The Linguistic Cycle: grammaticalization, economy, and pronouns Elly van Gelderen Workshop Internacional sobre Gramaticalização 26 August 2010

Outline GrammaticalizationLinguistic Cycle Formal account of both: Feature Economy Subject Cycle across languages Implications

Aims To identify recurring linguistic change To explain this in terms of the child interpreting input in a particular way Examine internal and external factors of linguistic change and their interaction

Grammaticalization (1)phrase > word/head > clitic > affix > 0 adjunct > argument > agreement > 0 (2)lexical head > grammatical > 0

Examples of Cycles Negative Cycle a negative argument > negative adverb > negative particle > zero b verb > aspect> negative > C Subject Agreement demonstrative/emphatic > 3 pronoun > agreement > zero noun/emphatic > 1/2 pronouns > agreement > zero Case or Definiteness or DP demonstrative > definite article > ‘Case’ > zero Future and Aspect Auxiliary A/P > M > T > C

Negative Cycle in Old English CE a.no/neearly Old English b.ne(na wiht/not)after 900, esp S c.(ne)notafter 1350 d.not>-not/-n’tafter 1400

Old English: (1) Men ne cunnon secgan to soðe... hwa Man not could tell to truth... who `No man can tell for certain... who'. (2) Næron 3e noht æmetti3e, ðeah ge wel ne dyden not-were you not unoccupied. though you well not did `You were not unoccupied, though you did not do well'.

Weakening and renewal (1)we cannot tell of (Wycliff Sermons from the 1380s) (2)But I shan't put you to the trouble of farther Excuses, if you please this Business shall rest here. (Vanbrugh, The Relapse1680s). (3)that the sonne dwellith therfore nevere the more ne lasse in oon signe than in another (Chaucer, Astrolabe 665 C1). (4)No, I never see him these days (BNC - A9H 350)

The Negative Cycle XP SpecX' na wihtXYP not> n’t…

Cycle or Spiral? von der Gabelentz 1901: “always the same: the development curves back towards isolation, not in the old way, but in a parallel fashion. That's why I compare them to spirals.” (“immer gilt das Gleiche: die Entwicklungslinie krümmt sich zurück nach der Seite der Isolation, nicht in die alte Bahn, sondern in eine annähernd parallele. Darum vergleiche ich sie der Spirale”, p 256).

The Linguistic Cycle -Gardiner (1904): Egyptian Negative cycle -Hodge (1970: 3): Old Egyptian morphological complexity (synthetic stage) turned into Middle Egyptian syntactic structures (analytic stage) and then back into morphological complexity in Coptic. - Giv ó n (1971) “today’s morphology is yesterday's syntax“.

Language Change = -Cycles are the result of reanalysis by the language learner who apply Economy Principles. I argue that the real sources of change are internal principles. -This is very different from models such as Lightfoot's and Westergaard’s that examine how much input a child needs to reset a parameter. According to Lightfoot, "children scan their linguistic environment for structural cues" (2006: 32); for these, change comes from the outside

Internal Grammar

Macrocycles or Microcycles? - Hodge (1970: 3): Old Egyptian morphological complexity (synthetic stage) turned into Middle Egyptian syntactic structures (analytic stage) and then back into morphological complexity in Coptic. - Heine et al. (1991: 246): there is “more justification to apply the notion of a linguistic cycle to individual linguistic developments.” - EvG: some cycles (e.g. agreement) are more important for the typology of a language than others (e.g. negative)

Why are Cycles interesting? If these are real patterns of change, then they give insight in the Faculty of Language Factors: 1.Genetic endowment 2.Experience 3.Principles not specific to language

Three factors, e.g. Chomsky 2007 (1) genetic endowment, which sets limits on the attainable languages, thereby making language acquisition possible; (2) external data, converted to the experience that selects one or another language within a narrow range; (3) principles not specific to [the Faculty of Language]. Some of the third factor principles have the flavor of the constraints that enter into all facets of growth and evolution, [...] Among these are principles of efficient computation"

Faculty of Language: what, how, why Descriptive and explanatory But currently also why, e.g. - structure dependence rather than linear? - why grammaticalization?

