The Grammaticalization of Plant-Part Terms in Chibchan Languages

Dados Bibliográficos

ID4558804
AutoresMatthias Pache (0000-0002-9993-7076, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, autor correspondente)
Ano2016
Volume82
Fascículo4
Páginas425-452
Data de publicação2016-10-01
Peer ReviewedSim
Open AccessNão
TipoARTICLE
PeriódicoInternational Journal of American Linguistics (JOURNAL)
Identificadores do periódicoISSN: 0020-7071 • E-ISSN: 1545-7001
EditoraUniversity of Chicago Press (PUBLISHER • US)
DOI10.1086/688391
OpenAlexW2521866782
IdiomaEN
Citações recebidas5
Referências citadas10

It has long been known that the plant-part terms for ‘stick’, ‘leaf’, and ‘seed’ were grammaticalized as classifying elements referring to shape in several Chibchan languages. This interpretation, however, is by no means the only one possible. The Proto-Chibchan terms for ‘stick’, ‘leaf’, and ‘seed’ had a much wider application. They became stem formatives, attested above all in body-part terms. The Proto-Chibchan word for ‘stick’ also grammaticalized as an element with further functions, for instance, as a possessive or purposive marker. Unraveling all these grammaticalization trajectories not only provides insights into how elements of Chibchan lexicon and morphosyntax developed; it also gives an impression of the worldview expressed through Chibchan languages, at least as far as the vegetal world is concerned: plant-parts are conceived of as individual elements with a specific shape, as parts of a whole, and, in certain cases, as related to the general notion of ‘thing

Grammaticalization · Linguistics · History · Lexicography and Language Studies · Linguistics and language evolution · Linguistics, Language Diversity, and Identity · Mathematics · Philosophy