of Syntacuc Charnmg {31)
89
KOREAN:
Pulle il sigiera call-PERJtc dtrectionahcy seems to be the rule. In deranktng languages With the~e baMl word orders, the unmarked case IS that only the first predicate m a com,ecutlvc chain retains its fimte status, whtle all follo\.\.mg pred1catc~ are dcrankcd mto root form~, infimtives, verbal nouns or speafi< conjugatlo•ul forms. Clear examples of SVO-Ianguages wh1ch havunun.uy, then, we t.m fornwl.lt'l' the following two o.,tatcnlcnt~ on the dJrct..tlonJ]Jty of con~ccutivc dcrankmg:
(l4) a.
if
an SOY-language deranks
1ts
C-chams,
1t
tllllVl'r'>.ll
wt/1 derank
antertor predrcates.
b. If SVO-languages or VSO-/anguages derank thetr C-chams, they wzll derank posterzor pre.dzcates. It 1s only fair to pomt out here that these two ~tatemenrs must be taken as tendencies rather than law~: they formulate the unmarked cases of directionahry. Thus, for mstance, statement (34a) 1mphes that It IS normal for a dcrankmg SOY-language to prefer anterior derankmg of consecutive prediCates, but thi~ preference r,hould not be conceived of as a law which perm1ts no dcvi<J.tiOn. In our sample, we come across at least one counterexample to statement (Ha); Kanun is a derankmg SOY~ language whKh nonethe\ec:,c; prefers po.,tcrior derankmg m C-chams. 3 Wnh statement (34b), counterexamples are even more numerous. Fm~ msh, Engll~h, Dutch and French are all cases of SVO-languages wh1ch have at least margmal po decankmg SVO-
A Cross-lmgurstrc Typology of Comparatives
94
l.mp,,lgt·'> ~,.In h11111 thnnwh('-. to tlu: 'c,l\ll'f' pH~t.. t•dmc ol uHH.IttiOlhtl dcr.mkmg. It goes Without ~aymg, however, that tb1~ explanatu.m of the fact• on (37) 1s rather a temanve one, and that much p&ychohnguistic
research mto the process of derankmg will be needed before we can tell whthcr there is any plausibility to an analysiS of th1s kind.
4.4.4 Subtypes of consecutr"e derankmg If we accept the vahdny of the umversals presented Ill sect10n 4.4.3, we are m a posltton to reduce the subcategorlzanon of de ranked consecuttve construcnons to a typology whtch contams three baste n~btypes. These three typologiCal opnons form dusten of properties wh1ch are connected wrth condJtionahty, directionality and basic word order, and can be
defined as follows: (a) consecutive chams with absolute deranking of the antertor predrcate. Typically, languages with th1s option have SOV ward
order. •b) consecutive chains with absolute deranking of the posterror predtcate. Typ1cally, languages With this option have VSO word
order. ~c)
consecutive cha1ns w1th conditional deranking of the posterior
(>redicate. Typically, languages with this option have SVO word order. 4.5
The fonnal
exprcs~ion
of simultaneous chaining
In the precedmg section!!- of th1s chapter our mam concern has been with the way in wh1ch the semantiC concept of consecutive chammg 1s caddied m the ~yntact1c surface \trUcturt.'~ of natural languages. I wtll now make a few remarks on rhe codificatiOn of the other vanant of temporal chammg, v1z. stmultaneous chazmng. Our discussion of thts subtype of temporal chnmmg can be relattvely brief, smce a number of notions
v,.h1ch are necessary 1n the descripnon of the various types of simultaneous chams have been dealt With extensively dunng our survey of the subtypes of consecutive cha1ns. As far as the semantic, language-Independent defimtion of the nonon of 1 Simultaneous chaming' 1s concerned, maners are relauvely stratght-
f<Jrward. We can define a simultaneous cham (ot S-cham) crosshngmsncally as that construction type which expresses a situauon in wh1ch two events happen at the same pomt m tzme, or a situation in whtch two states obtam at the same potnt m ttme. Included m thiS
Tyf't'-" uf Syntattu Clwmmg
tldimuon .Ire .tl\(' Engh~h
adverbtal dau~c~ which are mtroduced by the conjunctwm. (ilt the ttme) when or uohrlc. A ~omewhat spec1al ca~e of 'l1multaneous chams is formed by those chams m wh1ch the two events or states are set off
agamst each other in a relation of adversatw1ty. Roughly speaking, in this ca~J~e
the two events or states are sa1d to happen c.q. obtam at the same time desp1te expectations to the contrary. A typ1cal cod1ficanon of such an adversative chain in English I& a coordinated structure m whtch cwo
sentences are hnked by the connecnve but. The syntacnc encodmg of Simultaneous chammg parallels the encodmg of consecutive chammg m a number of Important respects. For one thmg, JUSt hke C-chains, S-chams may be expressed euher by a balanced or by a deranked structural configuratiOn. That ts to say, m some languages the simultaneous cham has the shape of a syntactic coordmanon between clauses or sentence& c.q. the shape of a matn dause wtth an embedded
temporal clause, whereas m other languages one of the two predicates m the S-cham is morphologically marked for subordmanon. An example oi a language in wh1ch S-chams have to be balanced IS Pala: (38)
PAl-A:
Da e1tum ra tamat ma da so ra hanszk one·w11l eat the b1g and one-w1ll plant the small 'The b1g (yams) will be eaten and the small ones wtll be planted'
Tibetan, on the other hand, IS a language m wh1ch Simultaneous chams are obligatorily deranked, in the manner shown by example (39): (39)
TIBETAN:
Lam nan-pa -ym-las rta agrul-ma ·thub road bad-one-be -PRT horse walk -not-able 'The road was bad and the horses could not walk' A second parallelism between the cod1ficanon of simultaneous and
consecutive chains hes in the fact that deranked structures of both types of temporal chaining are subject to the same kmd of cond1ttonaltty. In the same manner as we observed for de ranked C-chain>, deranked S-chams can be subdivided into structures m wh1ch absolute derankmg IS pos be posstble t mack pred1cates a!. leftmost or rightmost, even m 5-chams. Som1· languages which derank thetr S-chain~ may have a preference for th{· deranking of a leftmo>t or a rtghnnost predicate in such chams. Ttbetan, for example, obligatorily deranks leftmost prediCates m Mmult ..tneou has been formally neutralized m a total or partial manner.
Secondly, for both of these semanttc subtype; a pnmaty spilt in thm possJbdJttes of &yntactJC codificatiOn mvolves the d1stmcnon between the structural opt'IOO'i of halancmg and deranking. Tlurdly, wlthm the category of deranked chammg constructiOns, both consecutive and ~trnultaneous cham~ can be !:>ubcategonzcd ac; instances of either conditional or ab~olute derankmg. Fourthly, m the case of drranked consecunve construcnons, the ~pht ben."' een condtttonal and abc;olute derankmg mtera.ct!:> w1th the d1stmct1on benveen antenor and poc;tcnor derankmg; this latter dJ!:.tmctlOn correlate!:> w1th the basic word order of the languages at issue. The mteractwn of the two di!:>tmctiOn produceasai, another Nilotic VSO-Ianguage. Opposed to this, two Australian languages (viz. Gumbamggir and Mangarayt) and the two Polynesian languages in the sample (MJ.on and Samoan) have the possibility to
derank predicate~ m ~unultaneous cham~, but, as far as I know, they lack a dcranking optmn for consecutive chams. However, the general tendenq m my sample IS cle:1rly that language~ wtll employ the same basic strategy m both the formahLJuon of stmultancous action and the formalization of •
consecutive actiOn.
The strw.:tural parallebsm between consecutive and encoJmg can al:)o be observed
10
simultaneou~
rhe kmd of condttionality under wh1ch
the two types of chJtnmg constructions can be deranked in a language, gtven that they can be deranked at aU. In general, it appears to be the case that, if a language ha< margmal) acceptabihty of a case of absolute consecuuve derank111g ltke (46b): (44)
FNCL/S/1:
john 1umped out of hrs cha~r and grabbed a gun (45)
FNCLJ\H:
Havmg lumped out of hrs charr, john grabbed a gun (46)
loNCL/\H:
a b.
John's ull{e left htm and he took to drmkmg Hts wtfe havmg left htm, john took to drmkmg
Morcover 1 English also seem& to have a hm1tcd poS!I.Jbdlty of postenor consecutive derankmg, whtch (English bemg an SVO-language) IS restricted to con must be seen as a c.:onceprual extenMon of the mental operatiOn by which two events are ordered with respect to their occurrence In ttme. This claim that, m a sense, compilTtson is a cognitwe metaphor of temporal chainmg may be of interest to both semanticists and cognitive psychologists. 1n formal hnguistic theory, acceptance of our modellmg-hypotheM; may ledd to the conclu;ion that, In umversal grammatiCal theory, we do not need construction·specific synta mentioned m chapter 2. As I noted m sectiOn 2.2.2, a first spin m the typology of comparat1ves concerns the distmctlon between comparanves tn wh1ch the standard NP has denved case and (.Omparanves m wh1ch the standard NP is put mto a fixed case. Now, our da1m 1s that the d1stnbut1on of these two optiOns over the languages m rl1e !.ample can be prediCted from the way m wh1ch the~c languages can be categonzed With respect to rhe first maJOr formal d1stmcnon m the cxpreOn, IS
and which 1s most frequently encountered in reld.tive dauses. The marker -ka turns out to be the genera) separative marker 'from', whtch aho appears as a suffix on the standard NP m Bedauyc eT 3SG •After the boy had been born, the hon ;wed h1m' In Andoke, the >randard NP m comparJtlves i; formed by the suffix ~aha,
wh1ch must be glossed as 'since' or 'from the point of vtcw of (Landaburu, 1979: 162-3). ThiS particle Jbo appear> a; a ;uffix on the anterior predicate m C·chains; m th1~ ca:,c, the antcnor predtcate has been nominalized by the suffix -i, and its subJect must be represented by
posseo;sivc mfixes. Cp. :1
II:!
171 ,r.
b.
·1 estmg tl>e Set of Chammg·bascd Unwersals \\'/)()/1.1•
Yadu yo 'he b -aya
~ehtronger than that man' Eka -se s -e -te -r -aha be ka -srko-t nver·th!S down·lts·dry-NOUN-from IND IPL·fish -ASS 'The nver ha~ fallen and we have fished~
The derankmg of anteriOr predicates by means of a nommahzmg stutegy IS also the procedure chosen m jurak. Apart from the nominahzanon suffix -an, a deranked Jntenor predicate 1s also obllgatonly
marked for :,ubJcct, regardless of whether this subJeCt IS Jdenucal or nonldt nncal to the subject of the mam verb. Given that the deranked predicate IS a nommahzanon n ts not surprising that this subject markmg takes the form of po'>'>C'i'ilV!! affixes. Fmally, a deranked anrenor pred1cate 111 a Jurak C-cham requires the pre;ence of the marker -hddlkohod. Thas 1> a separanvc case suffix wh1ch may appear w1th all nommals, tncludmg the standard NP tn comparat1ves. Cp.: 7
!8)
}URAK:
a.
Ty w"enu·kohod ptrcea rcmdeer dog -from b1g 'A remdeer ts btgger than
'After he arnved home, he threw the p1eces of nb to both s1des of hts tent'
The Austrahan language Aranda JS, m the words of Strehlow (1944: 2(>7), 'a language of pat11c1ples; and mo>t Enghsh clauses m wh1ch a fimte verb ts mtroduced by a conJunction would be rendert:d mto Aranda b) mrnmg thts fimte verb mto a parnaple and om1ttmg the conJunction: The parttctple whtch represents antcnor predicates m C-chams ts called the Prerente Part!Ctple. Tin\ ~~ a form whtch consists of the verbal stem, followed by the paG return·PERF.l"ffi_ IPL 'After the enemy had fled, we returned'
Wrth respect to the formal encodrng of chainmg m Tajik, Rastorgueva (1963: 100) remarks: 'If there are several verbs in a sentence that are related to a smgle subject and not dependent on each other, then all of them, except tor the very last, are usu.-lly in the gerund form, thus makmg together wtth therr supplementary and explanatory words the so-
called gerundial phrases .... The past gerund here tndicates an action whrch precedes that expressed by the fimte verb.' As to the conditionality of this deranking procedure, the author states explicitly that 'there rs quite wide-spread m Ta)rk a so-called absolute construction, i.e., the kind
of situation when a fimte verb and a gerund, wtthin the hmits of a single ~ntence, each have the1r own separate subject' (Rastorgueva, 1963: IOIJ. Cp.:
The Separative Comparattve
125
(23)
TA]/K:
a.
Ruy-ash az barf kham safed ast face-her from snow a nd/too white JS 'Her face IS whiter than snow'
b.
psramard kztob boy on carpet Stt-PERF GER old man book mekhond read-PAST. 3SG 'After the boy had ;at on the carpet, the old man read a book (to him)' Bacha rut gz/em tuchasta
Gerundial formo; as repre~entations of anterior pred1cates m C-chams
can also be encountered tn Hindi, where such forms are marked by the attachment of the suffix -karl-keto the bare (1.e., tense-less and personless) verb stem. Absolute usc of such forms~; po;,1ble; McGregor ( 1977: 39) observes that 'the subject implied man absolute form 1s generally the same as that of the main verb in tts sentence, but not invanably.' Cp.: {24)
HINDI:
a.
Ap us -se bare haim you him-from big be-PRES. 2sG 'You are bigger than him' Vahim bazth-kar bat -em homgi there sit -PERF. GER matter-PL. FEM be-FUT. }PL. FEM 'We will sit there and have a conversation'
The sttuation in Kashmiri is very simtlar to that tn Hindi, its IndoAryan relative in my sample. In Kashrnir1, too, anterior prediCates m Cchains are deranked by means of the attachment of a subordinatmg suffix to the bare verbal stem. Absolute use of these forms tS pcnnitted. Cp.: {25)
KASIIMIR/:
a.
Yt
kant
nishin trakur chu thts-INAN ~tone from hard ts 'This IS harder than stone' Nalama -tt rat -tth tam1s mztln d1tsOn embrace-with setze-PERF. GER to-htrn ktsses were-given~by-htm 'He embraced htm and k1ssed htm'
The attachment of subordinating suffixes to bare verb stems tS a deranking procedure whrch appears to be rather popular among the languages of this class. This strategy in the encoding of anterior consecutive predicates is also followed in Japanese, Burmese, Korean, Khalka,
'I tho •x.mpb giVen wdl >how, Jll thc>c languages permit absolute use of the1r deranked antenor predicates m Cchams. The Separative Comparanve m Japanese 1s matched by the so-called Gerund!ve (Kuno, 1973: 195) or Continuative (Kuno, 1978: 121-2) Form, whtch consiSts of the bare verb stem with the suffix ·te. The semanncs of this form are rather mtricate (see Kuno, 1973: 196-9), but there IS no doubt that It IS a subordmate form (1b1d.: 200-9) and that ItS b.tsic meamng 1s that Jt 'represents a temporal or logical sequence (1.e., "and then, and therefore") ... It 1mphes that S1 has taken place before Sl does' (Kuno, 1978: 122), Cp.: (26)
)APANESI:.:
a.
Nlhon-go wa dozts-go yon muzukasht Japanese TOP German from difficult 'Japanese IS more d1fficult than German' Bukka ga agat-te nunna ga komatte tru prrces TOI' riSe ·GI:.R all lOP suffenng are 'Prtces have nsen and all arc suffenng·
In Burmese, derankmg of antenor predicates inC-chains is effectuated by suffixmg the ~ubordmatmg particle -pt 1 after' to verbal stems: (27)
8URML"Eo
a.
Thu-hte? pem -te him -over be thm-NONI'UT 'She IS thmner than h1m' Se~
pye -pt em pyan -thwa-te mmd be desrroyed-GER. PEI\F home return-go ·NONFUT
'He got fed up and went home~ In Korean, we note agam the existence of ~a-called Converbs, that IS, 'verba! formations which, through their endmg and meanmg lead us to undcr,.,tand that the sentence is not finished but ... the main verb is lollowmg. In the European languages the two verbs arc united by the normal con}uncttons, but the Korean language, whtch has no conJUncnons, possc~scs, hke aH AltaJC languages, m.my bpec1al formations for connectmg one acuon wnh another' (Ramstcdt, 1968: 87). For our purpoc;e, the most relevant of these converbs IS the Converbum Perfecn, which IS formed from verbal stems by means of the suffix -ef-sJe. 'It would be poo;o;;tble to catl rlus form converbum anterwns. It g.~ves the acuon of the first verb as m time precedmg that of the following verb' (tbtd.: 89). Unfortunately, all the examples of this converb gtven by Ramstedt are mstances of non-absolute use; one of these examples Is:
The Separartve ComparatiVe
127
KOKI·AN:
l'henzir-tl s -SJe narera letter-ACC wnte-CONV PERF send-IMP 'Write the letter and send tt' We may note, however, that absolute use of the Converb Perfecti can be documented in constructions where thts converb is modified by adverbtal part1cles, which give the converb a concessive meaning. An example of this case is semence (29); as Rarnstedt (tbtd.: 89) expltctrly remarks, the converb in -s1e is used here 'to stre~ the difference in time': (29)
KOREAN:
Mawe -s}e do mekesso be bitter-CONY PERF even eat-FUT 'Although it is better, I will ear It'
Also, tt can be observed that other converbal formatiOnS may certamly appear in absolute constmctions (ibid.: 95 and 103): (30)
KOREAN:
Mun ktpht-na kenne kagesso water deep -CONY. CONCESS we go over-FUT 'Although the water ts deep, we will cross it' 31)
KOREAN:
Pab -il meget-ca saramr wata food-ACC eat -CONY. MOMEl, th1s separative marker may actually be a composition of the two suffixes -e and -s1e which fonn an tenor converb;. Cp.: (32)
KOREAN:
Na-eso to kheda 1 -from he btg-PRES 'He is bigger than me• Converbs, of the k1nd discussed above,. are also a common feature of the codification of chaining in Khalka. Street (1963: 219) mentions a considerable number of !>uch adverbiahzed formst wh1ch are all formed from verb stems by the suffigauon of 'converb1al particles'. For our
•
128
Testing the Set of Chaining-based Universals
purpose, it looks as If the converb in ~; 1s the most relevant, smce it refers, among other thmgs, to 'an action that precedes another in time, but is somehow related to tt' (Street, 1963: 221). Absolute use ofthis converb is
quite common. Cp.: (33)
KHALKA:
Uur cai -J g,egjee orloo day dawn·CONV light appear·PERF. IND. 3SG 'Day has dawned and light has appeared'
The posstbdity of absolutely deranked antertor predicates in C·chams matched by the occurrence of a Separative Comparative in Khalka: (34)
IS
KHALKA:
fame cham-aas targan J. you ·from fat-PRES. 3SG ')arne is fatter tban you' In the gerundial or converbtal constructions presented above, the
deranked predtcate did not change its category status; altbough being deranked, It retained its full verbal cbaractenstics, such as the possibility to take subjects •nd direct objects. In other languages, tbe deranking of a predicate stem by means of •uffigallon leads to a loss of verbal character. Specifically, it turns out that, in some cases, the deranking procedure resuhs in a nomtnalization of the predicate; this nominal character is
brought ro light by the fact that such deranked predtcates take possessive affixes or genitives to mark their subjects. One c..e of this nominalization is Eskimo. This language has Sub· ordinate Forms, marked by specific suffixes after the verbal stem. The suffix for the Past Subordinate Form, which IS used to encode anterior action in C~chams, ts -ngalmma. To this suffix, personal suffixes are obhgatori)y attached;
can be observed that these personal markers are related to the possessive suffixes on nominals (Thalbitzer, 1911: 1045). By the use of these person markers, absolute construction of the Past It
Subordmate Form IS made possible. Cp.: (35)
ESKIMO:
Angu-ssa -tik qalat-tart -nga -ta catch·PCP. PASS.·REFL.. POSS b01l -tbrough-PA~,·.sUBORD.·3PL natsern-mut poonutaq ilt -ssu -aat floor •DAT diSh put·FU L IND.·3PL TRANS 'After the things they have caught have been boiled, they will put them on the floor m a dosh'
The Separative ComparatiVe (36)
Una apum-it
qaqo -R-ne
this 'illOW-from white NOUN 'This is whiter than snow'
-R- u extst
129
-wo
- q
PRES. IND 3SG
In T up1, anterior predicates m C-chaim, are deranked by means of the postposition -rtre 'after, on verbal stem!), whtch cannot have reme markmg in this case. The nominal chara, we may conclude that Cceur d'Alene (and Kabspel) are cases of (Indirect) corroboration of Umversal 3A, despite the fact that they constitute a deviation of the unmarked word order for their class. Samllar observations can be m.a.de with regard to Classical Arabic and B1hhcal Hebrew,' although for these language> the facts are a hrtle bit more problematiC. There can be no doubt that the comparative m these two SemitiC VSO-language." of the separative type. The standard NP in both con"trucuon~ 1s marked by the prepos1t1on mm, wh1ch is also used f! eely as a spatial marker with the meaning 'from': 142)
CLASSICAL ARABIC:
Laysat al -msa "adcafa mm a/ -n1alt not the-women weaker from the-men 'Women are not weaker than men'
UJ
The Separatwe Comparattve (41)
II rill/( t\1, 111·1/RioW:
llakam 'ctteh mul- dt~m'el WISC
YOU '
from D.
