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Person-sensitive TAME marking in Galo

Historical origins and functional motivation
  • Mark W. Post
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Functional-Historical Approaches to Explanation
This chapter is in the book Functional-Historical Approaches to Explanation

Abstract

Scott DeLancey’s analysis of person-sensitive TAME marking in Lhasa Tibetan – “a.k.a. conjunct-disjunct marking” or “egophoricity” – has stimulated considerable discussion and debate, particularly as previously little-known languages of the Tibeto-Burman area, as well as outside it, have come to be described, and a wider range of functional factors have been taken into account. This chapter is intended as a contribution to this discussion, by presenting the first detailed analysis of person-sensitive TAME marking in a language of the Tani subgroup of Tibeto-Burman, namely Galo. Like Tournadre (2008), I find that person-sensitive TAME marking in Galo is not a grammaticalized index of person (“agreement”) nor of cross-clause subject continuity, but is instead a semantic index of an assertor’s knowledge state. Unlike in more westerly Tibeto-Burman languages, however, different construals of agency and/or volition do not seem to be factors in the Galo system. Thus, there are both similarities and differences underlying systems of person-sensitive TAME marking in different Tibeto-Burman languages; this suggests that further research - particularly, employing a diachronic perspective when possible - will be required before we can confidently characterize person-sensitive TAME marking from a pan-Tibeto-Burman (or broader) cross-linguistic perspective.

Abstract

Scott DeLancey’s analysis of person-sensitive TAME marking in Lhasa Tibetan – “a.k.a. conjunct-disjunct marking” or “egophoricity” – has stimulated considerable discussion and debate, particularly as previously little-known languages of the Tibeto-Burman area, as well as outside it, have come to be described, and a wider range of functional factors have been taken into account. This chapter is intended as a contribution to this discussion, by presenting the first detailed analysis of person-sensitive TAME marking in a language of the Tani subgroup of Tibeto-Burman, namely Galo. Like Tournadre (2008), I find that person-sensitive TAME marking in Galo is not a grammaticalized index of person (“agreement”) nor of cross-clause subject continuity, but is instead a semantic index of an assertor’s knowledge state. Unlike in more westerly Tibeto-Burman languages, however, different construals of agency and/or volition do not seem to be factors in the Galo system. Thus, there are both similarities and differences underlying systems of person-sensitive TAME marking in different Tibeto-Burman languages; this suggests that further research - particularly, employing a diachronic perspective when possible - will be required before we can confidently characterize person-sensitive TAME marking from a pan-Tibeto-Burman (or broader) cross-linguistic perspective.

Chapters in this book

  1. Prelim pages i
  2. Table of contents v
  3. Introduction ix
  4. Part I. Typological studies
  5. Non-aprioristic typology as a discovery tool 3
  6. Chorophorics, or the difference between place as an entity and place as a position in space 27
  7. On the diachrony of the ‘Ethical Dative’ 43
  8. Part II. Contributions to historical linguistics
  9. Biactantial agreement in the Gongduk transitive verb in the broader Tibeto-Burman context 69
  10. The dinguist’s dilemma 83
  11. Part III. TAME and case alignment
  12. Person-sensitive TAME marking in Galo 107
  13. Agent case marking in Sahaptian 131
  14. Part IV. Multi-clause constructions
  15. The Kurtöp - si construction 155
  16. Verb serialization in Ede from a diachronic perspective 179
  17. Tense-aspect morphology from nominalizers in Newar 195
  18. Part V. Functional motivation and extension
  19. Predicting reference form 223
  20. Causation as “functional sink” in Northern Paiute 237
  21. The challenge of Maa ‘Away’ 259
  22. Name index 283
  23. Language index 287
  24. Subject index 291
https://doi.org/10.1075/tsl.103.06pos

Chapters in this book

  1. Prelim pages i
  2. Table of contents v
  3. Introduction ix
  4. Part I. Typological studies
  5. Non-aprioristic typology as a discovery tool 3
  6. Chorophorics, or the difference between place as an entity and place as a position in space 27
  7. On the diachrony of the ‘Ethical Dative’ 43
  8. Part II. Contributions to historical linguistics
  9. Biactantial agreement in the Gongduk transitive verb in the broader Tibeto-Burman context 69
  10. The dinguist’s dilemma 83
  11. Part III. TAME and case alignment
  12. Person-sensitive TAME marking in Galo 107
  13. Agent case marking in Sahaptian 131
  14. Part IV. Multi-clause constructions
  15. The Kurtöp - si construction 155
  16. Verb serialization in Ede from a diachronic perspective 179
  17. Tense-aspect morphology from nominalizers in Newar 195
  18. Part V. Functional motivation and extension
  19. Predicting reference form 223
  20. Causation as “functional sink” in Northern Paiute 237
  21. The challenge of Maa ‘Away’ 259
  22. Name index 283
  23. Language index 287
  24. Subject index 291
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