A few more words should be said about the negative pronouns. It has already been stated that this category of indefinites seems to be more stable than others (apart from the MAT-borrowed nigdy ‘never’). However, one more example can be interpreted as testifying to Slavic influence: In the dialects, the negative determi- ner niekoks is found, cf. Russian nikakoj ‘none’.
12 An interesting fact is that the existence of forms like so-na-so in Latvian Romani is explained by the influence of Lithuanian (Manuš-Belugin 1973: 138).
(49) Ne-buv-o čia niekoki-os jau spatičk-os su neg-be-pst.3 here any-gen.sg.f already meeting-gen.sg with partizan-ais.
guerrilla-ins.pl
‘There was no fight whatsoever with guerrilla warriors.’ (Petrauskas &
Vidugiris 1987: 18) (50) Russian
Nikak-ogo somnenij-a zdes’ i by-t’ ne mož-et.
any-gen.sg doubt-gen.sg.n here and be-inf neg can-prs.3sg
‘There cannot be any doubt here.’
Obviously, this form can be explained by the dialect-internal process of paradigm levelling, i.e., the form nie-koks was constructed on the model of other negative pronouns like nie-kas, nie-kur, etc. Still, this process could be influenced or sup- ported by the surrounding languages.
In general, it is more difficult to prove that calquing took place, since very often the “suspicious” elements can also be explained as an independent deve- lopment. The use of this form of negative indefinites is supported by the fact that the calqued series discussed above (ne-, -tai) are more regular both structurally (usually all members of the series are used) and geographically.
5 Conclusions
Functional words, and indefinite pronouns as a subtype thereof, are easily bor- rowed. In the Lithuanian dialects that are dominated by other languages (as the one of Ramaškonys), more loans can be found. There are both MAT-loans, i.e., the form is directly borrowed, and PAT-loans, with a calqued functional pattern. In the dialects of the areas where Lithuanian is the dominant language, the number of loans is much lower. In these cases, the borrowings are usually PAT-loans of older periods when Lithuanian played a subordinate role in the sociolinguistic hierarchy of the area (i.e., when Polish, Belarusian, and Russian were more pres- tigious for various reasons). In general, PAT-loans are also likely to be typical for the whole linguistic area, i.e., such patterns can be found in several surrounding languages (see Sakel 2007: 21–25).
All cases of borrowed indefinites, together with the cases when the borrowed nature is impossible to prove, are listed in Table 2. The acquisition of a secondary meaning in Lithuanian is marked by (+), while (–) means that the use of the bor- rowed element is identical to the one of the source language. The existence of the element exclusively in the dialect or in the speech of the city population is
marked by OD (only dialectal), OL (only literary), and DC (dialects and colloquial speech). The interrogation mark is put when there are doubts of the borrowed origin of a marker or a meaning.
Table 2 shows that the free-choice function is more likely to be replaced by loans and that usually the meanings of the borrowed indefiniteness markers are kept identical to the source language model. The interrogation mark with the pronoun žėdnas is meant to show that there are no data that the meaning ‘every- one’ did not develop independently. The interrogation mark with the X ne X series shows there is doubt on the borrowed nature of the marker.
In general, the investigation of Lithuanian indefinite pronouns demonstrates that the complex system of Lithuanian emerges as even richer when the borrowed elements used in the dialects and colloquial speech are taken into consideration.
Further study of contact for Lithuanian grammatical forms and patterns might help to describe the linguistic situation in the area, as well as to understand the trends in the development of the borrowed elements.
Acknowledgments
I thank the editors of the volume, Mikhail Oslon, and two anonymous reviewers, for many useful comments on the earlier versions of this paper, and Cori Ander- son, for improving my English. All errors remain my own.
Abbreviations
Glosses
acc accusative act active adv adverb cnv converb
comp comparative dat dative f feminine fut future Tab. 2: Borrowed indefinites in Lithuanian and its dialects
Specific known Specific unknown Free choice Negative X ne X? (-)OL tai-series (-)DC
ne-series (-)DC nebūt-series (-)OD kalvek-series (-)OD
bile-series (+)DC koc’-series (-)OD abi-series (-)OD
nigdi (-)OD žėdnas (–?)OD
gen genitive hab habitual imp imperative indf indefinite inf infinitive ins instrumental loc locative m masculine n neuter
neg negation nom nominative pa active participle pl plural
pst past prs present refl reflexive sbjv subjunctive sg singular
Sources
KJP Korpus języka polskiego IPI PAN [The Corpus of the Polish Language]
http://korpus.pl
LKT Dabartinės lietuvių kalbos tekstynas [The Corpus of the Modern Lithua- nian Language] http://tekstynas.vdu.lt
LKŽ Lietuvių kalbos žodynas [The Dictionary of the Lithuanian language]
http://lkz.lt
NKJP Narodowy korpus języka polskiego [The National Corpus of Polish]
http://nkjp.pl
VLKK Valstybinė lietuvių kalbos komisija [The State Commission of the Lithu- anian language] http://www.vlkk.lt
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of ideophones and why they remain unknown in typology
