Reflections on language contact, areal diffusion, and mechanisms of linguistic change

The paper addresses mechanisms of language change and language contact, using examples from African and other languages.\ud \u

R.M.W. Dixon

Dixon's achievements lie in the grammars he has written, of languages from Aboriginal Australia, Oceania and Amazonia; in the grammars he has encouraged many students and colleagues to write; in his theoretical contributions concerning ergativity, adjective classes, noun classes and classifiers, causatives, demonstratives, etc.; and in the way he has nurtured linguistics as a scientific discipline in Australian universities

Evidentiality in grammar

[Extract] Evidentiality is a grammatical category that has source of information as its primary meaning – whether the narrator actually saw what is being described, or made inferences about it based on some evidence, or was told about it, etc. Languages vary in how many information sources have to be marked. Many just mark information reported by someone else; others distinguish firsthand and nonfirsthand information sources. In rarer instances, visually obtained data are contrasted with data obtained through hearing and smelling, and through various kinds of inference. As Boas (1938: 133) put it, "while for us definiteness, number, and time are obligatory aspects, we find in another language location near the speaker or somewhere else, source of information – whether seen, heard, or inferred – as obligatory aspects." The terms 'verificational' and 'validational' are sometimes used in place of 'evidential.' French linguists employ the term 'mediative' (Guentche´va, 1996). The term 'evidential' was first introduced by Jakobson (1957). A summary of work on recognizing this category, and naming it, is in Jacobsen (1986) and Aikhenvald (2004). Research Background: This article offers a concise and encyclopaedic summary of evidentiality as a grammatical category that has source of information as its primary meaning – whether the narrator actually saw what is being described, or made inferences about it based on some evidence, or was told about it, etc. Languages vary in how many information sources have to be marked. Many just mark information reported by someone else; others distinguish firsthand and nonfirsthand information sources. In rarer instances, visually obtained data are contrasted with data obtained through hearing and smelling, and through various kinds of inference. Based on seminal work by Aikhenvald and her predecessors, this article outlines the major parameters of variation of marking information source in the languages of the world, and its cultural and cognitive implications. Research Contribution: The main contribution of this article is the formulation of parameters of variation and semantics of devices used for marking information source across several hundred of the world's languages. The article provides original insights into human categorization of sources of perception, reasoning and inference, and culturally relevant parameters of categorization, which may also be influenced by social and physical environment. Research Significance: This article is part of the Encyclopaedia of Languages and Linguistics, a major reference source in the area of linguistics, languages and cognitive and behavioural studies. This article breaks new grounds in offering a comprehensive empirically based approach to human categorization of cognitive processes and perception, and correlations between language and culture. It is widely quoted and considered a major reference for the typology of information source

Arawak languages

The Arawak language family contains the largest\ud number of languages in Latin America. Geographically,\ud it spans four countries of Central\ud America – Belize, Honduras, Guatemala, Nicaragua\ud – and eight of South America – Bolivia, Guyana,\ud French Guiana, Surinam, Venezuela, Colombia, Peru,\ud Brazil (and also formerly Argentina and Paraguay).\ud \ud There are about 40 living Arawak languages. The\ud first Native American peoples encountered by\ud Columbus – in the Bahamas, Hispaniola, and Puerto Rico – were the Arawak-speaking Taino. Their language\ud became extinct within a hundred years of the\ud invasion. Spanish and many other European languages\ud inherited a number of loans from Arawak\ud languages. These include widely used words such as\ud hammock, tobacco, potato, guava, and many other\ud names for flora and fauna

Versatile cases

Case markers are thought of primarily as nominal morphemes, indicating the function of a noun phrase in a clause. In a few languages of the world case markers also appear on verbal forms. Such ‘ versatile ’ cases can express (i) temporal, causal and other relationships between clauses, and (ii) aspectual and modal meanings within a clause. Core cases tend to express aspectual and modal meanings, while oblique cases tend to be used as clause-linkers. The recurrent semantic differences between case morphemes as nominal markers, as clause-linking devices, and as exponents of clausal categories are rooted in the inherent polyfunctionality of these ‘chameleon’\ud morphemes: the specific meaning of any instance is affected by the morphosyntactic context in which it occurs. The conclusions are corroborated by a case study of Manambu, a Papuan language with extensive use of cases on nouns and on verbs, as exponents of aspectual and modal meanings and as clause-linking devices

Typological plausibility and historical reconstruction: a puzzle from New Guinea

Analyzing a previously undescribed language is fraught with difficulties. If a language has numerous homonymous forms, a linguist might try and establish connections between these, based on what is judged typologically plausible. Comparative evidence from related languages can also be handy. Typological studies help comparative linguistics;\ud and comparative linguistics may suggest hints as to which typological analogy to follow (see: Ivanov 1988: 17; Ivanov, Gamkrelidze 1984; Dixon 1997).\ud \ud But typological plausibility may turn out to be ephemeral, if historical facts revealed through a careful reconstruction uncover a different scenario. Here I focus on an example from Manambu, a previously undescribed Non-Austronesian ('Papuan') language from the Ndu family in the Sepik area of New Guinea, 'the last unknown'. This case study is dedicated to Vjacheslav Vsevolodovich, my role model in linguistics, to whom I owe most of my background in both typology and historical linguistics