Exercise 1 and 2
Relationships within the clause 205 6). The seminal work on constituent order and word order is Greenberg (1966). More recent proposals can be found in Hawkins (1983) and in Tomlin (1986); see also the large body of work by Matthew Dryer, for instance Dryer (1991). On case, see Blake (2001a). On grammatical relations, see Palmer (1994) and the collection of papers in Aikhenvald et al. (2001). On agreement, see Corbett (2006). All of these are textbook treatments and are much recommended. On ergativity, Dixon (1994) is a more advanced read, but absolutely central and very worthwhile. The properties of subjects in Section 6.5.2 are largely taken from Keenan (1976); see also Comrie (1989: Chapter 5). The Warlpiri data are largely taken from the work of Ken Hale, who was a brilliant linguist and who undertook extensive fieldwork on endangered languages. exerciSeS 1. Examine the following data in (1) through (3) (all taken from Stucky 1983). These are simple sentences from the Bantu language Makua, spoken in Tanzania, and they show that the order of phrases is very free in this language. (Makua marks both subject and object with agreement prefixes on the verb. The applic suffix on the verb is an ‘applicative’ marker; it’s this that gives the sense of preparing porridge for someone, rather than an actual preposition meaning ‘for’, which marks the recipient in the English. This construction is discussed further in Chapter 7.) (1) Araarima aho-n-ruw-el-a mwaana isima. Araarima su‑obj-prepare-applIc‑past child porridge ‘Araarima prepared porridge for a child.’ (2) Isima Araarima aho-n-ruw-el-a mwaana. porridge Araarima Su-Obj-prepare-applIc‑past child ‘Araarima prepared porridge for a child.’ (3) Aho-n-ruw-el-a Araarima mwaana isima. su‑obj-prepare-applIc‑past Araarima child porridge ‘Araarima prepared porridge for a child.’ Each sentence contains four phrases – a subject, a verb, a direct object and an indirect object – but they appear in a different order. In fact, any of the 24 (!) possible orders of the four phrases can be used, given the right context. Now consider complex sentences: given a subject, a verb and an embedded clause, there are six logically possible orders of these three phrases. However, only three out of the potential six orders are grammatical. The orders actually found in Makua are: ∑ Subject‑verb‑embedded clause (4). ∑ Verb‑embedded clause‑subject (5). Understanding syntax206 ∑ and in addition, verb‑subject‑embedded clause (I haven’t illustrated this, but you should be able to reconstruct it). (4) Araarima aheeew-a [wiira nt’u aho-thek-a iluwani]. Araarima su.hear-past that someone su.build-past fence ‘Araarima has heard that someone built a fence.’ (5) Aheeew-a [wiira nt’u aho-thek-a iluwani] Araarima. su.hear-past that someone su.build-past fence Araarima ‘Araarima has heard that someone built a fence.’ Task: Work out what the three unattested (= non‑occurring) phrase orders are and state the generalization about possible phrase orders in Makua. In order to do this, you’ll need to look at what the three attested orders and then the three unattested orders have in common. Why might a language have such a restriction, do you think? 2. Examine the data that follow (slightly adapted from Van Valin 1985) from Lakhota (a native American language, specifically a Siouan language of South Dakota, Montana and Manitoba) and answer questions (i) through (iv). i. Which argument(s) of the verb, if any, does the verb agree with? ii. How is agreement (or cross‑referencing) indicated in Lakhota? iii. Using the data in (1) through (3) as comparison, try to figure out why (4) and (5) are grammatical, but (6) is ungrammatical. The notation ‘π’ indicates that the Lakhota form is not a possible way of translating the English sentence given. iv. In light of your answer to (iii), why do you think (7) is ungrammatical? What generalization can be made about the grammatical vs. ungrammatical examples? (1) wičháša ki mathó wa̜ Ø-Ø-kté man the bear a 3sg.obj‑3sg.su-kill ‘The man killed a bear.’ (2) mathó wa̜ wičháša ki Ø-Ø-kté bear a man the 3sg.obj‑3sg.su-kill ‘A bear killed the man.’ (3) wičháša ki mathó óta wičhá-Ø-kté man the bear many 3pl.obj‑3sg.su-kill ‘The man killed many bears.’ (4) wičháša ki ixʔé óta Ø-ya̜ke man the rock many 3sg.Su-see ‘The man saw many rocks.’ Relationships within the clause 207 (5) wičháša ki mathó óta wíčhá-Ø-ya̜ke man the bear many 3pl.obj‑3sg.su-see ‘The man saw many bears.’ (6) *wičháša ki ixʔé óta wíčhá-Ø-ya̜ke man the rock many 3pl.obj‑3sg.su-see (π‘The man saw many rocks.’) (7) *ixʔé ki hená hokšíla wa̜ Ø-pi-phá rock the those boy a 3sg.obj‑3pl.su-hit (π‘Those rocks hit a boy.’) 3. In Welsh, the verb agrees with one of its argument NPs, but the conditions on this agreement are somewhat different than in more familiar European languages such as English, French or German. Study the following data, and answer these questions. i. Which NP argument does the verb agree with in Welsh? (Name its grammatical relation.) ii. What morphosyntactic categories of the NP does the verb agree with? iii. What are the restrictions on this agreement? iv. Why are (3), (4) and (8) ungrammatical? v. How could you change (4) to make it grammatical, while retaining the meaning? Hints ∑ All data given here are entirely regular, and no data are missing. You have enough information to answer without having to make guesses. ∑ Welsh has VSO (verb‑subject‑object) word order, but this is not relevant to your answer. (1) Gwelodd y bachgen ddreigiau. see.past.3sg the boy dragons ‘The boy saw dragons.’ (2) Gwelodd y bechgyn ddreigiau. see.past.3sg the boys dragons ‘The boys saw dragons.’ (3) *Gwelson y bechgyn ddreigiau. see.past.3pl the boys dragons (π ‘The boys saw dragons.’) (4) *Gwelson ein ffrindiau ddreigiau. see.past.3pl our friends dragons (π ‘Our friends saw dragons.’) 6 Relationships within the clause Exercises