'You are Wiser than Dame!' (EzechtcJ, 28~3) Now, from the literature on these languages (see, e.g., Nasr (1967) and
Yushmanov (1961) for Classical Arab1c and Brockclmann (1956) for B1bhcal Hebrew) •t turns out that the nonnal way of expreS>mg consecunve acnon m these languages ts the use of a balanced construction with a connective partide. Cp.: (44)
CLASSICAL ARABIC:
Qama fa kataba stand up-PAST. 3SG and write-PAST. 3SG 'He stood up and wrote' (45)
BIBLICAL HEBREW:
Halak Diivtd waJ-Jtdros' go-PAST. 3SG, MASC D. and-search PAST, JSC MASC 'et has's'ar the-ACC officer 'David went and looked for the officer'
G1ven this state of affa•rs, one m1ght conclude that both ClasSical Arable and Biblical Hebrew are counterexamples to Umversal 3A; they have a Separative Comparanve, but the~r C-chams are balanced, I thmk, however, that these two apparent counterexamples can be explamed away.lf we look a little closer at the optiOns for consecunve chaming in these languages, we find that they have also a hmtted possibility of deranking their consecunve predtcatcs- In Classical Arab1c, It IS possible to tum anterior VPs mto verbal nouns, the subJect of wh1ch comes to be constructed as a genitive (c,q. posseSsiVe) form. The anterior clause is further marked by a nominal preposition, usually ba'da 'after', but we also find cases in which the preposition mm 'from' •• used wtth the meanmg of our subordinatmg COOJUOctJon srnce. An example as: (46)
CUSS/CAL ARABIC:
Ba'da duhulr -nt al -bayta kataba after entering-my the-house-Ace wnte-PAST. 3SG 'After I had entered the house, he wrote'
In B1bhcal Hebrew, a very s•m•lar sJtuauon holds, Here too we find that anterior clauses in C-chams can be constructed as prepmmonaJ phrases, In which the anterior predicate has the form of the so-called 'infimtivus constructus'. Th1s is a nommahzed form. the sub1ect of which must be indicated by a gemtive NP or a possessive suffix. Clearly Biblical Hebrew
------~--~.
~,
'" "'
-
-
"
~-
'" ""'
"'"'"""
~~
,,b_/,,;;;4t~hr-.r.ii-i$iimA'iMIItm·*"e
'
>
•
•
-
· · ww, nnllli1illili ·ow!!? n ~ · t' ]{' :: if10m•m"tt:-:~n~••· I
I
Testmg the Set of Chammg-based Unit•ersals
132
-
permits absolUte use of anterior predicates which are deranked in this way. An example is: (47)
BIBLICAL HfBREW:
Mm mosa' dabiir s'alu'im s'ib'iih from go out-INF word ... weeks seven ·From the moment that the word went out ... (it has been) seven weeks' (Daniel9,25) It must be adm1tted that the procedure of derankmg which is described above is rather untypJcal, or at least stylistically marked, for both languages; there is a strong preference for coordmated structures, and mstances of ab~olute consecutive dcr.1nking are fairly rare. They are, however, real structural poss1bilitie~ for these l.1nguages, and the fact that such constructiOnS exist at all may be sufficient reason to cancel both Classical Arabic and Biblical Hebrew as genuine counterexamples to Universal3A. Moreover, we can note that ,tbsolutcly deranked structures of the type illustrated tn (46) and (4 7) prov1de for direct corroboratiOn of the universal at tssue; the preposition min, which marks the standard NP in comparatives, 1~ also employed to mark the nominalized anterior predicate in the deranked C-chains of both languages. 6.5
Counterexamples
Turning now to the counterexamples to Umversal 3Al we must note two cases which are problematic to a more or less serious degree. My sample contains two languages which clearly have a Separative Comparative, but which do not seem to be able to form C~chains in which the anterior predtcate has been de ranked tn an absolute construction. A first po1-.siblc counterexample is Nama, a Khoin-language with basic SOY word order. From the grammatical descriptions which I have been able to find (Schils, 1891; Memhof, 1909) it can be deduced that Nama has both a Locattve Comparative and a Separative Comparative. In th1s latter case, the standard NP IS marked by the postposition cha 'from' (sec Schils, 1891: 55): (48)
NAMk •
Ne khot -b gye ttta cha a getsa • thts person-MASC. PRT I from IS strong 'Thb man IS stronger than me'
Now, if we look at the way m which chaining is formally expressed m N.1ma, we find th,lt the lan~unp;e has a number of participtal forms at It t.h .. po~.tl. ( )f "Pt't.'t.d rdcv.Hh.:t to the pn:.,cnt d1'>CII\~10il 1'> tht· P1l'tcr!ll'
The Separative Comparat:ve
133
Participle, a verbal formation whtch consists of the (tenseless) verb stem to which the sutfix -tsi has been attached. 7 Thts Pretente Participle ts used to express anterior actton: (49)
NAMA:
Znou-toa
-tst
tita gye hat
strike-ready-PCP. PAST I
-be
darnat gye
PRT Damra -ACC chase PRf
'I struck the Damra and chased htm away' (50)
NAMA:
Mu-bi -tsi
-ta gye gye gowa -u
see -him-PCP. PAST-I
PRT PRT speak-PAST
'I saw h1m and addressed him' From these examples it becomes dear that Nama has the possibihty to express anterior predicates in C-chains by means of deranked forms. However~ the problem with these examples IS that they are all mstanccs of non-absolute constructions; in all the examples whkh I have been able to trace the subject of the Preterite PartiCiple r~ !dcnuc.al to th.lt of the following mam predicate. From what I have been able to find out about the syntax of Nama, it IS not clear whether thi~ language J.ccually forb1ds absolutely deranked C-chains; 1t may be that the non~occurrence of such constructions IS simply a matter of insufficient data. But however th1~, may be, given the present state of knowledge about Nama syntax th!' honest thing to do is to rate thts language a~ a counterexample to Universal 3A, at least as far as the conditiOnality of its consecut1v1~ construction is concerned. The second, and perhaps most damaging, counterexample to UmverLh (1956: 141) ')tate.'! cxphutly th.H 'Cruaran1 ... ha& neither an mfimmve nor a gerund, nor a supmum wtth us. own grammattcal forms.' Instead, we find coordinated structures of the type exemplified m (52): (52)
GUARANic
Oz-ke kaagwt pe ha o -henu petei avu he-went forest m and he-heard one n01se 'He went mto the forest and heard a noise' Also, Guaram ha~ the posstbthty to subordmate whole clauses by means of (clause-final) subordmatmg conjunctJOns. However, smce in such constructions the prcdtcatc of the ~ubordmated clau~e is not It~elf marked for subordmation, we are not permitted to rate this structural option aII'ILI ~OV-I.mgu,t~\' 1 111 l.tii~U.If.;C~ of tlu!\ type, the predicate Ill Jll embcddt.'d d.nl-,c .tlw,\y!) 1mn1cdt.1tdy prcccdcto. clause-final subordinating cOnJunctions. Guaram, on the other hand, has basic SVO word order, and hence the predicate m an embedded clause and the clause-final conJunction of that clause are not necessarily netghbourmg elements. Now, if we assume that one of the ways in which deranking of predicates in natural languages takes place involves the (mtonational and/or morphological) incorporation of a subordinating clause-marker mto a predicate, and if we assume further that thts incorporation 1s eas1er for languages in which the embedded predicate and the clause-marker must always occur in direct sequence, we may have a framework in whtch the observed difference between Tupi and Guarani might be explained. Guarani mtght be looked upon as a language 10 which derank10g of predicates has reached (c.q. has been reduced to} the stage of intonational mcorporation of clause markers, but 10 which th1s incorporation is hindered by the fact that the embedded predicate and the dause~marker are not contiguous items in all constructions. However, although this solution does not sound entirely implausible, it must be admitted that it is highly speculative as It stands, and that, therefore~ lt seems best to conclude that Guarani remains a problematic case for Universal3A.
6.6
Conclusion
In this chapter, we have examined the validity of Umversal 3A, by testing this universal against the facts of the languages m our sample with a pnrnary Separative Comparative. We have found that Universal 3A lS confirmed by 30 of the 32 languages involved. Moreover, we have noticed that there is a direct surface parallehsm between comparative construction and consecutive construction for 17 languages m this class. Lastly, we have seen that the facts adduced in this chapter confirm the datm that it is chaining type rather than basic word-order type wh1ch must be seen as the determinant of comparattve-type choice.
•••••••••--NOW '
OoOM
Oo
"•
0
0
........,,,..,""""'" ··--" ·"""'"'"""'..
•• ,.
0
•
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_, "·
7 The Allative and the Locative Comparative
7.1
Introduction
Having examined the languages with a primary Separative Comparative,
we now turn to the other two classes of adverbial comparatives. From the lists of languages presented in chapter 2, we learn that both of these types are relatively infrequent, at least in as far as primary options are concerned; they number 7 and 12 languages, respectively. Given the rather small size of the cia~ it is convenient to deal with them in a
single chapter. Apart from practical considerations, there is also a more principled motivation for a JOint dtscussion of Allative and Locative Comparatives.
As we will see below, the phenomenon of partial indeterminacy, which I commented upon in section 2.2.5, is not uncommon when the Locative and the AllatJve Comparative are involved. Three of the languages wh1ch I have listed provi>IOnally under the heading of the Locative Comparative actually exhibit a certain degree of neutralization in the spatial distinction between locative and allative relations, so that the typological status of these languages is, to a certain extent, indeterminate. We will discuss these indeterminate cases in a separate section at the end of this chapter.
7.2 The AUative Comparative In this section, we will examine the empirical vahdity of Universal 3B, which has been formulated in section 5.2 UNIVIoRSAL 38:
1n
the following manner:
If a language has an Allattve Comparative, it must have an absolutely deranked posterior consecutit•e • (.o1rstructzon.
The AIJative and the Locatwe Comparahve Thus, we will have to check tor each language with a primary Allallvt·
Comparative whether or not this language can be shown to have C chams in which the posterior predicate can be deranked under non· tdentity of subjects. The languages with a primary Allathe Comparativ••
form a set of seven members. The unmarked word order for this set 1, VS0. 1 Kanuri, an SOY-language, is the only deviation of thiS tendency 111 the sample.
7.Z. 1 Direct confirmation of Universa/38 Within the set of languages with a primary Allanve Comparative, we find
two languages which may be seen as 'du-ect' confirmation of Umvenal
3B. In these languages, we can observe an overt parallelism in the way 1n which comparison and consecutive chaining are fonnally expressed tn surface structure. Unfortunately, however, for both of these languages the data are of a relatively low quality. In particular, there is uncertainty as to whether absolute use of the consecunve construction ts permitted m these languages. The first language which we will di•cuss in this context is Siuslawan. This Kushan language has a large freedom of word order, but a certam preference for verb-initial constructions can be established! The standard NP in the comparative of Siuslawan has the so-called 'objective form', wh1ch is characterized by the presence of the suffix -tci-na. It can be observed that the suffix -tc is also the normal marker of allative motion. Cp.: (1)
SWSLAWAN:
a.
Liu'wd'x
qiutcilmii -tc
come-PAST. 3DUAL old woman-PRT
'The two of them came to an old woman'
"b.
-sea'hts na-te he good me-PRT 'He ts better than me'
As Frachtenberg (1922: 555) remarks, the •uffix -tci-na has a further use as an a.dverbializlng marker on verbal stems. By the use of th1s partH Je, posterior predicates m C-chatns can be deranked. The comtructlon appears to be of a limited distribution, and 1s subJect to certam specrfic condinons: ~When added to verbal stems, ·tc IS almost mvartJbly followed by the verb xint- to go, to start and hiq!· to starr, to begin' (ibid.). Example. of th" dcran ked con\truction ,lfc the iollowin~:
Testmg the Set of Chammg-bascd Umversals
138 (2)
\/1 \I ,I\\, I\.
a.
Ul
·tc xmtll ants tel and bemg low-to went that water ~And the water began to get low'
b.
qatcent yexau -tc ans1tc tcmam and he-went see -to that cousm-h1~
kap1
UL
'And he went to see hts coustn'
lr mu~t be conceded that Sm~lawan does not present a very strong case 1n fayour of the correctness of Umver.sal 3B. For one thing, the deranked
consecunve con<trucnon doe>. not seem to be generally apphcable. A senmd reservanon to be made ts that we have not been able to find ex:~mples of absolute use of the deranked consecuuve construction, nor
any mdiCatton that such absolute use lS actually permitted. On the credit swe, examples hke those m (2) can be used as a demonstration that Smslawan uses a deranked predicanve form as a model for the encodmg of 1ts comparative. A comparable s1tuanon can be encountered m Tarascan, an Isolated
VSO-language spoken m Southern Mexteo. In this language, adjectival stems must have the suffix -pe if they are used pred>catlvely. Further· more, companlion
marked m the adjectival predtcate by the so-called 'disJunctive' suffix -ku; With non-adjectival predicates, this suffix s1gnals tht• presence of an md1rect object, The standard NP m comparanves and th~· mdJrect obJect m non-comparatJve constructions are marked by the ca,,e suffix ·nt. Thus, we get the parallelism m (3alb), whiCh shows that IS
Tarascan has an Allanve Comparative:
(3)
1'ARASCAN: •
''.
X1 u -ku -aa ·ka ·m 1ma-m I do-DISJ·RIT·IND·lSG h1m·DAT 'I will do It for/to hun'
h.
X1 as -pe -ku ·S ·ka -m I good·PRED·DI>J • PRE>·INL)-lSG
Jmll-nr h1m-DAT
1 am better than lum'
1
Now, we can observe that the allat1ve marker -nt also show!:t. up as the sutfix on deranked consecutive predtcates. In th1s function, the suffix ts
placed immedtately after the verbal stem of the posterior predicate, thI' .lnJ hun love·V~RB. NUUN 'I respected him and loved h1m'
G1ven these facts of Middle Celtic, the hypothesis one nnght venture is this. In earlier forms of Celtic, there exiSred a possibdity to derank the posterior predicate in a C-chain mto a verbal noun. It IS probable that
th1s structural option was rather margtnal even in earlier Cdnc; m th•s connection, we may pomt to the fact that the posterior predicate, even though it has a deranked form, must be connected to its anterior clause by a coordinating con)unction. Hence, m later srages of Celtic this deranking procedure has been abandoned altogether in favour of the unmarked balancing procedure. Now, Breton 1s the only Celtic language m which the comparative construction has been modelled upon the
earlier deranked consecutive consrrucnon, instead of on the more central balancing construction; in contrast to all other Celnc languages (which have a Particle Comparative), Breton has retamed an Allative Comparative, desp1te the fact that the deranked construction on which this comparative is modelled has been lost. In short, one rmght assume that
the comparative construction m Breton is more conservative than the consecutive construction, and that the Allative Comparative reflects an earlier stage in the development of the language, a rime when the relation between consecutive type and comparative type could still be documented. 4 Needless to say, the above sketch of an explanatiOn for the facts m
Breton
IS
highly speculative. Moreover, we nmst pomt out that, even
1f
thiS explanation wer~ to be accepred, we are still faced with the fact that we lack the clara to decide whether the derankmg procedure m Early Breton permirted absolute use of the deranked postenor predicate, It is true that in some of the examples from other M1ddle Celtic languages the deranked posterior predicate can be seen to be accompamed by irs own subject NP. Strachan (1909: 79) quotes the followmg example from Early Welsh: (16)
EARLYWELSH:
Ac a dywawt na wnaethpwyt and he said
yn y
byt
drwc
y Bnaf , namyn rodt o
but
give• VERB. NOUN. PASS
dewret h1m for reason h1s valour
Esonra tdaw ef to
ef
not It-had-been-done on behalf him evll
m the world to B. E.
oe blert
achaws y
'And he said that on hiS part no evil m the world had been done
to Pnam, but that Hes10ne had been g1ven to h1m for his valour'
144
Testmg the Set of Chammg-based Universals
However, I have not been able to trace examples of this kind for Middle Breton. For these reasons, we are obliged to admit that, in all probability, Breton remams a counterexample to the prediction made by Universal 3B. The problem With whiCh Kanuri (see Lukas, 1937) confronts Universal 3B IS of an entirely different nature. There can be little doubt that thts language has an Allative Comparative; the standard NP is marked by the case suffix ~ro, an 1tem whiCh primarily indicates the goal of a movement and the indirect object. Cp.: (17)
KANUR/:
Ate-ma tutu-ro ngela go this-EMP that-to good PRT 'This is better than that'
We find that thlb element-rots also employed as a marker on subordinate predicates, which in this case must be deranked mto the form of a verbal noun. The construction permits absolute use: (18)
KANURl:
Leman bannazat
avtma
gapse
-nyi -ro
money waste-PRES. 3PL anythmg be-left-VERB. NOUN-NEG-to 'They waste money so that nothing is left' As can be seen from the translation of sentence (18), the main problem wrth the situation m Kanuri is that the semantics of the construction which formally marches the Allative Comparative are not right. If we apply the criteria which were formulated in section 4.2, it cannot be maintained that thts construcnon is a genuine case of consecutive action; from all rhe examples given in Lukas (1937) it becomes clear that it has a definite and unrnistJkJ.ble final readmg. What is more, Kanuri turns out to have several deranked constructions which correspond to our definition of consecutive chaining in a completely straightforward way. First, the language has a Dependent Past, a finite verb form which is marked for &ubordination by a special mfix. The form ts used to represent antenor prcdtcates in C-chatns: (19)
KANURl:
Mat AJt Makka-ro ct -gannya king A. M. -to go-DEP. PAST. 3SG 'After King Aji had gone to Mecca .. .'
A second verbal formation in Kanuri which may be relevant in this context is the so-called Conjunctive. Again, this is a finite form, marked
The AllatJVe and the Locative Comparatzve
145
by special personal suffixes, which js used to represent all prediCates except the last one in C-chains: (20)
KANURl' • Kamu nagadero ctze
wife
qmckly
kalgo goze rise-CON). 3SG vessel take-CON). 3SG
tu/Jin wash-PAST. IND. 3SG
'The wife stood up at once, took the vessel, and washed it' Thus, the problem which Kanur1 poses is this. Kanun is an SOYlanguage which has the possibility to derank anterior predicates m Cchains under non-identity of subjects. Now, given that this language chooses to modeltts comparative on tts C-chaming, the normal thing for this language would be to have a Separative Comparative. Instead, this language is deviant m that it does not select 1ts consecutive construcrton, but rather the semantically adJacent purpose~construction as the model of its comparative. In my opinton, the estimation of the status of the Kanun comparative with regard to Universal 3B depends on the rigorousnes~ with which one wants to apply the cntena for consecutive constructions that were laid down in section 4.2. In Kanuri, there is no indetermmacy between final and consecutive constructions; the dtsrinction between the formal codifications of these two semantically cognate constructions is perfectly dear. Therefore, if one wants to stick to rhe ltteral interpretaCion of the content of Universal 3B~ one must conclude that the Kanun comparative is not matched by an absolutely deranked posterior C-chain and that, therefore, Kanuri is a genuine counterexample to this universaL However, if one is willing to allow that, occasionally, a language may expand the notion of consecutive actiOn to mclude purpose-construction·;, Kanun ceases to be a counterexample; on the contrary, the language then becomes a direct confirmation of Universal 3B, m that it shows a straightforward surface parallelism between Its comparative and 11~ 'consecutive' construction. My personal opimon on thJ~ matter IS th.tt not much harm is done to the over~aH datm contained in our set of umversals if the second alternative is opted for. The number of languagt!S which turn out to model their comparattvc on their purpose-constructJ.on is negligible; apart from Kanuri, we find thts Situation m only two Other cases, viz. the primary comparative m Fulam (see sectiOn 8.3) and the secondary comparative in Mangarayi (see section 10.4).
146
Testmg the Set of Chatnmg-based Unrversals
7.3 The Locative Comparative The last type of adverbial compar.ltive constructions wh1ch we must di&cuss is the Locative Comparative. For this class, the relevant uruversal
" Umve.-al 3C, which has been formulated in section 5.2 m the following way: UNIVERSAL JC: If a langif the predicates m an S-chain under nonIdentity of &ubjects. The languages With a primary Locative Comparanve form a set of 11 members; in addmon, a the ~(h.:, •uch a• modalities, subJeCt agreement or obJect pronouns. Th1s process 1s obvtously gradual, so that a verb may lose its abtlity to take some affixes but not all at the same ttme.' Furthermore, Giv6n calls attennon to the bet that, in many languages, non·first verbs in a serial string tend to be
syntactically reanalysed as prepositions or conjunctions. (Again, this is a gradnal process so that a serial verb, even when reanalysed, may retain a number of syntactical verbal traits. For one thing, it may remain at the anginal serial verb position, even tf this position is not the one whtch is normally occupied by prepositions or conjunctions.) All these facts lead to the conclusion that senal verb constructions are not a case of syntacttc coordination, at least not as far as synchronic syntax is concerned; despite the absence of overt subordinate marking, they are instances of
temporal chams in wh1ch non-first predicates have been deranked. With respect to rhe condttionality of this type of deranked chaining w the bottle go to other-side 'He threw the bottle to the other side' Sim1lar cases are attested for Mandarin Chmese by Li and Thompson (1973a). On the whole, however, it must be said that cases such as these occupy a marginal position Wlthin the domain of serialization and that, in the overwhelming maJority of cases, Welmers' observation turns out to
be confirmed by the facts. Hence we may conclude that, from a structural p01nt of view, ser1al verb constructions are instances of conditionally
deranked chainmg constructions. A~ for the semanhc functton of a serial verb strmg! it can be observed that such constructions are e~sentially mdeterminate. This semantic
vagueness IS Illustrated clearly for Mandann Chmese by U and 'Thompson
The Exceed Com{Jaratwe
163
( llJ7H), who note that ~cri.1hzanon m thts langungc m.ly he Interpreted ns IIH.iH.:Clting parallel cvcnn,, conbecutwc cvcnb, .,unult.mcou., n~·nt.,, purro..,cconstrucrions or result·constructlons. LI and Thomp:..on ( 1978: 241) state explicitly: 'What is evident ... is that the senal verb constructiOn IS used to encode a number of different relatwnsh1ps between predicates in Mandarin. These predicate relationships are structurally distinct in most other languages because of the presence of grammatical markers.' Jn short, serial verb strmgs are formal neutralizations of the semantic distinction between simultaneous action, consecutive action and several other semantic relations, in much the same way as balanced coordinations are typically neutral in this respect (see section 4.1). 3 Just as is generally the case with balanced structures, the appropriate interpretation of a serial verb construction must be inferred on the basis of such factors as pragmatic and contextual knowledge, knowledge of the meaning of the particular lexical items in the string, and clues which derive from aspect marking of the first verb in the senes. To sum up, we can say that a senal verb construction is a type of conditionally deranked temporal chain, in which the distmction between simultaneous and consecutive action has been neutralized. Now, if we tum to the 20 languages in the sample which make up the primary instances of the Exceed Comparative, we find that ten of them have the possibility to form a serial verb construction. In these languages, a straightforward parallel between chaining construCtion and comparative formation can be established. As the examples presented below will demonstrate, the comparative in these languages is a special case of the general serial verb construction; to be exact, it is a serial verb string which contains a gradable predicate and an exceed-verb as 1ts members. Obviously, these ten languages provide strong and direct support for the claim which is contained m Universal 2A. Examples mclude:
(7) a.
