1. The /a/  /aj/ Shift in Russian Verbs and Cognitive Linguistics
Paradigm Structure:
The /a/  /aj/ Shift in Russian Verbs and Cognitive Linguistics
Tore Nesset, University of Tromsø
1. The Problem
Do inflectional paradigms have internal structure?
What is the structure of Russian verbal paradigms?
5. Statistics
Data unevenly distributed: Only verbs with 15+ examples for at least 3 forms analyzed (relevant cells boldfaced in table).
7. Analysis: Extensions or entrenchment?
Cognitive linguistics has two mechanisms that account for asymmetries in categories: Extensions from prototypes and different degrees of entrenchment.
The hierarchy correlates with markedness; semantically marked forms have higher /aj/ %.
Markedness can be described in terms of extensions from a prototype (Janda 1995). Therefore, extensions are pivotal in the structure of Russian verb paradigms.
What is the role of entrenchment (frequency)?
Test case: Verbs with high frequency non-finite forms and low frequency finite forms. Does /aj/ % correlate with frequency or markedness?
The table below shows no correlation with frequency, thus suggesting that extensions are more important than frequency for the structure of Russian verb paradigms.
Paradigm as a structured network
Paradigm as an unstructured list
2. Hypothesis: Language Change as Evidence
Peripheral forms in the paradigm show a stronger tendency to regularize than central forms.
Test Case: The Russian /a/  /aj/ Shift
Unproductive verb suffix /a/  productive /aj/:
/kaplj+ut/  /kapaj+ut/
«Слезы каплют одна за другой на клавиши.»
(Gončarov 1859 with /a/ suffix)
«Слезы в щи капают.»  (Bitov 1969 with /aj/ suffix)
Ideal test case:
Well documented (e.g. Krysin 1974, Andersen 1980)
Searchable in electronic corpora
Russian verbs have large paradigms with potentially complex structure.
4. My Database
Investigated 30 verbs where suffix shift is expected.
Only non-prefixed verbs examined so far.
Data from The Russian National Corpus
Balanced corpus of 120 million words
Searchable on the internet (
My database contains 12,000 examples.
Data from boldfaced cells yield the following diagram:
Problem: The Active Participle
Some verbs have high /aj/ % paralleling non-finite forms (e.g. vnimat’: 81%)
Some verbs have low /aj/ % paralleling finite forms (e.g. bryzgat’(sja): 15%)
Tentative explanation:
Participles are non-finite forms for which we expect high /aj/ %.
Formally, the active participle is closely related to finite forms, for which low /aj/ % is expected.
Diverse behavior may be due to these conflicting forces.
9. Conclusions
Suffix shift is compatible with implicational hierarchy
⇒ Russian verb paradigms have internal structure.
Hierarchy correlates with semantic markedness:
⇒ Extension relations are more important than entrenchment.
10. Further questions
Does prefixation influence the /a/  /aj/ shift?
Does the «postfix» -sja influence the /a/  /aj/ shift?
Does polysemy influence the /a/  /aj/ shift?
6. Analysis: Implicational Hierarchy
The diagram above shows that /aj/ % increases from left to right.
The /a/~/aj/ variation is compatible with an implicational hierarchy (left).
The hierarchy
confirms the hypothesis about regularization in peripheral forms (cf. Section 2).
suggests that Russian verb paradigms have internal structure.
Gerund 
Imperative
Other finite
1 singular
3 plural
3 singular