FS 2016 Class I: What is typology? - UZH3e455cc5-ef1f-484e-920a... · • Thus language typology can give us a “window” on the mind and communication as well as on our history

Linguistic typology

FS 2016

Class I: What is typology?

Linguistic Typology FS2016, class I 2

Exercise

Pick a foreign language whose structure you are familiar with (you do not have to speak it fluently, so Latin would work as well). Think of the ways this language differs from your native language (or – alternatively – English). On a sheet of paper write down a feature from each of the following domains for which you know that this language differs from your native language (or English):

• phonology

• morphology

• syntax

Do not include any obvious phonological differences in the realization of individual words or morphemes. Can you think of an example for each of the domains?


Exercise

B. Language X vs. language Y (Part II)

Build groups of 3–5 students, so that every member of the group chose a different language during the previous exercise. In group, pick one feature for each domain and fill out a table similar to Table 1.1 for all the languages considered by the group members.


Exercise


The linguistic landscape

There are between 7000-8000 attested languages (Ethnologue, Glottolog)

These languages belong to 432 macro families (Glottolog)


Structural diversity

«It is a peculiar fact about linguistics that practically none of the astonishing typological features eventually discovered empirically have been anticipated through prior deduction.»

«Languages (...) differ (...) without limit and in unpredictable ways.» (Joos 1957: 96)

Evans, Nicholas, p. 44

Linguistic Typology FS2016, class I 7 Source: Wikipedia


Ubykh

Hai đú.a bo? nhau là ti gia-đình thàng chông.

two individual leave each.other be because.of family guy husband

‘They divorced because of his family.’

Vietnamese (Nguyen 1997: 223, cited in Haspelmath & Simms 2010)


Paasi-nngil-luinnar-para ilaa-juma-sutit.

understand-not-completely-1SG.SBJ.3SG.OBJ.IND come-want-2SG.PTCP

‘I didn’t understand at all that you wanted to come along.’

West-Greenlandic (Fortescue 1984: 36, cited in Haspelmath & Simms (2010)


Huánuco Quechua (Peru) Juan aywa-n Juan.NOM go-3 ‘Juan goes.’ Juan Pedro-ta maqa-n Juan.NOM Pedro-ACC hit-3 ‘Juan hits Pedro.’

Yup’ik (Alaska) Doris-aq ayallruuq Doris-ABS traveled ‘Doris traveled.’ Tom-am Doris-aq cingallrua Tom-ERG Doris-ABS greet ‘Tom greets Doris.’

From Payne (1997) Describing morphosyntax. Cambridge: CUP.


Huánuco Quechua (Peru) Juan aywa-n Juan.NOM go-3 ‘Juan goes.’ Juan Pedro-ta maqa-n Juan.NOM Pedro-ACC hit-3 ‘Juan hits Pedro.’

Yup’ik (Alaska) Doris-aq ayallruuq Doris-ABS traveled ‘Doris traveled.’ Tom-am Doris-aq cingallrua Tom-ERG Doris-ABS greet ‘Tom greets Doris.’



Hasan öküz-ü aldi Hasan ox-ACC bought ‘Hasan bought the ox.’

The farmer killed the duckling

lladdodd y ddraig y dyn

killed the dragon the man

‘The dragon killed the man.’

nahita ny mpianatra ny vehivavy

saw the student the woman

‘The woman saw the student

toto yahosiye kamara

man it-grabbed-him jaguar

‘The jaguar grabbed the man.’

Turkish: SOV

English: SVO

Welsh: VSO

Malagasy: VOS

Hixkaryana: OVS


• a typology = simply a categorization of some range of

phenomena into various types

• to “typologize” something = to group its parts into

types.

• typological linguists are people who like to group

languages into well-defined and useful types

• a typology is useful when it makes “predictions”

about multiple characteristics of the items being

typologized, that is, if we know that a language is of

type X, we also know that it has Y

Linguistic typology

Why bother?

Linguistic typology

Why bother?

• Typology helps linguists understand the range and

limits of possible variation among human languages

• If logically possible types are found to be very rare or

nonexistent, that may provide some insight into how

the human mind works

• If patterns are geographically skewed, typology may

shed light on human population history.

• Thus language typology can give us a “window” on

the mind and communication as well as on our history

as cultural beings.

