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Coordinating nominal compounds: universal vs. areal tendencies
Full text linkCoordinating compounds, i.e. complex word forms in which the constituent lexemes are in a coordination relation, may be divided into two classes: hyperonymic, in which the referent of the whole compound is the "sum" of the meanings of the constituent lexemes (Korowai yumdefól '(her) husband-wife, couple'; van Enk, Gerrit J., & Lourens de Vries. 1997. The Korowai of Irian Jaya: Their language in its cultural context. Oxford: Oxford University Press: 66), and hyponymic, where the compound designates a single referent having features of all the constituents (English actor-director). It has been proposed that languages choose either type as the one with the "tightest" marking pattern; whereas the crosslinguistic tendency is to have tighter hyperonymic compounds, most languages of Europe rather have tighter hyponymic compounds (Arcodia, Giorgio Francesco, Nicola Grandi, & Bernhard Wälchli 2010. Coordination in compounding. In Sergio Scalise & Irene Vogel (eds.), Cross-disciplinary issues in compounding, 177-198. Amsterdam & Philadelphia: John Benjamins). In this paper, we will test this assumption on noun-noun compounds in a sample of 20 Standard Average European languages and in a balanced sample of 60 non-SAE languages, arguing that the preference for hyperonymic compounds is best explained by the default referential function of nouns; in hyponymic compounds, on the other hand, nouns are used to indicate properties. We will then compare nominal and adjectival coordinating compounds, showing that for the latter the hyponymic compounding pattern is the dominant one, as adjectives are prototypical property-denoting words
Coordinating Compounds
No full textCoordinating compounds, often referred to by their Sanskrit name dvandva, may be loosely defined as complex word forms in which all of the constituent lexemes (typically, two) share the same status, as Eng. bittersweet. The definition and delimitation of the category of coordinating compounds involves two issues: first, what a 'compound' is and how do we distinguish coordinating compounds from other multiword expressions; secondly, the understanding of what coordination is, and how it is to be distinguished from other, non-symmetrical relations (e.g. subordination). This article will provide an overview on coordination in compounding, discussing classifications of coordinating compounds with extensive exemplification from typologically diverse languages. © 2010 The Author. Language and Linguistics Compass © 2010 Blackwell Publishing Ltd
Grammaticalisation with coevolution of form and meaning in East Asia? Evidence from Sinitic
No full textSinitic languages are normally classified as isolating; as to Mandarin Chinese, it is often assumed that grammaticalisation processes are strongly constrained by its typological features. It has been claimed that secondary grammaticalisation, i.e. increase in morphological bonding/fusion, phonetic erosion, and semantic bleaching, does not generally occur in isolating languages; moreover, Bisang (2008) proposes that the lack of "coevolution of meaning and form" in grammaticalisation is an areal feature of the languages of East and mainland Southeast Asia. Basing on data from Northern Chinese dialects, I shall show that there are many counterexamples to the proposed typological and areal restrictions; I shall also argue that although the evolution on the formal level of signs is triggered by (primary) grammaticalisation, it may be carried on independently of the degree of grammaticalisation of the sign and of the context. (C) 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved
Towards a typology of coordinating compounds in Turkish
Full text linkhttps://www.degruyter.com/view/j/flin.2018.52.issue-2/flin-2018-0008/flin-2018-0008.xml?format=INTAlthough there is a rich literature on compounding in Turkish, coordinating compounds have not received enough attention from researchers in the field of morphology. The Turkish lexicon is characterised by a large number of coordinating compounds, belonging to different subclasses; this paper is a first attempt to sketch a typology of these word forms. We will first provide an overview of the different types of coordinating compounds in the language, exploring the limits of this phenomenon, and we will then analyse them in terms of five main parameters: (a) the semantic relation between the constituents and the referent of the whole compound; (b) input and output word classes; (c) morphological cohesiveness; (d) prosodic cohesiveness; (e) degree of conventionalisation/lexicalisation. We will argue that there is a fundamental divide between endocentric and exocentric coordinating compounds; the latter appear as more lexicalised and entrenched in the Turkish lexicon than the former and also seem to be closer to prototypical words in the morphology-syntax continuum
Constructions and headedness in derivation and compounding
No full textThe 'traditional' distinction of compounds into endocentric (Eng. doorknob) and exocentric (pickpocket) is based on the presence or absence of a head constituent (Bloomfield, Language, Holt, New York, 1933); since the early eighties, the syntactic notion of 'head' has been extended also to derivation, claiming that English derivational suffixes, as e. g. -ness, are heads, either in an absolute sense or in a categorial sense (see Williams Linguist Inq 12:245-274, 1981; Lieber On the organization of the lexicon, Indiana university Linguistics Club, Bloomington, 1981; Lieber, in Yearbook of morphology 1989, Foris, Dordrecht, 1989; among others). In this paper, we shall first review some key issues in the morphological notion of head, illustrating well-known problematic cases, and then we shall discuss the Construction Morphology approach to headedness in derivation and compounding (Booij in The Oxford handbook of compounding, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2009; Booij, in Cross-disciplinary issues in compounding, John Benjamins, Amsterdam, 2010a, 2010 Booij, Construction morphology, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2010b). The stipulation of a hierarchical lexicon with subschemas expressing intermediate generalizations is a powerful theoretical device in accounting for a phenomenon as headedness variation, as we shall show with a Vietnamese case study; also, inconsistencies in word-class assignment in derivation will be dealt with in a constructionist perspective. Moreover, we shall discuss the consequences of a constructionist approach to the distinction between compounding and derivation. © 2011 Springer Science+Business Media B.V
Towards a typology of relative clauses in Sinitic: headedness and relativisation strategies
Full text linkThe study of relative clauses (RCs) in Sinitic has attracted considerable attention in typological literature, especially because of the exceedingly rare correlation of Verb- Object order and prenominal relatives (Tang 2006; Dryer 2013b). As to the structural differences of rcs within Sinitic, although previous studies have brought to light several key issues (e.g. Liu 2005), there is much work yet to be done in this area. Basing on data from a convenience sample of 44 Sinitic languages, in this paper we will try to sketch a typology of relativization in Sinitic languages according to two parameters, namely the position of the head and relativization strategies. Also, we will highlight some meaningful correlations and implications constraining diversity in the domain of relativization in Sinitic
On Sinitic influence on Macanese: focus on indirect causation
Full text linkhttps://benjamins.com/#catalog/journals/le.1.2.03arc/detail
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