Home A multivariate analysis of canonical and non-canonical uses of switch-reference markers in Mbyá narratives
Article
Licensed
Unlicensed Requires Authentication

A multivariate analysis of canonical and non-canonical uses of switch-reference markers in Mbyá narratives

  • Guillaume Thomas ORCID logo EMAIL logo and Germino Duarte
Published/Copyright: December 5, 2024

Abstract

Switch-reference is a family of grammatical devices whose primary function is to indicate whether two linked clauses have coreferential pivots, where the pivot is a prominent argument in each clause. In some languages, in addition to their function of reference tracking, switch-reference markers can be used to indicate whether the events or situations described by the two linked clauses differ with respect to some parameter, such as time, place or actuality. This phenomenon is known as non-canonical switch-reference. Whether canonical and non-canonical switch-reference marking are distinct grammatical phenomena is still an open question. In this paper, we investigate uses of switch-reference markers in a corpus of Mbyá Guaraní (Tupian) narratives, and we argue that the alternation between canonical and non-canonical uses is an epiphenomenon of the multifactorial and probabilistic nature of switch-reference marker choice. In this perspective, there is only one grammatical process of switch-reference marking and the distinction between canonical and non-canonical switch-reference marking is matter of language use.


Corresponding author: Guillaume Thomas, Department of Linguistics, University of Toronto, Toronto, Canada, E-mail:

Award Identifier / Grant number: Insight Development Grant – 430-2019-00272

Glossing abbreviations for Mbyá examples

a1sg

first person singular active

abl

ablative

ana

anaphoric pronoun

asp

aspect

attn

attention

b1sg

first person singular inactive inflection

bdy

information structure boundary

cf

conterfactual

conv

converb

comit

comitative causative

comp

completive marker

cont

continuative

dat

dative

dim

diminutive

dir

directional

df

different switch-reference marker

excl

exclusive

frust

frustrative

fut

future

hab

habitual

hsy

hearsay evidential

int

intensifier

loc

locative

man

manner

mir

mirative

neg

negation

nmlz

nominalizer

npossd

non-possessed

obj

object marker

q

question particle

pl

plural

r

linking morpheme

sm

same Switch-Reference marker

src

source

seq

sequential

References

Asher, Nicholas & Alex Lascarides. 2003. Logics of conversation. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.Search in Google Scholar

Baron, Reuben M. & David A. Kenny. 1986. The moderator-mediator variable distinction in social psychological research: Conceptual, strategic, and statistical considerations. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 51. 1173–1182. https://doi.org/10.1037//0022-3514.51.6.1173.Search in Google Scholar

Behrens, Bergljot & Cathrine Fabricius-Hansen. 2010. The relation accompanying circumstance across languages: Conflict between linguistic expression and discourse subordination? In Dingfand Shu & Ken Turner (eds.), Contrasting meaning in languages of the east and west, 531–552. Oxford, UK: Peter Lang.Search in Google Scholar

Behrens, Bergljot, Cathrine Fabricius-Hansen & Kåre Solfjeld. 2012. Competing structues: The discourse perspective. In Kåre Solfjeld Cathrine & Dag Haug (eds.), Big events, small clauses, 179–225. Berlin, DE and Boston, MA: De Gruyter.10.1515/9783110285864.179Search in Google Scholar

Bresnan, Joan, Anna Cueni, Tatiana Nikitina & Harald Baayen. 2007. Predicting the dative alternation. In Gerlof Bouma, Irene Maria Krämer & Joost Zwarts (eds.), Cognitive foundations of interpretation, 69–94. Amsterdam, NL: Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences.Search in Google Scholar

Bybee, Joan. 2006. From usage to grammar: The mind’s response to repetition. Language 82(4). 711–733. https://doi.org/10.1353/lan.2006.0186.Search in Google Scholar

DeLancey, Scott. 1997. Mirativity: The grammatical marking of unexpected information. Linguistic Typology 1(1). 33–52. https://doi.org/10.1515/lity.1997.1.1.33.Search in Google Scholar

Dooley, Robert A. 1989. Switch reference in Mbyá Guaraní: A fair-weather phenomenon. Work Papers of the Summer Institute of Linguistics, University of North Dakota Session 33. 93–119. https://doi.org/10.31356/silwp.vol33.04.Search in Google Scholar

Dooley, Robert A. 1992. When switch reference moves to discourse: Developmental markers in Mbyá Guarani. In Shin Ja J. Hwang & William R. Merrified (eds.), Language in context: Essays for Robert E. Longacre, 97–108. Dallas, TX: Summer Institute of Linguistics and The University of Texas at Arlington Publications in Linguistics.Search in Google Scholar

Dooley, Robert A. 1999. A noncategorial approach to coherence relations: Switch reference constructions in Mbyá Guaraní. In Eugene Loos (ed.), Logical relations in discourse, 219–242. Dallas, TX: Summer Institute of Linguistics.Search in Google Scholar