Linguistic typology


The typological enterprise

Possible typology of typologies:

(i) holistic typology

(ii) feature-based universalist typology

(iii) distributional typology


Holistic typology «Jede Sprache ist ein System, dessen sämmtliche Theile organisch zusammenhängen und zusammenwirken. Man ahnt, keiner dieser Theile dürfte fehlen oder anders sein, ohne dass das Ganze verändert würde. Es scheint aber auch, als wären in der Sprachphysiognomie gewisse Züge entscheidender als andere. Diese Züge gälte es zu ermitteln; und dann müsste untersucht werden,welche andere Eigenthümlichkeiten regelmässig mit ihnen zusammentreffen (…) Dürfte man ein ungeborenes Kind taufen, ich würde den Namen Typologie wählen.»

H.G. von der Gabelentz


Holistic typology Goal: classify languages as a whole

Explanatory model (in the early years): cultural-historical development, usually in evaluative terms.

Von Schlegel bros.

Three types of languages: - No-structure languages (Chinese) - Agglutinating lgs (Turkish) - Inflecting languages (Latin)

1

2 3

Latin

Turkish Chinese

Holistic typology


Universals J. Greenberg

Linguistic typology as an approach to linguistic theory that uncovers and attempts to determine the limits of human language by looking for (near-) universal patterns in language structure and to explain them in terms of linguistic function.

Word order correlations - with holistic flavour, but functional explanations

OV GEN N Postpositions A N ... Head-final

VO N GEN Prepositions N A ... Head-initial

One design principle for word order for the entire language is cognitively «cheaper».


Universals

Matthew S. Dryer. 2013. Order of Subject, Object and Verb. In: Dryer, Matthew S. & Haspelmath, Martin (eds.) The World Atlas of Language Structures Online. Leipzig: Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology. (Available online at http://wals.info/chapter/81, Accessed on 2016-01-15.)


Universals

Absolute universals (all languages have X) Statistical universals (A large number of languages - i.e. significantly above chance level - have X) Implicational universals (if a language has X, it also has Y) - this also comes in absolute and statistical flavours.

The number hierarchy (Corbett 2000: 38) singular > plural > dual > trial


Distribution

Matthew S. Dryer. 2013. Order of Subject, Object and Verb. In: Dryer, Matthew S. & Haspelmath, Martin (eds.) The World Atlas of Language Structures Online. Leipzig: Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology. (Available online at http://wals.info/chapter/81, Accessed on 2016-01-15.)


Distribution Typology as a population science that studies the distribution of cross-linguistic patterns, with the aim of uncovering the principles determining this distribution.

“Instead of asking “what’s possible?”, more and more typologists ask “what’s where why?”. Asking “what’s where?” targets universal preferences as much as geographical or genealogical skewings.”


Course set-up

Experiencing the process of doing typological research

Formulate research question

Decide what and how to

measure

Collect data

Summarize data Analyze

data

Interpret results

1

2

3

4

5

6

Report results

7

Course set-up

Typological research (ideally)

Reformulate research question

Decide what else to

measure

Collect more /other

data

Summarize data again Analyze data

in a different way

Interpret results again

Report results

Typological research (really)

Course set-up


Approximate (!) schedule

Date Topic Literature (if available)

25-2 Introduction 1

3-3 Inflectional morphology 2.2

10-3 Comparing languages 3

17-3 Case and agreement variables 4.2

24-3 Sampling, data sources, database design 5

7-4 Introduction to R (bring your computer) Appendix 1

14-4 Data exploration and visualization (bring your computer) -


28-4 Hypothesis testing (bring your computer) -

12-5 Patterns and explanations in typology -

19-5 Reporting -

26-5 TBA

2-6 TBA


Approximate (!) schedule

Date Topic Literature (if available)

25-2 Introduction 1

3-3 Inflectional morphology 2.2

10-3 Comparing languages 3

17-3 Case and agreement variables 4.2

24-3 Sampling, data sources, database design 5

7-4 Introduction to R (bring your computer) Appendix 1



28-4 Hypothesis testing (bring your computer) -

12-5 Patterns and explanations in typology -

19-5 Reporting -

26-5 TBA

2-6 TBA

Milestone 1: fix database structure

Milestone 2: finish collecting data (first

round) Milestone 3:

finish correcting data

Milestone 4: draft paper

Milestone 5: deadline 20-6


Literature

Updates in OLAT

Comparability and variables

Section Name Contents Class

1 Introduction Define/describe Phenomenon, domain of investigation, hypothesis, variables

2-4

2 Sample Describe and evaluate the sample 5

3 Data analysis Describe, explore, test data statistically

6-9

4 Discussion Are there patterns in the data, what explanations could be offered (tentatively)

10

5 Outlook What would you need to give a better answer in 4?

10

(6) Abbreviations 11

(7) References 11

Documents

FS 2016 Class I: What is typology? - UZH3e455cc5-ef1f-484e-920a... · • Thus language typology can give us a “window” on the mind and communication as well as on our history