predicative possession jul 2009

[...]... America South America Khoisan Afro-Asiatic Nilo-Saharan Niger-Kordofanian Creoles Conclusion Part III A Model of Predicative Possession Encoding 13 A model of predicative possession encoding 13.1 13.2 13.3 13.4 13.5 13.6 13.7 Introduction Preliminaries The underlying structure of predicative possession Deranking languages Balancing languages Potential ambiguity and the Have-Possessive Conclusion Appendix... alienable possession, such as ‘Permanent Possession (Miller and Johnson Laird 1976), ‘Accidental Possession (Ultan 1978), ‘Acquired Posses sion’ (Seiler 1983) and ‘Transferable Possession (Nichols 1992) All these terms capture important aspects of the notion However, I have decided to stick with the term ‘Alienable Possession, ’ as this is the label that is used most widely 16 The typology of predicative. .. of predicative possession 10 there is no linguistic evidence to show that the modes of conceptualizing and/or encoding possession were diVerent at any time in empirically reconstructible history Attempts made by Meillet and others to establish that Proto Indo European did not have a grammaticalized category of possession, or that earlier generations of mankind had diVerent modes for expressing possession, ... concept of possession? What are the necessary and suYcient features a situation has to display in order for it to be called a case of possession? Are there diVerent semantic subtypes of the concept of possession, and if so, what are their distinctive features? What are the diVerent ways in which the concept of possession is formally encoded in natural language? In short, what does the typology of possession. .. provide such a deWnition for the domain of predicative possession After a cursory survey of previous literature in Section 1.2, in section 1.3 I will attempt a semantic/ cognitive analysis of ‘alienable’ possession, which is seen by many authors as the prototypical manifestation of the concept of possession In section 1.4, I will argue that the concept of possession must in fact be viewed as deWning... ever had, and it persuaded me to develop my vague and half-baked ideas on predicative possession into something that might safely be exposed Matters came to a Wnal formulation in a second summer school, this time sponsored by the Dutch Organisation of Linguists (LOT), in Leuven in 2007 In between these landmarks predicative possession took me to Konstanz, Stockholm, Helsinki, Bremen, Utrecht, Pavia,... Fischer et al (2004), and Bisang et al (2004) 6 The typology of predicative possession (2) Swahili (Niger-Kordofanian, East Bantu) a Possession: Wa-na pesa they-be.with money ‘They have money’ (Heine 1997: 189) b Progressive: Wa-na-ku-la they-be.with-inf-eat ‘They are eating’ (Heine 1997: 189) (3) English (Indo-European, West Germanic) a Possession: I have a motorcycle (own data) b Deontic modality:... cognitive space of possession: subdomains In the literature, cases of possession which conform to the deWnition given in (20) are commonly labelled as instances of alienable possession. 11 By this term, it is indicated that, in such constructions, the possessive relation between the possessor and the possessee is not seen as ‘inherent’ or ‘indissoluble’ Thus, although in cases of alienable possession the... conceptual content of possession can be expected to exhibit some degree of cross-cultural variation As we will see in the next sections, there are indeed some aspects of possession in which these cross-cultural diVerences come to light: societies may diverge in the range of objects that can be ‘possessed’, and also some subdomains of possession – notably, the subdomain of inalienable possession – seem... realize that alienable possession is not a completely isolated concept There is ample evidence that suggests that alienable possession is a part (or a ‘subdomain’) of a larger conceptual space,12 and that it borders on various other subdomains that cover possessive notions Thus, in addition to alienable possession, the literature also broadly acknowledges cases of inalienable possession and cases of . Model of Predicative Possession Encoding 697 13 A model of predicative possession encoding 699 13.1 Introduction 699 13.2 Preliminaries 700 13.3 The underlying structure of predicative possession. Typology of Predicative Possession 1 1 The domain of the inquiry 3 1.1 Introduction 3 1.2 Previous work 4 1.3 The semantics of possession: two parameters 10 1.4 The cognitive space of possession: . subdomains 15 1.5 Formal restrictions on the domain 25 1.5.1 Predicative and attributive possession 26 1.5.2 DeWnite and indeWnite possession 28 1.5.3 Other formal restrictions 30 1.6 The deWnition