Multiple Object Constructions in P’orhépecha: Argument Realization and Valence-Affecting Morphology (Brill's Studies in the Indigenous Languages of the Americas, 9) - Hardcover

Capistrán, Alejandra

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 9004288333 ISBN 13: 9789004288331

Publisher: Brill, 2015

Synopsis

In Multiple Object Constructions in P’orhépecha, Capistrán offers a detailed description of double and triple object clauses in P’orhépecha, a Mesoamerican isolate with a case system lacking an accusative-dative distinction. Regarding argument realization, Capistrán discusses alternating constructions and a construction split triggered by the person hierarchy. Valence-affecting operations―applicative, causative/instrumental and part-whole lexical suffixes―are examined, highlighting the person features of applicative suffixes and the complex part-whole morphology. Capistrán’s analysis demonstrates that in P’orhépecha most object coding properties show a neutral pattern, while all behavioral properties present asymmetries that shape a secundative pattern or PO/SO alignment. Capistrán argues that the strong tendency in P’orhépecha to determine PO selection according to a thematic ranking helps explain the (un)grammaticality of tritransitive constructions.

About this title

About the Author

Alejandra Capistrán Garza, Ph.D. (2010), El Colegio de México, is Professor of Linguistics at Universidad Autónoma Metropolitana-Iztapalapa. Her publications on P’orhépecha cover topics on constituent order, applicatives, causatives, lexical categories, and locative descriptions (Locative and Orientation Descriptions in Tarascan, 2011).

Edition details

• Publisher: Brill
• Publication date: 2015
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 9004288333
• ISBN 13: 9789004288331
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 358