Sharifi, Hassan

Sheik, Habib

English

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THE SEMANTIC STRUCTURE OF THE PERSIAN VERB I gereftoo n/ "to take" Habib Sheik California State Polytechnic University University of Nebraska and Hassan Sharifi University of Nebraska It seems to be the case that a great number of compound verbs in Persian are derived postsemantically, using Chafe's terminology, from a configuration of a limited number of lexical units To be more precise, certain simple verb roots combine with other types of lexical items to effect new semantic units The number and type of combinations possible depend upon the verb root Of equal interest is the fact that most of the derived semantic units seem to share somewhat the basic meaning of the simple verb root In this paper we shall explore / gereftre n/ "to take" and its derivatives within the framework of Chafe (1970) The following observations have been made by most grammarians about Persian verbs verb A There are two classes of verbs, which are traditionally called simple and compound B In each class the verb is used semantically differently both in terms of the accompanying lexical items and in terms of the meaning of the verb In the following sentences the verb is used as a simple 1 /dowlre t zre..-minhara gereft/ "The government took the lands" 2. /morad paye hormozra gereft/ "Morad grabbed Hormoz 1 s foot" 3 /morad moce hormozra gereft/ "Morad took Hormoz's wrist" or "Morad caught Hormoz in the act" 469 470 4. 5. 1975 MID-AMERICA LINGUISTICS CONFERENCE /morad ze;nra gereft/ /morad dozdra geref t/ "Morad caught the woman" "Morad caught the thief." In sentences (1-5) the traditionally simple verb is a process-act1on verb which requires the presence of two nouns, a patient and an agent. The basic meaning of the verb in all these sentences seems to contain the notion of take. However in sentences (6-10), the structures of which seems to be identical to sentences (1-5), the verb /gerefte n/ is ambiguous 6 /morad ketabra gereft/ "Morad took the book" 7. /morad pulhara gereft/ "Morad got the money" 8. /morad re lJgra gereft/ ''Morad took/got the paint" 9. /morad e kshara gereft/ "Morad took/got the pictures" 10. /morad e/kse hormozra gereft/ "Morad took/got the picture that belonged to Ho1Jllloz 11 or ''Morad took Hormoz 's picture." In these sentences initiation of the action seems to play a role in the semantic interpretation of the verb. When Morad is a beneficiary in (6-10), the verb could have an agent as in the following 6a. /morad ketabra e ~ men gereft/ "Morad took the boek from me." In this sentence /me n/ "I" is the agent which follows the preposition /aez/ "from" Therefore, in one sense the verb in (1-10) could be process-action. However, in (6-10) Morad may or may not be the agent When Morad is not the agent, it is the beneficiary This has been characterized by Chafe (1970 150) as follows Rule A v - ---)> benefactive {state } process -ambient which, among other things, states that a process-action verb may optionally add the feature "benefact1ve". Thus sentence (1) may be d1agramed as fol lows SEMANTIC STRUCTURE OF THE PERSIAN VERB /gereftren/ 471 1---v Pat agent process N N action I I geref t zre,.- minha dowl~ t Sentence (6a), however, may be diagrammed in two ways One would be similar to that for (1) above with Morad as agent, the other would be as follows __ __c-=~-·--= ~1 ~ • ~ ·-1 1--v Pat ben action N process benefactive I gereft ketab N Morad agt N I The semantic element "force" also seems to play an important role in the semantic structure of the verb For example, (5) is unambiguous because the semantic element of force is present one, In the following sentences while the verb is still a simple semantic structure differs from the earlier sentences its 11 12 13 14 15 /luleye boxari gereft/ "The heater pipe plugged up" /aseman gereft/ "The sky became overcast" /haeva gereft/ "The weather was overcast/It was over-cast" /kare'!