Subject: sum : function words

i . the question and its motivation three weeks ago or so , i asked linguist readers to help me find examples of function words with unusually specific meanings . this was meant to elicit examples that i could mention in a paper called " the formal semantics of grammaticalization " , where i discuss what happens to the meaning of a content morpheme that develops into a function morpheme . i argue there , developing work by other semanticists / logicians , that ( 1 ) function morphemes do have meanings ( contrary to a widespread assumption ) . just consider that the meanings of quantifiers , tense , aspect , modals , etc . are the bread and butter of us working semanticists . ( 2 ) there is a class of " logical " meanings that have certain formal properties ( permutation-invariance , high types ) . ( 3 ) unfortunately , there is no perfect correlation between logical meanings and functional morphemes . there are lexical / content morphemes with ( almost ) logical meanings ( adjectives " same " , " mere " , " alleged " , verbs " deny " , " believe " , nouns " majority " , etc . ) . and there might be functional morphemes with non-logical meanings ( hence the linguist query ) . ( 4 ) thus there is not much that we can say about what happens to the meaning of a morpheme that is becoming grammaticalized . although i make some presumably doomed efforts . the finished paper ( which is based on a talk i gave at the nels 25 workshop on language change ) will appear in the nels 25 proceedings ( to be available from the glsa at umass amherst , glsa @ linguist . umass . edu ) . the paper is downloadable by anonymous ftp from the following url : ftp : / / broca . mit . edu / pub / fintel / gramma . ps i would welcome any comments . ii . some of the responses : mark robert hale ( hale1 @ alcor . concordia . ca ) wrote : ) the reference [ to the pejorative pronouns " you shit " ] ) is samuel elbert 's grammar of ) rennellese / bellona , " echo of a culture : a grammar ) of rennell and bellona " , uhawaii press 1988 ) [ oceanic linguistics special publication no . 22 ] . ) ) a few interesting cases of ) grammaticalization of a somewhat relevant ) type do exist . in micronesian languages ) there are a set of verbal affixes for ) directionality ( up , down , towards speaker , ) towards hearer , towards some third ) party [ the usual deixis system ] ) which ) also include " toward the open ocean " ) and " toward the lagoon " ; whereas ( of course ) ) if you want to say " toward john 's house " ) ( or some other nonce collocation ) ) you need to use a pp . ) ) similar , but probably not similar enough , ) is the bizarre use of the cardinal directionals ) in icelandic documented in a classic paper ) by einar haugen ( i can dig up the reference ) if you really want it ) . it seems like , being ) predominantly coastal inhabitants , and having ) a rather uneven fjorded coastline , to go ) to a city which was north of you actually ) involved heading out in a southerly ) direction ( all that time ) . ( or , if you ) lived on the north coast , going south ) frequently involved your walking north ) or northeast . . . ) . the system ended up totally ) screwed up , as i recall ( it 's been some ) time since i read the article - - hoski ) thrainsson at harvard would probably know ) the relevant facts [ thrainss @ fas . harvard . edu ] ) , ) when the cardinal directions were grammaticalized ) with inverse force from their original ) semantics with verbs of motion ( or some ) such thing ) . ) ) the " river names " case is supposed to salishan . ) maybe sally thomason will respond to your ) linguist posting , otherwise you might write ) to her ( sally @ pogo . isp . pitt . edu ) . although ) the salish speakers she 's actually working ) with are land-bound , she 's done some historical ) salishan and probably knows the basic facts . ) ) the only other case i can think may not be ) all that relevant , either , i guess , but it 's ) kind of interesting nonetheless . in ho - min ) sohn 's " woleaian reference grammar " , i suspect ) in the discussion of noun incorporation ) ( but possibly elsewhere ) , he states that ) bare n objects obligatorily incorporate ) ( so ' i eat fish ' is ungrammatical , one has ) to say ' i fish-eat ' - - this is generally ) true with micronesian transitive clauses ; ) i ' ve written about it 's history ) . definite ) np objects cannot incorporate ( * i the-fish eat ) . ) nor can n 's that are modified by anything ) ( so ' i eat big fish ' is fine , in spite of ) the fact that ' i eat fish ' is garbage - - clearly ) a structural constraint : only heads can ) incorporate ) . anyway , " doctor " cannot ) incorporate under any circumstances , because ) there 's only ever been one doctor on woleai ! ) so it 's inherently specific , as it were . ) [ woleai is an atoll , population ca . 250 . ] ) like i said , maybe not directly relevant , ) but kinda cute . . . david gil ( ellgild % nusvm . bitnet @ mitvma . mit . edu ) wrote : ) i can think of so many examples of what you ' re looking for that ) i suspect there 's some terminological confusion . ) ) classifiers . they ' re about as idiosyncratic and as contentful ) as you 'd like - - but their uses are clearly functional . arguably ) so when in " numeral classifier " position , more clearly so when ) functioning as nominalizers ( eg . clf john saw , meaning " the one ) john saw " ) , ligatures / relativizers ( eg . movie clf john saw , ) meaning " the movie which john saw " , or articles ( eg . clf movie , ) meaning " the movie " ) . ( i ' m presently working on the syntax ) and semantics of these constructions in se asian languages . ) ) ) then , pronouns . i do n't know of any " you shit " examples , but ) in se asian languages pronouns come with all sorts of idiosyncratic ) and culture-bound " honorific " content . ) ) i could go on . . . hala 's z sa ' ndor ( halasz @ kewszeg . norden1 . com ) wrote : ) are the old germanic prepozitions enough for you : " benorth " , " beeast " , ) . . . ? i believe that in iceland they yet are found . old english had a ) bunch of words besides these that were adj 's that also behaved as ) prep 's ; the one left is " near " , but on the other hand " du " was pickd ) up : " the honor du me " , " tomorrow this is du " . it sumtimes seems to me ) that in old germanic the prep 's were an open class , with rules for ) making one from adj 's or other words . " randy j . lapolla " ( hslapolla @ ccvax . sinica . edu . tw ) wrote : ) in the qiang languages ( tibeto - burman family , sino - tibetan stock ) ) there are systems of verb prefixes that refer to geographic landmarks ) such as " towards the river " , " toward the mountian " , aside from ) " normal " references such as " towards the speaker " , etc . most ) interesting is that these prefixes also mark achievement vs . state , ) and also perfective vs . imperfective . lee hartman ( ga5123 @ siucvmb . siu . edu ) wrote : ) the following is probably not exactly what you are looking for , ) but it does bear some similarity to your example of ) prepositions that refer to the nearby river . ) indonesian has four words for north , south , east , and west , ) - - al monomorphemic so far as i know . but northeast and northwest are ) respectively _ timur laut _ and _ barat laut _ , ) literally east sea west sea ) ( southeast is _ tenggara _ - - monomorphemic ? - - ) and i have n't yet found a southwest . ) thank you all for your very interesting comments . - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - kai von fintel dept . of linguistics & philosophy mit , cambridge , ma 02139 email : fintel @ mit . edu http : / / broca . mit . edu / fintel . home . html