1 Why Lithuanian of all European languages?
The Neogrammarians and a Samogitian bishop
According to the classical definition by Doke (1935: 118) for Zulu ideophones are
“[a] vivid representation of an idea in sound. A word, often onomatopoeic, which describes a predicate, qualificative or adverb in respect to manner, colour, sound, smell, action, state or intensity”. The typological treatment of ideophones in the modern literature is typically limited to the languages of Africa, Australia, South America, and South East Asia. Indo-European languages are hardly mentioned in the standard volume on ideophones by Voeltz and Kilian-Hatz (2001). Creissels (2001: 75) goes as far as to claim that ideophones do “not correspond to any of the categories traditionally recognized in descriptions of European languages”.1 However, there is at least one European language, where ideophones have long been recognized to be a part of speech: Lithuanian. They have a different name, however: ištiktukai “particles for what happens; ‘happenlings’ or – a less awkward translation – ‘eventives’”. “Eventive” is also the term used by Andersen (2009).
This chapter discusses Lithuanian ideophones both from the point of view of their very specific history in Lithuanian grammar writing (Section 2) and from the point of view of their typological properties (Section 3). In many languages, ideophones index spoken modality, rural environment, and communal society.
However, in Lithuanian ideophones are particularly prominent in a sample of written language, a novel by the Samogitian2 Bishop Motiejus Valančius publis- hed in 1863, which has been particularly important for the history of their gram- matical description. In Section 2, I argue that this is no contradiction since the novel uses ideophones as a stylistic device to establish rural identity in a time when Lithuanian was heavily suppressed. Section 3 then continues with discus- sing the particular properties of Lithuanian ideophones from a cross-linguistic
1 For a recent and comprehensive survey, see Dingemanse (2012).
2 Samogitia or Žemaitija is “Lower” Lithuania, the northwestern part of Lithuania in contrast to High Lithuania (Aukštaitija).
point of view. I argue that Lithuanian ideophones have several properties typical of a word class marking events, notably event number (Section 3.2) and valency.
Unlike ideophones in many other languages they do not associate with bleached light verbs (Section 3.5). In these respects, they resemble the so-called verboids in Russian, such as gljad’ ‘look’ and xvat’ ‘grab’ (Nikitina 2012).
The term ištiktukai ‘eventive’3 has been coined by the most influential norma- tive grammarian of Lithuanian Jonas Jablonskis (also publishing under the name Rygiškių Jonas). He writes – thirteen years before Doke’s classical definition: “Iš jaustukų tarpo išskiriami yra dažnai būtųjų ištikimų vaizdelaičiai, vadinamieji ištiktukai: burbt, čiūzt, barkšt…” [“Among interjections one has to distinguish a group of markers for past events, so-called eventives burbt, čiūzt, barkšt…”]
(Jablonskis 1922 sections 282–283 [1957: 353]).4 Jablonskis’ name for ideophones ištiktukas ‘eventive’ is an excellent characterization of the part of speech. One of the most characteristic functions of ideophones in many languages is to express salient events. As Noss (2001: 268) writes, for instance, about Gbaya and Sotho:
“In Gbaya expression, ideophones ‘show’ what the speaker has seen or experi- enced. They enable the audience to participate ‘in a happening’ as Daniel Kunene has written about Southern Sotho ideophones.”
Jablonskis (1922) was the first grammarian to give the phenomenon a name, but he was not the first one to describe it. Prior to Jablonskis work, Lithuanian ideophones had already been treated extensively by the German Neogrammarian August Leskien (1902/1903: 165), who clearly distinguishes them from interjec- tions proper, but fails to give the category a name:
Ich beschrọnke aber die Aufgabe auf solche Ausdrỹcke, mit denen man Bewegungs-, Licht-, und Schallerscheinungen nachahmend, ausmalend oder verdeutlichend begleitet, schliesse also aus die eigentlichen Interjektionen, ebenso Nachahmungen von Tierschreien, Lockrufen u. dgl., da hierin das Litauische nichts besonders Bemerkenswerthes bietet.5
3 Danylenko (this volume) calls them “onomatopoeic particles”.
4 Jašinskaitė (1975: 4) argues that it was Žiugžda (1961: 221) who first considered ištiktukai to be a part of speech. It is true that Jablonskis (1922) does not strictly call them a part of speech, but he clearly sets them apart from interjections.
5 Similarly, Paul (1909: 180) subsumes what we know as ideophones under interjections, but they are clearly a distinct group within interjections: “Sie sind Reaktionen gegen plửtzliche Erregungen des Gehửrs-oder Gesichtssinnes … Sie werden dann auch bei der Erinnerung und Erzọhlung der solche plửtzliche Erregung wirkenden Vorgọnge gebraucht. Ich meine Wửrter wie nhd. paff, patsch, bardautz, perdauz, bauz, blaff, buff, puff, bums, futsch, hurre, husch, hussa, klacks, klaps, kladderadatsch, knacks, plump, plumps, ratsch, rutsch, schrumm, schwapp, wupp etc.”
