Periphrasis and Possible Lexemes1

Periphrasis can be investigated for the ways in which it splits the paradigms of lexemes (into periphrastic and non-periphrastic parts); this is done in the context of other morphological phenomena which also split paradigms. This chapter proposes a typology of splits. First, the splits can be motivated ‘externally’, for example by different morphosyntactic or morphosemantic features, as in Russian where verbs are split by periphrasis and by stem alternation in line with tense differentiation. Alternatively, splits may follow a division internal to morphology (morphomic); we find this in a Romanian dialect example, where periphrastic forms do not make a coherent morphosyntactic group, but follow an already existing pattern of stem alternation. All this demonstrates that periphrasis splits lexemes in the same ways as other morphological phenomena, such as suppletion, stem alternation, and heteroclisis. It points to the conclusion that the periphrastic part of the paradigm may not be homogeneous, and the splits induced by periphrasis are comparable to other morphological splits.

Periphrasis in Tundra Nenets1

A detailed picture of periphrasis in Nenets (Uralic) presents a typologically rare instance of periphrasis in a nominal paradigm (as opposed to more familiar verbal periphrasis). Previous accounts treated Nenets nouns as an uncontroversial example of periphrasis, but this chapter demonstrates that a closer look reveals a more complicated picture. It argues that the choice between the usage of the periphrastic dual form and the numeral ‘two’ (which takes the singular) correlates with definiteness and/or discourse givenness. In addition, analysis of this rare instance of periphrasis in a noun system reveals interesting aspects of the way the number system works in the language. The chapter also investigates the periphrastic realization of verbal negation, where the auxiliary carries the information of the verb type. For intransitive verbs, the type is either ‘subjective’ or ‘reflexive’ and there are, surprisingly, arguments in favour of treating these as purely morphological classes.

Periphrasis in Archi1

The Nakh-Daghestanian language Archi has several types of verbal constructions: periphrases, complex predicates, and phenomena very similar to serial verb constructions. This chapter investigates these constructions, using the approach of canonical typology; this allows different constructions to be ranked in terms of their proximity to the canonical centre. The analysis suggested is relevant for the general typology of multiword constructions, since it identifies tests for distinguishing them: for complex predicates the test will be their syntactic behaviour, for constructions close to serialization it is the fact that they are only available for a subset of verbs, while periphrasis is exhaustive. The chapter also has a descriptive purpose: published research on Archi does not describe all the available meanings for the periphrastic constructions nor their syntactic behaviour, and so an attempt is made to fill these gaps.

Periphrasis in the Sanskrit Verb System*

Ancient Sanskrit had two tenses of particular interest: periphrastic perfect and periphrastic future. At first glance, they are rather similar: both realize a particular value of tense through a combination of a lexical verb (devoid of personal agreement) and an agreeing auxiliary. There are, however, important differences which are revealed in this chapter: the periphrastic future is available for every verb, and can be distinguished from the synthetic future on semantic grounds, while the periphrastic perfect is available only for certain verbs, and these do not make up a semantically homogeneous group. A formal analysis is proposed, within Paradigm Function Morphology, for the two periphrastic tenses. It is demonstrated that a morphological rather than a purely syntactic account is preferable here. The verbs with a periphrastic perfect make up a conjugation class; on the other hand, the periphrastic future is formalized as a morphosyntactic property whose default realization is periphrastic.

Instability in Stability

Periphrasis has a striking role in the Australian (non-Pama-Nyungan) language Dalabon, where it helps to maintain the paradigm structure, and at the same time reshapes the paradigm by adding new categories. The key area concerns divalent prefixal marking in verbs, which has been used as evidence in establishing genetic relatedness of non-Pama-Nyungan languages. In Dalabon, there is a set of prefixes to mark subject-object relations for singular objects. The non-singular objects, however, are coded by preverbal pronouns and this chapter demonstrates the true periphrastic nature of this construction. Dalabon is also viewed in the context of other languages of the family, and this allows us to establish the systemic functions of periphrasis, that of ensuring stability of divalent marking in the paradigm, and that of enlarging the paradigm. More generally, then, the Dalabon data provide new evidence of how morphological paradigms behave in the context of change and renewal.

Introduction

This introductory chapter defines periphrasis and briefly discusses previous studies of the phenomenon (types of periphrasis and defining criteria previously suggested). It outlines the typological diversity of periphrasis in terms of the word classes involved and the grammatical features realized by it, both typical and exotic. Then the discussion turns to the most common functions of periphrasis, such as making the inflectional paradigm of a language complete, and to the interaction of periphrasis with other morphological and syntactic phenomena of the given language. Since several chapters in the volume employ a set of criteria for periphrasis worked out within the Canonical Typology approach, these are listed in the introduction. The criteria prove valuable for the analysis of less familiar instances of periphrasis, such as nominal case in Nenets, the large periphrastic paradigms of Archi verb, and embedded periphrasis in Bulgarian. Finally, there is an outline of the chapters which make up the volume.

Relatedness in Periphrasis

Bulgarian has several relevant verbal constructions, and this chapter concentrates on those where one instance of periphrasis is embedded within another. For example, the (periphrastic) future perfect has a periphrastic form of the verb ‘be’ as one component, giving a construction with embedded periphrasis. The formal account proposed for these nested constructions combines a realizational approach to morphology with a lexical non-transformational framework for syntax. While periphrasis constitutes part of the morphological paradigm, and the relatedness of different periphrastic constructions can be understood in terms of the cross-categorization of features, the syntactic structure of these constructions does not mirror the same nesting. To solve this mismatch, and to capture the nesting effect, a set of rules for Bulgarian periphrastic forms is proposed, involving realization rules which are a composition of two separate rules. The complexity of nested periphrases receives a formal account, shedding light on the syntax-morphology interface more generally.

Sentence Negation and Periphrasis

In order to establish a typological picture of periphrastic negation, this chapter begins from the criteria for periphrasis established by Ackerman and Stump. These are feature intersection, non-compositionality, and distributed exponence. It is argued that while the first two work well for defining periphrasis, the third criterion is not sufficiently robust, and should therefore be substituted by the criterion of multiple exponence. Multiple exponence is a recurrent feature of morphology and therefore, when found in a syntactic construction, it signals its morphology-like status. The chapter analyses the applicability of the criteria by testing them on data from genetically and typologically diverse languages (such as Japanese, and languages within Oto-Manguean, Nilotic, Tungusic, Uralic, Nakh-Daghestanian, and Semitic languages). It shows the extent to which the existing criteria can be applied to languages of different types, and justifies the new criterion (multiple exponence) for identifying periphrasis.

The Phrase-structural Diversity of Periphrasis

Periphrastic constructions in related and well-studied languages such as English, German, and French exhibit significant diversity in their syntactic structure. In English the main verb combines with its complements first, whereas in German the main verb combines with the auxiliary first. French demonstrates that it is possible to have diversity even within one language. Two periphrastic tenses in French — the perfect and the near future — correspond to two distinct phrase structure configurations. This chapter argues that different syntactic configurations show the same level of paradigm integration in the relevant language, and thus the theory of periphrasis should not depend on the particular phrase structure. It presents a formal account for the phrase-structural diversity of periphrases using Paradigm Function Morphology as the inflectional component for an HPSG account.