Re: THEORY: Xpositions in Ypositional languages {X,Y}={pre,post}

Eldin Raigmore wrote:
[snip]
> Some of my questions were apparently answered in a paper by Dryer,
>
http://linguistics.buffalo.edu/people/faculty/dryer/dryer/DryerWalsAdpNoMap.pd

Thanks - I've downloaded it & now have a hard copy  ;)
[snip]
>>Possible example; in Tagalog there seem to be a whole lot of Impositions.
>
> Apparently, the correct word is "inposition" rather than "imposition".
> Dryer explains why he calls these infixes "adpositions".
Yes, but as far as I can see, he doesn't mention Tagalog.

> (He also talks about adpositions which can appear both as
prepositions and as
> postpositions in the same language.  I gather that's one meaning
> of "circumposition";
If it is, and I don't find Dryer using the term himself, then IMHO it is
a blatant abuse of the term because (a) it shows no understanding of the
Latin 'circum' and (b) the word is already in use with a different (and
more etymological correct usage), namely ....

> the other meaning appears to be a preposition-
> postposition pair which must be used together.)
I'm not sure why you write "appears to be" as this is, indeed, the
meaning one ought to expect and, in fact, is that which most people
AFAIK understand by the term. Trask [1993] defines 'circumposition' thus:
"A combination of a preposition and a postposition functioning together
as a single adposition, such as Mandarin _dao4...li3 'into', illustrated
in _Wo3 ba3 shui3 dao4 dao2 guon4 li3 I Acc water pour to can in 'I pour
water into the can.'"
[Actually Trask gives the Mandarin with the Pinyin diacritics to show
tone, and not the numbers which I've given above]

---------------------------------------------------

Eric Christopherson wrote:
> On Sep 20, 2007, at 6:18 PM, Eldin Raigmore wrote:
>
>> Are there any natlangs in which Prepositions and Postpositions  taken
>> together
>> don't dominate the adpositions? Possible example; in Tagalog there
>> seem to be
>> a whole lot of Impositions.
>
> Do you really mean inpositions, as opposed to infixes? I know Tagalog
> has the latter, but I haven't found anything on the former.
Quite so. Infixes are not so uncommon, but I too am not aware of any
evidence that Tagalog actually has inpositions.
------------------------------------------------

Andreas Johansson wrote:
> Quoting Eldin Raigmore <eldin_raigmore@...>:
[snip]

> I was going to say I could easily imagine a supraposition, supposing my
> supposition as to meaning be correct, coming into existence from a
postposition
> first becoming asyllabic and then turning into a toneme - imagine a
development
> like _aba su_ > _abas_ > _abà_ where _aba_ is some noun and the grave
is low
> tone - but then it struck me if we discover such a beast in the wild,
we would
> likely call it a case-form, not an adpositional phrase, at least by
the third
> stage.
I think by the second stage we surely have a suffix and, presumably,
some sort of case ending; so even at that stage it has IMO ceased to be
an adposition. As for the 3rd stage, well, yes, suprafixes (or according
to Trask better called 'superfixes') do actually occur in natlangs.
Trask gives an example from Ngbaka, a language of the DR Congo, in which
four major tense/aspect forms of verbs are denoted solely by tones.

> I guess I should go read the paper you linked to and find out exactly
why Dyer
> thinks the Tagalog inpositions are just that and not case inflections.
You'll be disappointed (unless I'm really getting senile & missed
something). The only examples I found Dryer gave of 'inpositions' were
from Anindilyakwa (Northern Territory, Australia), and Tümpisa Shoshone
in California. He does note that altogether six Australian languages
share this feature, but he gives no examples except the one from
Anindilyakwa.

I must confess from the evidence that he gives I am far from convinced
of that 'inpositions' actually exist as a separate category. As far as I
understand Dryer's reasoning, one should also call the adpositions in
the following attested  Latin phrases 'inpositions':
mirum in modum = in a marvelous way
quam ob rem = on account of which thing = why?
multis cum lacrimis = with many tears
summa cum celeritate = with the utmost speed

In fact we do not do so. We regard them as prepositions which, instead
of preceding the whole noun phrase (as is normal in English), precedes
the final noun in the phrase. By the same token, it seems to me the
example he gives from Tümpisa Shoshone is surely no more than a
postposition which follows the noun at the beginning of the phrase
instead of following the whole phrase, i.e. a mirror image of the Latin
construction.

As for the Anindilyakwa it is unclear from the evidence Dryer presents
why -manja should be considered as an adposition rather than a locative
suffix. But, even granting that a case can be established for its being
an adposition, why is it not then an example of a _postposition_ which
follows the first word in the NP rather than the whole NP?

Thus, I remain skeptical about the supposed category 'inposition'.
--------------------------------------------------------------------

Eldin Raigmore wrote:
> ---In conlang@yahoogroups.com, Andreas Johansson <andjo@...> wrote:
[snip]
>>A supraposition, I suppose, is a suprasegmental feature that serves
>>the function of  an adposition,
>
> Right, basically a "suprafixed adposition".
Yes, personally I doubt such an animal exists. Suprafixes/ superfixes
are attested in natlangs. But it seems to me that distinguishing
'suprapositions' from suprafixes would require some very pedantic slight
of hand.

>
>>but what is a transposition?
>
> Some people sometimes refer to what happens in the Triconsonantal Root
> Systems of some Afro-Asiatic languages as "transfixes".
Do they, indeed? Please do not misunderstand me. I have no doubt that
you are correct. But I do note that neither Larry Trask nor David
Crystal gives the term in their linguistic dictionaries, nor does the
SIL online 'Glossary of linguistic terms' give the term. So I'm not sure
how widespread the term is accepted.

>By parallel with
> prepositions, postpositions, inpositions, and circumpositions, I made
up the
> terms "supraposition" and "transposition" to mean a "a suprafixed
adposition"
> and "a transfixed adposition".
Once again - accepting for the sake of argument the category of
'transfix' - I really do fail to see how one could meaningfully
distinguish between 'transfixes' and 'transpositions' without some
over-pedantic slight of hand.

[snip]

> somewhat larger class he calls "case markers".  So, yes, for purposes
of this
> paper, I suppose a suprafixed case-marker would count as a supraposition
> (though nobody actually uses that term);
The case markers of Latin, Greek, German, Finnish, Esperanto, Volapuk
etc, etc. etc are called _suffixes_, not postpositions. Surely a
suprafixed case-marker would be a suprafix. The term suprafix is used.

>a transfixed case-marker would
> count as a transposition (though aren't the Semitic triconsonantal
roots mostly
> verb-roots? so natlangishly attested transfixes are mostly in
conjugations
> rather than in declensions?);
In which case they could not possibly be 'transpositions' as adpositions
are always attached to _Noun Phrases_

> an infixed case-marker counts as an inposition; a
As I explained above, I am skeptical of the existence of 'inposition'.

> circumfixed case-marker counts as a circumpositions; etc.
A circumfixed case-marker (if it exists) would surely be nothing more or
less than a good ol' circumfix!

I hope none of the above has come across as confrontational; that is not
my intention. I'm trying to make sense of things and quite unashamedly
applying Occam's razor    ;)


Ray
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http://www.carolandray.plus.com
==================================
Entia non sunt multiplicanda
praeter necessitudinem.

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