The role of prominence in Katripul Puyuma: Voice and coding of arguments in two-place predicates
-
Stacy Fang-ching Teng
Abstract
The voice system of Philippine-type languages has continued to be of interest to linguists with either theoretical or typological orientation. While most debates have centered on whether the alignment patterns in these languages should be best analyzed as ergative, accusative, or as symmetrical voice, there have been fewer studies focusing on the motivations for the speakers to choose one voice over another. Two factors are regularly mentioned as being closely related to voice selection in the Philippine-type languages: the referential properties of arguments and aspect. For instance, it has been claimed that in Nanwang Puyuma, the undergoer of an actor voice clause is indefinite and the undergoer of an undergoer voice clause is definite, and if there is a definite undergoer, it will be the subject of the clause and will induce a voice alternation. While this observation may hold true in most cases, there are situations where the referential properties of arguments and aspect alone are not enough to explain the speakers’ voice choice. The current study is corpus-based, and it departs from earlier works on the Puyuma language by (i) providing empirical evidence from natural texts, rather than elicited data, and by (ii) reassessing the notion of prominence via an evaluation across multiple levels: (i) information-structural level in terms of focus and topic, (ii) referential level in terms of specificity and animacy, and (iii) event-structural level in terms of the importance of a participant for the predication expressed by the verb and the construal of the event.
Abstract
The voice system of Philippine-type languages has continued to be of interest to linguists with either theoretical or typological orientation. While most debates have centered on whether the alignment patterns in these languages should be best analyzed as ergative, accusative, or as symmetrical voice, there have been fewer studies focusing on the motivations for the speakers to choose one voice over another. Two factors are regularly mentioned as being closely related to voice selection in the Philippine-type languages: the referential properties of arguments and aspect. For instance, it has been claimed that in Nanwang Puyuma, the undergoer of an actor voice clause is indefinite and the undergoer of an undergoer voice clause is definite, and if there is a definite undergoer, it will be the subject of the clause and will induce a voice alternation. While this observation may hold true in most cases, there are situations where the referential properties of arguments and aspect alone are not enough to explain the speakers’ voice choice. The current study is corpus-based, and it departs from earlier works on the Puyuma language by (i) providing empirical evidence from natural texts, rather than elicited data, and by (ii) reassessing the notion of prominence via an evaluation across multiple levels: (i) information-structural level in terms of focus and topic, (ii) referential level in terms of specificity and animacy, and (iii) event-structural level in terms of the importance of a participant for the predication expressed by the verb and the construal of the event.
Kapitel in diesem Buch
- Frontmatter I
- Contents V
- Prominence in Austronesian: An introduction 1
- The role of prominence in Katripul Puyuma: Voice and coding of arguments in two-place predicates 19
- Prominence and the (non-)correspondence between topic and subject in Saisiyat 55
- Information structure and syntactic choices in Kelabit 91
- The role of prominence in post-verbal word order alternation in Javanese applicatives 129
- The dynamic grammar and socio-pragmatics of prominence in Balinese 169
- Discourse, prominence, and morphosyntax: Managing information structure in Tukang Besi 201
- Accessibility and prominence in the Amarasi NP 229
- Demonstratives as markers of pragmatic prominence in Paluai (Admiralties, Oceanic) 267
- Animacy as a prominence-lending feature in Lakurumau morphosyntax and discourse 305
- Index 329
Kapitel in diesem Buch
- Frontmatter I
- Contents V
- Prominence in Austronesian: An introduction 1
- The role of prominence in Katripul Puyuma: Voice and coding of arguments in two-place predicates 19
- Prominence and the (non-)correspondence between topic and subject in Saisiyat 55
- Information structure and syntactic choices in Kelabit 91
- The role of prominence in post-verbal word order alternation in Javanese applicatives 129
- The dynamic grammar and socio-pragmatics of prominence in Balinese 169
- Discourse, prominence, and morphosyntax: Managing information structure in Tukang Besi 201
- Accessibility and prominence in the Amarasi NP 229
- Demonstratives as markers of pragmatic prominence in Paluai (Admiralties, Oceanic) 267
- Animacy as a prominence-lending feature in Lakurumau morphosyntax and discourse 305
- Index 329
