open access

https://doi.org/10.14943/93118

https://hdl.handle.net/2115/77596

Changes of Grammatical Categories in Ainu : the Interrelationship between Phrase-to-Word and Verb-to-Noun Conversions

日本語

形式意味論

2020-03-20

Japan Association of Northern Language Studies

Northern Language Studies

10

219-230

This paper shows that two grammatical category conversions in Ainu, i. e. that of verbto-noun conversion and that of phrase-to-word conversion, both play an important role in the formation of Ainu compound nouns and further argues about what enables Ainu intransitive (one-place) verbs to convert to nouns so regularly. The results of the investigation of these problems are as follows: 1) In terms of formal semantics, common nouns and intransitive verbs are both described as a one-place predicate. Ainu converts intransitive verbs into nouns based on this similarity of their types of extension as shown in the following formulas. nouns: [[apple]] = [λx: x ∈ De . x is an apple] intransitive verbs: [[run]] = [λy: y ∈ De . y runs] 2) The Ainu language has zero-place verbs (e.g. sir-pirka ‘the weather (sir-) is fine (pirka)’. The extensions of these verbs are either T (true) or F (false) as shown in the formula below. Ainu zero-place verbs cannot be converted into nouns in principle. Again, this can be explained by formal semantics: their type of extension is different from that of one-place predicates like those of intransitive verbs and nouns as is known from the formula above. T [[sirpirka]] ＝F 3) In fact, some sporadic exceptions to 1) and 2) like eper-se-sito ‘rice cake which a bear carries on his/her back’ and kamuy-sirpirka ‘glorious fine weather’ are also found among Ainu compound nouns. However, these seem to be mere exceptions that are formed by another grammatical category conversion, i.e. phrase-to-word conversion. In the future research, we should survey various languages to discover ones which follow the same formal semantic restrictions on grammatical category conversions as in Ainu. In addition we should carry out a contrastive study of them with Ainu for its exhaustive description.

紀要論文

Version of Record

2185-7121

AA12516968