Economy Locality = Minimize computational burden (Ross 1967; Chomsky 1973) Use a head = Minimize Structure (Head Preference Principle, van Gelderen 2004) Late Merge = Minimize computational burden (van Gelderen 2004, and others)

If there are Economy Principles, they should be visible in Lg Change Two main patterns (van Gelderen 2004 etc): a)Phrase to Head b)Up the tree: both phrases and heads Principles: acquisition and derivation

What: (a) Phrase (Specifier) > Head Full pronoun to agreement Demonstrative that to complementizer Demonstrative pronoun to article Negative adverb phrase to negation marker Adverb phrase to aspect marker Adverb phrase to complementizer

and (b) higher in the tree On, from P to ASP (I am on going) VP Adverbials > TP/CP Adverbials Like, from P > C (like I said) Negative objects to negative markers Modals: v > ASP > T Negative verbs to auxiliaries To: P > ASP > M > C PP > C (for something to happen)

Reanalysis of `how’ as Yes/No:

How/why: Cognitive Economy (or UG) principles help the learner, e.g: Phrase > head (minimize structure) Avoid too much movement (1)XP SpecX' XYP Y…

Computational - Lexical Structural Economy is computational If all variation is in the lexicon, is there also `help’ for the learner there? Yes, Feature Economy: if you have a LI with i-F, use it with u-F as well.

The Subject Cycle (1) demonstrative > third person pron > clitic > agrmnt (2) oblique > emphatic > first/second pron > clitic > agrmnt Basque verbal prefixes n-, g-, z- = pronouns ni ‘I’, gu ‘we’, and zu ‘you’. Pama-Nyungan, inflectional markers are derived from independent pronouns. Iroquoian and Uto-Aztecan agreement markers derive from Proto-Iroquoian pronouns Cree verbal markers ni-, ki-, o-/ø = pronouns niya, kiya, wiya.

Subject vs Agreement ThetaXP/Xfixed lang Full pronyesXPnoHindi/Urdu, Japanese Head pron yesXnoFrench, (English) Agrmnt =PALyesXyesArabic, Navajo AgreementnoXyesHindi/Urdu, English

Some stages Japanese and Urdu/Hindi: full pronoun (1) watashi-wa kuruma-ounten-surukara. I-TOPcar-ACCdrive-NONPST PRT ‘I will drive the car'. (Yoko Matsuzaki p.c.) (2)tiisaikare smallhe (3)watashi-wadrove the car I-TOP ‘I drove the car.’ (Yoko Matsuzaki p.c.). (4)mẽy nee uskodekha 1S ERGhimDATsaw (5)ham log `we people‘ (6)mẽy or merii behn doonõ dilii mẽy rehtee hẽ I and my sister both Delhi in living are

English: in transition (a) Modification, (b) coordination, (c) position, (d) doubling, (e) loss of V-movement, (f) Code switching Coordination (and Case) (1)Kitty and me were to spend the day. (2)%while he and she went across the hall. Position (3)She’s very good, though I perhaps I shouldn’t say so. (4)You maybe you've done it but have forgotten. (5)Me, I was flying economy, but the plane, … was guzzling gas

Doubling and cliticization (1)Me, I've tucking had it with the small place. (2)%Him, he.... (3)%Her, she shouldn’t do that (not attested in the BNC) (4)*As for a dog, it should be happy. CSE-FAC: uncliticizedcliticizedtotal I (=25%)2722 you (=12.1%)1338 he12819 (=12.9%)147

Loss of V-movement and Code switching (5)What I'm go'n do? `What am I going to do' (6)How she's doing? `How is she doing‘ (7)*He ging weg ` he went away’ Dutch-English CS (8)The neighbor ging weg

Standard to Colloquial French (a) Modification, (b) coordination, (c) position, (d) doubling, (e) loss of V-movement, (f) Code switching (1)et c'est elle qui a eu la place. and it was her who has had the place (2)*Je et tu... (3)*je lis et ecris (4)Moi, j’ai pas vu ça. (5)Et toi, tu aimes le rap? (6) on voit que lui il n'apprécie pas tellement la politique one sees that him he not-appreciates not so the politics (LTSN corpus, p )

