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On the origins of serial verb constructions in Kalam

  • Andrew Pawley
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Syntactic Complexity
This chapter is in the book Syntactic Complexity

Abstract

In Kalam, a Trans New Guinea language spoken in Papua New Guinea, there are two main types of serial verb construction (SVC), showing different degrees of morphosyntactic complexity. Compact SVCs contain from two to four verb roots that form a single, semantically and syntactically very tight-knit verb phrase. Narrative SVCs depict a sequence of events that make up a familiar episode. They contain from two to five small verb phrases, compressed into a single clause–lik e construction. The paper will discuss the functions and origins of these two constructions and reflect on the paradox that while condensing multi-clause constructions into a single clause may simplify the task of speech planning it has creates a clause type of exceptional complexity.

Abstract

In Kalam, a Trans New Guinea language spoken in Papua New Guinea, there are two main types of serial verb construction (SVC), showing different degrees of morphosyntactic complexity. Compact SVCs contain from two to four verb roots that form a single, semantically and syntactically very tight-knit verb phrase. Narrative SVCs depict a sequence of events that make up a familiar episode. They contain from two to five small verb phrases, compressed into a single clause–lik e construction. The paper will discuss the functions and origins of these two constructions and reflect on the paradox that while condensing multi-clause constructions into a single clause may simplify the task of speech planning it has creates a clause type of exceptional complexity.

Chapters in this book

  1. Prelim pages i
  2. Table of contents v
  3. Introduction 1
  4. Part I. Diachrony
  5. From nominal to clausal morphosyntax 23
  6. Re(e)volving complexity 53
  7. Multiple routes to clause union 81
  8. On the origins of serial verb constructions in Kalam 119
  9. A quantitative approach to the development of complex predicates 145
  10. Elements of complex structures, where recursion isn’t 163
  11. Nominalization and the origin of subordination 199
  12. The co-evolution of syntactic and pragmatic complexity 215
  13. Two pathways of grammatical evolution 239
  14. Part II. Child language
  15. On the role of frequency and similarity in the acquisition of subject and non-subject relative clauses 251
  16. ‘ Starting small ’ effects in the acquisition of early relative constructions in Spanish 277
  17. The ontogeny of complex verb phrases 311
  18. Part III. Cognition and neurology
  19. Syntactic complexity versus concatenation in a verbal production task 391
  20. The emergence of linguistic complexity 405
  21. Cognitive and neural underpinnings of syntactic complexity 433
  22. Neural mechanisms of recursive processing in cognitive and linguistic complexity 461
  23. Syntactic complexity in the brain 491
  24. Part IV. Biology and evolution
  25. Neural plasticity 509
  26. Recursion 531
  27. Index 545
https://doi.org/10.1075/tsl.85.05ont

Chapters in this book

  1. Prelim pages i
  2. Table of contents v
  3. Introduction 1
  4. Part I. Diachrony
  5. From nominal to clausal morphosyntax 23
  6. Re(e)volving complexity 53
  7. Multiple routes to clause union 81
  8. On the origins of serial verb constructions in Kalam 119
  9. A quantitative approach to the development of complex predicates 145
  10. Elements of complex structures, where recursion isn’t 163
  11. Nominalization and the origin of subordination 199
  12. The co-evolution of syntactic and pragmatic complexity 215
  13. Two pathways of grammatical evolution 239
  14. Part II. Child language
  15. On the role of frequency and similarity in the acquisition of subject and non-subject relative clauses 251
  16. ‘ Starting small ’ effects in the acquisition of early relative constructions in Spanish 277
  17. The ontogeny of complex verb phrases 311
  18. Part III. Cognition and neurology
  19. Syntactic complexity versus concatenation in a verbal production task 391
  20. The emergence of linguistic complexity 405
  21. Cognitive and neural underpinnings of syntactic complexity 433
  22. Neural mechanisms of recursive processing in cognitive and linguistic complexity 461
  23. Syntactic complexity in the brain 491
  24. Part IV. Biology and evolution
  25. Neural plasticity 509
  26. Recursion 531
  27. Index 545
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