scholarly journals The semantics of pluractionals and punctuals in Konso (Cushitic, Ethiopia)

Author(s):  
Ongaye Oda Orkaydo ◽  
Maarten Mous

AbstractEvent number is an important grammatical category in Konso in addition to nominal number. Event number has two main values, singular and plural, which can be expressed by two distinct verbal morphological processes, punctual and pluractional. The interpretation of a sentence in terms of event number is arrived at through an intricate interplay of lexical meaning, the core meaning of the number marking morphology and the separate system of aspect. Each verb has its intrinsic values for event number associated with its systematic lexical distinctions in terms of event number. Event number includes both event internal and event external situations. The meaning of the markers of singular and plural event number has a primary and a secondary value. There are several situations in which the primary meaning is excluded and the secondary meaning is the only possible interpretation. The pluractional is fully productive while the punctual is not productive and has interesting structural morphological restrictions.

Kalbotyra ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 74 ◽  
pp. 49-71
Author(s):  
Ana-Maria Cozma

This paper addresses the issue of polysemy, and more precisely of multiple meanings in the case of the words francophonie/francophone from the perspective of argumentative semantics. The aim of the paper is to examine the mechanisms that account for the multiple meanings of francophonie/francophone, i.e. the semantic and discursive mechanisms involved in the (re)construction of lexical meaning as the words occur in discourse. The data analysed in this paper consists of a set of discourse fragments about francophone identity, discourses that vary according to the speaker, the geographical location and the media support. The study is carried out within the framework of the SAP theory (Semantics of Argumentative Possibilities), following a procedure based on a pre-built reference meaning – i.e. a description of the argumentative potential of the lexeme – that will be used when analysing the discursive occurrences. First, the paper briefly presents the SAP theory and the pre-built reference meaning of the lexemes francophonie/francophone (described in terms of core-elements, stereotypes and argumentative possibilities). It then illustrates several discursive mechanisms of meaning construction. The analysis highlights a series of meaning construction mechanisms: transgressive activation of the argumentative potential, reconfiguration by scission of the core-elements or by deletion of one of the elements, modality addition, transgressive reconstruction of the core meaning, and finally core circularity. Thus, the paper indicates, from the perspective of argumentative semantics, that the multiple meanings of the words francophonie/francophone, i.e. the various semantic configurations attached to these words, can be seen as reconfigurations of a single lexical meaning.


This volume offers an overview of current research on grammatical number in language. The chapters Part i of the handbook present foundational notions in the study of grammatical number covering the semantic analyses of plurality, the mass–count distinction, the relationship between number and quantity expressions and the mental representation of number and individuation. The core instance of grammatical number is marking for number distinctions in nominal expressions as in English the book/the books and the chapters in Part ii, Number in the nominal domain, explore morphological, semantic, and syntactic aspects of number marking within noun phrases. The contributions examine morphological marking of number the relationship between syntax and nominal number marking, and the interactions between numeral classifiers with semantic number and number marking. They also address cases of mismatches in form and meaning with respect to number displayed by lexical plurals and collective nouns. The final chapter reviews nominal number processing from the perspective of language pathologies. While number marking on nouns has been the focus of most research on number, number distinctions can also be found in the event domain. Part iii, Number in the event domain, presents an overview of different linguistic means of expressing plurality in the event domain, covering verbal plurality marking, pluractional modifiers of the form Noun preposition Noun, frequency adjectives and dependent indefinites. Part iv provides fifteen case studies examining different aspects of grammatical number marking in a range of typologically diverse languages.


2009 ◽  
pp. 89-99
Author(s):  
Aleksandar Loma

The word kiljan / kiljan, -a (Variants: kiljen, kiljas) is found in the most parts of Montenegro; its area ranges over the border between Zeta - and East-Herzegovina dialects of Serbian. Of its five meanings, three are to be considered peripheral (building block (of limestone) in SW, target in a game in NW), or occasional (hill). The core meaning of the word seem to be 'a stone stuck into the ground', to mark something, either a boundary between the fields or a place of somebody's violent death (shifting to 'gravestone'). Of these two usages, the former may claim the priority, ancient boundary stones being often reinterpreted, in local legends, as memorial ones. Indeed marking the land parcels with stones was unfamiliar to the ancient Slavs (Common Slavic *medja land boundary is usually a hedge, a grove, a path or a furrow), but characteristic of Mediterranean countries with their scarcity of arable land; for the ancient Greeks, it is attested since the Homeric epoch, and was practiced by the Romans too, which suggests a possible Romance source of the word in question. Significantly enough, this practice is attested by the Old Serbian charters only for Zeta, a SW Montenegrian region where kiljan is the proper term for this kind of landmarks (in a charter from 1316, it is not explicitly mentioned, but described by kamy ukopan stone dug into the ground). The word kiljan has no convincing etymology so far Illyrian one proposed by Petar Skok in his etymological dictionary is made up out of thin air, and a possible interpretation based on (Balto)Slavic facts (Lith. ku?lis 'stone', Common Slavic **kyl- as a variant of *k?l- eyetooth tusk; crag') highly improbable as well. However, the Old Dalmatian, a Romance language extinct since the end of 19th century, provides a plausible source with its continuation of the Latin word columna 'column, pillar', which is kilauna; and the SCr forms kelomna / kelovna in Ragusa (Dubrovnik), kilovna in the Bay of Cattaro (Kotor) in today's Montenegro must go back to a similar Romance form. Although the details of vocalism are not clear, especially the development in the penultimate, the derivation kiljan columna seems highly probable in view of the fact that in medieval Latin sources from Dalmatia the same thing - a boundary stone - is designated by colonella, a derivative from Lat. columna.


