Strategies of colexification-2: Additional oppositions

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Del curso dictado por National Research University Higher School of Economics

Towards language universals through lexical semantics: introduction to lexical and semantic typology

21 calificaciones

National Research University Higher School of Economics

Towards language universals through lexical semantics: introduction to lexical and semantic typology

21 calificaciones

The aim of the course is to obtain the idea of the lexicon as a complex system and to get the methodology of the typological approach to the lexicon cross-linguistically, as well as to learn about the general mechanisms of semantic shift and their typological relevance. By the end of the course the students should know the basic principles of lexical organization, the main parameters of semantic variations in lexicon, and be able to apply the basic methods of the analysis of lexical meaning to different lexical domains. The course is designed for students of linguistic programs (BA, MA, PhD), as well as for teachers and researchers in the named field. The course contains the overview of different approaches to the semantic description of lexical items and lexical systems in different languages and discusses the methodology of Moscow Lexical Typology Group (lecture 1). This methodology (“frame approach”) is illustrated with the data of the following domains: aquamotion verbs (lecture 2), verbs of falling (lecture 3), adjectives denoting oldness (lecture 4) and pain metaphors (lecture 5 and 6). The results of the analyses are visualized with specially constructed lexical semantic maps.

De la lección

Does the octopus swim? AQUA-motion in cross-linguistic perspective

The lecture considers the project on AQUA-motion verbs in more than 50 languages and describes the possible strategies of colexification of basic situations denoting being in water and motion in water.

Strategies of colexification-2: Additional oppositions9:21

Conoce a los instructores

Ekaterina Rakhilina
Professor
School of Linguistics

Now, we'll consider additional oppositions within some frames,

and we'll start with people, birds, fish, and animals, so swimming subdomain.

Now, what about people?

Komi distinguishes the situation of swimming with visible limbs.

So, you look at the person who is swimming and you see his limbs over the water – and,

again, swimming verb, active swimming without any limbs visible.

Now, Korean distinguishes sportive swimming and just ordinary active swimming.

Nganasan language.

In Nganasan, they live in the very north of Russia.

So, there is not a lot of opportunities for swimming, by the way, there.

But, there are two verbs for active swimming

as described in the article of Valentin Gusev in our volume.

The first verb is swimming as diving, and it is mostly used for ducks.

And the second verb, again for animals, not for people normally,

or people riding reindeer.

Reindeer, themselves, they cross the rivers

and this situation is normally with this very verb.

So, there is a sort of metonymy here.

Now, you know, this verb is really important culturally for Nganasan,

because they hunt for reindeer at the moment they cross the rivers,

and they get meat because of this.

So, this verb is really important.

They describe a culturally relevant situation of swimming.

By the way, there is a nice story about a shaman.

He saved his village from starvation

because there were no deer one year crossing the river.

And so, he wanted to cross the river himself in order to cause the deer to come.

And for this shaman swimming in the river as a reindeer

they used the same verb.

Now, swimming birds.

This situation is illustrated by the system of Hebrew and Arabic,

and the system is so interesting.

Just look.

Some speakers combine birds with vessels, and some of them display the ordinary system

of people and birds covered with one and the same verb.

So, sabaha, in Arabic, could be applied both for people and birds and,

at the same time, some speakers say that 'a:ma is also applicable to birds.

So, you see, it is reasonable because when you look at the bird swimming,

it resembles a sort of vessel, in a way.

Now, we see that birds, they form a sort of subframe in the whole picture,

and the subframe is situated on the map close to vessels

because it is combined with vessels, at least in some languages.

What about fish?

A single fish behaves as an individual, so it behaves just like any animal or a person.

It controls its motion, and its motion could be directed, and so on and so forth.

But, a school of fish is conceptualized in another way.

Its motion is usually described with the help of general motion verbs.

So, from this point of view, they are much closer to vessels which also are,

as you remember, described with general motion verbs.

So, there is a distinction between a single fish, and a school of fish.

Now, the system of Bengali.

Bengali makes a difference between big water animals and small water animals,

like crocodiles, sea turtle, hippo – they are slow swimmers.

And fish and fry, they are fast swimmers.

So, you see?

There are two main verbs in Bengali: sãtrano and bhasa.

And the first one describes people and small animals, and the second one –

big animals and logs in the sea, so passive motion,

as if those big animals were carried by water because they're so slow.

Now, several subtypes of sailing.

So, there are special sailing verbs and normally, in many cases, they are denominant.

So, they are derived from a certain noun,

like from the noun sail in German, in Portuguese, in Finnish, in Indonesian, in English.

And there are special rowing verbs, so they are derived from rowing instruments.

And there are different rowing instruments so there are different verbs, like to oar,

to scull, to paddle, and they go back to the corresponding rowing instruments.

In Armenian, the verb of sailing goes back to the name of ship, just from the word ship.

Indonesian has a very nice derivational system

and a special affix which helps to get sailing terms derived from water bodies,

like to go in a lake, from the noun lake;

to go seaward, from sea; to go in a channel, from channel, and so on and so forth.

Now, this is not the end.

There are lots and lots of instruments for sailing and swimming also.

Just look.

These are instruments used in South India, special containers people use to swim safely.

And again, in North America they use special plates

or small boards, again, to swim in the river.

There are many of them.

And we'll leave this specification and this typology for anthropologists.

And the interesting linguistic question is whether these languages

with these special instruments do have special verbs

derived from the names of instruments,

or they use, for example, general verbs of motion instead of special verbs

or verbal phrases to describe this sort of swimming or sailing.

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