Reconstructing complex structures: A typological perspective
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Ferdinand von Mengden
Abstract
Depending of the type of results we wish to achieve, different methods need to be employed in reconstructing proto-languages. In the first part of this paper I shall discuss the Comparative Method and elaborate why, I believe, this method is in principle not suitable for syntactic reconstruction. In the second part of the paper, I shall discuss alternative methods, which, although not unproblematic either, are, in my view, more promising for this purpose from a typological perspective. One is the use of implicational universals and the inferences on diachronic processes that can be drawn from them. In the second approach, cross-linguistic regularities of grammaticalization processes are used to reconstruct complex structures in proto-languages. Both these approaches have in common that they draw on crosslinguistic data, but both also display considerable differences.
Abstract
Depending of the type of results we wish to achieve, different methods need to be employed in reconstructing proto-languages. In the first part of this paper I shall discuss the Comparative Method and elaborate why, I believe, this method is in principle not suitable for syntactic reconstruction. In the second part of the paper, I shall discuss alternative methods, which, although not unproblematic either, are, in my view, more promising for this purpose from a typological perspective. One is the use of implicational universals and the inferences on diachronic processes that can be drawn from them. In the second approach, cross-linguistic regularities of grammaticalization processes are used to reconstruct complex structures in proto-languages. Both these approaches have in common that they draw on crosslinguistic data, but both also display considerable differences.
Chapters in this book
- Prelim pages i
- Table of contents v
- Acknowledgments vii
- Foreword ix
- Syntactic reconstruction: Methods and new insights 1
- How much syntactic reconstruction is possible? 27
- Reconstruction in syntax: Reconstruction of patterns 73
- Reconstructing complex structures: A typological perspective 97
- Competitive Indo-European syntax 121
- Principles of syntactic reconstruction and "morphology as paleosyntax": The case of some Indo-European secondary verbal formations 161
- Syntactic change and syntactic borrowing in generative grammar 187
- Index 217
Chapters in this book
- Prelim pages i
- Table of contents v
- Acknowledgments vii
- Foreword ix
- Syntactic reconstruction: Methods and new insights 1
- How much syntactic reconstruction is possible? 27
- Reconstruction in syntax: Reconstruction of patterns 73
- Reconstructing complex structures: A typological perspective 97
- Competitive Indo-European syntax 121
- Principles of syntactic reconstruction and "morphology as paleosyntax": The case of some Indo-European secondary verbal formations 161
- Syntactic change and syntactic borrowing in generative grammar 187
- Index 217
