Acquisition of the Impersonal Voice by an Estonian Child

Bibliographic Data

ID11264220
AuthorsReeli Torn-Leesik (0009-0006-0551-2904, corresponding author), Maigi Vija
Year2012
Volume43
Issue2
Pages251-271
Publication date2012-06-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueJournal of Baltic Studies (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0162-9778 • E-ISSN: 1751-7877
PublisherInforma UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/01629778.2012.674799
OpenAlexW2000395662
LanguageEN
Citations received2
References cited17

Click to increase image sizeClick to decrease image size Acknowledgements We would like to thank Renate Pajusalu, Meelis Leesik and two anonymous reviewers for their useful comments on our article. We also gratefully acknowledge support from the Estonian Scientific Foundation, grant 7492. Notes 1. The child's age in years, months, and days. 2. CHILDES (Child Language Data Exchange System) http://childes.psy.cmu.edu/. 3. In Balto-Finnic, synthetic verb forms are considered to be older than periphrastic verb forms (Laakso 2001 , p. 190). 4. The isomorphism between perfect forms of impersonal and passive constructions has led to disagreement about whether there are two discrete voice constructions (Blevins Citation2003; Pihlak 1993 ; Rajandi 1999 [1968]; Torn 2002 , 2006a; Vihman 2004 ), or a more general construction that subsumes the impersonal and the passive (Erelt Citation1989; Erelt et al. 1993 ; Tauli Citation1980). The present paper follows the first approach, which regards impersonals and passives as two different constructions. 5. The object in Estonian can occur in the partitive, genitive, or nominative case. 6. Rajandi (Citation1999 [1968], p. 81) suggests that agentive adverbials may also appear in the elative, but this use is not very frequent. The use of adessive arguments in the impersonal and passive has been studied by Lindström and Tragel (Citation2007). 7. The term is used in generative linguistics to refer to a relation between a moved NP and its trace. The trace is coindexed with the moved NP and forms a chain with it. 8. Kunnari et al. (Citation2010) also show that Finnish children comprehend similar Finnish voice construction well at the age of four. 9. The postposition poolt 'by' which is used in agentive phrases can also be interpreted as 'from'. 10. The asterisk * or [*] marks forms that are considered ungrammatical in Standard Estonian. 11. Examples are given in the form they are represented in the CHILDES database. 12. [+ I] imitation. 13. We give a free translation of the entire example, but gloss only the clauses containing impersonal verbs. Impersonal verb forms are in bold. 14. [SR] self repetition. 15. The verb tegema 'do' is the source for the majority of impersonal forms in both Andreas's and his mother's speech. 16. See Tulviste (Citation2004)

Deixis · Estonian · Genitive case · Linguistics · Nominative case · Noun · Passive voice · Relation (database · Verb · Computer Science · Linguistics and language evolution · Natural Language Processing Techniques · Philosophy · Psychology · Syntax, Semantics, Linguistic Variation

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