CAMBODIAN:
Ta
yok dong-pakka seese sombotr
old-man take pen write letter 'The old man took a pen and wrote a letter'
b.
Bony-sreuy khngom crieng pirueh cireng nih elder-sister my sing good exceed this 'My elder sister s1ngs better than this'
(8)
DAGOMBA:
a.
Nana
san -la
o -suli n
-dum mra
scorpion take-HAB h1s-tail PREF·sting people 1 The scorpion stings people with its tail'
164
Testmg the Set of Chaining-based Universals
b.
0-make dpeoo
n
-gare
-ma
he-has strength PREF-surpass-me 'He is stronger than me' (9)
a.
DUALA:
A mala nanga dtwendt he go fetch knife 'He went and fetched a kmfe' .
Nm ndabo e kola buka nme this house it btg exceed that 'This house IS bigger than that' (10)
GBEYA:
a.
Wa kay wa
a'
nu
they take them put ground 'They take them and put them on the ground'
Ngma mo gan 6 ngay gdn nzapa na some thing NEG is strong surpass God NEG 'There is nothing stronger than God' (11)
JABEM:
a.
Ngapale ke-tang ke-ko andu boy he-cries he-remain house 'The boy ts crying in the house' T amoc kapoeng ke-lelec ae su father is-big he-exceed me ready 'My father ts taller than me'
(12)
MANDARIN:
a.
Wo na hwo-penn wm-peul kiu I carry stove outside go 'I carry the stove outside'
Wo na p't ma pt nt na p't ma kwat I this CLASS horse exceed you this CLASS horse is-btg 'My horse IS bigger than your horse' (13)
NGUNA:
a.
Ku po man a paki nta you PFRF do it go~to him 'You have done It to him'
165
The Exceed Comparatwe
b.
Namauriana e parua ltu navtnaga life it great exceed food 'Life is more than food: man does not live by bread alone'
(14)
THAI:
a.
Phom Jang moong arai maJ-hen I stdl look-at thing not-see 'I snll can't ~ee anything'
b.
Khaw rar kwaa phom he h1g exceed me 'He is btgger than me'
(15)
VIETNAMFSE:
a.
Ong khong co dem vo-con qua Ben-Phap be NEG PERF take family go-over France 'He has not brought his family over to France'
b.
Vang qui hon hac gold valuable exceed silver 'Gold is worth more than silver'
{16) a.
YORUBA:
b.
Mo fi ade ge tgi I rook machete cut wood 'I took the machete and cut wood'
lie mi kere JU tiwon house my small exceed theirs 'My house i~ smaller than theirs'
Regarding these examples, we musr make a lew additional remarks. First, it will be noted that m a serial Exceed Comparative of this type it
can be e1ther the exceed-verb or the comparative predicate which
IS
the
deranked (1.e.,non·first) predicate in the construction. This essenuallack
of ordering becomes understandable once we realize that ~uch r,enal vcr~ constructions allow for a definite simultaneous tnterpretanon, and that generally, S-chain; imply no d~rectionality (see ..cnon 4.5). Secondl~, tht· above examples show that the usual form of a dcranked verb Ill a serial verb string is that of a bare verbal stem. which lacks ali morphologiCal marking for tense, mood, aspect or person. Only two cases are e~cepttonal m this respect. In Jabem, we note that the deranked verb has retamed It~ person markmg (see (I1a/b)). Nevertheless, the construction must be considered to be a case of predicate derankwg. Dempv.olff (19l9: 81)
I estmg the Set of Chaming-based Umversals
t:>.phutly ~t.ucs thm there I\ e of the Excced-3 Comparative; the comparative predicate is the 1nain verb in the construaion, while the verb tongun 'to exceed' is deranked mto an infinitive, by reduphcation of the first syllable of the stem. It turns out that such infinitives can also be used as partioples (Spagnolo, 1933: 232), that i•, they may represent deranked predJcates inS-chains under identity of subJects: (21)
BAR!:
a.
A
ktrut Iopeng kwekwindye ngwayik ko
and then he
showed
mugun
the-boys with body
nanyit ~ miJ -mOkin his-own. INF-try
'And then he showed it to the boys with his own body, trymg (the exercises)'
b.
KOrsuk a lokong to -tongun joko is wise INF-exceed 'KOrsuk is wtser than jOkO'
K-
J.
The formanon of the comparative in Yagan is essentially parallel to
Bari. Yagan, too, has an Exceed-3 Comparative; in this case, the exceedverb manaan has been marked by the suffix -a, an element which turns out to be the regular marker for Present Partic1ples. Unfortunately, no full sentence. in which such a Present Participle is used are available. Cp.: (22)
YAGAN'
a.
KikJi-keia manaan-a him -ACC exceed -PCP. PRES 'more ~tnful than him'
ulpaki smner •
The Exceed Comparative b.
169
Kuru-a love -PCP. PRES 'loving'
Uet
-wOschtagu-a
adultery-do -PCP. PRES 'committmg adultery'
Wolof JS one of the rare cases where the Exceed Comparative has a direct surface parallel in a consecutive action construction. In this language, there exists a Consecutive Form, whtch is used w represent posterior predicates in C-chains. Formally, such a deranked predicate consists of a verb in the (subordinate) SubJunctive Mood, preceded by the marker a; identity of subJects 1s obligatory in rh1s construction. Exactly the same construction is used to express NP-comparison. Cp.: (23)
WOLOF:
a.
Dem na ma a• 0 ko go JND l SER. MARK caii-5UBJUNCf hun 'I went and called him' •
na a• bakh gen your mother exceed IND SER. MARK is-good-SUBJUNCf sa bat
Sa
ym
your father 'Your mother
IS
better than your father'
Next, let us take a look at the three Bantu languages in the sample. As might be expected, these languages employ basiCally the ;arne procedure in the formatiOn of their comparatives. In particular, they represent the subordinate predicate in their respective Exceed Comparatives in the form of a noun, which is marked by a prefix as a member of the nomm more-eloquent PRl C. 'Ctcero is more eloquent than Cato' b.
F.st tam dwes quam {rater i1 PRT rtch PRT brother 'l1e IS as r1ch as h1s brother'
Wlule the combtnatton tam . . . quam IS commonly used to expre% equality m Latin, tdenrity or dtfference usually requtrc the prc~ence of the particles ac or atque {see sentence (31a)). The elements ac and ..ztque occur freely as coordinators of balanced construt,;ttons, as sentence ( ~ 1b) w1H show. Now, the mreresung thmg I& thJ.t we cAn find Latm ::.entences in whach the equahty-constructwn (wtth tam-quam) and th~:: .4-:tUcncet. m whKh tht· p.n·tu.l('\ clc /,1/,f/11' h.lvt· hn·n n:pl.ltnl h)' tht·unu •!"•'"'· ed Unrversals
(31)
LATIN:
a.
lllt sunt alio ingento atque tu they-NOM are different-OAT character-OAT PRT you-NOM 'They are of a different character than you' (Plautus, Eudolus, 1134).
•
Senatus ac populus et gent• ~ratus erat senate-NOM and people-NOM this-OAT tribe-OAT angry was 'The senate and the people were mad at this tribe'
An eandem Romams tn bello vzrtutem Q same-FE!d. SG. ACC Romans-OAT Ill war·ABL V!rtue-ACC quam m pace lascrvzam adesse PRT in peace-ABL mdiscipline-ACC be present-INF credztJs believe-PRES. 2PL ·or do you beheve that the Romans have the same VIrtue in war as the inample which have some kmd of primary Parnde Comparative. Thus, the real problem wtth Particle Comparatave~ IS
not so much a mcttter of descnpnon; It IS rather a question of explanation. In contrast to what can be ob!:lc:rved for Conjomed Comp.lrativo, the modelhng functlOn of coord1nated chain~ is far from self~ev1dent m a number of in'itances of the Parttde ComrJrdtive. Indeed, lt looks as 1f the correlal!on between coordinated the model for Con1omed Comp.u.UJvc,, on~o: may
at .111.
well .l'.k wily P.Ht!dt• f'omp.lLitiVl""> ... hould
~·XI'>f
Testmg the Set of Charnmg-based Unrversals
198
Tlu: IX'lUIMr phc.·nomc.·non of l).trt1dc.· Comp.u',ltiVL'~ will be: dt~cu,..,~td further Ill d!Jpter 15 wuhm the general context ol Jil explanJtlon of comparatiVe-type choice. In ordrr to explore some ba&~c concepts whtch may play a role in such an explanation for Part1cle Comparatives, I will conclude thiS chapter with a more detailed discussion of the facts in two specific Particle Comparatives, VIZ. the primary comparatives in Dutch and English.
9.4
The comparative construction in Dtuch and English
In the precedmg sectiOn, we established that Dutch and Enghsh are both languages w1th a Particle Comparanve; their comparative particles are dan and than, respectiVely. Smce these two languages are both predommantly balancmg in thm formalizatton of temporal chaimng, they can he conSidered confirmations of Universal 1A. In this sectton, I want to d1scuss the comparanves in these l.mguages in some detail. I hope 1t w1ll become clear that the correlation between the occurrence of a Particle Comparative and the possibility of coordinated chainmg in these languages 1s not a merely accidental fact, but that it can, at least giVen some speofic assumpttons, be explamed on the baSts of the modellinghypothesis which forms the explanatory background of our investigation. Furthermore, I hope that this discussion will shed some more light on the peculiar status of Parncle Comparatives in general. From the facts in Dut< h and Engli•h, and from the contrasts which can be observed bern.een them, I thmk some m>tghts can be gamed which can be put to use in chapter 15 withm a more general explanatory context. E\en if we limit ourselves to pubhcations which were written Within the theoretical framework of transformational-generative grammar, the hterature on the comparative in English and other European languages is conSiderable. Apart from the role whtch the study of comparative• has play.,d m general theoretical debate, the construction Itself has been subJected to hngu1snc analys•s from various pomts of vJew, givmg rise to quesnons such as the corret."t phrase structure analys1s and transformational denvation of the constructiOn {lees, 1961; P1lch, 1965; Doherty and Schwartz, 1967; Bresnan, 1971, 1973; Klooster, 1972, 1979; Seuren, 197_1; Hendnck, 1978), the exact nature of the rule system needed to denve elhptical comparatives {Bresnan, 1975; Kuno, 1981 ), the negative polanty which can be observed in comparative clauses Uoly, 1967; Seuren, 1973; Mlttwoch, 1974; Napoh and Nespor, 1976; Cantrall, 197 7; Seuren) 1984) and the syntacto~semantic analysis of degree words (Klooster, 1976, 1978, 1979; Seuren, 1978).
Denved-case Comparatives
199
Dllkrcntly tuned .lppro.Khc'> lo thl' ~.:omp.lr.ltiV(' problem ~m·lmmd 111 pn:~>cnt-d.ty 'lonna! ~>cmJntlc::.', lll p.trtlcular 111 :,tmhc:, by Cr~.·M,well (1976), Hellan (1981), Hoeksema (1983), Klem (1980) and von Stechow (1984). These studies have in common a general predilectton for 'surface semantics', i.e., the view that no separate level of semannc representation is required for a semantic calculus to work upon. It is an exphcit aim, in th1s form of semantics, to circumvent all obstacles, traditiOnal or newly discovered, to surface semantics by the application of new formal techmques. Without denying relevance to such work tn other contexts, we mL1 St decide that in the context of the present study the relevance of this work IS, at least at this moment, not apparent. Thts is mainly due to the fact that the psychologtcal relevance of work m formal semantics is either low or not apparent, as is widely recognized. The present work, on the contrary, is clearly oriented towards criteria of psychological relevance (see part three), as is most work in universalist linguistics. Moreover, the surface semantics v1ew adopted in current formal semantiCS excludes accounts of grammatical structures m terms of historical reanalysis from ongmally transparent constructions. Now, as will be made clear in section 9.4.3, our analysis of Particle Comparatives IS based on the theory, proposed by authors such as Giv6n (1979), that historical development of grammancal structures often involves a process of 'grammaticalization', by which a semantically transparent construe~ tion 'jells' into a new and separate denved grammatical construction which is then no longer transparent_ Smce for formal semantics all constructions are by definition semantically transparent, provided a powerful enough formal apparatus IS applied to sentences, there is no room m formal semantics for a theory involvmg grammatical reanalysis through time. Yet, the evidence for such processes is 1mpress1ve. We shaH, as a general rule, leave the formal semantic treatments of comparatives undiscussed. Thus limiting ourselves to the framework of the present study, we must conclude that not all research results obtamed or claimed in those hngmsnc approaches that fall withm our scope are of equal relevance. To name but one top1c, It must be recalled that the approach adopted in this study is essentially model-neutral, at least as regards the models that fit into our framework. Hence discussions centrmg around the question of the exact formal nature of the (transformational or PS) rule system needed for the derivation of vanous types of comparative constructions are largely outside our domain of interest. We shall discuss the comparatives of English and Dutch with a specific problem in mind: our a1m here is to argue that, despite superficial mdtcations to the contrary, the Parnde Comparanves in the!>e languages can be shown to be modelled on
200
Testmg the Set of Chaining-based Universals
balanced chammg constructions, albeit that this modelling has come to be obscured by the operation of interfenng processes. Gtven th1s aim, the empirical issue whtch is of specific interest to us concerns the grammatrcal status of the Engltsh and Dutch comparattve clause (i.e., the clause followmg dan/than). In particular, it is of relevance for us to know whether this dame must be thought of as a subordmate clause or a mam clause; if the latter alternative can be made plausible, the conclusiOn must follow that the comparative in Dutch and Engh&h consists of two matn clauses, which would suggest an analysis of thts construction in terms ot coordmation. Related to this issue of the status of the comparative clause IS the matter of the categorial status of the comparative parttcle; gtven our general demarcation of the problem, it IS relevant for us to determine whether the items dan and than must be conceived of as preposrtions c.q. subordinating conjunctions, or rather as temporal adverbs wh1ch mark balanced chammg constructions. In what follows, I Will first deal with some structural properues ot the Dutch Particle Comparative. Following that, I will contrast the Dutch data with the facts of the Enghsh comparative. As it will turn out, the comparatives m the two languages have a significant number of features in common, but they can also be shown to differ in some interesting respects.
9.4.1
The grammatical status of the Dutch comparative clause
Apart from cases of NP-comparison like the one in (44), the particle dan 1n Dutch can be followed by a large variety of other structural units, such as full clauses (see (45a)), adJeCtive phrases (see (45b)), prepositional phrases (see (45c)), verb phrases (see (45d)), and strings which do not form single constituents (see (45e) and (45()): (44)
DUTCH:
Ik ben ouder dan mi1n nee( I dffi older than my cousin 'I am older than my cousin' (45)
DUTCH:
a.
Vltegen 1s goedkoper dan U denkt flying is cheaper than you think
b.
Ht] he
c.
1S
eerder dam
dan slecht
JS
rather stupid than malicious •
•
Onze ploeg speelt beter dan m het vorzge setzoen our team plays better than in the last sea~on
201
Deriued-case Comparatwes dan wordt verondersteld Joggen zs gevaarli1ker assumed Joggmg is more dangerous than is Ik besteed meer geld aan boeken dan Jan aan eten I spend more money on books than J. on food 'I spend more money on books than Jan does on food' Beter een vogel m de hand dan tien m de Iucht better one b1rd m the hand than ten m the sky 'A b1rd in the hand is worth t\vo rn the bush'
Now, with respect co comparative constructions like those in (45), It 1s generally assumed m the literature that they must be accounted for by the application of some procedure of ellzpsis) wh1ch relates them to ~truc tures wtth 'full' comparative clauses. The position on these 'incomplete' comparative clauses (whtch can be encountered not only 1n Dutch, but also in other languages with a Particle Comparative) IS summed up
succinctly by Hankamer (1973: 182), who,
tn
hi; dJScu;swn of the
Particle Comparatives m Latin and Classical Greek, writes: the conJunctiOns of compan~on [1.e., Latin qumn J.nd Greek e] may be followed by all kmd'i of com.tttuents, and even by non-commuents. Tlw-, \.l.m~e-1unk' can be accounted for only a!l- the remams of unded~mg full dJ.u::.e~ v.hu..h have undergone elhpsts. Any other ai..count would fail to capture the gencrahLJtton thJ.t the JUnk m comparanvc expresstons IS c1lways po!l-Mble left-overs from a full clause, and never, !l-ay, two verbs in succe~~•on, or three NPs m the genmve ca~e. Since the facts of the 'incomplete comparatives' in Latm and Clas\tcal Greek are completely parallel to the facts 10 Dutch, we w11l take Hankamer's analysis to apply also to the sentences in (45), and we will therefore assume that all these sentences have an underlymg representatiOn in which the comparative particle dan ts followed by a full, non-
elliptical clause. It should be added here that it ts a moot pomt whether tht'> elliptiCal analysis of the sentences m (45) can also be extended to cases of NPcompanson m Dutch. Hankamer (1973) argues that, at least m Enghsh, NP-compari::.on ha::. structural properties whtch are dtffcrent from those of clause-companson. Th1s leads him to the conclusron that, tn Enghsh, NP-comparatives are non-elliptical, and that therefore there must be assumed to exist two ttems than in Engli::.h, one element bemg a preposition wh1ch takes NPs as its complement, whtle the other ts a clause-ininal particle. I will present the mam points of Hankamer's argumentation tn sectiOn 9 .4.2, and demonstrate there that the structural differences between NP-comparison and clause-companson m English arc largely ab .. cnt in Dutch. For the moment, however, r wtfl not deal
202
Testmg the Set of Chatmng-based Unzversals
wnlt .1\t"'> ol NP-uunp.m'lnn 111 Dutth~ I will coJKl'lltr.nc on romp.lr,ltlvc., '.uch ,1~ tho&e 111 (45), that lb, ca~e!:> of Dutch comparative~ for wh1ch the cltusal status of the stnng followmg dan is undisputed. Now, given that, in sentences like those in (45), the comparative parttde ts followed by a clause, the main question which will concern us here IS whether this comparative clause must be conceived of as a subo1 drnate (adverbtal) clause or as a main clause, Under the first alrcrnanve, the element dan is seen as a subordinating conjunction, which 1s of essentially the same type as other elements which introduce Dutch adverbial clauses, buch as voor 'before', smds 'smce' and terwzJI 'while'. If we accept the second altcrnattve, we are forced to conclude that the Dutch comparatJve contains two roam clauses. A plausible way to account for this would be to assume that, at least in some stage in the denvation, the comparative m Dutch has (or had) the form of a coordinauon, and that the comparative particle dan is, at least in its origin, identical to the temporal adverb dan which marks balanced temporal chams tn Dutch. In what follows, I will argue that both positions on the structural status of the Dutch comparanve clause have theu strong pomts. Given the dilemma created by this, l will offer an analysis of the Dutch comparative m whtch the notton of 'syntactlzation', as developed in GIV6n (1979), plays a cructal role. Perhaps the most relhng argument m favour of a subordinate status of the Dutch comparative clause stems from facts with respect to the word order m thl!> clause. In Dutch, as in German, there is difference in word order between main clauses and subordmate clauses; while roam clauses are bastcally SVO, subordinare clauses have obligatory verb-final order: (46)
DUTCH:
Ik zag hem voor hij mtJ zag I saw htm before he me saw 'l saw htm before he saw me' b. ·· lk zag hem voor hij zag m11
a.
Now, lt 1~ clear that the word order in Dutch comparative clauses is verb~ final: (17)
DUTCH:
a.
lk zag hem eerder dan hii ml{ zag [ saw him earlier than he me saw
..
'I saw him earlier than he saw me'
b.
• Ik zag hem eerder dan htJ zag mtJ
Ob'nously, the complete word~order paraHehsm between sentences (46a)
203
Denvcd-case Comparatives
.111d (47a) 1~ a ~tronp, argu111cnt for lhc ~uhord1n:ltl' .w.dyM~ of Dutch Lomp.lr.tliVC d.tu~c~. A second argument which militates strongly m favour of th1s ana!yr,1s can be derived from the fact that, in Dutch adverbial clauses, the clauseimtial conjunction can often be optionally followed by the general subordmating conJunction dat 'that'. Although, at least ln some cases (for instance, in adverbial clauses introduced by terwijl or sinds), the use of the additional element dat is considered somewhat substandard, sentences hke the b-exarnples below are frequently encountered in colloquial Dutch: (48)
DUTCH:
a.
Ik heb hem opgebeld voor
hi1 naar Afrika vertrok
I have him phoned before he to 'I phoned him before he left for Africa'
Africa departed
b.
Ik heb hem opgebeid voordat hii naar Afrika vertrok
(49)
DUTCH:
a.
Sinds we in Belgii!
wonen , voel ik me
gelukkig
Since we in Belgium live feel I myself happy 'Ever since we've lived in Belgium, I feel happy' b. ? Sinds dat we in Be/gil! wonen, voel ik me gelukkig (50)
DUTCH:
a.
Terwii/ hii dat zei, /achte
hii afkeurend
as he that said laughed he disapprovingly 'As he said that, he laughed disapprovingly'
b.?r Terwtil dat hii dat zei, lachte htJ afkeurend Now, the optional occurrence of the complementizer dat in adverbial clauses JS paralleled completely by the optional appearance of this element m Dutch comparative clauses: (51)
DUTCH:
a.
Htj praat meer dan goed voor hem is
he talks more than good for is 'He talks more than ts good for him: he talks too much for his own good' b. ? Hii praat meer dan dat goed voor hem is What is more, the same feeling of non~standardness which is generated by the use of dat in some adverbial clauses can be observed among Dutch speakers with respect to the use of dat in comparatives. Thus, on the face of it~ it looks as if matters are fauly straightforward. The above observations point unequivocally to an analysts of the Dutch
204
Testing the Set of Chaming-based Universals
comparative clause as an mstance of adverbial complementation, m which the element dan functions as a complementlzer. I think it is useless to deny the validity of these observations. However, below 1 would like to point out a number of facts which appear to be at odds with a subordinate analysis; these data suggest that, at least in some dcnvanonal stage, the Dutch comparative clause must be considered to have mainclause status. First, 1t can be observed that Dutch comparative clauses are restricted m the posJttons which they can occupy in a sentence. In general, adverbial clauses (and other adverb1al elements) in Dutch can occupy at least three d1fferenr posmons in a main sentence: they can be sentenceinitial, or sentence-final, or tn a posttion immediately following the finite
verb. The examples in (52) Illustrate this relative freedom for Dutch adverbial clauses: {52)
DUTCH:
a.