> gereft/ /mast gereft/ "His business prospered " "The yogurt Jelled 11 Sentences (11-15) all contain the simple verb which is basically a process verb Our simple verb which was basically process-action has undergone deactivation process which is characterized by Chafe (1970 ) as follows Rule B v action process gereft -- ---->) v process gereft + deact1vat1ve 472 1975 MID-AMERICA LINGUISTICS CONFERENCE Th.is means an inherently process-action verb could der1vationally acquire the semantic unit "deactivative" and thus become a process one. It requires the presence of a patient which undergoes a change in its state. For example in sentence (15) /mast gereft/ "The yogurt Jelled", the Jelling changes the state of the mixture from liquid to semi-solid. The meaning of 'the verb 1n (14) is similar to that of (15) in the sense of "it held together". Again a meaning of "se1111ure", an "overtaking" is present in (12) and (13), as well as the semantic unit of "force" (of nature). Sentences (16-21) constitute the third set of examples in which /gereftfen/ seems to act as a simple verb. 16. /pam gereft/ Literally ''My foot/ leg cramped" meaning I got a cramp in my leg." 17 /gu~a,, m gereft/ Literally ''My ear plugged" meaning ''My ear felt plugged up." 18. /ga,,.."""lum gereft/ Literally "My throat plugged" meaning "I choked" 19. /binim gereft/ Literally ''My nose plugged" meaning ''My nose was plugged up" 20 /qael.rbaem gereft/ Literally ''My heart selZed" meaning "I had a temporary heart seizure" or the idiomatic maning "I felt closed in, sad" 21 /zaebunaem gereft/ Literally ''My tongue seized" meaning "I stuttered or stumbled in my speech" In these sentences the verb seems to be a process verb which has been derived through the application of Rule B. The difference between the verb of (11-15) and those of (16-21) is the application of further rule to the latter which Chafe (1970 146) characterizes as v -action -- --->> experiential Th.at is, all non-action verbs could optionally be further specified as "experiential." However, for Persian, 1n the case of the verbs exemplified in (16-21), the rule is obligatory. The required experiencer noun in these examples is "I". Thus we have the following rule having applied as well SEMANTIC STRUCTURE OF THE PERSIAN VERB /gereftffin/ 473 Rule C v -----» process gereft + deactivative v process gereft + deactivative~ + experiential Thus, the semantic structure of the verbs has changed in terms of the accompanying nouns, specifically the loss of an agent and the addition of an experiencer Furthermore, the lexical meaning of the verb has gone through a post-semantic process That is, the new meaning of the verb is first converted into its original meaning (that of "take") as exemplified in sentence (6) /morad ketabra gereft/ "Morad took the book", which then goes through the same symbolization and the same phonological process as the original verb root Thus the new meaning is postsen,anti-cally derived from the old meaning This generalization applies to all the sentences and not Just to (16-21) This explanation seems Justified since the new meanings ("cramp", "plug", "choke", "seize", "stumble", etc) seem to all share the semantic unit "process" where a "seizure" or "taking" chd:l1ges the state of the patient by a force from within or without which creates a closing, cramping situation Now, let us examine sentences in which the verb is used as a compound verb 22 /bacce madaeraesra gaz gereft/ "The child bit his mother " 23 /morad naesrinra nisgun gereft/ "Morad pinched Nasrin" In contrast with the previous sentences, the non-verb element (usually nominal) part of the compound verb in (22-23) may not be considered as an independent element such as patient, etc This can be demonstrated when we compare (1) /dowlaet zaeminhara gereft/ "The government took the lands" with (22) /bacce madaerae~ra gaz gereft/ "The child bit his mother " In (1) /zaeminha/ is the patient of the verb, and the normalization of the predicate will give /gereftaene zaeminha/ "the taking of the lands" but not /zaem1nha gereftaen/ (Sharifi, 1973) However, in (22) /gaz/ is not the patient of the verb, it is part of the verb structure This is supported by the fact that the nominalization of the predicate is the reverse of that in (1) In (22) the nominalization will give (gaz gereftren/ but not /gereftrene gaz/ This establishes (gaz gereftaen/ as a single semantic unit which constitutes the verb in (22) with the 474 1975 MID-AMERICA LINGUISTICS CONFERENCE meaning "to bite." A similar explanation can be offered for con-sidering all of the two-part compound verbs as single semantic units which derive their meanings postsemantically from the meanings of the noun and the verb root in each case. 2 The verbs in (22-23) are process-action since each contains a patient and an agent, e.g., in (23) Morad is agent and Nasrin is patient. It should be pointed out that the semantic structure of the verb varies depending on the number and relations of accompanying nouns. This is derived postsemantically by the verb unit under-going derivational rules 24. 25. 