More doubling, loss of V-movement and code switching (1)une omelette elle est comme ça Swiss Spoken an omelette she is like this (2)c'est que chacun il a sa manière de... Swiss Spoken it is that everyone he has his way of (Fonseca-Greber 2000: 335; 338). (3) Alors pourquoi moi aussi je n'aurais pas le droit d'enfumer les autres quelques minutes dans un bar? Then why me also I not-have not the right to fill-with-smoke the others some minutes in a bar (4)tuvasoùColloquial French 2Sgowhere (5)nta tu vas travaillerArabic-French you you go work (from Bentahila and Davies 1983: 313).

Brazilian Portuguese (1)Vossa mercê> Vosmecê > (V)ocê>cê your favor/mercyyouyou-indefinite (see Mattoso Câmara 1979; Gonçalves 1987; Dutra 1991, cited in Vitral & Ramos 2006) (2)cê only in subject position and pre-V (3)ele(s) >el, es ela(s) >éa, éas (4)es inventa um bocado de coisa / eles inventam … `they invented (S) …’

Italian Venice (1)Ti te magni sempre you you eat always (2)Nissun (*el) magna Nobody he eats (both from Poletto 2004) Trentino (3)Nisunl'hadit niente nobodyhe-hassaidnothing `Nobody said anything' (4)Tutl'ècapitade not everythingit-hashappenedat night (both from Brandi & Cordin 1989:118)

Subject Cycle: HPP and LMP TPTP(=HPP) DPT’DPT’ pronTVPpronpron-TVP… Urdu/Hindi, JapaneseColl French, CVC TP [DP] T’(=LMP) [pron]pron-TVP Navajo, Spanish, Arabic

Actual Mechanism stage (a): the pronoun moves from specifier of vP to specifier of a higher FP stage (b): the subject pronoun moves from vP- internal position. At what point is the pronoun a head? Chomsky (1995: 249) says "a clitic raises from its [theta]-position, and attaches to an inflectional head. In its [theta]-position, the clitic is an XP; attachment to a head requires that it be an Xo". stage (c): pronouns in the higher position are reanalyzed as agreement markers (=LMP)

Why does `person’ start the cycle? Definiteness Hierarchy 1/2 > 3 > definite > indefinite/quantifier Another instance: Mexican Spanish, overt Subject:1sg24.4% 2sg12.5% 3sg8.2% (Lopez, 2007) Poletto (2000): SCL replaces features on a verb; different positions.

Feature Economy and the Subject Cycle emphatic/ demonstrative > personal > agreement [i-phi][i-phi] [u-phi] [i-deixis][u-Case]

Feature Economy Minimize the interpretable features in the derivation, e.g: (1) AdjunctSpecifierHeadaffix semantic>[iF]>[uF] (2)emphatic > full pronoun > head > agreement [i-phi][i-phi][u-1/2] [i-3][u-phi] Chomsky (1995: 230; 381) "formal features have semantic correlates and reflect semantic properties (accusative Case and transitivity, for example)." This makes sense if a language learner uses the semantic features in the derivation, these features turning into interpretable ones so to speak.

Feature Economy: select minimum from the lexicon LocativeSpecifierHead affix semantic>[iF]>[uF]>-- Head>(higher) Head>0 [iF] / [uF][uF] uF is a Probe

What are some of the features? TP T' TvP DPv' vVP [u-phi]DPV’ [ACC][i-phi]V [u-Case] Semantic, interpretable, and uninterpretable

Source of renewal Old FrenchModern French EmphRegularEmph Regular Subjecttuzerotoitu Obliquetoitetoite (from Harris 1978)

Pronominal Argument Languages, e.g. Navajo (a) optionality of nominals and sentences with more than one nominal are rare. Therefore: nominals are adjuncts, sometimes with a different case system (e.g. Jelinek 1989) (1)bínabinishtin b-í-na-bi-ni-sh-tin 3-against-around-3-Q-1S-handle-IMPF `I teach it to him' (Y&M 1987: 223) (2)(Diné bizaad) yíníshta' Navajo language 1-study `I am studying Navajo'.

