RELATIVE CLAUSES AND NOUN-MODIFYING CLAUSES:

A CROSS-LINGUISTIC INVESTIGATION

Yoshiko Matsumoto (Stanford University)

The project is a theoretical and cross-linguistic investigation of clausal noun-modifying constructions (NMCs) with a focus on languages in Asia. Noun modification by a clause, which includes what are generally referred to as relative clause and noun-complement constructions, has been one of the central issues in linguistic research because of the complexity of the structure, and its frequent and extensive uses within and across languages. In spite of the importance of the construction, the majority of research on the structural properties and construal mechanism of NMCs has been based on English and other typologically related languages, often with the implied or explicit assumption (e.g. in Chomskyan accounts) that the findings should be viewed as universal. The aim of this project is to challenge and change the current state and predominant approach of research in this area. We plan to do so by investigating in depth NMCs in collaboration with linguists who are experts in the less frequently studied target languages using corpora of natural text and by collectively developing a framework for systematic cross-linguistic investigation.

NMCs in Japanese, for example, present properties that are not encountered in the study of relative clauses or noun complements in English and other related languages, and which cannot be explained by conventional syntactic accounts. A careful examination of naturally-occurring NMCs in Japanese (e.g. Matsumoto 1997) demonstrates that their construal and production are governed by a fundamentally different principle from that conventionally proposed for English constructions. The crucial structural features of Japanese NMCs are that (1) there is no explicit marking (e.g. a relative pronoun or verb form encoding person or number) which would indicate the grammatical and semantic relationship between the head noun and the prenominal subordinate clause, and that (2) relative clause constructions and noun-complement constructions have exactly the same basic structure, making the conventional claim of a syntactic distinction between them questionable. Matsumoto (1997, 2007) argues that analysis must pay attention to an aggregate of semantic and pragmatic factors, including the semantics of the predicate and the head noun, as well as to contextually and culturally shared knowledge.

A number of other languages of Asia seem, at least prima facie, to have Japanese-type, or “general”, noun-modifying clauses. Comrie (1996) mentions Korean, Chinese, Ainu, Khmer, Tamil, and Karachay-Balkar (a Turkic language of the North Caucasus), but notes that, in all cases, broader and deeper investigation is needed, along the lines followed by Matsumoto on Japanese. Such detailed work on NMCs, heretofore missing for these and most other languages in Asia, would enable us to delineate the areal and/or genealogical boundary between languages with and without general noun-modifying clauses. The project therefore needs to bring in experts on the various languages involved, who will contribute both native speakers’ judgments as well as the results of examination of corpora of natural text. An illustration of a preliminary finding can be seen in the surprising result presented in Comrie (1998) for two closely related, indeed to a high degree mutually intelligible Turkic languages, namely Karachay-Balkar and Turkish. Despite having rather similar "relative clause" constructions, Karachay-Balkar seems to have all the hallmarks of a general noun-modifying clause construction, while Turkish can be shown to differentiate clearly between relative clauses and other noun-modifying constructions.

During the first year, we will hold a workshop (March 22-24, 2008) at which the primary and the invited collaborators will discuss their findings on the relevant languages. This is envisaged to be a preliminary meeting to identify issues and questions that should be further investigated and focused on in later workshops. We hope to gather again in the following year for a more in-depth and focused workshop based on the specific questions identified at the first meeting. We also wish to invite additional collaborators in the second year.

REFERENCES

Comrie, Bernard. 1996. ‘The unity of noun-modifying clauses in Asian languages’. In Pan-Asiatic Linguistics: Proceedings of the Fourth International Symposium on Languages and Linguistics, January 8–10, 1996, 1077–1088. Salaya, Thailand: Institute of Language and Culture for Rural Development, Mahidol University at Salaya.

_____ . 1998. ‘Turkic languages and linguistic typology’. Turkic Languages 1: 14–24.

Matsumoto, Yoshiko. 1997. Noun-Modifying Constructions in Japanese:  A Frame Semantic Approach.  Studies in Language Companion Series 35.  John Benjamins.

_____ . 2007. ‘Integrating frames:  Complex noun phrase constructions in Japanese.’ In Aspects of Linguistics: In Honor of Noriko Akatsuka (Gengogaku  no Syosoo: Akatsuka Noriko Kyoozyu Kinen Ronbunsyuu), (eds.) Susumu Kuno, Seiichi Makino and Susan Strauss. Tokyo: Kurosio Publishers. 131-154.

Primary collaborators:

Bernard Comrie – East Caucasian; Papuan

Director, Department of Linguistics, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology

Distinguished Professor of Linguistics, University of California Santa Barbara

Yoshiko Matsumoto - Japanese

Associate Professor, Department of Asian Languages, Stanford University

Invited collaborators – commitment to participate in meetings confirmed:

Kaoru Horie – Japanese, Korean, Mandarin Chinese, Vietnamese, Marathi

University of Tohoku, Japan

Elena Kalinina – Daghestanian languages

Moscow State University, Russia

Jaklin Kornfilt – Turkish languages

Syracuse University

Shin-Sook Kim – Korean

University of Frankfurt, Germany 

Beth Levin – Italian, Lexical semantics

Stanford University

Stephen Matthews – Chinese/Cantonese 

University of Hong Kong

Johanna Nichols – Chechen, Ingush

University of California at Berkeley

Michael Noonan – Tibeto-Burman

University of Wisconsin at Milwaukee

Peter Sells – Korean, Japanese

The School of Oriental an African Studies, UK

Virginia Yip –Chinese / Cantonese

University of Hong Kong