Dooley, Robert A. 2011. Mbyá Guaraní collection of Robert Dooley. www.ailla.utexas.org.Media:text (accessed 1 August 2024).Search in Google Scholar

Dooley, Robert A. 2015. Léxico Guarani, dialeto Mbyá: Introdução [Guarani lexicon, Mbya dialect: introduction]. Associação Internacional de Linguística – SIL Brasil. https://www.sil.org/resources/archives/72343 (accessed 1 August 2024).Search in Google Scholar

Dooley, Robert A. 2016. Léxico Guarani, dialeto Mbyá [Guarani lexicon, Mbya dialect]. Associação Internacional de Linguística – SIL Brasil. https://www.sil.org/resources/archives/72342 (accessed 1 August 2024).Search in Google Scholar

Givón, Talmy. 2001. Syntax: An introduction, vol. 2. Amsterdam, NL and Philadelphia, PA: John Benjamins Publishing Companty.Search in Google Scholar

Gries, Stefan Th. 2017. Syntactic alternation research: Taking stock and some suggestions for the future. Belgian Journal of Linguistics 31(1). 8–29. https://doi.org/10.1075/bjl.00001.gri.Search in Google Scholar

Grosz, Barbara & Candace L. Sidner. 1986. Attention, intentions, and the structure of discourse. Computational Linguistics 12(3). 175–204.Search in Google Scholar

Grosz, Barbara, Aravind K. Joshi & Scott Weinstein. 1995. Centering: A framework for modeling the local coherence of discourse. Computational Linguistics 21(2). 203–225.10.21236/ADA324949Search in Google Scholar

Guérin, Valérie. 2019. Bridging constructions, vol. 24. Language Science Press. https://langsci-press.org/catalog/book/216 (accessed 1 August 2024).Search in Google Scholar

Guillaume, Antoine. 2011. Subordinate clauses, switch-reference, and tail-head linkage in Cavineña narratives. In Rik van Gijn, Katharina Haude & Pieter Muysken (eds.), Subordination in native South American languages, 109–140. John Benjamins (accessed 1 August 2024).10.1075/tsl.97.05guiSearch in Google Scholar

Haiman, John & Pamela Munro. 1983. Introduction. In John Haiman & Pamela Munro (eds.), Switch-reference and universal grammar, ix–xv. Amsterdam, NL and Philadelphia, PA: John Benjamins.10.1075/tsl.2Search in Google Scholar

Harrell, Frank E. 2015. Regression modeling strategies. New York, NY: Springer.10.1007/978-3-319-19425-7Search in Google Scholar

Hastie, Trevor, Robert Tibshirani & Martin Wainwright. 2015. Statistical learning with sparsity, 143. Boca Raton, FL: CRC Press.10.1201/b18401Search in Google Scholar

Hobbs, Jerry R. 1985. On the coherence and structure of discourse. Standford, CA: CSLI Publications. Technical Report 85-37 Center for the Study of Language and Information.Search in Google Scholar

Hothorn, Torsten & Achim Zeileis. 2015. partykit: A modular toolkit for recursive partytioning in R. Journal of Machine Learning Research 16(118). 3905–3909.Search in Google Scholar

Kammer, Michael, Daniela Dunkler, Stefan Michiels & Georg Heinze. 2022. Evaluating methods for lasso selective inference in biomedical research: A comparative simulation study. BMC Medical Research Methodology 22(206). 1–13. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12874-022-01681-y.Search in Google Scholar

Kamp, Hans & Uwe Reyle. 1993. From discourse to logic. Dordrecht, NL: Kluwer Academic Publishers.10.1007/978-94-017-1616-1Search in Google Scholar

Ladeira, Maria Inês. 2018. Guarani mbya. In Fany Pantaleoni Ricardo (ed.), Povos indígenas no brasil [Indigenous Peoples in Brazil]. Instituto Socioambiental. https://pib.socioambiental.org/pt/Povo:Guarani_Mbya (accessed 1 August 2024).Search in Google Scholar

Lewis, Myles J., Athina Spiliopoulou, Katriona Goldmann, Costantino Pitzalis, Paul McKeigue & Michael R. Barnes. 2023. nestedcv: An R package for fast implementation of nested cross-validation with embedded feature selection designed for transcriptomics and high-dimensional data. Bioinformatics Advances 3(1). vbad048. https://doi.org/10.1093/bioadv/vbad048.Search in Google Scholar

Mann, William C. & Sandra A. Thompson. 1988. Rhetorical structure theory: Toward a functional theory of text organization. Text 8(3). 243–281. https://doi.org/10.1515/text.1.1988.8.3.243.Search in Google Scholar

McKenzie, Andrew. 2014. On the emergence of discourse functions from semantics and pragmatics. Invited talk, 8th Conference on the Semantics of Under-represented Languages of the Americas (SULA 8).Search in Google Scholar

Mithun, Marianne. 1993. Switch-reference: Clause combining in central pomo. International Journal of American Linguistics 59(2). 119–136. https://doi.org/10.1086/466192.Search in Google Scholar