Hij is erg
veranderd smds hii hoogleraar is
he ts a lot changed since he professor is 'He has changed a great deal since he became a professor'
b. c.
Hi7 ts, smds hlJ hoogleraar is, erg veranderd Smds htj hoogleraar is, ts hi; erg veranderd
Now, tn contrast to this, comparative clauses introduced by dan are allowed neither m sentence-inttial nor m post-verbal position. 3 Thear only di.!.tnbuttonal option ts the sentence-final position, i.e., the posttion m whiCh we \VOt!ld expect them to show up if we were to asstgn to them the status of coordmate clauses: (53) DUTCH: a. Hq zs meer veranderd dan Je zou denken
he is more changed than you m1ght think 'He has changed more than you might think' b. * Hi} zs dan Je zou denken meer veranderd c. ·' Darz }e zou dettken is ht} meer veranderd Secondly, mam~dause status for Dutch comparanve clauses can be argued from the behaviour of certain sentential adverbials. Dutch has a class of sentential modifiers, such as eerlyk gezegd 'to be honest' and naar ik vrees 'I fear', whtch can occur only m main clauses and m daLises for which a roam-clause ~tatus has been argued, such as unrestncted relative clauses: (54)
DUTCH:
a.
H'l is , eerl,k
gezegd , nogal sa at• honestly sa1d rather dull
he ts 'To be honest, he 1s rather dull'
205
Derived·case Comparatives
Onze burgemeester, dte , eerb/k gezegd, nogal saar zs rather dull JS our mayor who honestly satd 'Our mayor, who, to be honest, is rather dull'
•
~
Het zs een fezt dat htJ, eerbjk gezegd, nogal -;aar It IS a fact that he honestly satd rather dull
H
1~
As can be expected, these modtfiers cannot be permitted m adverb1rtl clauses mtroduced by voor or srnds: (55)
DUTCH'
a.
HtJ /rep weg voor tk ecn mttwoord had he walked away before I an answer had
b.
>
'He walked aw.-ay before I could think of an amwer' Hi! /iep weg voor ik, eerltJk gezegd, een antwoord had
In contrast to tht~, comparative ciJu~es m which such modifiers occur do not gtve n::,e to unacccptabdity: {56)
DUTCH'
HtJ beweett meer dan htJ, eerll}k
gezegd, kan bewt)zen
he clatms more than he honestly said can provl 'Itt. He claims more than, to be honest, he can prove'
As a third pomt, let us consider the operatton of a specific deletiOn rule in Dutch. Ju;t like Engli;h, Dutch has a rule of GJppmg, wh1ch deletes a fimtc verb in a coordinated sentence, g~ven the identity of th not {or not overtly) show mcorporation of a negative element. Thm, 10 French the neganve particle ne shows up obhg.at()flly m a comparative clause tf that clause contains a fimte verb: (85)
FRENCH:
II est plus grand que vous '" he is more tall than you 'He Is taller than you think'
NEG
pensez dunk
A ;imdar phenomenon can be observed in ltaltan (see Seuren, 1973: 535). In formal Italian >tyle, clausal comp.u-arives an: introduced by the particle che, which (Just hke Its French counterpart que) has its etymological origm In Latm quo 'by wh1ch'. U.e of che m comparanvcs reqmres the presence of the negative item non m the comparative clause, and the verb in the clause has to be m the SubJunctive Mood (cp. (86a)). An alternanve formation of Italian comparative clauses mvolves the use of the complex comparattve particle dt quello che. In thts case, the verb in the clause is m the Indicative Mood, and the negauve Item non t!) no longer present. Cp.: (86)
ITALIAN:
a.
Gtannt
e
ptu
grande cbe non pensasst
G. IS more tall than NEG thmk·PAST. SURJl!NCT ISG 'Gianni is taller th•n l thought'
b. c.
'
Giannr e' piu
grande dt quel/o che non pensasst Gtanm pn'· grande dt que I/o che pensavo G. I\ mor(.' tall rh ,1n thmk-PA~I INil '( .t.uuu t\ t.tll~:r th.m I th~ml!,llt'
e
j\(,
218
Testmg the Set of Chammg-based Umversals
The mtimate relationship of the comparanve construction With negation m aL least some of the languages with a Particle Comparative lS also suprorted by a number of observations from English and Dutch. As 1s noted by Seuren (1973, 1984), comparative clauses m these languages may contain so-called neganve-polarity items, 1.e., lexical Items or idioms whtObly ;orne fossohzed form of the verb 'to be') •·· deleted when the standard constituent ts an NP. Cp.: (7)
BAR/:
a.
Nan ktta bya na gwon do yeye1u I work more PRT you thmk "I work more than you thmk'
b.
Monye a lo'but bya na tore lonytt father IS good more PRT 5on h1s ·The father IS heucr than h1c., '"on'
The r J.rtldc na'na gwon ha!> J number of other functwns m the syntax of Ban. For one thmg, na gwon can be used a5 the advcr~at1ve conJunction 'but' (Spagnolo, 1933: 266). Also, na or na gwon may be used as the equtv alent of our temporal COOJU11Ctton ~while'; m this case~ the temporal dauo;;c• l-'> marked at 1t11 end by a repennon of the part1de na (Spagnolo, 1933 257). Fmally, we find cases of clauses marked by na ... na m wh1ch a consecunvc mterpretatJon o;;eem.;; to be 1mphed (Spagnolo, 1933: 256). Relevant exampteb arc:
227
An ExaminatiOn of Secondary Choices (8)
BAR/:
a.
S6r6mundt kata • na gwon kala 'baym ground-nuts ex1st PRT teeth not-exlst ·we have ground-nuts, but no appetite'
b.
Na gwon kl 1010n na
, ngutu gwogwolong kadr
it rain PRT people be-at 'Whtle it rains, the people stay inside the house'
house
PRT
c.
Na Komandan a1e jam kulya srne na PRT commander was say
a
,
words these PRT
ngutu aku,ono
pank
and/ then people become-afraid very much 'After the Commander had said these words, the people grew much afraid' GIVen these examples, I think it IS safe to conclude that the secondary Particle Comparative in Bari has a direct surface parallel in the balancing procedure which the language employs to encode its various forms of temporal chaining. As a last case in thts category, we must draw attention to the secondary comparative in Classical Nahuatl. In section 9.2 we saw that the primary option for this language is a Conjoined Comparative. In addition to thiS, Andrews {1975: 350ff.) lists a comparative of the type Illustrated in (9)
CLASSICAL NAHUATL:
Nehhuatl oc-acht
nt-tlamatint1 tn ahmo iuhqur tehhuatl
I a bit more I -learned 'I am a bit more learned than you'
PRT
you
As we can see, the standard NP in this construction is preceded by a senes of items. In this item stnng, the element ahmo is obligatory; this element is the general negative element 'not'. In the comparative construction at han~ the negation ahmo is commonly preceded by the item in, an element which functions as a general adjunctor and 1s, among other things, the eqwvalent of our definite articles and relanve pronouns. Furthermore, the negative ttem in this construction may optionally be followed by the element tuhltuhqui; in its origin, this element is a verb with the meaning 'to be so, to be thus'. The whole of the item string precedmg the standard NP IS glossed by Andrews {ibid.) ao 'while not thus, I.e., than'. Given this translation, and given the etymological origm of the Items involved, It seems appropriate to rate this secondary comparative as a type of Particle Comparative; to be exact, we might see It as a Particle Comparattve in whiCh both the procedures of relativization
228
Testing the Set of Chaming-based Universals
and negattve mcorporation have been effectuated (see section 9.4.3). Since Nahuatl has a Conjoined Comparative as Its primary option, Lt wtll come as no surpnse that the secondary Particle Comparative, too, can be matched by a balanced chammg construction. As a matter of fact, Classical Nahuatl appears to be a l.mguage which IS predommancly, tf not strictly, balanctng. A further example of a coordinated structure m thts language ts: (10)
CLASSICAL NAHUATL'
o -tlacuah 0 -motlalzh , zhuan he~sat down moreover he-ate 'He sat down and ate'
10.3
Secondary Exceed Comparatives
Next, we turn to the six languages tn the sample which select an Exceed Comparative as theu secondary option. Of these languages, Umversal2A prcdtcts that they ~hould have either a conditionally deranked S-cham, or a condiuonally deranked C-chain, or both. As it turns out, all six languages at issue can be sho\o\•n to fulfil this reqUirement; in some cases, however, we will come across specific problems which deserve some further comment. Relatively strmghtforward cases m this class are Sranan and Sika. In Sranan, an Engltsh-based creohzation) the modern comparative IS a Parttcle Comparative which employs the particle leki 'like' (see section 9.3). This constructiOn has replaced the older Exceed Comparative, which was modelled on the senahzation construction that formed a part of the African substratum of Sranan. As sentence (11b) shows, seriahzat10n is still a hvmg syntactic option 111 modern Sranan: (11)
-\R.4N.-L'\'
a.
A kont pasa mt he smart surpass me "He tS smaner than me'
b.
A tyarz a buku kon gz mt he carry the book come give me 'He has brought me the book'
Stka IS a language with a primary ConJoined Comparative. This primary optiOn IS matched by the fact that a balancing procedure ts largely favoured in the encoding of both smmltaneous and consecuttve chams in S1ka. However, it appears that a form of serialization IS
An Examination of Secondary Choices
229
permitted for a hmJted number of case&; the language has a numba of verbal forms which are constructed as the postenor element In a sntalverb-strmg, and which gradually adopt the function of prepositiOn&: (12)
SJKA:
a.
Nimu tutur nora guru he talk have teacher 'He talks about the teacher'
b.
Cau ou whelz micu ceca I search give you food 'I will search food for you'
From these examples, It will be clear that this construction can be used only if the subjects of the predicates involved are tdcnttcal; morc•Jver, these examples show that the serial construction tn Stka covers instances of both simultaneous and consecutive chaimng. As we have seen m section 8,2, these are general characteristics of serial verb strings. The serialization construction in S1ka is directly matched by the 'ecor.dary comparative for this language: (13)
SJKA:
Au gahar tot
wuce
aung
you big excel brother your e nommalized verb are put mto the geninveldative ca&e form. An example
of this construction is: (37)
MANGARAYI:
Na -bamar-wu na ·fllYa -wu 0 -ninga-n NOUN·steal ·OAT NOUN-meat·DAT 3SG-come-PAST 'He came to steal the meat' This 'absolute dattve• (Merlan, 1bid.)
IS
'usually semantically purposl\e'
(Merlan, 1982: 10; my italics). Again, one ought deduce from this formulation that the construction at ISSUe here has a certain amount of semantic indeterminacy, and that, therefore, It might be rated as a case of consecutive deranking, to which (as we saw in sectton 4.2) crves that Mangarayi has 'a le!.!. common (but nevertheless span~ taneously produced) construction type', in which the standard NP is marked for dative/purposive case: (38)
MANGARAYI:
Na-yaba na-balayt ngan1u brother big lSG-DAT 'My brother JS bigger/older than me'
The last two languages m the sample wnh a Locative ComparatiVe as the1r secondary opt1on are Maori and Samoan. From the hterature on vanous Polynemn languages it can be derived that they onginally had C0'1Joined Comparanves, but that in recent times a Locative Comparatlv< has been gammg ground. This Locative Comparative ts typtcally marked by means of the multifuncttonal preposition tie 'at' on the standard NP. Examples of this Polynesian Locattve Comparanve have been attested for Samoan (Marsack, 1975: 67), Marquesan (Dordtllon, 19c• I' 12), Fl)Ian (M>Iner, 1956: 34) and Maon (Rere, 1965: 16). Cp.: {l9)
SAMOAN:
Ua
stli
tele le mauga
i
/e
fale
PRES more high the mountain at the house 'The mountam is h1gher than the house' (·10)
MARQUrS.~N:
Mea mettat Ionane 1 Iakopo thing good I. on I. 'lonane is better than lakopo' (41)
~/f!AN:
Sa
levu na ka
oqo e
na ka
oqort
PRES b1g
the thmg this on the thmg that 'ThiS is bigger than that' (42)
MAORI:
Teia te rakau roa ake i tena this the tree big more on that 'This tree IS higher than that one' Botll Samoan and Maon can be shown to be unproblematic Instances of Umversal 3C. In these languages, hke in all Polynesian languages, it Is pos.'>lble to derank simultaneous predicates by means of a nominahzation. Tht s, rhe predicate m the simultaneous clause 1s turned into a derived
An Exammatwn of Secondary Choices
243
noun, and the tense-aspect-mood parncle whJCh as obhgarory for fimte verbal forms is replaced by a marker of spec1fic1ty. In East Polynesian languages such as Maori, the nommahzation rule also involves the attachment of some alternant of the nominahzmg suffix -anga to the verb stem (see Chung, 1978: 298); m the Samoic-Outlier branch, of wh1ch Samoan is a member, the derived noun has the morphologlcal form of the bare verbal stem. Nominalized predicates must be structurally rated as heads of NPs; their subjects are marked for genitive case by the particles a oro. In Maon, deranked (i.e., nommahzed) simultaneous predicates may be constructed either as a free NP, or as a prepositional phrase marked by the preposition t 'at'. In this latter case, direct surface parallelism between the ~econdary comparative and the deranked S-chain is achreved: (43)
MAORI:
a.
Te tae
~nga
o Hutu kz raro
the arrive -NOUN of H. to below 'When Hutu arrived in the underworld .. .' (Chung, 1978: 300)
b.
I te
are -nga
o ' tera tangata na taatat , at the walk-NOUN of this man along beach kua site i tetai pai PAST see ACC one ship 'While this man walked along the beach, he saw a ship'
In Samoan~ simultaneous nommahzarions are often preceded by the prcdicarional particle 'o. This particle has a number of dtfferent functions (see Marsack, 1975: 20-2), the most important of which appear to be the marking of nouns and pronouns 'standing by rtself and not forming part of a sentence', or the markmg of the subJeCt when It precedes the verb. The deranked 5-chain in Samoan IS Illustrated by sentence (44}, which has been borrowed from Chung (1978: 306). Cp.: (44)
SAMOAN:
'0 le sau a le ta'avale a leo/eo ' PRED the come of the car of police 'ou te /if malamalama 't Ql I UNSPEC not understand to It 'When the police car came, I wasn't aware of It'
10.5
Secondary Separative Comparatives
To conclude our examination of secondary opnons m comparative-type choice, we must consider the nine cases m our sample which have a
244
Testing the Set of Charnmg-based Umversals
secondary Separative Comparative. Following Universal 3A, rhese languages should have the possibility to form consecunve chains m which the anterior predicate is deranked under absolute conditions. As it rums out, all nine languages are clear confirmations of the universal at issue. Startmg w1th Tamil, we have remarked earher rhat this langnage has an unusually large variety of comparatives at its disposal. In addition to the Locative Comparative and the vtta-comparanve discussed in section 7.3.2, several authors mention a secondary Separative Comparative and a secondary Allat1ve Comparative for Tamil: (45) a.
b.
TAMil.:
Ten ·zn -um rnttu emta honey-from-and what sweet 'What IS sweeter than honey?' Ittu·ku atu nallatu this·DAT that good 'This is better than that'
The secondary Separative Compar.nve in Tamil is matched by rhe occurrence of the so-called Vimzryeccam (Bcythan, 1943: 103), a gerundial form With rhe suffix -ttu attached to the verb stem. The form IS the obligatory representation of anteriOr predicates in C-chains, and can be used freely under absolute conditions: {46)
TAMIL:
Naan panam kudu-ttu avan sinimaa-vukku • I money give ·PERF. GF.R he mov1e -to poonan go-PAST. 3SG cl gave h1m money and he went to a movie
The Allative Comparative illustrated m (45b) is modelled directly on the purpose-con~truction which Tamtl employs. In this construction, too, the predicate is deranked into a non-finite form. If there is 1dent1ty of subjects between the main predicate and the predicate of the purposeclause, this latter predicate has rhe form of the Infinitive in -a; in other words, m this case the purpose·construction has the same surface expression as the simultaneous action construction (see section 7.3.2), If, however, the subjects are non-identical, the predicate of the purposeclause must be de ranked into a verbal noun, which is then pur into Dative case. It is this latter construction wh1ch provides the direct parallel With the secondary AHa rive Comparative in Tamil. Cp.:
An Examination of Secondary Chotces
245
(47)
TAMIL:
a.
Engka ammaa-ve paakka naan Cengkat-tukku pooreen our mother-ACC see-INF I C. -to go-PRf"'.l >G 'I am going to Chengam to see my mother'
b.
Avan pustaka-m vaang-kina -tukku pana -m he-NOM book ·ACC buy ·PAST. NOUN-DAT money-ACe kututteen give-PAST. 1SG 'l gave hun money so that he could buy a book'
The remaining eight languages with a secondary Separative Compa,·attve are all European Parncle-languages. For some of these languages, direct surface parallelism can be attested. A case in point is Basque; tn addition to the Particle Comparative dtscussed tn sectton 9.3, Lafitte (1944: 139--40) mentions two secondary (and somewhat archa1c) Basque comparatives of the adverbial type. In one of these constructJOns, the
standard NP is in the Mediative case, which is marked by the suffix -zl-
az, and which normally mdicates cause, manner, mottve and temporal duration ('while, during'). Cp.: (48)
BASQUE:
Cure }ite
-az
goragoa
our nature-MED higher 'supertor to our nature' Th1s Mediative Comparative correspond~ with the posstbiluy of stmultaneous derankmg m Basque. Deranked predtcates m S-chains have the form of the nommal Infimtive (with the suffix -te) or the Supinum (wtth the suffix -i or -n), which are then put mto the Mediative case. For both forms, absolute use is permitted. If the deranked prediCate has the form of the Infinitive, the subJeCt is put either mto the Geninve CJ.se (that ts, the Infinitive is cons1dered to be a noun) or into the Nominative c.q. ErgatJVe case (that is, the lnfimtive IS taken to be a verb). The Supmurn IS a verbal form; tts subject is always in the Nominative c.q. Ergative case. Cp.: (49)
BASQUE:
a,
Aita Jt -te -az atsegin dut father-NOM come-INF-MED happy l-am 'Now that my father IS co•ning, I am happy'
b.
Atta -ren ji -te -az atsegin dut father-GEN come-INF·MED happy l-am 'Now that my father is commg, I am happy'
Testmg the Set of Chammg-based Unwersals
246 c.
Htra
J1
-n
atsegin dut
-ez
he-NOM come-SUP-MED happy
l-am
'Now that he is commg, I am happy'
In 1 he other ~econdary comparative m Basque, the standard NP ts put mto the Elanve case, marked by the ~uffix -tk. This Separative Comparative has Jts duect parallel m the way m which C-cham~ can be represented m Basque; anterior pred1cates are deranked into the form of the Supmurn, whiCh is then marked for Elat1ve Ca~c. The form clearly allows for absolute use, with subJeCtQUc:
a.
Nztar-tk
gorago-ko
norbatt
me -ELAT higher -GEN someone 'someone who is supenor to me
Harek erra-n -1k
badagzku
he-ERG say -SUP-ELAT knoW-It-PRES. l.PL
·Now that he has sa1d
It,
we know It'
As we saw m section 2.1, Latm ha.s a secondary comparative 1n which the standard NP I!> put Into the Ablative case; this is a case which
ind1cates the agent of an action, and which
used furthermore m the complement of both locative and separative prcposmons (cp. ab urbe 'from the town' and in urbe 'm the town'). Hence, there is a certam lS
degree of mdetermmacy m the classification of the secondary Ablative Comparative m Latm; we mtght rate It as an mstance of the Separanve Comparanve, but there is al 1)
LATIN:
Cato C.-NOM
Ctcero-ne
c.
-ABL
eloquentwr est more eloquent IS
'Cato 1~ more eloquent than Ctcero'
The 1ndetermmacy of the status of the Ablative Comparative is matched by the parnal neutrahzatton of the ways m which S-chains and C-chams are represented m Latm. As we saw in section 4.1, Latin deranks prechcates m temporal chams by puttmg them into the form of pamc1plcs; If the cham IS sunulraneous, the Present Participle i-; used, whereas in consecutive chams the antenor predicate gets the form of the Perfect Paniciple. In cases of absolute dcrankmg, the participle and tts subJect are both put mto the Ablative case, whtle the participle muse agree With
An Exammatwn of Secondary Chotct•s
247
subJect in number and gender. Examples of ab')olutely deranked Schams and C-chams m Laun are the followmg:
Aegyptum ad11t A.-ACC go to-PERF. IND. JSG 'After Pompe1us had been defeated, Caesar marched mto Egypt'
lt will be clear that the parallelism between the formalizatiOn of S-chains and C-chams m Latin is fairly far-reachmg, in that It has led to nearneutralizatiOn; the only d1fference between the two types of chainmg constructions lies in the tense marking of the participles mvolved. Given that the Ablanve Absolute construction can be used for both $-chams and C-chams (depending on the teme of the pamctple employed), there IS no tcllmg whether the Ablative Comparative in Lalln has taken the Simultaneous construCtiOn or rather the consecutive construction as its model. Thus, we see that the near-neutralization in the formalization of chaming constructions has its counterpart in the indetermmacy of the classificatiOn of the Ablative Comparanve in Latm. A Situation which IS very ~Jmllar to that m Latm can be encountered m ClassiCal Greek. In this language, the secondary comparative was formed by puttmg the standard NP mto the Genitive case, a form which had taken over the functiOns of the defunct ablative and locative ca'ies. Again, we see that thl& mdeterminacy IS matched by a near-neutraJJZat10n in the forrnahzation of S-chains and C-chains; Classical Greek deranked the predicates m ItS temporal chains Into partiCiples, wh~eh under absolute conditions agreed in case, gender and number with its subJect, wh1ch had to be m the Genitive case. Examples. of the Gemnve Comparative in Classical Greek, and of the Gemtive Absolute constrncuon for both Schains and C-chams are the fo1lowing: (S l)
CLASSICAL GREEK:
a.