2021 ◽  
Vol 7 (2) ◽  
pp. 155-231
Author(s):  
Leonard Talmy

Abstract The entire conceptual content represented by a single morpheme—its plenary meaning—is in general both copious and structured. This structuring consists of both the patterning of its content and the distribution of attention over that pattern. With respect to the patterning of its content, a morpheme’s plenary meaning can be divided into a core meaning and an associated meaning. In turn, its associated meaning can be subdivided into five sectors: the holistic, infrastructure, collateral, disposition, and attitude sectors. And with respect to its distribution of attention, eight specific attentional factors and three general attentional principles are cited. The main attentional factor is that a morpheme’s core meaning is generally more salient than its associated meaning or any of the sectors therein. But another attentional factor holds that the attitude sector, especially its expletivity type, can challenge or exceed the core meaning in salience.


Author(s):  
William J. Abraham

In sorting through how best to understand the work of Christ we need a narrative that captures the core meaning of “atonement” and a way to deploy the various theories that abound in the tradition. At the root of the issue is a narrative of reconciliation that highlights the serious alienation that exists between human agents and God. Fixing this problem requires both divine and human action. Theories of atonement seek to spell out the divine action involved. Each has its own advantage in developing complementary descriptions of what has gone wrong with the world and how to fix it.


2019 ◽  
Vol 56 (2) ◽  
pp. 269-314
Author(s):  
SHIN FUKUDA

Japanese has two types of two-place motion verbs whose ‘objects’ can be marked as either accusative or oblique (accusative–oblique alternations). The accusative–goal verbs mark their objects with accusative case -o or the goal marker -ni, and the accusative–source verbs mark their objects with accusative -o or the source marker -kara. Previous studies describe systematic differences in the interpretation of the arguments of these verbs and the events they denote between the two structures. This study argues that these alternating verbs are variable behavior verbs that are linked to two distinct syntactic structures. The core evidence for this claim comes from the results of two acceptability judgment experiments with Japanese native speakers that examined: (i) selectional restrictions on the subjects of the alternating verbs and (ii) the ability of their subjects to license ‘floating’ numeral quantifiers. The results of the experiments demonstrate that the accusative–source verbs alternate between the transitive and unaccusative structures, whereas the accusative–goal verbs consistently behave like transitive verbs but assign two different structural cases to their objects. Thus, the study shows that there are multiple ways in which two-place motion verbs are mapped onto distinctive syntactic structures, whereby the core meaning of the verbs and their syntactic structures together determine their interpretation.


2011 ◽  
Vol 65 (4) ◽  
pp. 293-306
Author(s):  
Gea Smit

In the New Testament, the belief that the last judgment would arrive soon was paired with an ethical appeal to change one’s attitude or way of life. However, with the expectation of an imminent judgment fading, this connection weakened. This paper investigates whether the existential theology of Rudolf Bultmann offers an inter-pretation that manages to actualise belief in a last judgment for the present day. Bultmann interprets the core meaning of judgment to be that God, with the coming of Jesus Christ into the world, opens the possibility for a new form of true existence for every individual who submits to it. This conception indeed implies an existential importance of the belief in an eschatological judgment for human life in the present. However, a more exact interpretation of the rather abstract notion of this form of true existence seems hard to describe and therefore leaves the question somewhat open.


2018 ◽  
Vol 53 ◽  
pp. 348-368
Author(s):  
Вадим [Vadim] Юрьевич [IUr'evich] Меликян [Melikian] ◽  
Анна [Anna] Васильевна [Vasil'evna] Меликян [Melikian]

