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The category of person has both inflectional and lexical aspects, and the distinction provides a finely graduated grammatical trait, relatively stable in both families and areas, and revealing for both typology and linguistic geography. Inflectional behavior includes reference to speech-act roles, indexation of arguments, discreteness from other categories such as number or gender, assignment and/or placement in syntax, arrangement in paradigms, and general resemblance to closed-class items. Lexical behavior includes sharing categories and/or forms and/or syntactic behavior with major lexical classes (usually nouns) and generally resembling open-class items. Criteria are given here for typologizing person as more vs. less inflectional, some basic typological correlations are tested, and the worldwide linguistic-geographical distribution is mapped. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Papuan language Mian allows us to refine the typology of nominal classification. Mian has two candidate classification systems, differing completely in their formal realization but overlapping considerably in their semantics. To determine whether to analyse Mian as a single system or concurrent systems we adopt a canonical approach. Our criteria - orthogonality of the systems (we give a precise measure), semantic compositionality, morphosyntactic alignment, distribution across parts of speech, exponence, and interaction with other features - point mainly to an analysis as concurrent systems. We thus improve our analysis of Mian and make progress with the typology of nominal classification. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this article, I consider the notions of crosslinguistic categories and comparative concepts as they apply to a diminutive category in Walman, a language in the Torricelli family spoken in Papua New Guinea. I discuss three interpretations of the question of whether the Walman diminutive is a gender. One interpretation is the question whether the Walman diminutive is an instance of a crosslinguistic category of gender. I argue that this interpretation is problematic since it assumes the existence of crosslinguistic categories and I argue that there is no reason to believe that crosslinguistic categories exist, since the similarities among languages can be explained without appeal to crosslinguistic categories. A second interpretation involves a question of how the diminutive fits into the grammar of Walman, whether the diminutive should be considered a third value of a feature in the grammar of Walman which has two clear values, masculine and feminine. I argue that the evidence supports the view that the Walman diminutive is not a gender in this sense. The third interpretation is whether the Walman diminutive is an instance of a comparative concept of gender. But the answer to that question depends on how one defines gender as a comparative concept. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article addresses the problem of crosslinguistic rarity by mapping the types of diachronic factors that contribute to the rarity of a particular feature. It is proposed that a number of different diachronic factors may play a role, such as the rarity of source constructions, the rarity of particular types of change, the number of stages necessary for a particular feature to develop, and the number of pathways that can lead to a particular feature. This article looks at a rarissimum of person marking, namely, a zero-marked feminine 2nd singular person index in the Sahidic dialect of Coptic (Afroasiatic; Egypt). It is argued that such markers are rare because they presuppose rare input structures, and most processes of change would lead away from - rather than to - zero-marked 2sg. Furthermore, this study identifies a diachronic process in which a part of a morpheme is reinterpreted as a segmentable morpheme (in this case, a person index), thereby leading to the loss of a zero person marker. This is the converse of the well-known 'Watkins' Law', in which a segmentable person marker is reinterpreted as part of a base. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Verbs in San Pedro Amuzgo, an Oto-Manguean language of Mexico, often have two different stems in the paradigm, one used with singular subjects and the other with plural subjects. This split motivated by number is typologically interesting due to its rarity, since number splits are commonly along the S/O vs. A distinction, not the S/A vs. O distinction. Apart from at stem level, the split is also manifested in the incompletive of an inflectional class of verbs. At stem level the plural stem is derived in a variety of unproductive ways, making the relation between singular and plural stems, synchronically, one of suppletion. In this article, we study the distribution and the morphological properties of this split in depth, using a sample of almost 600 fully inflected verbs from a large database compiled by native linguist Fermín Tapia and now publicly accessible on the Surrey Morphology Group's website. We also place it in a typological context, relating it to other systems we have observed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Ecuadorian Siona reportative is prima facie an evidential par excellence because it indicates that the information contained in the utterance has been acquired through hearsay. However, the morphosyntactic and semantic behavior of the reportative verb form demonstrates that it is not an evidential. Rather, it is part of the clause-typing system, together with the assertive, interrogative, and imperative. Clause-typing relates to the assignment of authority: the speaker holds the epistemic authority in assertions, the addressee in questions, and a non-speech-act participant in reports. The hearsay reading of the reportative clause type emanates from a shift of epistemic authority. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article presents a typological characterization of a class of demonstratives so far neglected in the literature: demonstrative verbs expressing manner. First, the morphological characteristics and syntactic behaviors of these demonstratives are examined to illustrate their verbal properties and to justify categorizing them as verbs. Next, their exophoric and endophoric roles in narratives and interactions are described. As their discourse usages closely replicate that of nominal demonstratives, we argue that demonstrative verbs belong to the class of demonstratives and propose to integrate them in a general typology of demonstratives. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Evidentiality - a grammatical expression of information source (, ) - is often expressed on a clausal level, and its marking is associated with the verb. In a few languages, a noun phrase can acquire its own evidential specification. Evidentiality can be expressed autonomously, or be fused with another grammatical category, including aspect, tense, or mood for verbs, or spatial distance and topicality for noun phrases. We investigate interactions and dependencies between evidentiality and other grammatical categories, both verbal and nominal. A number of such dependencies is supported by the diachronic development and history of evidentials. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To gain more insight into evidentiality, the grammatical marking of information source, it is worth studying the category in its relation to other grammatical categories. This study explores tensed evidentials, morphemes in which tense and evidentiality are fused, in 36 languages from four macro-areas (North America, South America, Eurasia, and Papunesia). The study reveals several interactions between tense values and evidential values. As opposed to what has been claimed, firsthand future evidentials seem to exist. Visual and non-visual evidentials occur equally with present and past, whereas mental activity evidentials and reportative evidentials are much more limited to the past. These findings conform to the logic of tense: every type of evidentiality can be gathered in the past, whereas some are less suited for present or future. As a result, we find exceptionless implicational hierarchies of the form future ⊃ present ⊃ past for several evidential values. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Allocutivity is a term coined to describe a phenomenon in Basque whereby, in certain pragmatic (and syntactic) circumstances, an addressee who is not an argument of the verb is systematically encoded in all declarative main clause conjugated verb forms. Although the term has been exclusively applied to Basque, similar phenomena are found in other languages as well. Indeed, despite certain differences in the degree of grammaticalization and usage, allocutive verb forms are attested in at least Pumé (isolate; Venezuela), Nambikwara (isolate; Brazil), Mandan (Siouan; North America), and Beja (Cushitic; Northeast Africa). The aim of this article is to propose a typology of verbal allocutivity in a crosslinguistic perspective, taking into consideration the locus of encoding, the manner in which it is encoded, the information concerning the addressee which is encoded, and the syntactic environments in which it can appear. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Critically reviewing the recent analysis of the distinction between the so-called 'absolute' and 'annexed' 'states' in Kabyle (Berber) by (M&F), it is shown that it does not fare better than the existing treatments in its account of the empirical facts, mainly due to the assumption of monosemy. It is further argued that M&F's rejection of 'case' as a valid notion for the description of the Kabyle data rests on simplistic and ill-informed views on the nature of case, and that adoption of a case analysis allows one to compare the Berber data to a wide range of languages with similar peculiarities in the distribution of dependent marking. Finally, M&F's claim that their analysis of Kabyle has pointed out a 'previously unrecognized typological category' is refuted, showing that it stems from an unwarranted mixing of language-particular descriptive categories and crosslinguistic comparative concepts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

From the perspective of prototype theory, boundaries between categories can be more distinct or less so. This gradience is captured by the notion of boundary permeability which is applied to units (e.g., nouns vs. verbs), properties (e.g., count vs. mass), and levels (e.g., phonological vs. morphological). boundary permeability is introduced as a typological parameter in the sense that a given language is generally characterized by (relatively) soft or (relatively) sharp boundaries. A fairly extensive analysis is offered of category and level boundaries in English and German. A battery of fourteen comparisons between the two languages reveals that German is a largely sharp- or strict- but English a largely soft-boundary language. This scalar difference is argued to follow from the varying importance of inflectional morphology in the two languages. Inflections are claimed to be boundary markers in that they bring about a divide between syntax and the lexicon. Thus, the moderately strong inflectional component makes German a strict-boundary language and the relative lack of inflections makes English a soft-boundary language. A tentative case is made for regarding strict boundaries as the typologically unmarked, and soft boundaries as the typologically marked, option. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Kin terms in some languages have suppletive roots according to the person of the possessor, as in Kaluli na:la: 'my daughter', ga:la: 'your daughter' versus ida: 'her/his daughter'. Suppletion is generally seen as a language-specific morphological peculiarity, but in this context there are a number of lexical and morphological similarities across languages, suggesting the motivation may also lie in the nature of kin terms themselves. We offer a typological assessment of suppletive kin terms through a case study of the languages of New Guinea, where the phenomenon appears to be particularly common. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this article two hypotheses about the relationship of verbal and adnominal agreement are proposed: first, it is claimed that languages tend to have adnominal agreement only if they also have verbal agreement, but not vice versa. Second, it is argued that languages with adnominal agreement are areally restricted, while languages with verbal agreement are not. A sample of languages was selected to test these hypotheses, and both are confirmed by the data. The article closes with an admittedly speculative explanation of the hypotheses involving patterns of grammaticalization of different types of agreement markers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Cognate Head-Dependent Constructions (CHDCs) are employed across numerous genera in Africa to signpost alternations in the aspectual characteristics of a predicate or the information focus of a clause. The co-occurrence of a finite lexical verb (the cognate head) and an etymologically related (deverbal) noun or non-finite verb form (the cognate dependent) in such structures is interpreted with reference to the scalar semantics of events and properties. Within this areal typology, CHDCs are employed to indicate either (i) a high point relative to a norm on a semantic scale or (ii) a conventionally low-ranked possibility, in order to implicitly contrast possible alternatives. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article describes the reality status system of Nanti (Arawak) and argues that it constitutes an instance of a canonical reality status system. The relevance of such a system is examined in the light of literature that casts doubt on the typological validity of reality status as crosslinguistic grammatical category. It is shown that reality status is an obligatory inflectional category in Nanti, and that the distribution of realis and irrealis marking across Nanti construction types hews closely to expectations based on notional understandings of 'realis' and 'irrealis' categories grounded in a contrast between 'realized' and 'un-realized' situations. It is also shown that the Nanti reality status system does not exhibit evidence of being based, either synchronically or diachronically, on semantically narrower notions that could account for the distribution of reality status marking in the language, without recourse to the more generalized notions of realized and unrealized events. It is suggested that the Nanti reality status system might serve as a suitable canonical system around which a canonical typology of reality status might be built. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]