26. /morad du~ geref t/ /morad zaen gereft/ /morad aeks gereft/ "Morad showered/took a shower." "Morad got married." "Morad took pictures." In (24-26), the verb seems to have been "deprocessized" since there are no patients, thus these verbs can be said to have under-gone the following rule Rule D v --)} v action process compound verb action compound verb + deprocessive Sentences (27-28) have undergone the derivational rule "deactivative" (Rule B) and thus contain only patients. Accordingly, in (27) /rae9g gereft/ is the verb element and /muhfd/ is the patient. 27 /muhas raeng gereft/ "His/her hair acquired color." 28. /otaq bu gereft/ "The room acquired an odor." Sentences (29) and (30), although in the surface they appear to contain only one noun in addition to the compound verb, in fact can be said to be similar to (15-21) in that a second noun accompanies the verb, namely the experiencer which is overtly indicated through the pronominal suffix Like (16-21), these can be said to have undergone the derivational rule "experiential" (Rule C) 29. 30. /delaem daerd gereft/ /siE riE m daerd gereft/ "I got a stomachache " "I got a headache." SEMANTIC STRUCTURE OF THE PERSIAN VERB /gereftffin/ 475 Sentences (31-33) also have the experiencer indicated through the pronominal suffix, but it is not entirely clear whether the other nominal unit should be considered a patient or as part of the compound verb 31 /sa saem gereft/ "I felt like urrnatrng/needed to urinate 11 32 /zaendaem gereft/ "I felt like laughing/started to laugh " 33 /geryaem gereft/ "I felt like crying/started to cry " The meaning of the verb in (31), (32), and (33) is similar, a kind of biological, emotional seizure, resulting in the action which is temporarily controlled in (31), but is perhaps uncon-trolled in (32) and (33), emotional control being more difficult than biological It can be said that the verbs in (31-33), in addition to having the semantic features "state" and "experiential", have what might be termed "delayed action " To conclude this part of the paper, following Sharifi (1973) and the paper presented by him in this volume, it can be said that the verb root, in this case /gereftce n/ 11to take", which is basically a process-action verb provides the basic semantic content of all derived and non-derived verbs both simple and compound It is also evident that although Chafe's theory seems to work with Persian data in general, the theory needs further elaboration in dealing with semantic notion of intention, force, possession, volition, etc , which appear to play a role in the interpretation of sentences ONe last remark regarding the ambiguous sentences As can be seen from the translations, some of the sentences such as (3) /morad moce hormozra gereft/ and (2) /gaelbaem gereft/ are ambiguous in the sense in which there is a literal meaning and an idiomatic meaning Of interest is the fact that when the literal sense is taken, the verb is a simple process or process-action, however, when the idiomatic meaning is taken, the patient forms part of the compound verb which is now used with a new (though semantically related) meaning Chafe's explication of "off-base" Chafe, (1970 44-45) seems to be appropriate here in that we can say that the second meaning, the idiomatic meaning, can be said to be derived postsemantically 476 1975 MID-AMERICA LINGUISTICS CONFERENCE from the literal meaning. In relation to the idiomatic meaning, in each of these cases, the single semantic unit corresponding with the compound verb first goes thorugh a postsemantic process giving the literal, postsemantic structure which in turn goes through the same symbolization and eventually the same phonetic output. We may regard the verbs with idiomatic meanings as a kind of idiom, some of which without a literal counterpart, which nevertheless are derived postsemantically in the manner described by Chafe (1970 48) and applicable to (3), (20), (14), etc. In this sense idlomatization of verb roots may be considered "rule of the game" rather than "the exception." NOTES 1This follows Chafe, 1970, Chapter S, in particular his discussion on "restricted idioms." 2This is similar to Chafe's (1970) treatment of non-restricted idiom BIBLIOGRAPHY Chafe, Wallace L. Meaning and the Structure of Language. Chicago Chicago University Press, 1970. Sharifi, Hassan "The Feature Compatibihties of Persian Xordan (to eat) with Notmds, AdJectives, etc A Metaphysical Process," Meaning A Common Grotmd of Linguistics and Literature In Honor of Norman C. Stageberg, University of Northern Iowa (1973). "A Semantic Analysis of the Persian verb Kesidaen "to pull," Papers from the Mid-America Linguisties Conference, University of Iowa, 1973 

SEMANTIC STRUCTURE OF THE PERSIAN VERB /gereftaen/

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SEMANTIC STRUCTURE OF THE PERSIAN VERB /gereftaen/

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