Fdtppos en sofoteros ton proterOn F.-NOM was more~wise the-Gt.N. PL earlier-GEN. PL
bast/eon king-GEN. PL
Ibihty of 'purpose·modellmg' from the set of confirmmg data for our umver~als~ these languages (viz. Tamil and Mangarayt) can be rated as counterexamples ro Universal )Bon theu ~econdary opnom.
'
'
1 ~'
'
I
•
Part Three Towards an Explanation of Comparative-type Choice
11 Theoretical Background Assumptions
11.1
Introduction
ln tne foregomg chapters of this essay, we have first set up a typology of comparative constructions m natural languages (chapter 2). Followmg that~ we have put forward the hypothesls that the options m this typology can be predicted on the basts of the types of temporal chaming construe~ tion~ wh1ch are possible m natural languages (chapter 3). The proposed con elations between comparative types and chammg types have been latd down 10 a set of chammg-based umversals of comparative-type choice (chapter 5). In the chapter; of part two of this study these umversals have been tested agamst the empirical facts of the languages m
the
~ample.
S . uveymg the results of our mvestigatton so far, I think we are Justified 111 drawmg the followmg conclus1on. The exammatwn of the various umvcrsals m the chapters of part two can be satd to have led to an empmcal confirmation of these umversals; m VlCW of the overwhdmmg majonty of 'regular' cases, the few problematic cases for each of these umversa!s may reasonably be rated as 'mc!de.nal'. Therefore, we can con.:lude that the da1med correlations between comparative~type chotec and chammg·type chOice are firmly established. Furthermore, we have been able to account for the attested correlation between word order typl's and some comparative types, by demonstratmg that these wordord~~r options are correlated with the particular chammg types which dct( rmme the comparauve types in question. 1 Th1s, then, constitutes the maJor descrtptwe result of our cross-hngmsuc mqu1ry. However, as we stated explicitly m chapter 5, the set of chammgbas1:d umversals IS not only mtended as a purely descnpuve statement of an observed correlatiOn between two kmds of typologiCal optwns m ncttmal languages. In addmon, th1s set of umversab, taken .a~ a whole, mw.t be conce1ved of as the expressiOn of the clatm that, m natural
Theoretical Background AssumptiOns
255
language systems, the encodmg of the concept of companson 1s denvanve of the encoding of the concept of temporal chainmg. In other words, we clatm that the cocrelanons latd down in the umversals are the way they are by virtue of the fact that comparatives are not an 'mdependent', 'autonomous' constructiOn type; their syntactiC expression has been modelled upon the way m whiCh the 'deeper-lying' concept of temporal chammg has been formahzed m language. In this way, the set of chammg-based umversals lays datm to an explanattan of the facts m the typology of comparative constructions. With respect to this explanatory clatm contamed m our analysis, the first thing we must remark IS that the VIew of temporal chaimng as a more 'fundamental' concept than companson IS not Implausible; it IS certamly more plausible than the v1ew that the modellmg relatton should be the other way around. The percepnon of temporal ordenng between events IS undoubtedly a very element'!fY psychologiCal process, and the conceptualization of temporal relations (wh1ch, If locahst grammanans are nght, may in its turn be denvative of the conceptuahzanon of spanal relauons) is one of the prereqmsttes for such fundamental human faculties as memorizing and deductive reasomng. Moreover, the mtuitive VIew that, of comparison and temporal chammg, the latter is the more basic concept has been affirmed by a number of psychological and psycholinguist!C expenments, which we w1ll touch upon m section 11.4. Thus, I think it can be argued Wtth some confidence that our mterpretation of the set of chammg-based uruversals m terms of a modelhng of companson on temporal chammg does not meet With senous difficulties, at least not in as far as the dtrccnon of modelhng whtch ts Implied m this mrerpretation ts concerned. While our Interpretation of the chammg-based umversals m terms of a modelling relation does not seem to be Implaustble from a conceptual pomt of view, there are nonetheless a number of empmcalltngUistic facts wh1ch have not yet been explamed withm this framework. Concernmg the explanation of the occurrence of the various types of comparatives, the reader will have noted that cases of Mtxed Compan~on, as well as the case of the T elugu comparauve (see section 2.5) have not yet found their proper place wtthin our set of universals. Moreover, the occurrence of the vanous sorts of Parnde Comparatives remams a recalcitrant phenomenon. Despite the analysis of these cases m terms of the nonon of syntactizatwn (see chapter 9), there ts one fascmanng problem connected wnh Particle Comparatives whJCh we have as yet hardly touched upon. Thts que~tion can be put m the followmg way: given that languages whteh model their comparatives on balanced temporal chams can come up with a (semanttcally completely transparent) ConJomed Comparative,
256
Towards an Explanation of Comparative-type Chotce
why should there be Particle Comparatives at all? Gtven the concept of syntacnzatton, th1s questiOn can be rephrased as follows: why do some languages syntacticize their balanced input-structures, while other languages prefer to keep them balanced? Apart from the occurrence of vanous as yet unexplained comparattvetypes, there IS also the cunous phenomenon of 'double opnons' tn comparative-type choice. In particular, it may be expected of our explanatory framework that It be able to account for the fact that some pairings of pnmary and secondary comparative types occur quite frequently, whereas other theoretically possible pairings seem to occur only mcidentally or not at all.
In order to 1mprove the explanatory value of our analysis on these points, I will develop in the following chapters a new model for the prediction of comparatiVe-type chotce. A fundamental charactenstic of this new model 16 that it contains a~&umpnons on both the cogmtivesemJntic .1nd the syntactic representation of comparative constructions. Furthermore, It makes some specifiC claims about the Interdependency between these two !c\ ds of representatiOn. As for the syntactic encodmg of comparatives, the new model mcorporates the set of chammgwbased universal& proposed w chapter 5; thar is, rhe new model, too, rests on the assumption rhat rhe encoding of comparatives in natural languages IS ' encoding options for temporal chaining. As will become modelled on the dear, however, the new model transcends the original set of universals m that it does nor take derankmg to be the only relevant syntactiC procedure in the formalization of temporal chain mg. The new model will assume that, m addition to deranking, there is a second grammatical procedure whtch~is relevant in the derivatton of temporal chains {and hence, given the modelling hypothests, in the derivation of comparatives). This addttiorldl procedure, tdentity de!ettOn, allows for a number of distinct option.'> 111 tts apphcatron, which can be shown to be paired off with the vanou~ typological options of derankmg in a non~random way. As a result, we can formulate a set of procedure-types with respect to cham formatwn, m whlCh a spectfic optton of tdentlty deletion ts combined wtth a specific optiOn 1n the deranking procedure. The new typology of chain formanon whtch results from thts wtll be examined for ItS value as a determinant of the typology of comparatives; it will turn out that thts new typology has an explanatory power which exceed~ that of our earher set of universals, whtch were based ~olely on the typologtcal opttons in the grammatical procedure of deranking. The new mode! of comparative-type choice will be presented m detatl in the following chaprers. However, we must first make a short dtgresswn, in order to state a number of ba!>JC assumptions about some general
Theoretical Background Assumptions
257
conceptual matters m the theory of language. Although the framework Within wh1ch our mve~ugation IS conducted IS dellberately mcdelneutral, it Is impossible to avOid at least a mimmum of theore:1cal background a&&umptlon~ about the general orgamzation of the theoq· of language; wtthout these, it would be Impossible to formulate 1r an intelligible fashion a clanficat10n of the umversal properties of the comparative construction. However, thoughout the expo~itlon w11ch follows I have made efforts to frame my a.sumptions in terms of concept. which are by and large uncontrovers1al. None of the thmgs I have to say on the theory of language in general will strike the reader as 'ery onginal; the linguistic concepts employed here belong to the common stock-in~trade of post~war grammatical theory, while my v1ewb on certain psycholinguistic ISsues have been borrowed mamly from Fodor, Bever and Garrett (1974) and Fodor (1976).
11.2 Three levels of linguistic structure My first assumpnon IS that natural language is a mechamsm wh1ch connects thoughts (1.e., mental representations) to forms (1.e., represent· ations which are ultimately expressed physically in sound), and that It IS the task of the theory of language to provide a sy!tematic descrtptlcn of the nature of this connection. Given this perspective, we can say that a complete description of the formal and conrentiVe propetlles of a sentence in a given language will mvolve the statement of at least two different levels of structure for that sentence. The first of these levels has, since Chom1ky (1964), been commonly referred to as (syntactic) surface structure. Surface structure 1s the (theoretical reconstruction of the) structural form of the sentence as It 1s uttered by the speaker and perce1ved by the hearer; w11hm the overall model of a hnguisttc theory, surface structure functions as the input for the rules of phonological mterpretation. Surface structure prov1des ooth lexical information on sentences (m that 1t spec1fies the lexical ttems of which the sentence IS composed) and structural information: tt spectfies the linear order of the lexical items in the sentence, and it furthermore describes the organization of constituent elements. into larger strucrural units. A common way to represent burface s.truc..-rureb graphtcaJly I'1 the use of tree diagrams, in which both the linear order of constituent elements and the relanve degree of structural cohesion wh1ch holds between them are depicted. The second type of structure wh1ch 1> needed m a complete theo ·y of language IS at the very opposite of surface structure: 1t 1s the structure
2. 5H
f oward:, t.m txfJlaua/l()n of Comparatli'C#typr Cho1entence m a natural language mvolve~ a ~pecdicatton of the levels of surface \tructure and cogmnve structure, and furthermore a statement of the relations bern.een cogmnvc and ~urfacc ')trucrure whtch obtam m the sentences of that langu•ge. Now, m h-epmg wnh anctent tradltlon 1n the philosophy of lai'lguage, I w1ll make one further assumption about the orgamzanon of tl-.e theory of language. I a-.~ume that, between cognmvc structure (whteh representS 'thought') and surface structure (wh1ch represents 'form'} an tntt>rmedtate level of structure must be poo;;tulated. llw; level reprc 'cntS the type of lmgm•nc mformauon trad1tItiOn~. To be exact, we have argued that comparatJvcs are umver1:.al!y modelled on temporal chams; m terms of our theoretical mcdel, we can rephrase thi~ da1m as unplying that the US of a compar~mve construction has been 'borrowed' from the way m whiCh teemingly profitable problem area, at least not for a• long as they are not forced to do so by irrefutable empirical evidence. In other words, gaven that there are no dech1ve arguments in favour of one of the two po!:lsable po&itions, the a!:lsumpTton that cognitive btructures are universally vJIId IS the more fruitful of the two, at least from the pomt of view of theoretical hnguistics.
Apart from these merhodolo!lJcal conSiderations (which ultimately oo1l down to a chotce of tacttcs in the politics of saentific mquiry), we rnay adduce another argument for our positton, which has to do with considerations of a general epistemical nature. If we assume that speakers of languages m whtch a certain concept bas a different formal encodmg
also employ different cognitive representanons for that concept (that IS, 1f we assume that people who •peak cbfferently also think differently), we are mexorably committed to accept some version of lmgmsnc relatiVISm, in the sense of Whorf (1956). Now, as has been remarked repeatedlt m the hterature, hnguistic relativism ts a posttwn whtch ts very hard to falsrfy, 1f, mdeed, It can be fals16cd at alL Nevertheless, there are a number of empirical data wh1ch seem to be at odds with at least the rrore radical verswns of lmgu1stic relativism. The fact that translations
between languages are, to a large extent, successful, and the extstence of language umversals, are data whtch are dtfficult to explain wtthm a relativist framework. For further dtscu'iston on th1~ top1c I refer to Fodor, Bever and Garrett (1974). For our present purposes, I will rake 1t for granted that rhe consequence of ltngUisttc relativtsm ts a defimte dtsadvantage for the posinon that cognitive representations whtch und{·rhe a certain construction type are language-dependent.
I owtJhl~ ,ml-.xplmzalwll of Comparattv(!·fY/J'' Cllm( e
Lot,
11.5 Conclusion The
malll pomt~
of rhts chapter can be &ummarized as follows. As
IS
the
case wnh any other con!Jtrucnon type, the structural description of comparatives mvolves representations on three dJsnnet levels. The cogmttve strut.ture underlymg express10ns of comparison can be visualized as a language-mdependent spatial configuratiOn, m wh1ch the difference in
degree of mtenstty IS represented m terms of spatial distance between the two .:ompared Items. By the apphcanon of cognitive strategies thiS spatial configuration is to be mapped onto the language •ystem; the output of thtc; rnappmg IS constrained by the requirement that any &trategy must result m an under/yrng structure wh1ch has the form of a temporal cham of propositions. The underlymg structures must further be mapped onto the :.urface structures of vanou~ languages by means of grammatical proc-edureh. Agam, the output of thts mapping IS constrained, in that the appl·catlon of any grammatical procedure to an underlying structure of a comparative must result 11'1 the selection of one of the hmned set of surf~ce
vanants wh1ch have been ilttested m the typology of comparative
cons rru ctwns.
12 Cognitive Strategies in Comparative Formation
12.1
Introduction
In the previous chapter, we have established the mimmal propertJe!l wh1.ch must be attrtbuted to the various levels of repre!lentation for comparative expressiOns. Followmg thts, we must now tum to the que~tion of the various rule types which are Instrumental m the mappmg of the~e structural representations onto one another. In th1~ chapter, our concern w1ll be wtth the nature of the cognittve strategtes which are needed to achteve a mappmg of the cogmnve representation of comparison onto the underlying structures of comparatives. Agam, the reader should be warned beforehand that much of what I have to say on this toptc is htghly speculative. For one thing, cognmve psychology Itself does not seem to be very certam about the nature of cognitive mappmg operations, On top of this, as a linguist I find myself here m the uncomfortable position of a trespasser on a domam in whtch I am not qualified. I can only hope that the exposition wh1ch follows will contam a certain degree of plau~Jbility from a psychological poim of vtew (I have, in fact, derived the g1~t of my ideas from psycholmguistic pubhcatiom). and that it may encourage cogrnnve psychologists to haV'e theu say on these Issues, too.
12.2
Basic features of cognitive strategies
the ta~k whtch cognitive strategies must accomplish JS the transformation of a spattal cognitive structure mto a lmearly ordered lmgmsnc structure. Thus, the mappmg of the CS of comparison onto the US of a comparative mvolves a transitiOn of a spatially modelled configuration onto a configuration which is modelled on a temporal chain: strategies 'read off' vanous bns of information from the CS and c.odify them m the form of (a sequence of) propositions. As we noted above, spatially modelled configurations (such as pictures,
Af;, I see
It,
268
Towards an ExplanatJOn of Comparative-type Choice
maps, blue-pnnts and the like) have the property that the mformation which they contaut ts made available simultaneously. A consequence of this property IS that the observer enJOYS considerable freedom in deahng with such configurations: dependmg on the scannmg strategy which he selects, he may read off whatever mformat1on he chooses in whatever order he choose~. In other words, smce all information in the CS 1s presented to the observer ~in one ptece', the observer has the freedom to decide for hmrself which feature of the CS is to serve as the primary focus of his scanmng strategy. As an example, let us consider the case in which an observer i5 confronted with a picture of a red triangle (see Fodor, 1976: 187). In cod1f},ng the information which is contained in rhlS spatially modelled configuration, the observer may choose to focus hi> scanning procedure on the colour of the picture, and hence he may come up with the proposition 'x is red' as a first mapping of 1nformatton. However, there 1s nothing which prevents the observer from focusmg h1s scannmg strategy on another feature of the configuration, say, the form of the pictured obJect. If he chooses to do this, the first proposition which results from his mapping operanon may be something like 'x is triangular'. The Important point here ts that nothing in the cogmtive representation 1rself forces the observer to select a particular feature of that representatiOn dS h1s first focus of scanmng; the decision to select a particular SCJnning mategy is completely up to the observer. This being sa1J, however, 1t must be added that it is quite plauSible to assume that the decision for a particular scanning strategy in a given situation will be heavily influenced by considerations of 'salience'. That is, when confronted with a cognitive representanon, the observer will naturally rate some features of that representation as more •salient' (1.e., as more useful to his present purposes than other bits of informatton which are also objecttvely present in the configuration}, and hence he will focus his scannmg strategy on these salient features. In short, in mapping a CS onto a US a speaker/hearer may employ various different strategres, depending on h" c;omat!On of the Jmportance of the vanous p1ece< of information whrch are contained m the cognJttve representation. Now, il we look at the CS of compamon wh1ch we have proposed m the foregoing chapter, we can observe that there are mimmally three features ol this configurJtton which are possible candidates for 'salience', and which may therefore be selected as the starting point of a cogmtive mapping strategy. To be specific, we can see that the definmg elements of wh1ch the CS of compariSon consists are the following: (a) the axrs, wh~eh represents the spatial dimensiOn along wh1ch
gradience 1s demarcated;
269
Cognitzve Strateg~es
(b) the tzvo compared ztems A and B, which are Juxtaposed on the
IXIS
to the effect that there ts a distance between them; (c) the extents on the axis, which represent the reld.rive degree·; of mtcnliltt) whtch the two compar~d Items po~. In the next sectlon, I w1ll present three different mappmgs of the C) of c:ompanson onto underlymg structures. In other words, I wtl1 as!)un"ie
that the mappmg of this CS onto the language system ha; at lca;t three dtfferent outputs. The difference between the;e three rnappmgs wtli be taken to be cssenually a roa.equence of the ;olecnon of three dtffel ent scanmng strategie!), based upon the !>election of a different startmg pomt for these scanning strategies in the CS. Whether these three Mrate~1es exhaust the possibtlities of the ways in wh1ch the CS of comp.ut~on can
be mapped onto the language system IS a question wh1ch I onnot even begin to answer. For a discussion of thts matter, we would have to ha•re a much dearer v1ew of the constraints whteh are to be tmposed on the notton of 'po;;ible scanning strategy'. Evidently, thts cs a problem yntax) walk a thin line between the two ev1ls of longwmdedness and unmrelhgJbihty. These procedures can be COJlCeJved of as seckmg a balan..::e between rhe demands that are made on them from the part of the decoder ;:~.nd the encoder, sometimes giVtng m ro one s1de, while mother cases the opposite mterest prevatls. As a matter of fact, It may be suggested that a fundamental respect m wh1ch languages d1ffer from one another hes m the dectstons whtch they make when faced with such confhcnng mterests; some languages are generally mchnc-d to s1de WJth the hearer, whereas other languages generally prefer to ',acnfice the mterests of the hearer to the speaker's convemence. 1
13.3
Deranking and identity deletion
Gtven the assumpnon that underlymg structures of comparattves must be VIewed as formal extensiOns of temporal chaming, tt seems plaustble to look for the relevant operanons among those grammattcal procedures whtch are pre·emmently apphed m the hngmsttc formahzat1on of conM
Grammattcal Procedures
279
secuuve and simultaneous chams. In what follows, I will propose two
types of rules which I take to be operative m that area of syntax. Both of thc'Se operations may be subsumed under the general heading of structurereducmg procedures, smce their rnam effect is to reduce, and hence to compress, underlying structures in the course of their transformation into ~urface structures.
The first of the structure-reducmg operations which I propose for the grammatical treatment of chaining consuuctlons has been dealt With extenSively m the foregoing chapters, so that a few short remarks may suffice here. Throughout this book, we have employed a notion of structural deranktng, i.e., a grammancal procedure by which predicates m a cham are downgraded m rank with respect to the remaming mam
predicate. In a certam sense, the procedure of deranlong can be looked upon as an instance of a more general type of syntactic operauon, v1z. the procedure of subordination. However, as we have argued in chapter 4, derankmg IS a specific and !united case of subordination; while general
subordmatlon has the effect of downgrading a whole clause, deranking has the additional effect of robbtng an en;twhde full clause of its sentenoal status by downgrading Its predicate. FunctiOnally speakmg, one m1ght po•tulate that deranking is a type of grammatical procedure which is pnmarily aimed at makmg things eas1er for the hearer, at the expense of some additiOnal effort for the speaker. By the application of deranking, the number of S-node• in a chaming construction is reduced, and all the mformanon contamed m the chain gets structurally arranged onder one S-node. Thus, looking at the
derankmg procedure from a spec1fic angle, one m1ght say that thiS procedure reduces the structural complexity of the structure at tssue, in that It results m a <prumng' of the anginal tree dtagram by means of a trummahzanon of the number of rule cycles. 2 As we have seen in chapter 4, languages may vary considerably in the
extent to which they permit the procedure of derankmg to apply in the encodmg of their temporal chains. To be exact, we have found that, with respect ro the applicability of derankmg, languages can be d1v1ded into three categories, viz. languages which are balancmg, languages which permit only conditional deranking, and languages which allow absolute derankmg. Now, in the precedmg chapters we have tacnly assumed that the options which a language has m the derankmg procedure constitute the only relevant detenninmg factor in the prediction of the surface variation of comparauves across languages. At this point, however, we must
mtroduce a second grammatical procedure m the encodmg of temporal chams. As we will see below, the options which languages have tn the
280
Towards an F.xplanation of Comparative-type Chozce
apphcabihty of this second procedure also have their effects upon the ways tn which the choice for a particular comparative construction m a given language is made. Th1s second grammatical procedure may be referred to as rdenttty deletion. The concept of Identity deletion JS meant co cover all those mstances of chaming formatwn m which lextcal material has been omitted or suppressed on the basi~ of the identity of that matenal wtth lexical matenal which IS present elsewhere m the string. Using a somewhat drfferent, but essentially equivJ!ent terminology, we may say that tdentity deletion ts meant to cover all those cases in which lexiCal material has been reduced to a null-anaphor under conditions of 1denttty. Thus, the well-known phenomena of Coordmation Reductwn and Gapping, whtch have been dt!:.CU!:.Sed extensively m recent grammatical literature, are taken to be instance.:, of a case in which {some spectfic vanant of) tdenttty deletiOn has applied to a string. Concermng the concept of tdent1ty deletion, two remarks should be made i.mmedtately. F1rst, we must stress that the concept of tdenttty deletion which we employ here will be taken to apply only to those cases of stnng-reducnon in whtch the omltred matenal bears a formal relatton to some other element In the same strmg. In other words, a condltlon on the applicatiOn of Identity deletion IS that the deleted material should be fully and unequtvocdlly recoverable from the lingutsttc context. Hence, cases where lextcal material IS left out on the basi!, of recoverability from the general non-hngmsttc context w1\l not be taken to constitute Instances of identity deletion. For example, elhptical sentences hke those in (1), which have been discussed at length in Shopen (1973), do not fall under our definition of idennty deletion. It will be clear that the suppressed lexiCal matenal m such sentences, whatever it may be, does not have to bear a relauon of 1dennty to previously mentioned material, but can only be supplied by mvokmg the extra-linguistic context: (1)
ENGUSHc
a. b.
