three dichotomies in the kavalan demonstrative systemhj3/pub/kavalan demonstratives.pdf · three...

ICAL-11, 2009 Haowen Jiang 1

Three dichotomies in the Kavalan demonstrative system

Haowen JiangRice University

[email protected]


Outline

• Intro to the Kavalan language• Kavalan demonstrative system• Dichotomy 1: -zi vs. -zui• Dichotomy 2: yau vs. zau• Dichotomy 3: yau vs. wi• Conclusion


Outline



Taiwan


Fongbin, Hualien


Xinshe Village


Xinshe Village (2)

Hsieh and Huang (2007)


Kavalan people

Hsieh and Huang (2007)

Kavalan Population in Fongbin Township


Kavalan language• Atayalic (Atayal, Seediq) • East Formosan

– Northern (Basai-Trobiawan, Kavalan) – Central (Amis) – Southwest (Siraya)

• Puyuma• Paiwan• Rukai• Tsouic (Tsou, Saaroa, Kanakanabu) • Bunun• Western Plains

– Central Western Plains (Taokas-Babuza, Papora-Hoanya) – Thao

• Northwest Formosan (Saisiyat, Kulon-Pazeh)• Malayo-Polynesian Blust (1999)


Focus system

Jiang (2006: 7)


Outline



Types of DEMs• Nominal—can occur in an NP with a noun or

pronoun (e.g. “[this stone] is hot”) or, in most languages, can make up a complete NP (e.g. “[this] is hot”).

• Local adverbial—occur either alone (e.g. “put it here”) or with a noun taking local marking (e.g. “put it (on the table) there”)

• Verbal “do it like this”, with an accompanying mimicking action — can occur as the only verb in a predicate, or together with a lexical verb.

Dixon (2003: 62)


Kavalan DEMs


Nominal DEMs• zau, unay/’nay, and wi’u can make up a

complete NP, but yau cannot.


Nominal DEMs• All nominal demonstratives can occur in an

NP. For zau, yau, and wi’u, a linker is preferably used between the head noun and the demonstrative. For unay/’nay, however, no linker is needed.


Nominal DEMs


Nominal DEMs• Interestingly, unay, but not yau or wi’u, also

refers to some temporal point away from now, whether in the past or in the future.


Local adverbial DEMs• Local adverbial demonstratives are

frequently followed by a locative phrase specifying the exact location.

• The following examples are from the same speaker in the same conversation occurring at the same place. Distance from near to far with respect to the speaker: PakteRung > the church or the school > the huge rock.


Local adverbial DEMs


Verbal DEMs• Verbal demonstratives are crosslinguistically rare.

“I know of only two languages with verbal demonstratives—Boumaa Fijian and Dyirbal—and in each instance there is just one verb “do it like this” (with transitive and intransitive variants in Dyirbal). Further work may well reveal a language with a contrast between two verbal demonstratives, but I suspect that most languages which show this category will have a single item.”(Dixon 2003: 88)


Verbal DEMs• Kavalan shows a contrast between two

verbal demonstratives: (s)nazau ‘do/be like this’ and (s)nayau or snaunay ‘do/be like that’.


Verbal DEMs• Syntactically, Kavalan verbal

demonstratives function as the head of a predicate, whether there is another lexical verb in the same clause or not.


Verbal DEMs


Verbal DEMs• In terms of functions, Kavalan verbal

demonstratives can be used deictically or anaphorically.


Outline



Dichotomy 1: -zi vs. -zui

• ta N-an, maq-N, paqa-N, pasa-N, s-N• -zi ‘this place’; -zui ‘that place’


Dichotomy 1: -zi vs. -zui• Iconic word order


Dichotomy 1: -zi vs. -zui• Hither vs. thither


Dichotomy 1: -zi vs. -zui• In Li & Tsuchida’s (2006: 513) Kavalan

Dictionary, wis- is listed as a morpheme meaning ‘go to’.E.g. wis-tati or wi s-tati


Dichotomy 1: -zi vs. -zui• Other lexical items that show the contrast

between -zi and -zui:


Outline



Dichotomy 2: zau vs. yau



• For the contrast between (s)nazau ‘do/be like this’ and (s)nayau ‘do/be like that’, please see examples (12-18).


Outline



Dichotomy 3: yau vs. wi

• Demonstrative modifiers



• Locative predicates


Dichotomy 3: yau vs. wi• Spatial deictic predicates


Dichotomy 3: yau vs. wi• Temporal deictic predicates



• Aspectual auxiliaries


Dichotomy 3: yau vs. wi• Deictic particles in Tokelauan (Oceanic)

also indicate aspect (Hooper 2002). While mai ‘toward speaker’ expresses progressive aspect, atu ‘away from speaker’ expresses inchoative aspect.

• The relationship of nominal demonstratives with existential/locative predicates and tense/aspect markers in other Formosan languages.



• Central Amis: ra ‘that’; ira ‘exist’ (< i-ra‘LOC-that’); a-ira indicates future tense.

(44)

Zeitoun et al. (1999: 23)



• Northern Paiwan: zua ‘that’; izua ‘exist’ (< i-zua ‘LOC-that’); izua-zua indicates progressive aspect.

(45)




• Labuan Rukai: kai ‘this’; yakai ‘exist’ (< i-a-kai ‘LOC-REAL-this’); yakaikai indicates iterative aspect.

(46)



Outline



Conclusion

• Kavalan illustrates all the three types of demonstratives as described in Dixon (2003). While nominal and local adverbial demonstratives show a contrast between three terms, verbal demonstratives make a two-way distinction, with the latter category being typologically rare.


Conclusion

• Not all nominal demonstratives are created equal: whether a DEM can make up a complete NP, requires a linker when modifying an NP, or can refer to time.


Conclusion• Three dichotomies are found in the Kavalan

demonstrative system: the contrast between -zi and -zui is primarily manifested in local/directional adverbials; the contrast between zau and yau in demonstrative human pronouns and verbal demonstratives; finally the contrast between yau and wi in their diverse functions, including place deixis, motion predicates, and aspectual auxiliaries.


Conclusion

• In Formosan languages, it is not unusual for a particular nominal demonstrative to be closely related to existential/locative predicates and tense/aspect markers. In addition to Kavalan, languages like this include Central Amis, Northern Paiwan, and Labuan Rukai. However, Kavalan is unique in using exactly the same form (i.e. yau) across the board.


Acknowledgements

• Prof Shuanfan Huang• NTU Corpus of Formosan Languages• Kavalan informants abas, api, buya, ngengi,

pilaw


Thank you!

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