(b) Absence of anaphors and non-referential quantified DPs and (c) minimal embedding (1)má'iiałtso dibé baayijah coyoteallsheep3-3-ran-away `The sheep ran away from all the coyotes' or `All the sheep ran away from the coyotes'. (Jelinek 2001: 18). (2)honeesná-nígíí yoodlá 3.win-NOM 3.believe `He believes he won' or `he believes the winner' (Willie 1991: 178).

Back to English: features of DP (1)a.*That the dog loves their the toys. b.I saw that. c.*I saw the. (2)DPDP thatD’DNP [i-loc] DNPthe3S [i-ps]3S[u-phi]

History: Dem > Article (1) hu ða æþelingas ellen fremedon how those noblescourage did 'how the nobles performed heroic acts' (Beowulf 3) (2) se wæs Wine haten & se wæs in Gallia rice gehalgod. he was wine called and he was in Gaul consecrated (3)Hi habbad mid him awyriedne engel, mancynnes feond, and se hæfd andweald... They have with them corrupt angel, mankind’s enemy, and he [the angel] has power over... (Ælfric, Homilies ii )

(1) gife to … þa munecas of þe mynstre give to … the monks of the abbey (Peterborough Chron 1150) (2) *the (Wood 2003: 69) (3) Morret's brother came out of Scoteland for th'acceptacion of the peax (The Diary of Edward VI, 1550s) (4) Oh they used to be ever so funny houses you know and in them days … They used to have big windows, but they used to a all be them there little tiny ones like that. (BNC - FYD 72)

OE pronouns and demonstratives He, heo, hit, hi-se, seo, etc. non-deicticdeictic reflexiverelative clause

So 1200: a reanalysis (1) & gaddresst swa þe clene corn All fra þe chaff togeddre `and so you gather the clear wheat from the chaff.’ (Ormulum , Holt edition) (2)3ho wass … Elysabæþ 3ehatenn `She was called Elisabeth.’ (Ormulum 115) (3) & swa þe33 leddenn heore lif Till þatt te33 wærenn alde `and so they led their lives until they were old.’ (Ormulum 125-6) (4) þin forrme win iss swiþe god, þin lattre win iss bettre. `Your earlier wine is very good, your later wine is better.’ (Ormulum 15409)

InternalExternal se -->the seo --> she that --> thathi --> they him/her --> him/herself a.se>the [i-loc]/[i-phi][u-T]/[u-ps] b.he/hiis replaced byhe heo/hais replaced by she (possibly via seo) hi/hieis replaced bythey [i-phi][i-phi]/[i-loc]

Conclusions (Micro)-Cycles exist Economy Principles = Third factor Children use these to analyze their input + there is language change if accepted. Change is from the inside Possible Principles: HPP and LMP; Feature Economy Grammaticalization (SM Economy) vs renewal(CI Economy)

And uF is `normal’ Chomsky (2002: 113) sees the semantic component as expressing thematic as well as discourse information. If thematic structure was already present in proto- language (Bickerton 1990), the evolutionary change of Merge made them linguistic. What was added through grammaticalization is the morphology, the second layer of semantic information.

A possible Feature Macro-Parameter Phi-features `Case' (for head-marking)(for dependent-marking) yesnoyesno JapaneseJapaneseNavajo u-Fi-FEnglish EnglishNavajo Phi-Tno EnglishBantu(EvG to appear)

Some References Chomsky, Noam Approaching UG from below, in Uli Sauerland et al. (eds), Interfaces + Recursion = Language, Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. Gardiner, Alan H The word... Zeitschrift für Ägyptische Sprache und Altertumskunde 41: Gelderen, Elly van Grammaticalization as Economy. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. Gelderen, Elly van to appear. The Linguistic Cycle. OUP. Givón, Talmy Historical syntax and synchronic morphology. Chicago Linguistic Society Proceedings 7: Hodge, Carleton The Linguistic Cycle. Linguistic Sciences Vitral, Lorenso & Jânia Ramos Gramaticalização: uma abordagem formal. Rio de Janeiro: Tempo Brasileiro.