Fire! One more beer, and I leave
c.
Into the dungeon wrth hLm!
Also, cases of Pro-Drop are assumed to lie outs1de the scope of our notion of 1dent1ty deletion. Thus, the fact that, in languages like Larin and Rumaman, there is no need for the overt expression of a subject by means of a non-stressed personal pronoun, as is illustrated in the following sentences:
Grammatical Procedures '2)
281
LA71N:
In Astam transterunt ln A.·ACC cross-PERF. JPL 'They crossed into Asia, '])
RUMANIAN:
lntelege pzesa under;tand-PRES. 3SG p\ay-DET 'He understands the play' is not covered by our definition of Identity deletiOn. Agam tt IS dear tl-·at, m ca!>e~ of l)ro·Drop, unstressed lexical material may be omitted In .my construction where the reference IS recoverable from the general c~>n text, 1 and that thts left-out matenal does not have to be subJect to conditions of 1dent1ty with previOusly mentioned matenal.. Secondly, we :.hould make a short comment on the nature of the identity-relation which 1:. fundament.ll to the ddenun procedure at ts~ue here. A!> the literature on various type& of identrty-ddenon proce~:.es 11as :.hown conclu1>ively, It is not just mere JeJ!._ic,:tiJdentity- which IS required here. ln addition, we need at least ::.orne further functional or C•)nfigurational 1dennty, to the effect that repeated matenal may be supplessed only 1f It occupies the same configurational posmon (c.q . ha~ the same structural functiOn) as the precedmg element which 'tnggers' the delenon- At pre!>ent, it must be satd that, despite considerable progre~s made in thts area, the exact content of the notion of tdentlty needed m this type of delenon procedure is not yet fully known . For our purpo1.es, however, thh doc~ not have to be much of a problem, smce we wdl apply the procedure of identity deletion only to very simple configurauon!>. m whtch the combined requirements of lexical and configurational identity are met m a straightforward way. If we compare the procedure of identity deletion to the procedure of deranking, we nute considerable differences between the two. Identity deletion effectuates the eliminatiOn of lextcal matenal, and hence It reduce:. the input stnng in length, but it doc!> not alter the configUL~lt•on of the underlying ~tructure. That IS, identity deletion has the effect of filling structural po~ltion& lil the underlying configuration with Iex~eally empty matenal, but- at least m general- It leave~ the ongmal structural configurJtion intact_4 In opposition to thi~, Jeranking IS a procedure wh1ch fundamentally affects the btructural configuration of the mput string, in that 1t changes the structural rank of some elements m that stnng. Unlike identity deletion, however, dcrankmg normally doe~ not result in the loss of lexical material from the string . That 1s, derankmg
28 2
I owards an l:xplanalmn of ComfJarattvc-type Chotce
alters the structural dependencies between elements of a string, but it generally keeps the ongmallexical content of the stnng mtact. Th1s formal d1ffercnce between the two structure-reducmg procedures proposed here may be thought to have its reflection lll a difference m functional status. of these two procedures. As we suggested above, deranking may be thought of as a procedure wh1ch pnmarily serves the communicative interests of the hearer, m that 1t reduce:. the number of mam clauses m a structure, and hence may lead to a reduction of the number of rule cycles wh1ch have to be applied to that structure. On the otPer hand, 1t IS natural to assume that the apphcatton of identity delenon IS mamly beneficial to the . bcmg equal! the task of decodmg wdl be much stmpler and more effictent 1f elhps1~ occurs m followmg conJuncts rather than precedmg ones.
Despite Its functwnal naturalness, however, the Forward Pnnc1ple tS not a blindly applicable law. The linguistic data clearly show that f"lerc are languages in which this principle has been thwarted, in that blCk¥ ward deletion for ~ubJCCts or prediCate:. ts permtttcd or even obligatory. Accordingly, what we need IS some princtple by which the opera two of the Forward Principle can be constrained for spectfic cases. The relevant research on this pomt IS agam due to Sanders (1976). Hu. re!,ults can be summarized m the followmg statement:
The Boundary Constratnt on identity deletion: Languages tend to avoid elltpsis of elements on sentence boundanc1 .. In effect, th1~ constraint :,tate~ th.u clement!, which arc the first or rhe )a. Now, if we apply these two dtrectlonahty pnncaples to the operation of tdennty deletiOn m languages of dtfferent baste word-order types. we arnvl! at the follow&ng sume to be needed m the de~cnptton of the lmguiStlc encodmg of compar1wn m natural languago. BneHy !>Ummannng our posmon, we can ~ay that we have poc;tulated a general model of hngulstlc dcs~.:nptton, m wh1ch a consuuctton type lS taken to bed< fined by three levels of >tructure, vtz. the CS, the US and the SS. We have assumed that there ts a umversally vahd CS of companson of the type defined m sectton 11.4. In order to achteve the mappmg of thts CS of companwn onto the language system, we have postulated a set of three different cogmnve ~uareg1cs (~sectiOn 12.3 ), wh1ch result 1n three basic types of posMble undcrlymg structures for comparatives m natural languages. The mappmg of these underlymg structures onto the surface forms of comparauves ts clatmed to be effectuated by the operanon of two cruc1ally relevant grammatical procedures, v1z. derankmg and identtty delctton (see secroon 13.3 and 13.4). Both of rhe>e grammatical proc(•dures aJJow for a three-way vanat100 m theu apphcation acrOS!:I natut allanguag~. Thu::., m our J.naly5.Js, the vanat10n tn surface mamfestat1on of comparatives aero::.::. langudge~ IS thought to result from the possibility that, stamng from a umversally ••ltd CS, languages may vary m thetr apphcanon of cogmnve strategte!:l and grammatical procedures during the cour•e of the mappmg of thts CS onto the vanous surface forms of comparanves. However, even If one accepts the general plau!.Ibility of thts .approach, tt wtll be noted tmmedtately that rhe analysts presented so far prcdlct~ a number of poss1ble ::.urface structure~ whtch lS much larger than the number of compJranve types whtch are actually arrested 111 the cross-hngUIStlC data. Our analysl& assumes that there are at least three
Opt1ma/ and Non-opt•mal Language Types
291
baMC types of underlymg structures wh1ch are possJble candidates for the
starting point of the operation of deranking and identity deletion. Furthermore, both derankmg and 1dentity deletiOn allow for a crosslmgmstic variation into three categones, so that, logically, there are nine possible lingmstic types m the application of grammancal procedures to the underlymg structures of comparatives. Coupled With the three basic types of underlying structures, tlus will amount to the prediction of twenty-seven possible surface types of comparative constructions across languages. In reahry, of course, the empmcal data show that the actual number of attested comparanve types is far more hm1ted; there are only five maJOr surface types of comparatives in the sample, plus a few minor ones, such as Parnde Comparatives and cases of Maxed Companson. In other words, our model of linguistic descrtptiOn 1s, as 1t stands, much too unconstrained to account for the empincal data; clearly, tf our model is
gomg to work at all, some principle (or set of principles) should be found by wh1ch the number of combmatory posSJblhties can be drastically bmtted. In order to adueve this lim1tanon, I will propose two general princtples
which I take to be apphcable in the linguistic encod1ng of comparison, and in the operation of linguistic systems in general. The first of these rrmciples 1S meant to delim!t the ways in which the various opnons m grammatical procedures may be combined. The second principle, wh1ch will be d1scussed in section 14.3, has to do wnh the limitation on the possible combinations of procedure-types and strategy-types.
14.2
The Principle of Procedural DepwJency
I take It to be self-evident that every natural language will have to make a chOice for both one of the optwns m Identity deletion and one of the options m deranking. That ts, every natural language system will contam some pa1rmg of a particular deletion vanant and a particular derankmg variant; if languages select a different pairing of these two types of variants, they will be said to belong to different procedure types. Now, up to the present point in the discussion we have more or less tacidy assumed that identity deletion and derankmg are two grammatical procedures which operate mdependently of one another; hence, given the three-way variation which both procedures permit, one mtght conclude
that languages can be divided into mne different procedure types. In reahty, however, the combmatory po~stbthttes of procedural vanants turn out to be limited by the fact that there IS a cerram degree of mterdepcndency between the two procedures at hand. To be specific,
292
Towards an ExplanatiOn of Comparative-type Cho1ce
po::.::.tble patrings of procedural vanams turn out to be empmcaHy restncted by the following universal pnnciple:
The Prinaple of Procedural Dependency: If a language has a derankmg procedure, it must also have a procedure of identity deletion. An alternative and equivalent formulation of this principle might be: 'If d language has no procedure of identity deletion, 1t cannot have a procedure of derankmg'. In other words, the principle is meant to state that, out of the four logtcally posstble combmations presented tn the table below. the second combmatton (viz. deranking and no 1dcnuty delenon) is empmcally excluded:
Deranking
Identity deletion
+ + ---"'-----·-------', + + It should be stressed here that the Pnnc1ple of Procedural Dependency (PPD) must be vtcwed as the statement of an emptrrca/ly attested crosslmgutsttc fact; m other words, the PPD has the status of an unphc.ltlonal universal of language. In my sample, I have found no counterexample to this prmciple; that is, my sample does not contain any language which has deranking, but not some form of identity deletion. Conversely, there arc no languages m my sample which lack identity deletion but have nonetheless the possibtlity to derank predicates m temporal chains. I hope I can be abwlved from the obligation to present the full cross-hngutsttc evidence by wh1ch this principle is confirmed in my sample; a complete presentation of the relevant facts would fill at least 50 pages of text. Therefore, I must ask the reader to accept without further argumentation that the PPD embodte& a v.tlid restrictiOn on the structural po:,sibilmes of natural languages. It 1&, of course, natural to ask why a restnction hke the PPD should be Imposed on natural language systems. I can only offer some htghly tentative speculations here. For one dung, the concept of explanatwn tn general is ~till very unclear m Umversal Grammar, and, moreover, in thts particular case there are several plausible perspectives from which such an explanation might be developed. One of the approaches one might pursue on this pomt Is an explanation on the basts of functiOnal considerattons. As we suggested in section 13.2, the procedures of Identity deletiOn and derankmg have a dttfcrent functional status, in that deranking 15 mainly a service to the hearer~ whereas 1denttty deletion 1s
Optimal and Non-optimal Language Types
293
pnmanly aimed at mimmalizing the efforts of the speaker. Now, 1! we accept thts suggestion, we can see that the pa1ring which 1s exduded by the PPD (vi?. rhe pamng of derankmg and no idcnt1ty deletton) !S the combmanon which puts all the efforts requ1rcd for unprob(emJtlc commumcat10n on the :,houlders of the ~peaker; m this pamng, the speaker has to make the effort of derankmg prcdu...ates m temporal chams, but he IS not cornpcm.ated for tht~ by a permt~::,.~on co omH redundant lexical material. In other word~, the p.uring which ts excll1ded by the PPD demands maxtmal effort from the speaker while givmg h1m nothmg in return; and this ·unfairness' to the speaker may be the reason why natural languages try to avmd thl~ part!Lular p.unng. It can be noted that m other possible patring~, wh1ch arc permitted by the PPD, the efforts of communicanon are distnbuted more evenly over speaker and hearer. Thu.;;, for instance, in the first pa~r~ng hsted m the table the spcdker must make the effort of derankmg, but he IS "rewarded' for Lh1s by the perrmsswn to leave out redundant matenal. In the fourth pa1nng listed, speaker and hearer also stnke an equal bargam: the speaker does not have to go through the trouble of derankmg, but the hearer doe~ not have to make the effort of recovering omitted rnatenaL It goes Without saymg that such an explanation of the PPD 111 funcnonal terms IS at present nothmg more than a ~pcculat1ve ~k(·tch. First of all, It w1ll be nece::,sary to support It by mdependcnt p~ycho hnguistic data. Furthermore, it 1,hould be observed that, even as It stand~. the analysis outlined above leaves a number of quc::.t10ns un.ln~\\l red. Thus, one may well ask why the tlurd alternative m the table (viz the pairing of no dcrankmg and Identity deletion} 1~ not excluded as well, since in this pairing all the effort of commumcatlon IS unloaded on the hearer. Now, we wdl see in the followmg sectwns that this partH u!ar pairing may mdeed be viewed as less 'optimal' (in a sense to be de!ined below) than the other t'.\0 pamngs vvh!Ch are pt:rmttted by the J>PD. However, even tf we gram tht~, our analy~i~ doe~ not provide a pnnc1pled account of the apparent fact that placmg the whole burden of Sentially independent of the word order of the language in question. Secondly, we have decided in section 14.4 that the languages of this type, like those of its optimal counterpart, will normally select the Ordered Strategy. Thus, the predicted range of underlying structures for the comparatives of the languages in this class consists of the variants of US· 2 presented in section 12.3. To all of these possible USs, the procedure of total identity deletion will apply, after the option of deranking one of the predicates in the chain has been foregone. In keeping with the general tendency noted above, total identity deletion will affect the predicate which has the standard NP as its subject; in this way, the comparee NP can turn up in surface structure as the subject of the main verb in the construction. Given th1s tendency, there is no need for us to consider
An Explanatory Model
311
those variants of US-2 which differ from other variants only in the order in wh~ch the two predicates succeed one another. Hence, the relevant
vanants of US-2 to which balancmg and total identity deletion must be applied are the following three: US 2.2 (a BIG) & (b BIG) US 2.3 (a BIG-x) & (b BIG-)') US 2.5 (a BIG-X) & (b not BIG-X)
Application of balancing and total1dentity deletion yields the following surface suuctures for the comparatives of the languages in this class: SS2.2 abigandB SS 2.4 A big-x and By SS 2.5 A big-x and B not x
G1ven these surface structures, 1t will come as no surpr1se that I claim that the languages of the type which oombine balancmg and total identity ddeuon are those languages which have some kind of Particle Comparative. In chapter 9, and especially 1n section 9.4.3, I have argued that Parocle Comparatives must be seen as cases of syntactization, a process
which has as its necessary condition that the language in question possesses some form of Coordmate Ellipsis. Application of this stringreducing procedure may in itself be sufficient for the derivation of a structure to which syntactization can apply. However, it is often the case that, in addition to Coordmation Ellipsis, the process of syntactization of a comparative construction will involve the incorporation of a negative element, or some form of relativization, or both. Now, I think that the
various surface structures which have been derived from the variants of US-2 by total identity deletion are just those rypes of structures which can, by means of the process mentioned above, be syntacticized into a Particle Comparative of some kind. First, it is obvious that the SS wh1ch has been derived from US-2.2, viz. SS-2.2, is the kind of surface structure which is exhibited by those Particle Comparatives in which the comparative particle is identical to the elements and, but or then/after that. Thns, we claim that Javanese, Goajiro, Toba Batak, Ilocano, Basque and Bari form their (primary or secondary) comparatives by applying balancing and total identity deletion to US-2.2. The second SS which results from the application of balancing and total identity deletion to a variant of US-2, viz. US-2.4, is a likely candidate for syntactJzation by means of relativization. For this to happen, we take it that the mdex on the deleted predicate (y) will be pronominalized, relativized and adverbialized mto some locative or
312
Towards an Explanation of Comparative-type Choice
instrumental case; in other words, this index will be syntacticized into a pronominal adverbial item with the original meaning 'to/atlby which'. Languages in wh1ch this process seems to have taken place are Finnish, Russian and Albanian, and probably also French, Latin and Hungarian. For those languages in which the comparative particle has the meaning 'like', we will assume that the syntacuzation of the pronominal adverbial at issue has proceeded up to a point where the pronominal origin of the particle is no longer recognizable. Indications that there is some aansition between a 'to-which'-particle and a 'like'-particle can be found in the data from Latin and Hungarian (see section 9.3)! Thirdly, there ate languages in which the comparative particle originates from a pronominal adverbial into which a negative element has been incorporated. Examples of languages in wqich such a 'to which not'particle appears are Hungarian, and possibly also Dutch and English. For this type of Particle Comparative, we will assume that the grammaucal procedures which are typical for all Particle languages (viz. balancing and total identity deletion) have applied to US-2.5. The SS which results from this application, viz. SS-2.5, then undergoes syntactization, in that the remaining index in the reduced clause IS relativized into a pronominal adverbial item, wh1le the residual negation in the reduced clause comes to be incorporated into that item. By an analysis hke the one given above, the occurrence of most of the attested types of Parude Comparatives can be accounted for. However, the reader wlil have noted that the analysis leaves out one attested category of Particle Comparatives, viz. those comparatives in which the comparative parucle is a disjunctive element ('or') or a negative conjunction ('nor'). For this type of Particle Comparative (to be found in Gaelic, Latvian, Classical Greek and Gothic), we will claim a status which is similar to the position of the Telugu comparative within the class of adverbial comparatives. As was the case with languages which combine total identity ddetion and absolute deranking, languages which combine balancing and total identity deletion will normally select the Ordered Strategy. There is, however, also a marginal possibility to select one of the variants of the Independent Strategy which meets the demands made by the language type at issue. The relevant US is US-1.2, which, by the application of total identity deletion and balancing, will have the following derivation: US 1.2 (a BIG) & (b not BIG) SS 1.2 A big and B not
In our analysis, we will assume that SS-1.2 will be syntacticized into a Particle Comparative, in that the conjunction and and the residual
An Explanatory Model
313
negative element melt together into a 'nor·~partide or an 'or'·panide. In summary, our model predicts that there will be a positive cot·
relation between the option of a Particle Comparative and the option of combining balancing and total identity deletion. In this way, our model describes the category of Particle Comparatives as a kind of 'intermediate' category between the 'optimal' categories of adverbial comparatives (which are correlated with the pairing of absolute deranking and total identiry deletion) and conjoined comparatives (which, as we shall see shortly, correlate with the options of no identity deletion and no deranking). The (admittedly rather scanty) historical evidence which we have seems to suggest that most Particle languages are languages wh1ch used to belong to the first optimal type, but which gradually came to prefer the option of balan!;ing to the option of deranking. Equivalently, one might say that, in the typical case, a language with a Particle Comparative is a Jangnage with total identity deletion, which, somewhere along the road, has lost the will to derank. As we noted in chapter 10, a considerable number of Particle languages have an adverbial comparative as their secondary option, and, in all the cases for whkh historical evidence is available, this adverbial comparative appears to be the elder of the <wo. The two types of languages discussed so far are the most complex cases among the five language types listed in section 14.4; the predictions of comparative-type choice for the three remaining langnage types whi.:h our model allows can be dealt with relatively briefly. First, let us consider the second optlmallangnage type specified in the model, viz. the set of languages which combine the options of limited identity deletion and conditional deranking. For these languages, SVO word order is predicted, since the option of conditional deranking is restricted to languages of this word-order type. Furthermore, the model predicts that the languages of this type will preferably select the Relatwe Strategy, since the US produced by this strategy (viz. US-3 in its several variants) IS the only US available in which subjects are 1dentical. Accordingly, we predict that the languages in the rype under discussion will form their comparatives by deriving them from a US of one of the following lorms: US 3.1 (a BIG) & (a BEYOND b) US 3.2 (a BEYOND b) & (a BIG) As we stated in section 12.3, it is natural for USs of th1s type to receive a simultaneous interpretation. Therefore, we will expect that the procedure
of conditional deranking applied to these USs will be the procedure which the langnage employs to derank its S-chains. A consecutive
314
Towards a11 Explanattolf of Comparative-type Choice
interpretation of these USs IS not entirely excluded, but must definitely be rated as a secondary possibility here. To these two variants of US-3, limited identity deletion (1.e., the deletton of a subject under identity) and cond1tional deranking will apply. Since there is no intrinsic ordering between the deletion of a subject and the deranking of a predicate,' we are, m principle, free to choose either ordering of apphcation of these procedures; for the sake of illustrat10n, I will adopt here the ordering in which limited identity deletion precedes the application of the deranking procedure. Furthermore, we must note that, in principle, the deletion of the subject might affect the first subject as well as the second subject in the chain, since the comparee NP will turn up in the SS as a main subject in any case, no matter what the directionality of the deletion procedure is. However, as wt· have established m section 13.4, general principles dictate that deletion of subjects in SVO-languages applies forward, i.e., always affects the second occurrence of the identical subject. Since, as we have seen in chapter 4, the deranking procedure in SVO-languages always affects the second predicate in the chain, we can conclude that the combined efforts of hmited identity deletion and conditional deranking will be directed at the rightmost clause in the various versions of US-3. Once we have made these decisions, It is fa1rly easy to sketch the syntactic derivanon which leads to surface comparatives for the languages of this type. For rbose languages which select US-3.1 as their starting pomt, the syntactic derivation outlined below leads to an Exceed-1 Comparative: (aBIG)
&
(aBEYONDb)
limited identity deletion (a BIG)
&
(BEYOND b)
conditional derankrng A b1g exceed-deranked B
If US-3.2 1s selected, the derivation will run along the following lines, eventnally resulting man Exceed-2 Comparative: (a BEYOND b)
&
(a BIG)
/imit£d identity deletion (a BEYOND b)
&
(BIG)
conditional derankrng A exceeds B b1g-deranked
In short, our model predicts that there will be a strong positive correlatiOn between the opoon of (some variant of) the Exceed Compara-
An Explanatory Model
315
tive and the possibility of combinmg h011ted identity deletion and conditional deranking in natural languages. In addition to the second opnmallanguage type discussed above, our model also allows for a non-optimal type of languages with limited identity deletion. In this latter type, the option of lrmited identity deletion is coupled with the option of balancing. For languages of this type our model will not specify a prefcneJ word order, since the option of balancing is not restricted to languages of a particular word-order type. What our model does specify, however, is that languages of this type will select the Relative Strategy, and, as a consequence, some variant of US-3 as the input of the syntactic derivation of their comparative constructions. Gwen that langoages of this type will delete the second subjeCt in US-3, bur will leave the second predicate balanced, the resulting surface structures will be the followmg: A big-main verb (and) exceed-main verb B A exceed-main verb B (and) big-main verb It will be dear rbat the surface suuctures derived in this way are those which are exhibited by the so-called Mixed Comparatwes which we discussed in section 2.5; we have seen there that languages like Acholi and Temne possess a (primaty or secondary) comparative in which features of Conjoined Comparatives and Exceed Comparatives have been brought together. Cp.: (2)
ACHOLI:
Gwok mera d1t ki kato mert dog my big and exceed your 'My dog is b1gger than yours' In short, our model predicts a positive correlation between the option of a M•xed Comparative (of the type exhilnted by Achol• and Temne} and the possibility of combining !Jmited identity deletion and balancing. Thus, our model characterizes this type of Mixed Comparatives as being an intermediate category between the two optimal categories of Exceed Comparatives and Conjoined Comparatives. In the same way as Particle languages, languages with a Mixed Comparative can be rated as languages which have some form of identity deletion, but which have lost (or never have had) the ability to derank predicates in chaimng constructions. Finally, we arrive at the fifth language type which our model allnws. The languages which belong to this set bave a minimum of snucturereducing procedures, JR that they have neither derankmg nor identity deletiOn. For these languages, the model snpulates that there will be no preferred word order, due to the choice of the balancmg option. Funher-
Towards an Explanation of Comparative-type Choice
316
more, we have argued m section 14A that the optimal strategy choice for languages of this type will be the Independent Strategy, and that therefore the favoured US for the comparative in these languages will be one of the variants of US-1, viz. US 1.1 US 1.2
(a BIG) (a BIG)
&
&
(b SMALl.) (b not BIG)
Since neither of the two relevant grammatical procedures will operate on these underlying chains, the sudace result for the comparative in this language type will typically be a Con;omed Comparative, either in its antonymous variant (from US-1.1) or in its polar variant (from US-1.2). In short, our model predicts a positive correlation between the option of a Conjoined Comparative and the option of combining balancing with no identity deletion. In this context it should be recalled that, although the Independent Strategy is preferred in this language type, other strategy choices are not completely excluded here. We can 6nd occasional instances of comparatives where, apparently, a language with minimal structure-reducing procedures has opted for a different strategy. Clear examples of such a case are Fulani and Motu; in one of the comparatives of these languages, balancing and no identity deletion have been applied to a US which is the product of the Relative Strategy. The comparatives at issue have the following forrns: (3)
FULANI:
Samba mawi , o buro Amad11 S. is-big , he exceeds A. 'Samba is bigger than Amadu' (4)
MOTU:
Una na namo , ina herea-ia this is good that exceeds 'That is better than this'
It must be added, however, that examples like these from Motu and Fulani are very exceptional, and that the unmarked choice for minimally structure-reducing languages is a Conjoined Comparative of the polar or •
antonymous variety. Summarizing the exposition in this chapter, we can say that we have
argued for the following new set of procedure-based universals of comparative-type choice:
An Explanatory Model
317
1: Languages with an adverbial comparative are languages with absolute deranking and total identity deletton. UNIVERSAL 2: Languages with a Separative · e are languages
UNIVERSAL
with absolute anterior consecutwe deranking and total UNIVERSAL 3:
UNIVERSAL 4:
UNIVERSAl.