Note that this was at a time when many of the best linguists of the days went to Lithuania to do fieldwork on Lithuanian dialects because Lithuanian was considered to be one of the most important languages for Indo-European studies and was believed to be heavily endangered. Leskien’s work again is dif- ficult to imagine without its major source: a little novel, Palangos Juzė, full with ideophones published by the Samogitian Bishop Motiejus Valančius in 1863 at a time when publishing Lithuanian books was very difficult. After the Polish- Lithuanian insurrection of 1863, there was a ban on writings in Polish and Lithu- anian in Latin script (1866 to 1904) in the Tsarist Empire, and Bishop Valančius was one of the major organizers of book smuggling from Prussia. Despite the pro- hibition, Lithuanian books were secretly available in most Lithuanian villages. It was one thing to make books available, another one to write books that would be of interest for the Lithuanian peasants and which could strengthen their national self-esteem. Valančius’ booklet serves this purpose in an excellent manner, as we will see shortly, and ideophones are one of several stylistic devices marking rural identity. Palangos Juzė also inspired other linguists such as Alfred Senn (1924, 1966) to work about Lithuanian ideophones,6 and it is also a major source for this article. Another important source is the monograph on ideophones by Jašinskaitė (1971) assembling many examples from Lithuanian literature and from dialects.
Let us now consider an example from Valančius: two sentences with eight ideophones (or six if we disregard the elements associated to cries of animals as suggested by Leskien). Note that full reduplication plays an important role, it expresses event number (multiple events), as will be discussed in Section 3.2. In the example, all ideophones are marked in boldface, and at the end of the examp- les, a list with all ideophones is given with a few lexical remarks about each of them. The example is about a “wolf”, and we will see shortly that the characteri- zation of animals or of persons compared to animals is a characteristic context of use for ideophones in Lithuanian.
6 Senn (1966) uses the German term Verbalinterjektionen ‘verbal interjections’ to translate ištiktukai.
(1) Ideophones in nineteenth-century Lithuanian literature (Valančius [1863]
1996: 41)7
Ant gal-o vis-i su-šok-o ant vilk-o, on end-gen.sg all-nom.pl.m pv-jump-pst.3 on wolf-gen.sg čiupt ger-ai nu-tvėr-ė, brūkš pa-trauk-ė, benc ideo good-adv pv-seize-pst.3 ideo pv-draw-pst.3 ideo iš-vert-ė ir takš takš muš-ti pradėj-o.
out-turn-pst.3 and ideo ideo beat-inf begin-pst.3 Vilk-as, girdi, pirma cypt cypt cyp-ė, wolf-nom.sg hearsay first ideo ideo squeak-pst.3
paskiaus vau vau kauk-ė, ant gal-o strapt then ideo ideo howl-pst.3 on end-gen.sg ideo stoj-o-s ir tabalai tabalai pa-bėgo, nė stand.up-pst.3-refl and ideo ideo pv-flee-pst.3 not
uodeg-os ne-be-palik-ęs.
tail-gen.sg not-more-leave-cnv:ss:ant:sg:m
‘In the end all jumped on the wolf, čiupt grasped it well, brūkš pulled it, benc knocked it down, and began to beat it takš takš. The wolf first cypt cypt squeaked, then vau vau howled and in the end got up strapt and escaped tabalai tabalai, without leaving a tail.’8
čiupt ‘quick seizing’, related verb čiupti ‘grasp, seize’
brūkš(t) = briaukš(t) ‘quick pulling away, cutting off’
benc ‘intensive falling on the ground’, no related verb
takš(t) ‘heavy beating’, related to taškyti ‘splash’, iterative of tėkšti (pres.
teškiu) ‘hit, splash’
cypt ‘squeaking’, related verb cypti ‘squeak’
strapt ‘sudden end or beginning of a movement’, no related verb tabalai ‘staggering’, no related verb.
In (1), the “wolf” is not really a true wolf. The example describes a game young people play in the evening after work. In the narrative, a long dispute
7 This and all other examples from Valančius are given in modern Lithuanian standard orthography after the 1996 edition of Valančius. Example (1) reads as follows in the original orthography: Ant gała wisi suszoka ąnt wiłka, cziupt gieraj nutwiere, bruksz patraukie, bęnc iszwerte ir taksz taksz muszti pradieje. Wiłkas girdi pirmu cipt cipt cipe, paskiaus wau wau kaukie, ąnt gała strapt stojes ir tabałai tabałai pabiega, nie uodigos nebipalikies.
8 I adopt the strategy of the English translator of Wilhelm Busch’s Max und Moritz not to translate ideophones: Knacks! – Da bricht der Stuhl entzwei; ‘Knacks! The chair breaks! down they go’, Schwapp! – Da liegen sie im Brei. ‘Schwapp! – into a trough of dough!’