The phenomenon of syntactic semioimplicationSemioimplicative meaning is a “derived,” secondary meaning. The typical example of a semioimplicative meaning in syntax is the use of the positive constructions in the meaning of the negative ones and vice versa (converted meaning). The semioimplicative sentence interpretation scarcely has logical limitations. Most sentences, given the right intonation, can undergo an enantiosemic conversion. The ironical negation can be hidden in practically each sentence. In this article we single out and parameterize the main conditions of such semioimplication and the kinds of language means triggering the semioimplicative mechanism. Besides, we draw attention to the ways of expressing diverse connotations organically linked with the very process of syntactic constructions semioimplication and consistently caused by it. The core of semioimplicative structures is constituted by constructions that are able to express two meanings: direct and transferred (in this case, opposite) meaning. We have termed them “symmetrical” constructions. The sentence models with one meaning opposite to the form expressing it and also the models opposite in sign but not correlated according to some morphological characteristics serve as the periphery of semioimplication (“nonsymmetrical” constructions). The models that possess any language means facilitating their reconsideration as their own opposites are called the “specialized” models in the research. The “non-specialized” models do not have such qualities. The ability to express two opposite meanings can potentially take place on different levels of the sentence model concretization: abstract (syntactic), morphological, general lexical and concrete lexical (i.e., on the level of speech model realization). Each of the types of opposition, both objective and evaluative ones, has its own means of specialization. In the sphere of enantiosemical and evaluative opposition of the sentence meaning the dominating development line of the semioimplication phenomenon is the pursuit of maximal language expressivity, on the one hand, and of monosemanticity, accuracy, and effectiveness, on the other hand. The tendency toward language means economy turns out to be weak in this case. The reason for this process consists in the desire to assign these sentences to the sphere of the expressive syntax by using them exclusively in the secondary, ironical and most expressive meaning. As a result, the nonsymmetrical (the maximally specialized) constructions are 1.5 times more numerous than the symmetrical constructions (ones with moderate specialization). We find research of this subject-matter in its functional-communicative, cognitive, discoursive and pragmatic-linguistic aspects to be to a topical and worthwhile endeavor. Zjawisko semioimplikacji składniowejZnaczenie semioimplikacyjne to znaczenie „pochodne”, wtórne. Typowym przykładem występowania znaczenia semioimplikacyjnego w składni jest używanie konstrukcji pozytywnych w znaczeniu negatywnym i vice versa (konwersja znaczenia). Semioimplikacyjna analiza zdania praktycznie nie napotyka na logiczne ograniczenia. Większość zdań, jeśli towarzyszy im odpowiednia intonacja, w określonych kontekstach może ulegać enantiosemantycznej konwersji: ironiczne zaprzeczenie może skrywać się w praktycznie każdym zdaniu. W tym artykule identyfikujemy i parametryzujemy podstawowe warunki takiej semioimplikacji oraz rodzaje środków językowych, jakie inicjują mechanizm semioimplikacyjny. Zwracamy także uwagę na sposoby wyrażenia różnorakich konotacji związanych organicznie z samym procesem semioimplikacji struktur składniowych i regularnie przez nią wywoływanych. Rdzeniem struktur semioimplikacyjnych są konstrukcje mogące wyrażać oba znaczenia: dosłowne i przenośne (tu: przeciwstawne). Określiliśmy takie konstrukcje mianem „symetrycznych”. Za peryferia zbioru konstrukcji semioimplikacyjnych (za konstrukcje „niesymetryczne”) można uznać modele zdań mających tylko jedno znaczenie, które jednak jest przeciwstawne w stosunku do wyrażającej go formy, oraz modele o przeciwnym znaku, ale nieskorelowane pod względem niektórych parametrów morfologicznych. Modele zdań dysponujące środkami językowymi ułatwiającymi zmianę ich znaczenia na przeciwstawne nazywamy „wyspecjalizowanymi”. Modele „niewyspecjalizowane” nie dysponują takiego rodzaju środkami. Zdolność wyrażania dwóch przeciwstawnych znaczeń może potencjalnie zachodzić na różnych poziomach konkretyzacji modelu: abstrakcyjnym (składniowym), morfologicznym, leksykalnym ogólnym i leksykalnym konkretnym (tzn. na poziomie językowej realizacji modelu). Każdy z typów przeciwstawności, czy to przedmiotowej czy wartościującej, dysponuje własnymi środkami specjalizacji. W sferze enantiosemicznej i wartościującej przeciwstawności znaczeń zdania dominującym kierunkiem rozwoju zjawiska semioimplikacji jest dążenie, z jednej strony, do maksymalnej wyrazistości języka, z drugiej zaś – do jego jednoznaczności, precyzji, efektywności. Tendencja do zwiększania ekonomii środków językowych okazuje się w badanym przypadku słabsza. Przyczyną tego procesu jest dążenie do trwałego przypisania takich zdań ekspresyjnej sferze składni za sprawą używania ich wyłącznie w drugim, ironicznym, a zarazem bardziej ekspresyjnym znaczeniu. W rezultacie konstrukcji niesymetrycznych (maksymalnie wyspecjalizowanych) jest w przybliżeniu 1,5 raza więcej niż konstrukcji symetrycznych (umiarkowanie wyspecjalizowanych). Uważamy za wskazane dalsze badania nad zarysowaną tu tematyką w jej aspekcie funkcjonalno-komunikacyjnym, kognitywnym, dyskursywnym i pragmalingwistycznym.


2020 ◽  
Vol 73 (3) ◽  
pp. 9-14
Author(s):  
N Asilbekova ◽  

This article discusses in more detail the derivational methods of anthroponyms in the Kazakh language. Synthetic word formation is also complicated by the meaning and individuality of personal names. Here the suffix is ​​the causal basis of the lexical meaning, and the suffix adds its meaning. The new secondary meaning is created by the derivational meaning of the suffix. Professor A. Salkynbai writes in detail in his work "Word formation of the Kazakh language" that the meaning of the causal root is broader than the meaning of the derived word. Based on this theory, it is easy to see that the same conclusion applies to the synthetic method of personal names.


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