5:
UNIVERSAL
6:
UNIVERSAL
7:
UNIVERSAL
8:
identity deletion. Languages with an Allative Comparative are languages with absolute posterior consecutive deranking and total tdentity deletion. Languages with a Locative Comparattve are languages with absolute simultaneous deranking and total identity deletion. Languages with an Exceed Comparative are languages with conditional deranking and limited identity deletion. Languages with a Conjoined Comparative, and the languages with a Mixed Comparative of the type encountered in Motu and Fulani, are languages with no identity deletion and no deranking. Languages with a Partu:le Comparative are languages with no deranking and total identity deletion. Languages with a Mixed Comparative of the type found in Acholi and Temne are languages with no deranking and limited identity deletion.
If we look at our new model from the point of view of the prediction of the attested range of comparative types, we can conclude that it turns out to be adequate to a considerable degree. In our model, the range of possible comparative types in natural languages is conceived of as being a derivate of the possible combinations of identity deletion and deranking options. As the discussion in this section has shown, the range of comparative types predicted by our model matches exactly the range of comparative types established in the empirical investigation in chapter 2. In short, our model can be shown to fulfil the 'all-and-only' -requirement for the types of comparative choice: it pred1cts correctly that the types which are empirically attested are all possible options of comparativetype choice, and it does not predict any comparative type whach is not attested in the data. Furthermore, our model accounts for the word·order preferences shown by some types of comparativ~ m that it traces these prefrrences to the procedure types upon which these comparatives are assumed to be modelled. It should be remarked here that, in its prediction of the range of comparative types, the modd devdoped m this section is super1or to a
31~
Towards an Explanation of Comparative-type Chotce
model which is based on a correlation of comparative types with deranking options alone. Unlike a modd which takes deranking options to be the sole basis of predicting comparative types, the new model, which bases itself on the possible pairings of two procedural options) has a satisfying explanation for the existence of Particle Comparatives. Moreover, the new model IS able to explain the occurrence of Mixed Comparatives and the Telugu comparative, cases which must appear as mere oddities in a model m wh1ch deranking is the only predictive factor.
15.3
The prediction o! language distributions
In this section, we will consider the second general explanatory question, which regards the distribution of the various attested comparative types over the languages in the sample. Since the basic !earnre of our model is the claim that choice of comparative type is predictable from the procedure type to which a language belongs, we will have to check whether all the languages With a comparative o! type X have the pairmg of derankmg and delenon options which the model predicts for them. Now, for the various options which languages select in the procedure of deranking, the chapters m part two have shown that, with only a small number of exceptions, the followmg correlations hold: (a) languages with an adverbial comparanve are languages with
absolute deranking; (b) languages With an Exceed Comparative are languages with condttional deranking; (c) languages With a derived-case comparative (i.e., a Conjoined Comparative or a Particle Comparative) are languages which have chosen tbe opnon of balancing. Since these correlations are exactly those whtch are predicted by the new model, we can conclude that this model is adequate as far as one of the factors which we claim to be predictive is concerned. Wtth respect to the other grammatical procedure which we drum to be a predictive factor in comparative-type choice, matters are considerably less dear. The new model predicts that, in the correlation of comparative types and types of Identity deletion, the following three statements can be empirically confirmed: (a) languages With either an adverbial comparative or a Particle Comparative are languages with total1dennty deletion;
An Explanatory Model
319
(b) languages with an Exceed Comparative (mcluding Mixed Comparatives of the Acholi type) are languages w1th limited identity deletion; (c) languages with a Conjoined Comparanve (includmg Mixed cases of the Fulani type) are languages with no identity deletion. If we start out to check these predictions against the linguistic data, we w!ll soon be confronted With the unfommate fact that the sources on the languages in our sample usually fail to provide a clear statement of the cond1tions under which string-reduction is permitted or excluded. Identity deletion is a phenomenon which is very margmal to the average grammarian, even more so than the phenomenon of deranking; while de ranking, if it takes place, gives rise to a distinct, new construction type, identity deletion will often escape the attention of grammarians, since irs application does not, as a rule, create a specific construction rype of its own. A further hand1cap is that It is often left unclear whether an example of a sentence in wluch a subject has been omitted is a case of genuine identity deletion or a case of Pro-Drop. That is, it is often impossible to decide from the presenred data whether a given language can omit just any non-stressed subject, or only subjects wh1ch are bound by an 1dentiry condition. Thus, at the present state of our knowledge, we have no other choice than to admit that our predicted correlations between the options of 1dentiry delenon and the choice of comparative types are seriously underderermined by the available lingutstic data. However, while we must concede that these predicted correlations are at present far from being confirmed, it must also be remarked that they do not seem to be senously refuted by the ava!lable facts. In the limited set of languages for which I have been able to find explicit statements on the options of identiry deletion, the facts appear to be in line with the tendencies contained in the above correlational statements. These fact!, (which are drawn from 42 languages, that is, almost 40 per cent of the sample) will be concisely enumerared below. For a large part, the relevant data stem from recent studies which deal explicitly with the phenomenon of ellipsis in coordinated structures; they are supplemented by data which I have gathered myself from grammatical descriptlons which I have consulted. Starring with those languages for wh1ch the possibility of total identity deletion is predicted, we can say that the crucial criterion for the positive identification of such a language lies in its ab1hty to omit predicates or verbs from chains, under identity with another predicate or verb in the
structure. Thus, the possib1hty of total identity deletion in a language can be demonstrated, among other thmgs, by showmg that this language has
320
Towards an Explanation of Comparative-type Choice
the possibility of VP-Deletion in coordinate structures (as illustrated by the French sentence (5)), or the possibility to reduce the predicate m answers under 1denmy with the predicate in corresponding questions (as illustrated by the Dutch example (6)), or the ability to apply Gapping (as illustrated by the Japanese example (7)): (5)
FRENCH:
Mon (rere joue le piano~ et ma soeur aussi my brother plays the piano and my sister too 'My brother plays the piano, and my sister does, too' (6)
DUTCH:
Heeft ]an opgebeld? Nee, Henk. Has J. phoned No H. 'Did Jan call? No, Henk did' (7)
JAPANESE:
Sumie wa inu o , Norio wa ki o mita S. TOP dog ACC N. TOP tree ACC see-PAST 'Sumie saw the dog and Nerio the tree' Now, if we look at the languages for which the new model predicts a possibihty of total identity deletion, we can attest the following facts. For the languages with a Separative Comparative, the possibility to apply Gapping has been documented for Finnish and Korean (Koutsoudas, 1971), for Japanese (Ross, 1967), for Turkish (Hankamer, 1979), for Quechua (Pulte, 1971) and for Amharic (Cohen, 1936: 348).ln the set of languages with an Allative Comparative, we find positive evidence for Gapping and other verb-reducing procedures in Jacaltec (Craig, 1977: 38), Breton (Wojcik, 1976) and Maasai (Tucker and Mpaayi, 1955: 1 06). In the class of languages with a Locative Comparative, there is positive evidence for Gapping in Tamil (Asher, 1982: 75) and Latvian (Koutsoudas, 1971), while VP-Deletion can be attested for Mapuche (de Augusta, 1903: 230) and predicate-ellipsis in answers can be shown to exist in Cebuano (Wolff, 1967: 23). The category for which some form of total identity deletion can be identified most extensively is that of the
languages with a Particle Comparative; various forms of verb-ellipsis, including Gapping, can be shown to operate in Dutch (own data), French (own data), Engltsh (Ross, 1967), Latin (Kuhner-Gerth, 1955), Classical Greek (KUhner-Stegmann, 1963), Nahuatl (Andrews, 1975), Albanian (Hetzer, 1978), Malagasy (Keenan, 1976b), Hungarian and Russian (Harries, 1978), Gaelic (Mallinson and Blake, 1981) and Javanese (Kiliaan, 1919: 349ff.). Finally, Koutsoudas (1971) states that in Telugu the deletion of verbs under Identity is a definite possibility. To sum up)
An Explanatory Model
321
the predicted correlation between, on the one hand, the option of total identity deletion and, on the other hand, the choice for an adverbial comparative or a Particle Comparative can be shown to hold for at lt'ast 27 out of the 71 relevant languages in the sample. Moreover, there is hardly any available evidence which contradicts thts correlatiOn. The only possible counterexample I know of is Toba Barak, a VOS-language with a Particle Comparative, for which Koutsoudas (1971) claims that verb·reduction is impossible. Opposed to this, however, are statements by Van der Tuuk (1867: 329ff.) to the effect that, in Toba Barak, all kinds of elhptical processes are a common occurrence. In the second statement presented above, a correlation is predtcted between the selection of an Exceed Comparative and the optton of limited identity deletion. Thus, in order to confirm the correlation, we should be able to demonstrate that languages with an Exceed Comp.lrative lack the ability to delete verbs under identity (that is, for mstance, they should not be able to apply Gapping), while at the same time permitting the deletion of one of a pair of identical subjects. In this case, again, the set of data which we have at our disposalts far from opttmal; of the 20 languages at issue, there are only eight for which an explicit statement as to their deletion opt1ons can be found. It is remarkable, however, that all of these eight languages provide straightforward corroboration of the correlation at issue. Thus, for instance, Mallinson and Blake (1981: 218) state explicitly that Mandarin and Thai are languages which 'totally resist deletion of verbs'. As a result, the following example from Thai is ungrammatical: (8)
THAI:
' Somchaj top Mali lae! Damrong Atcha S. slap M. and D. A. 'Somchaj slapped Mali and Damrong Atcha' On the other hand, it is quite dear that deletion of Identical subjects is common in both Thai and Mandann. The following examples bear witness to this fact· (9)
THAI:
Somchaj top Mali lae? kha: Damrong S. slap M. and kill D. 'Somchaj slapped Mali and killed Damrong' (10)
MANDARIN:
W o na hwo-penn wai-peul kJU 1 carry stove outside go 'I earned the stove outside'
322
Towards an ExplanatiOn of Comparatrve-type Choice
Apa1t from Mandarin and Thai, a resistance to verb-reducing processes such as Gappmg has been noted for Yoruba, lgbo and other Kwa languages (George, 1975). Koutsoudas (1971) claims that Wolof and Hau-.a do nor have any procedure for the elimination of idcnncal verbs; mor"over, he states that Swahili, at least in some of its dialects, lacks the optton of verb-ellipsis. Finally, my own data on Fulani (taken from Taylor, 1921, and Labourer, 1952) show that this language is also restst.ant tO the deletion of verbs. However, there is in this language, at least m some of the dtalecrs, also a ban on the deletion of identical ~ubwcts, a fact whtch in our model1s brought into connection with the Mtxed Comparative that can be attested as one of the options for Fulana. In summary, the correlation under discussion here is confirmed by eight out of 20 relevant languages m the sample, while no data are as yet available which refute the vahdtty of this correlation. Lastly, we must constder the third correlational statement, which da1ms that the cho1ce of a Conjoined Comparative is tied up with the inab1lity to reduce both subjects and verbs under tdenttty. Concerning thts parncular correlation, I am sorry to say that 1t has even less support m the available data than the foregoing two correlations. Part of the difficulty here is that, in general, the grammatical descriptions of the languages at issue are of a poor quahty anyhow, and that they occupy themselves mostly with morphology, to the exclusion of syntax. Another pomt, which we touched upon above, is that it is often hard to decide whether a case of apparent ellipsi!> m these languages is governed by condnions of structural identny, or whether it is rather a case of 'contextually recoverable' ellipsis, such as Pro-Drop. Up to now, 1 have been able to find pertment data in only SIX of the 20 languages involved here. Of these stx languages, Kobon (Davies, 1981: 75) and Yavapai (Kendall, 1976: 148) are clear confirmations of the correlation under discussion. The same may be claimed for Hixkaryana (Derbyshire, 1979), considering such non-reduced verbal sequences as the following: (1 1}
HIXKARYANA:
Mawu
wono
howler-monkey he-shot-It
wono
Waraka
w.
horoto
xarha
, spider-monkey also
Waraka
he-shot-it W. 'Waraka shot a howler-monkey and a spider-monkey' As for Mangarayi, Merlan (1982: 36) notes that verb-ellipsts may take place m only a limited number of contexts, especially those in which specific sentential adverbs like wadi! 'also' or galayJmingan 'in turn' are
An Explanatory Model
323
mvolved. In this context, it should be recalled that Mangarayi has an Allative Comparative as its secondary option (see section 10.3.2). Much the same observations can be made with regard to the two Polynesian languages m the sample: Maori and Samoan both have at least a limited possibility of total identity deletion, and they are both languages in which an adverbial comparative (in this case, a Locative Comparative) is possible in addition to the primary Conjoined Comparative. Surveying our examination of the predictions which our model makes on the correlations between comparanve types and deletion types, we have to accept the fact that, for the present, these predictions are underdetermined, and hence not confirmed, by the ava1lable data. On the pos1t1ve side, however, it must also be recogniZed that there is as yet no
reason to reject these predictions off-hand. On the contrary, what evidence is available seems to indicate that these correlations stand a good chance of bemg shown to be empirically valid, once the range of peronent data has been extended to a satisfactory s1ze.
15.4 The prediction of double options
In the preceding two sections, we have examined the empirical validity of the central claim which is incorporated in our model of comparative-type choice; that is, we have checked to what extent the correlations which our model claims exist between comparative type and procedure type are borne out by the cross-linguistic data. There is, however, also a more 'indirect' or 'circumstantial' respect in
which our model can be con-
fronted with linguistic reality. Thus, it may be the case that some linguistic support for the over-all validity of the model can be derived from an examination of the attested and non-attested combinations of primary and secondary comparative-type choices in the languages of the sample. In the remainder of this chapter, we will comment briefly on this phenomenon of 'double options' in comparative-type choice. Given that we can attest six different types of comparatives in the sample, simple arithmetics tells us that there are 15 logically possible pairings mto double options of comparative-type choice. However, the data on the attested combinations show that these 15 possible pairings are not distributed evenly over the languages with a double option for comparatives: there are certain pa1rings which are highly favoured, whereas others do not seem to occur at all. A classification of the cases of double options presents the following p1cture:
Given this distribution, it seems appropriate to assume that the phenom· enon of double comparative-type choice is not a case of random pairing; it can be seen, for instance, that the 6rst three pairs in the list, when taken together, cover more than half of the attested cases of double options. Therefore, we should be able to find a principled way to predict the apparent frequency of occurrence of certain combinations and the apparent exclusion of others. In my opinion, the model presented iu this
chapter can offer a framework for such predictions, provided that we are willing to accept some specific assumptions about the process of historical shift in the selection of comparative types. First of all, we can note that, for at least three of the pairs listed, the model will immediately predict the fact that they are possible or excluded. For one thing, within onr model it is perfectly natural to predict that the pairing Separativ~Allative will be an improbable, if not Impossible, option. As we have seen, these two comparative types
presuppose mapping strategies which are diametrically opposed in directionality of scanning. Moreover, since this opposition in scanning directionality IS apparently tied up with the opposition between SOV and VSO word order, a combination of these two comparative types would assume that a language can have these two diametrically opposed word orders at the same time. However, as is shown in the literature on wordorder change and word-order variatton (see, among others, Steele, 1978), a combination of SOV order and VSO order in one single language is highly untypical.
An Explanatory Model
325
The fact that the pairing Separative-Locative and Allative-Locative are empirically attestable has also a straightforward explanation in our model. These combinatiOns have as the1r only presupposition that languages can be undecided as to whether the US which they have selected for their comparative should be temporally Interpreted as a consecutive or as a simultaneous chain; the relative indeterminacy of this temporal interpretation of underlymg structures has been commented upon in section 12.2 and section 12.3. In any case, Within these pairings no changes in the choice of strategy type or procedure type are implied. As regards the remaining 12 possible pairings of comparative type., matters are cons1derably less straightforward. In order for our modd to be able to account for at least some of these pairings, it will be necessary to adopt some specific vtews on the phenomenon of double comparanve choice, which have their basis in some specific assumptions about dtachronic developments in various classes of languages. To be specific, we will start from the idea that languages may undergo gradual shifts in the types of syntactic procedures which they possess, and that (at least some cases of) double optwns in comparative~type choice are a reflection of the fact that, in various groups of languages, this process of proceduretype shift has not yet been completed. Given this baste conceptiOn of the phenomenon of double options, l propose the following analysis. As we saw in section 14.4, the five procedure types specified by our model can be rated according to thetr ~extremism' in the application or non-application of potentially ava1lable procedural options. On one end of the scale, we can place the optimal language type in which both relevant procedures are applied to a maximum; these languages combine total identity deletion and absolute deranking, thus giving rise to an adverbial comparative. On the oppos1te end of the 'extremism'-scale, we can place the opttmallanguage type m which no use whatsoever is made of deranking and 1dentlty deletion; such languages will typically select a Conjoined Comparative. Now, given these two diametrically opposed language types, l claim that at least some of the frequencies in the list of double comparative options can be accounted for if we assume that these two opposed language types form the two starting pomts from whtch a gradual change in procedure type (and hence, a change in comparative type) can be ~et in motion. To be specific, I will assume that there are two dtachronic changes wh1ch may lead to the adoption of a secondary comparative, viz. (a) languages with a deranking procedure may start to lose tl>at
procedure; and (b) languages which have no deranking procedure may start to acquire such a procedure.
