Grammaticalization of Demonstratives as Subordinate Complementizers in Ngumpin-Yapa* An earlier version of this paper was presented at the Blackwood Australianist workshop and at the ALS conference in 2003, and thanks go to colleagues who provided comments at those meetings and later, especially Joyce Hudson, Mary Laughren, David Nash, Rachel Nordlinger, Rob Pensalfini, Eirlys Richards, Jane Simpson, Tasaku Tsunoda and David Wilkins. Thanks too to the Max-Planck Institute of Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig, where as a visiting scholar in 2003 I carried out revisions, and particularly to Holger Diessel, Zygmunt Frayzingier and Eva Schultze-Berndt for discussion there and to Christian Lehmann for comments

Dados Bibliográficos

ID12059245
AutoresPatrick Mcconvell (Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies, autor correspondente)
Ano2006
Volume26
Fascículo1
Páginas107-137
Data de publicação2006-03-16
Peer ReviewedSim
Open AccessNão
TipoARTICLE
PeriódicoAustralian Journal of Linguistics (JOURNAL)
Identificadores do periódicoISSN: 0726-8602 • E-ISSN: 1469-2996
EditoraTaylor & Francis (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/07268600500531669
OpenAlexW4244779949
IdiomaEN
Citações recebidas3
Referências citadas26

Demonstratives have grammaticalized as subordinate, including relative, complementizers in a number of language groupings around the world, including Germanic. This paper provides evidence for this type of grammaticalization in the ‘adjoined relative clause’ in Australian Aboriginal languages, in particular in one Pama-Nyungan subgroup, Ngumpin-Yapa, where there has been a series of parallel grammaticalizations of various demonstratives in different languages. There are two main types of outcomes involved: (1) paradigm type: choice among a set of demonstratives in initial position, followed in some cases by a separate or adjoined complementizer; and (2) specialized type: a single complementizer descended from one demonstrative in initial or second position. The common explanations for demonstrative > complementizer grammaticalization in other language groups have been a transition between parataxis and hypotaxis, and the interpretation of the demonstrative as cataphoric. It is argued that these explanations require modification for the Ngumpin-Yapa case, and a different analysis is proposed in which the demonstrative is located in Spec-CP at some stage in the process, and in some cases (especially of the specialized type) ends up in C as a result of Spec-Head reduction

Complementizer · Demonstrative · Grammaticalization · Head (geology · Linguistics · Syntax · Computer Science · History · Language and cultural evolution · Linguistic Variation and Morphology · Philosophy · Syntax, Semantics, Linguistic Variation