The mirage of apparent morphological correspondence
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Kazuhiko Yoshida
Abstract
It is an ordinary practice in comparative linguistics that idiosyncratic common features observed between historically related languages are ascribed to their parent language. The possibility of accidental similarity is usually rejected in situations where more than one language shows a unique morphological correspondence which is impeccable in terms of form and meaning. However, an apparently unmistakable correspondence of this kind sometimes turns out to be a mirage resulting from parallel and independent developments in the internal histories of the relevant languages. Such a case is shown by languages which have numerous documents written over many centuries. In this paper I will attempt to demonstrate that some features traditionally posited for Proto-Indo-European are in fact mirages. Needless to say, the comparative method is a powerful tool for reconstructing proto-languages, and there is a constant temptation when practicing the comparative method to attribute too much to the common ancestor. It is therefore important to recognize its limitations.
Abstract
It is an ordinary practice in comparative linguistics that idiosyncratic common features observed between historically related languages are ascribed to their parent language. The possibility of accidental similarity is usually rejected in situations where more than one language shows a unique morphological correspondence which is impeccable in terms of form and meaning. However, an apparently unmistakable correspondence of this kind sometimes turns out to be a mirage resulting from parallel and independent developments in the internal histories of the relevant languages. Such a case is shown by languages which have numerous documents written over many centuries. In this paper I will attempt to demonstrate that some features traditionally posited for Proto-Indo-European are in fact mirages. Needless to say, the comparative method is a powerful tool for reconstructing proto-languages, and there is a constant temptation when practicing the comparative method to attribute too much to the common ancestor. It is therefore important to recognize its limitations.
Chapters in this book
- Prelim pages i
- Table of contents v
- Foreword and Acknowledgements vii
- Editors’ introduction 1
-
Part I. Grammaticalization
- The role of historical research in building a model of Sign Language typology, variation, and change 15
- On the origin of Niger-Congo nominal classification 43
- A closer look at subjectification in the grammaticalization of English modals 67
- Subjectivity encoding in Taiwanese Southern Min 83
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Part II. Problems in historical comparison and reconstruction
- Emergence of the tone system in the Sanjiazi dialect of Manchu 101
- Searching for undetected genetic links between the languages of South America 115
- Reconstructing the category of “associated motion” in Tacanan languages (Amazonian Bolivia and Peru) 129
- The mirage of apparent morphological correspondence 153
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Part III. Historical development of morphosyntactic features
- Analogy as a source of suppletion 175
- The rise and demise of possessive classifiers in Austronesian 199
- Immediate-future readings of universal quantifier constructions 227
- The historical development and functional characteristics of the go-adjective sequence in English 243
- Recycling “junk” 267
- Sapirian ‘drift’ towards analyticity and long-term morphosyntactic change in Ancient Egyptian 289
- Language index 329
- Index of terms 333
Chapters in this book
- Prelim pages i
- Table of contents v
- Foreword and Acknowledgements vii
- Editors’ introduction 1
-
Part I. Grammaticalization
- The role of historical research in building a model of Sign Language typology, variation, and change 15
- On the origin of Niger-Congo nominal classification 43
- A closer look at subjectification in the grammaticalization of English modals 67
- Subjectivity encoding in Taiwanese Southern Min 83
-
Part II. Problems in historical comparison and reconstruction
- Emergence of the tone system in the Sanjiazi dialect of Manchu 101
- Searching for undetected genetic links between the languages of South America 115
- Reconstructing the category of “associated motion” in Tacanan languages (Amazonian Bolivia and Peru) 129
- The mirage of apparent morphological correspondence 153
-
Part III. Historical development of morphosyntactic features
- Analogy as a source of suppletion 175
- The rise and demise of possessive classifiers in Austronesian 199
- Immediate-future readings of universal quantifier constructions 227
- The historical development and functional characteristics of the go-adjective sequence in English 243
- Recycling “junk” 267
- Sapirian ‘drift’ towards analyticity and long-term morphosyntactic change in Ancient Egyptian 289
- Language index 329
- Index of terms 333