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Towards an Explanation of Comparative-type Choice
In short, we cla1m that (at least some) double options denve from a historical shift in either the 'mimmal' or the 'maximal' language type, and that this shift crucially involves a change of option in the deranking procedure. As an Illustration of the way 1n which these assumed historical developments may be instrumental in the acquisition of a 'new' comparative type, let us constder the case of the 'maximal' language type. As stated, these languages pair total identity deletion with absolute deranking, and typically select the Ordered Strategy, thus providing the US for an adverbial comparative. Now, suppose that some of the languages in this set undergo the first of the d1achronic processes mentioned above, by which they gradually come to replace their option of absolute deranking by the option of balancing. It will be noted that our model predicts that such a change in the deranking procedure will not force these languages to select a new type of identity deletion; the Principle of Procedural Dependency, as stated in section 14.2) permits these languages to keep their opt1on of total identity deletion mtact. Hence, these languages do not have to change thetr strategy in the selecnon of a US: they can stick with the Ordered Strategy, and apply their only remaining procedure, viz. total identity deletwn, to the US which is produced by this strategy. The new comparative construction which, according to our model, will result from this is some variant of the Particle Comparative. Thus, we can conclude that our model, if supplemented by some specific assumptions about diachronic change, is able to account for the fact that Separattve-Particle~ Locative-Particle and Allative-Particle are emp1rically attested cases of double comparative choice. (The fact that, in our /.ample, Separative Comparatives occur almost three times as often as Loc(ltlve Comparatives and almost five times as often as Allative Comparatives is reflected in the relarive frequencies of these three double option types in the sample.) To summarize, the claim is that the languages in which these three types of double options can be attested are those languages in wh1ch the option of absolute deranking has gradually fallen out of favour; as a result of this, these languages have started to develop a Part1cle Comparative in addition to their adverbial comparative. In this context, Jt can be added that there are some (although, unfortunately, not very systematic) pieces of independent support for the analys1s just given. These data, which are of a diachronic and of a geographical nature, will be briefly commented upon below. First, it can be established that, for at least some of the languages w1th an Adverbial-Particle pamng, the adverbial comparative is the older of the two, and that it has come to be superseded by the newly developed PartJcle Comparative, which, as a rule, acquires a wider range of employ
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327
than the adverbial construction. The rise of such a 'rivalling' Particle Comparative has been documented for Latin, Classical Greek, Russian and several Germanic languages, including English. In English, and in Germanic languages in general, the process has led to the complete abolition of the older adverbial comparative, but traces of this comparative can be found as late as the fourteenth century. Completely in line with this change in comparative rype is the fact that several of the languages at issue here can be shown to have undergone a gradual shift in their preference for deranked structUres to balanced structures. For instance, the use of absolute constructions in modem English and French, as well as in modern Hungarian and Russian, has become very limited and stylistically marked, even to the point of bookishness. As a further point, we must call attention to the fact that the Adverbial-Particle pau is clearly an areal phenomenon. All of the 10 languages in the sample which exhibit this pairing are (or were) spoken on the European continent. This fact may in itself lend a certain amount of credibility to the claim that the pairing of adverbial and particle comparatives is the result of a unified process. More to the point, the particular areal distribution of this double option type explains why some of the languages involved have SVO word order. Given the fact that languages with absolute deranking (and hence, with adverbial comparatives) prefer either SOV or VOS word order, the presence of SVO-Ianguages in the group at issue is to some extent problematic for the analysis outlined above. However, if we take the European origin of this type of pairing into account, this occurrence of SVO-languages can be attnbuted to the well-known process of 'word·order drift' (see, among others, Vennemann, 1975), which has led to a change from SOV to SVO m European languages. (Whether this word·order drift is an independent phenomenon, or a process which is causally related to the loss of deranking in this group of languages, is a question that will remain unanswered here.) Finally, the scarcity of Allative-Particle combinations (and hence, the scarcrty of VSO-languages) in the group at issue is another fact that can be brought into connection with the areal limitation on the phenomenon involved. In the European Sprachbund, the only VSO-languages are the Celnc languages, and these are languages which, as a rule, have a Particle Comparanve as their only option. Thus, one might venture the hypothesis that the Celtic languages have been very radical in their transition from deranking to balancing, and that they (just like modern English and other Western European languages) have chosen to discard their adverbial comparatives completely. That adverbial comparatives must have been an option for at least some members of the Celtic family is
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Towards an Explanation of Comparative-type Choice
shown·by the occurrence of an Allative Comparative in Breton. In sectton 7.2.3 we noticed that Breton is a deviant case, in that it has an Allative Comparative, but no (or very marginal) possibilities for deranking.lf the analysis presented above is accepted, Breton can be accounted for as a language which has g1ven up deranking but which, untypically, has retained its older adverbial construction as its only option in compara~ tive-type choice. Having dealt with the languages of the 'maxima1 1 procedure type, we turn to the opposite case, viz. those languages which have neither identity deletion nor deranking. As we stated in section 14.4, languages of this type may, in prinaple, select any mapping strategy, and may therefore
base their comparatives on any US. However, we have also seen that the selection of the Independent Strategy is the most natural for languages of this type, and that, as a result, they will normally opt for some variant of the Conjoined Comparative. Now, we have claimed above that double options for languages with a Conjoined Comparative derive from a diachronic process by which these languages have gradually acquired some form of deranking. It will be recalled that our model implies that languages which acquire deranking must also acquire some form of identity deletion; the Principle of Procedural Dependency, which is incorporated in our model, states that a language cannot derank if it does not delete. In other words, if minimally structure-reducing languages start to acquire deranking, this change will necessarily involve a transition to a new optimal language type. This, in turn, presupposes the selection of a new mapping strategy and, consequently, a new US for the comparative in this languages. This, however, does not have to be a serious problem for the languages at issue, since, as we noted above, they have a certain amount of freedom anyway in the selection of their mapping strategies. Reviewing the various cases of pairings in which a Conjoined Comparative is one of the options, we can note that, for one of these cases, the diachronic process outlined above can be supported by synchronic crosslinguistic observations. The Conjoined-Exceed pairing is attested synchronically in our data base in all the successive stages which we assume to figure in the diachronic development of this pairing; of special relevance in this context are the Mixed Comparatives in Fulapi, Motu, Acholi and Temne. Thus, the process by which a Conjoined-Exceed pairing may come about can be reconstructed as follows. For a minimally structure-reducing language, the first step in changing its comparative involves the selection of a new mapping strategy and US instead of the normallndependent Strategy and US-1; for the languages which interest us here, this new strategy will be the Relative Strategy, and the new US
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329
will be US-3. Once this change has been made, it is quite possible that nothing further will happen; the comparative construction in Fulani (see sentence (3)} is an example of a case in which minimal structurereduction is applied to US-3. However, languages which have opted for US-3 mstead of (or m addition to) US-1 may proceed to develop the possibility of subject-reduction; the comparatives in Temne and Achuli are cases in point here. Having acquired some form of identity deletion, a language of this type may go as far as to derank the predicate m the clause which has been affected by $-Deletion; the result of this operation is a genuine Exceed Comparative. Thus, languages with a ConJOinedExceed pairing are viewed here as languages which are synchronically undecided as to whether or not they should acquire the possibility of conditional deranking. Again, it can be added that there is some independent evidence for 1he reality of the diachronic process assumed here. In particular, there is historical evidence that serializations (i.e., ca~es of conditional derankmg of predicates) are the result of a gradual syntactization of balanced structures; references to literature dealing with this pomt have been giVen in section 8.2. Since one of the typical forms in which an Exceed Comparative may manifest itself is that of a serialization, it is obvious that this historical evidence on the development of serializations m general supports our specific claim that, in languages with a ConjoinedExceed pairing, the Conjoined Comparative is the older of the two. Turning now to the other possible pairings in which a Conjoined Comparative is present, we can state that our analysis predicts that languages with a Conjoined-Adverbial pairing are, in origin, mimm.llly structure-reducmg languages, which have chosen the Ordered Strategy, and consequently US-2, in addition to the more typical Independent Strategy. For these languages the claim is made that they have gradually acquired the possibility of absolute deranking; as we have seen, rhis process implies that such languages should also acquire the possibility of total identity deletion. In this connection, it must be noted that our model definitely allows for the possibility that a minimally structure-reducing language may acquire total identity deletion without the addittonal acquisition of absolute deranking. For languages which have chosen US-2 as an additional option, the acquisition of total identity deletion without the selection of absolute deranking will lead to the development of a secondary Particle Comparative, and hence to a Conjoined-Particle pairing. This process seems to have taken place in Ilocano and Classical Nahuacl (see section 10.2 for examples). If we take a look at the cases of ConJoined-Adverbial pairing in the
330
Towards an Explanation of Comparative-type Choice
sample, we notice that the ConJomed-Locative pairing is by far the most popular of the rhree possible combinations. Despite the facr rhat Locative Comparatives are, as primary choices, far less frequent than Separative Comparatives, there are seven Conjoined-Locative cases against two Conjoined-AIIat1ve cases m the sample, while Conjoined-Separative is not attested at all. For this diScrepancy m frequency, the following explanatiOn presents itself. Mimmally structure-reducing languages typically select a US which IS temporally interpreted as a simultaneous chain, viz. US-1.lf these languages select an additional US, rheywill tend to keep this temporal interpretation intact, and hence, when they select US-2 as an additional option, they will typically derive that comparative winch IS based on a simultaneous interpretation of US-2, i.e., the Locative Comparative. In this context, it should be noted that tbe two attested cases of pairmgs in which a Conjoined Comparative is combined w1th a non-Locative Comparative (that is, the two cases of ConjoinedAllatlve) are of a dubious nature in any case. As we saw in section 4.7, Nuer lS a deviant language, in that it 1s one of the very few cases where there IS no procedural parallelism in the syntaCtic treatment of chaining constructiOns; Nuer has balanced S-chains, but absolute posterior deranking for C-chains. As for Mangarayi, we have noted in section 10.4 that this language is one of the very few cases in our sample where a comparative is not modelled on a temporal chain, but on a final construction. Given these considerations, we can safely say that the normal manifestation of a Conjoined-Adverbial pairing will be ConjoinedLocative, and that Conjomed-Allative and Conjomed-Separative are definitely secondary, if they are possible at all. As a last remark on Conjoined-Adverbial pairings, let me pomt out that, here too, there is some fragmentary independent support for the historical process which we assume to have caused this type of double option. Authors on languages which have a Conjoined Comparative as one of their options often implicitly express the view that this option is very old and, in some way, Characteristic' for the language in question. ThiS feebng is made quite explicit in Merlan (1982: 68), who states that tht· ConJotned Comparative in Mangarayi is the most common construction, while the Allative Comparative in this language is a 'less common (but nevertheless spontaneously produced) construction type', Further· more, with regard to Maori and Samoan we may pomt out that various authors on Polynesian languages (e.g., Chung, 1978: Marsack, 1975) imply thar the Locative Comparative in these languages is a relatively re<ent mnovation and that the original 'Polynesian Comparative' is a Conjoined Comparative. It must be admitted, though, that historical ev1dence of thiS kmd is very sporadic, due to the fact that the diachronic 4
An Explanatory Model
331
developments in the languages involved are very poorly documented in general. As a last class of double opnons we must discuss the pairings in which an Exceed Comparative is combined with either an Adverbial Campara~ tive or a Particle Comparative. From the listing of frequencies it can be seen that all these pairings define rather small classes in the sample: none
of them contains more than two members. Moreover, from the word orders of the relevant languages tt can be deduced that the Exceed Comparative in these pairings must be rated as secondary. None of the languages with an Exceed-Adverbial pairing has the SVO word order which might be expected if the Exceed Comparative were the primary optiOn in the pair. Instead, the two languages with an Exceed-AUative pairing (Maasat and Tamazight) have the VSO order which is normal for languages with an Allative Comparative. In the same way, the two languages with an Exceed-Separative pairing (Quechua and Aymara) have the SOY order preferred by languages with a Separative Comparative. Thus, there are reasons for assuming that the Exceed Comparative in these pairs is an extra option, acquired by these languages as an additton to their baste comparative type. It should be added that, for at least one language at issue here (viz. Quechua), it can be established diachronically that the Exceed Comparative is a later addition, which is, moreover, restricted to cenain dialects. 4 Whatever the stams of the Exceed Comparative in these pairs may be, however, it must be conceded that there is no elegant explanation for these patrings within the assumptions on which our analysis of double comparative choice is based. The problem which these pairings present can be elucidated by considering the following. It can be noted that, for ali pairmgs discussed so far, our analysis has accounted for their occurrence or non-occurrence on the basis of the following general principle: The Principle of Strategy Retention' A secondary comparative in a language will be ba~ed upon the strategy which is required (or permitted) for the primary comparative in that language.
One might view this principle as another manifestation of a general principle of economy in the strategy choice and procedure choice of natural languages, on a par wtth the Pnnciple of Optimal Harmony discussed in section 14.3. The Principle of Strategy Retention (PSR) is meant to stipulate that transitions and additions in comparative-type choice should involve changes which are as minimal as possible. When a language wants to add a secondary comparative, it will tend to be
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Towards an Explanation of Comparative-type Choice
'faithful' to its original strategy choice; changes and additions in compara-
tive type do not mvolve a change or addition in mapping strategies, but are restricted to either
(a) a change in the temporal interpretation of the original US, while keeping the procedure type of the language intact; or (b) a change in the procedural option of deranking, while keeping the temporal interpretation of the original US intact. In this way, the PSR enables us to account for the occurrence of the Allative-Locative and Separative-Locative pairings; these are pairings in which the only change lies in the temporal interpretation of the US involved. Furthermore, the PSR accounts for the fact that AdverbialParticle pairs are possible. These pairings occur in languages in which the Ordered Strategy, and hence US-2, is chosen as the basis for both the
primary and the secondary comparative, but which have undergone a gradual change in their deranking option. On the opposite end, the PSR accounts for the fact that Conjoined-Exceed and Conjoined-Locative
are possible pairings. Since for languages with a primary Conjoined Comparative all strategies are, at least in principle, available in any case, the double comparative choice in these languages does not involve a change in strategy; it can be attributed to a gradual change in the deranking option, while the original (simultaneous) interpretation of the US is kept intact. Finally, the PSR correctly predicts that Conjoined-Ailative and Conjoined-Separative are minor, if not impossible, pairings, since they would involve both a change in deranking option and a change in temporal interpretation of the US. Given that the plausibility of a principle like the PSR is accepted, it will be evident that the pairings Adverbial-Exceed and Particle-Exceed will always involve a violation of the PSR. No matter which direction one assumes for the diachronic transition in these pairs, the languages in which one of these pairs is present will always need the brute force to effectuate a change in mapping strategy. Hence, these pairings represent a serious difficulty for our analysis of double options in comparative~ type choice, and, indirectly, for the validity of our model of comparative-type choice in general. As 1 see it, there are several ways to evaluate this difficulty. First, one might rate the attested occurrence of Adverbial-Exceed and ExceedParticle pairs as a genuine counterexample to the claims contained in our general model of comparative-type choice. Secondly, one might accept this model in its generality, but accept the occurrence of these pairings as a refutation of the PSR. As a consequence, one should allow languages to develop secondary comparatives which involve a change in mapping
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333
strategy. It must be remarked, however, that such a decision would diminish the value of our model for the prediction of possible comparative pairings almost to the pomt of vanishing; without a principle like the PSR (or some other restrictive principle), one essentially commits oneself to the view that, m the pairing of comparative types, practically anything: goes. A third way to deal with these recalcitrant cases is to assign to them a status which differs from that of other pairings. Specifically, one might suggest that Exceed-Adverbial and Exceed-Particle pairings are not a case of a gradual structural shift in the languages themselves, but that they are the result of the extra-linguistic process of lmguisttc borrowing. Since the concept of borrowing is a notorious escape route for all kinds of problems in Universal Grammar, one should be very cautious in bringing up this possibility. However, if we look at the geographical and sociolinguistic position of the relevant languages, the notion of linguistic borrowing appears to be not completely implaustblc. Of the six languages at issue, the three African languages (viz. TamaZlgbt, a Berber language, and Maasai and Bari, two Nilotic languages) are spoken by people who live either in or at the close periphery of the extensive linguistic area in Africa where the Exceed Comparative is the common and regular option. As for Sranan, this is an English-based creolization, which retained its Exceed Comparative from its African substratum, but which has, in modem rimes, largely discarded th1s comparative in favour of the Ieki-comparative, a direct borrowing from the English like-construction. Lastly, the Exceed Comparative in the two possibly related South-American languages Quechua and Aymara mtght also be a case of borrowing; thert: is some evidence that this Exceed Comparative is a later innovation in some dialects of Quechua, and th.lt its rise may be connected with the fact that parts of the extensive area m which Quechua is spoken are heavily creolized. In short, we can say th.lt the view of the Exceed-Adverbial and Exceed-Particle patrings as a nonstructural, areal phenomenon is not completely refuted by the geoR graphical and sociolinguistic data. It goes without saying, however, th.1t the evidence for the borrowing-analysis of these pairings is extremely weak, as is generally the case with arguments in which the notion of linguistic borrowing is invoked. Evaluating the discussion in thi!t section, we may conclude the followR ing. Our analysis of double comparative choice, which assumes processes of diachronic change which are constrained by the PSR, certainly has a number of strong points. In particular, this analysis is able to account for the fact that Adverbial-Particle, Separative-Locative and ConjoinedLocative are all combinations ,.;th a relatively high frequency, and that Conjoined-Separative, Conjoined-AIIative and Separative-Allativc are
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Towards an Explanation of ComparatiVe-type Choice
Improbable, if not impossible~ paumgs. On the other hand, however, it must also be conceded that our analysis cannot be satd to have been completely successful. In particular, the analysis fails to provide a prmcipled account of a number of attested combmatwns in the sample, namely, the Exceed-Adverbial and Exceed-Particle pairings. In addttion to this empirical inadequacy of the analysis, it must be admitted that the mdependent evidence for the reality of the diachronic processes postulated, as well as the evidence for the existence of the Principle of Strategy Retention, is far from conclusive, to put it mildly. Thus, while It can be maintamed that our analysis may represent a first step in the explanation of double comparative choice, it must also be concluded that this curious phenomenon has aspects wh1ch, at least for the present, defy explanation.
15.5
An evaluation of the new model
In the foregoing sections of this chapter, we have examined the predicnve value of the model of comparative-type choice which was progressively developed in the previous chapters of part three. Stnpped to its essentials, th1s model claims that the range of attested comparative types in natural languages, and the d1stnburion of these various types over natural languages, can be explamed if we accept the correctnes!> of the following statements:
The linguzstic expression of the concept of comparison ts modelled on the lingurstic expression of temporal sequencing. Therefore, the underlymg structures of comparatzve constructions in natura/languages have the form of temporal chains. STATEMENT 2: The relevant syntactic procedures in the derivation of surface structures of temporal chains (and hence, of comparative constructiOns) are derankmg and identity deletion. These two procedures interact both With one another and with cognttive mapping strategtes, to the effect that they define a restricted set of possible language types.
STA1 EMENT 1:
The emp1rical content of this model of comparative-type choice has been la1d down in section 15.1 in a set of procedure-based uniVersals. If we compare thts new model of comparative~type choke with the earlier set of chaining-based universals (see chapter 5), we can conclude that rhe new model ts superior in one important respect, namely, in its predtction of the attested range of comparative types. Smce the new set of procedure-based universals fully incorporates the earlier set of chainingbased umversals, the new model takes over all the correct predictions
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made by the earlier one.. In add1tion, however, the new model also presents a principled account of cases like Particle Comparatives and Mixed Comparatives, which were to some extent problematic for the
earher model. Finally, we can observe that the word-order preferences of some of the comparative types find a systematic explanation in the new model, in that these preferences can be connected with the relevant procedure types on the bas1s of independently motivated directionality principles. Thus, we can conclude that the new model, in its prediction of the attested variation of comparative types among languages, achteves a remarkable degree of accuracy, and as such it can be sa1d to provide an
explanatory framework for the non-randomness in that variation. Given th1s undeniably attractive feature of the new model, it is only fair to point out its potential weaknesses. For one thmg, we must concede that the distribution of comparative types over the languages in the sample, as predicted by the new model, cannot be completely corroborated by the facts (see section 15.3); it remains to be seen whether this lack of confirmation will turn out to be a real weakness of the model, or rather just a matter of momentary absence of the relevant linguistic data. Secondly, we saw in section 15.4 that the prediction of double comparative choice, as specified by the new model, is not entirely conclusive, and that it is partially based on assumptions about diachronic developments for which there is only slight independent support. Lastly, a general criticism may be that the new model presupposes a number of cognitive and perceptual principles which have not, to my knowledge, been affirmed by research from outside the field of linguistics. At the present stage of our knowledge, I think it is hardly feasible to assess the extent to which these deficiencies are senously damaging to the overall plausibility of the new model. Those who judge that the new set of procedure-based universals rests upon too many un<e~tainties should fall back upon our earlier, less comprehenSive model of comparative-type choice; I trust that the data presented in part two of this essay show convincingly that the set of chaining-based universals formulated in chapter 5 is by and large in accordance with linguistic reality.
Notes
Chnpter 1: Introduction 1 The concept of 'research programme' which is alluded to here should be taken in the te a negatton. Th1s phenomenon Js not restricted to Italian; It can also be attested m French and Hungarian. A dtscussion of the Jelanon between negat10n and compartson c,m be found in sections 9.4.3 and 15 .2. 2 For a suggesnon as to the etymologtcal origin of thts morphologJCal comparative markmg see chapter 15, n.2. 3 It should be pomted out that the formulanon employed here has been chosen
33S
Notes to pages 32-78
for reasons of expos1t1on only. I do not want to 1mply that the deCISIOn to
mcode this standard NP as a direct obJect ISy m some funcnonal or psycho-logical sense, prmr to the selection of an exceed-verb. 4 Among the wealth of pubhcat1ons devoted to rhe descnpuon of spanal 1elauons m natural languages, I have been mspired panicnlady by B1erw•scb
(1967), Bennett (1970), Anderson (1971), E. Clark (1971), H. Clark (!973), Jessen (1974) and Traugott (1975).
5 For the relatton between possessave structures and locanve structures in natural languages see, among others, Lyons (1967? 1968}, Asher (1968}, Welmers (1973) and E. Clark (1978). 6 For an argumentation that at least some of these Parncle Comparanves are diachromcally derived from adversative oonJuncnons see secuons 9.4.3 and 15.2. 7 My concept of the propornons of word-order type occurrence in a random -,ample has been borrowed from Greenberg (1963, 1966)) who states that, m a random sample, there w1ll be SO per cent SOV-Ianguages, about 40 per cent SVO-languages, and about 10 per (ent VSO-Ianguages. Obv10usly, thiS ·itatement can Itself be subjected to fa.lsdication, by checking 1t agamst wordorder type occurrences m other random samples. For dte present, however, I have assumed that Greenberg's statements provide a useful gu1de-hne m assessmg the degree m wh1ch word-order type occurrence m a gtven category devtares from the random norm. 8 Engh
orne detatl, 2 The variation between the forms barno and batnan as prObably due to
d•alecncal differences (see N'D•aye, 1970; Rollo, 1925). However, Lafitte (1944: 176) rates these two forms as distinct lexical Item~. Further d1scussion of the Basque comparative parnde wdl be given in chapter 9, n.l. Chapter 4: T JPCS of Syntactic Chaining 1 In some languages, the Jsomorphy between 6mte mam verbs and finite verbs m subordmatc clauses has been g1ven up; those languages employ a speer/it
Notes to pages 79-137
339
subordmatzve conJugatton for verbs m subordinate clauses. Of course, tt ts rather difficult co dec1de whether such subordmatJve conjuganonal forms are mstances of predicate deranking, or rather a concomitant phenomenon in the process of clause embedding. I have not adopted a generally applicable solunon for these cases; the status of flex1onal forms whiCh are marked for subordmanon wLll be decided upon for each mdlVldual case. 2 For further discussmn of the nonon of backgroundmg see GIV6n (1979) and Hopper (1979). 3 For further discussion of the encodmg of temporal chatmng m Kanun see section 7.2.3. 4 For the posstbilities of derankmg m Fmmsh see sectron 10.5. The (margmal) dcrankmg opnons m Enghsh and French wtll also be d1scussed in that section.
Chapter 6: Testing the Set of Chaining-based Universals 1 In Lamunc, the elements -du~k and ~k alternate as separative markers. See
2 3
4 5 6 7
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