Mithun, Marianne. 2021. Switch-reference: Clause combining in central pomo. In Patience Epps, Danny Law & Na’ama Pat-El (eds.), Historical linguistics and endangered languages, 182–211. New York, NY and London, UK: Routledge.Search in Google Scholar

Muller, Philippe, Marianne Vergez-Couret, Laurent Prévot, Nicholas Asher, Benamara Farah, Myriam Bras, Anne Le Draoulec & Laure Vieu. 2012. Manuel d’annotation en relations de discours du projet ANNODIS. Technical Report 21 CLLE-ERSS Toulouse.Search in Google Scholar

Pustet, Regina. 2013. Switch-reference or coordination? A quantitative approach to clause linkage in Lakota. International Journal of American Linguistics 79. 153–188. https://doi.org/10.1086/669627.Search in Google Scholar

Reese, Brian, Julie Hunter, Nicholas Asher, Pascal Denis & Jason Baldridge. 2007. Reference manual for the analysis and annotation of rhetorical structure. Inria-00514933.Search in Google Scholar

Roberts, John. 1988. Amele switch-reference and the theory of grammar. Linguistic Inquiry 19. 45–63.Search in Google Scholar

Roberts, John. 2017. A typology of switch reference. In Alexandra Y. Aikhenvald (ed.), The Cambridge handbook of linguistic typology, 538–573. Cambridge University Press (accessed 1 August 2024).10.1017/9781316135716.017Search in Google Scholar

Sanders, Ted J. M., Vera Demberg, Jet Hoek, Merel C. J. Scholman, Fatemeh Torabi Asr, Sandrine Zufferey & Jacqueline Evers-Vermeul. 2021. Unifying dimensions in coherence relations: How various annotation frameworks are related. Corpus Linguistics and Linguistic Theory 17(1). 1–71. https://doi.org/10.1515/cllt-2016-0078.Search in Google Scholar

Stirling, Lesley. 1993. Switch-reference and discourse representation. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.10.1017/CBO9780511597886Search in Google Scholar

Taylor, Jonathan & Robert Tibshirani. 2015. Statistical learning and selective inference. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 112(25). 7629–7634. https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1507583112.Search in Google Scholar

Thomas, Guillaume, Gregory Antono, Laurestine Bradford, Angelika Kiss & Darragh. Winkelman. 2021. Switch-reference and its role in referential choice in mbyá Guaraní narratives. Corpus Linguistics and Linguistic Theory 17(3). 563–597. https://doi.org/10.1515/cllt-2020-0028.Search in Google Scholar

van Gijn, Rik. 2012. Switch-attention (aka switch-reference) in South-American temporal clauses: Facilitating oral transmission. Linguistic Discovery 1(10). 112–127. https://doi.org/10.1349/ps1.1537-0852.a.407.Search in Google Scholar

van Gijn, Rik. 2016a. Switch-reference: An overview. In Rik van Gijn & Jeremmy Hammond (eds.), Switch-reference 2.0, vol. 114 Typological Studies in Language, 1–54. John Benjamins (accessed 1 August 2024).10.1075/tsl.114.01vanSearch in Google Scholar

van Gijn, Rik. 2016b. Switch-reference in western South-America. In Rik van Gijn & Jeremmy Hammond (eds.), Switch-reference 2.0, vol. 114 Typological Studies in Language, 53–206. John Benjamins (accessed 1 August 2024).10.1075/tsl.114Search in Google Scholar

Veríssimo, Tupã A. 2002a. Opa mba’e re nhanhembo’e aguã 1 [Let us learn about everything 1]. Nhombo’ea Guarani: Mundo Indígena.Search in Google Scholar

Veríssimo, Tupã A. 2002b. Opa mba’e re nhanhembo’e aguã 2 [Let us learn about everything 2]. Nhombo’ea Guarani: Mundo Indígena.Search in Google Scholar

Watkins, Laurel J. 1993. The discourse functions of Kiowa switch-reference. International Journal of American Linguistics 59(2). 137–164. https://doi.org/10.1086/466193.Search in Google Scholar

Yi, Yang & Zou Hui. 2015. A fast unified algorithm for solving group-lasso penalized learning problems. Statistics and Computing 25. 1129–1141. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11222-014-9498-5.Search in Google Scholar

Yuan, Ming & Yi Lin. 2006. Model selection and estimation in regression with grouped variables. Journal of the Royal Statistical Society: Series B (Statistical Methodology) 68(1). 49–67. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9868.2005.00532.x.Search in Google Scholar


Supplementary Material

This article contains supplementary material (https://doi.org/10.1515/cllt-2024-0015).


Received: 2023-12-23
Accepted: 2024-11-06
Published Online: 2024-12-05

© 2024 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston

Downloaded on 22.9.2025 from https://www.degruyterbrill.com/document/doi/10.1515/cllt-2024-0015/html
Scroll to top button