-
Isolating and synthetic languages
Typology 3
" Languages can also be classified by the way they mark grammatical functions.
" In isolating languages such as Chinese, words usually consist of one morpheme (a
- Isolating and synthetic languages
linguistic unit that carries meaning), while in synthetic languages, they can consist of
several morphemes.
- Semantic and grammatical relations
" English is mildly synthetic (it has inflections such as the plural suffix in books), while
- Lexical typology languages such as Latin have many inflections. Some languages such as Inuktitut
(spoken by the Inuit) are sometimes called polysynthetic because they use very many
inflectional affixes, and one word in such languages can correspond to an entire
sentence in other languages.
" Synthetic languages can be divided into fusional and agglutinative languages. In
agglutinating languages, each morpheme usually has a single function and words can
consist of many morphemes (e.g., Turkish).
evlerimde ( in my houses ) = ev (house) + -ler (plural) + -im (my) + -de (in)
" In fusional languages, affixes can combine functions. In the Spanish word habló ( he
spoke ), -ó simultaneously indicates both the past tense and a third person singular
subject.
" There are no clear-cut boundaries between these categories however and languages
rarely fall perfectly into one category.
Semantics and grammatical relations
" Transitive verbs have two core arguments, labelled A (the more active or in-control) and
O, which in a language like English are subject (A) and object (O). Intransitive verbs
have a single core argument, labelled S, which in English (but not in all languages) is
also a subject.
" Not all three of these labelled arguments (S, A, O) are distinct. In most languages, two
are treated one way (such as the subject in English, which covers S and A) and the third
is distinct (as the object in English, which covers O). That is, the labels are abstractions.
" The best-known system is the English type, with a distinct O (object). These are called
nominative accusative languages, or just accusative languages, after the nominative
and accusative cases, which are how A/S and O are distinguished in Latin.
" The best known of the other systems is the ergative system, named after the ergative
case, which is how A is marked in many languages (such as Inuit and Basque) which
distinguishes A from S/O. Ergative absolutive (or ergative) alignment treats an
intransitive argument like a transitive O argument (S=O; A separate)
e.g.: John moved the stone. / The stone moved. (the verb move is ergative)
John bought a car. / *A car bought. (the verb buy is not)
An A may be marked with an ergative case (or sometimes an oblique also used for genitive
or instrumental case roles), while the S argument of an intransitive verb and the O
argument of a transitive verb are left unmarked or sometimes marked with an absolutive
case.
Lexical typology
Lexical typology: major foci
" the characteristic ways in which language [& ] packages semantic
material into words (Lehrer 1992: 249),
" 1 (onomasiology): what meanings are encoded as single word in
" typologically relevant features in the grammatical structure of the
different languages, what distinctions are made in lexical systems for
lexicon (Lehmann 1990: 163) / typologically relevant vs. Language
encoding a particular cognitive domain and what factors underlie them.
specific
" 2 (semasiology): what different meanings are expressed by one and the
" patterns of lexicon-grammar interaction (Behrens & Sasse 1997).
same lexeme or by lexemes synchronically and historically derived
" the cross-linguistic and typological dimension of lexicology (Maria
from each other (polysemy, semantic shifts etc.)
Koptjevskaja Tamm 2007)
" 3: how lexical entries interact with the grammar
1
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