The challenge of Maa ‘Away’
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Doris L. Payne
Abstract
All branches of Eastern Nilotic have directionals. The Maa (Maasai) away morpheme has a range of functions, including motion away, direction away, distributive action or situation, continuous aspect, a possible plurality function, an applicative-like function, and with some verbs a valence decreasing function. With some other verbs, away is simply lexicalized as part of the stem. The story of away is coherent once the core semantic function is understood, which Tucker and Mpaayei (1955) called ‘Motion Away’. However, processes of both lexicalization and grammaticalization have taken place, and the synchronic meaning of this morpheme cannot always and only be understood as indicating (even metaphorical) ‘motion away’.
Abstract
All branches of Eastern Nilotic have directionals. The Maa (Maasai) away morpheme has a range of functions, including motion away, direction away, distributive action or situation, continuous aspect, a possible plurality function, an applicative-like function, and with some verbs a valence decreasing function. With some other verbs, away is simply lexicalized as part of the stem. The story of away is coherent once the core semantic function is understood, which Tucker and Mpaayei (1955) called ‘Motion Away’. However, processes of both lexicalization and grammaticalization have taken place, and the synchronic meaning of this morpheme cannot always and only be understood as indicating (even metaphorical) ‘motion away’.
Chapters in this book
- Prelim pages i
- Table of contents v
- Introduction ix
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Part I. Typological studies
- Non-aprioristic typology as a discovery tool 3
- Chorophorics, or the difference between place as an entity and place as a position in space 27
- On the diachrony of the ‘Ethical Dative’ 43
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Part II. Contributions to historical linguistics
- Biactantial agreement in the Gongduk transitive verb in the broader Tibeto-Burman context 69
- The dinguist’s dilemma 83
-
Part III. TAME and case alignment
- Person-sensitive TAME marking in Galo 107
- Agent case marking in Sahaptian 131
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Part IV. Multi-clause constructions
- The Kurtöp - si construction 155
- Verb serialization in Ede from a diachronic perspective 179
- Tense-aspect morphology from nominalizers in Newar 195
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Part V. Functional motivation and extension
- Predicting reference form 223
- Causation as “functional sink” in Northern Paiute 237
- The challenge of Maa ‘Away’ 259
- Name index 283
- Language index 287
- Subject index 291
Chapters in this book
- Prelim pages i
- Table of contents v
- Introduction ix
-
Part I. Typological studies
- Non-aprioristic typology as a discovery tool 3
- Chorophorics, or the difference between place as an entity and place as a position in space 27
- On the diachrony of the ‘Ethical Dative’ 43
-
Part II. Contributions to historical linguistics
- Biactantial agreement in the Gongduk transitive verb in the broader Tibeto-Burman context 69
- The dinguist’s dilemma 83
-
Part III. TAME and case alignment
- Person-sensitive TAME marking in Galo 107
- Agent case marking in Sahaptian 131
-
Part IV. Multi-clause constructions
- The Kurtöp - si construction 155
- Verb serialization in Ede from a diachronic perspective 179
- Tense-aspect morphology from nominalizers in Newar 195
-
Part V. Functional motivation and extension
- Predicting reference form 223
- Causation as “functional sink” in Northern Paiute 237
- The challenge of Maa ‘Away’ 259
- Name index 283
- Language index 287
- Subject index 291
