Different ways to do serial verbs

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Chengjiang
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Different ways to do serial verbs

Post by Chengjiang »

So I'm stalled on making Chavakani because I wanted to make heavy use of serial verb constructions, but I'm struggling at making them interestingly different from those found in the southeast Asian sprachbund, i.e. those found in Chinese and languages sharing regional influences with Chinese. What are some different types of SVC not found in that area?
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Re: Different ways to do serial verbs

Post by Akangka »

I found the Tigrinya's gerundive (which should not be confused the Latin ones) fascinating. Generally, it denotes completed action that is still relevant. A verb in the gerundive can be used alone or serially with another gerundive verb. In the latter case, it may sometimes be translated with an adverbial clause: bitri hidju kheydu (literally, "a-stick he-took-hold-of he-began-walking") means "while holding a stick, he is walking", i.e. "he is carrying a stick".[1] Another example:

መስኮት ሰቢሩ ሃዲሙ
mäskot säbiru hadimu
window break (3p.m.sg., GER) escape (3p.m.sg., GER)
He broke a window and escaped.'

Note that both verbs are marked by gerundive.

Alternatively, you can use affix that means "after that." It is marked on second sentence. I don't know if it is present in natlang, though (the following is a random throwaway language):

a-dak-a-na k-a-runj-o k-a-sup-o
3SG-explode-STT.DIR-NOM 1SG-3SG-go.away-DYN.DIR FTT-1SG-3SG-run-DYN.DIR
I am running avoiding explosion (i.e. I am evacuated from volcano eruption)

NOM = Nominalizer
FTT = After That
STT = Stative
DYN = Dynamic

Notice that in language like Japanese, the counterpart of the verb "runjan" is transformed into te-form, while here the marked one is the verb "supan"

[1] = https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gerundive

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Re: Different ways to do serial verbs

Post by Ketumak »

As I recall from the China Construction Kit, if a Chinese sentence has:

Noun1 Verb1 Noun2 Verb2

Then Noun2 is the object of Verb1 and the subject of Verb2. If that's the model you're trying to avoid, how about Yoruba?

I looked up Yoruba SVC a few years back for ideas for my Õtari conlang and discovered that where a Yoruba sentence has:

Noun1 Verb1 Noun2 Verb2

Then Noun2 is the combined object of Verbs 1 and 2:

(51) Olú ń se ẹran tà
̀Olu PROG cook meat sell
‘Olu is cooking meats and selling them’

(52) Adé ń ra ẹran jẹ
Ade PROG. buy meat eat
‘Ade is buying meats and eating them’

These two examples are taken from page 14 of Yoruba : a grammar sketch by Oluseye Adesola.

I also cam across an argument as to why this is the case but can't find it at the moment. The argument said the object was trying to follow both its verbs at once and therefore the second copy of it was redundant: SVOVO > SVOV. Don't know how much store to set by that though.

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Re: Different ways to do serial verbs

Post by Imralu »

Off topic, but ...
Akangka wrote:I found the Tigrinya's gerundive (which should not be confused the Latin ones) fascinating. Generally, it denotes completed action that is still relevant.
Does anyone have any idea why someone chose to call that gerundive of all things and not simply perfect? The only reasoning I could think of that would make sense would be if this form is very similar to a/the gerund form in Tigrinya, but even then, I'd still think that that's a silly and misleading choice of name for this structure.
Glossing Abbreviations: COMP = comparative, C = complementiser, ACS / ICS = accessible / inaccessible, GDV = gerundive, SPEC / NSPC = specific / non-specific
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Re: Different ways to do serial verbs

Post by Yng »

It looks like it might be cognate with Arabic's participles, which typically denote either continuous or perfect/resultative meaning depending on context.

Why you'd call these gerund(ive)s though I have no idea.

For what it's worth, Turkish has quite a few subordinating verbal endings ('converbs') which allow you to create sequences of verbal forms whose tense is informed by the final one:

Sakin sakin şarkımı söyleyip gideyim istiyorum
quiet quiet song-1sg-ACC sing-CNV go-1sg.OPT want-CNT-1sg
'I just wanted to sing my song calmly and go.'
كان يا ما كان / يا صمت العشية / قمري هاجر في الصبح بعيدا / في العيون العسلية

tà yi póbo tsùtsùr ciivà dè!

short texts in Cuhbi

Risha Cuhbi grammar

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Re: Different ways to do serial verbs

Post by kuroda »

Yng wrote:Why you'd call these gerund(ive)s though I have no idea.

For what it's worth, Turkish has quite a few subordinating verbal endings ('converbs') '
Since the 1860s or so, 'gerundives' was (and in some circles still is) the term of art for these things in Turkology (and thence Mongolistics, and occasionally metastasizing further). 'Converb' seems to be a modern replacement term (I guess)?
CONLANG Code: C:S/G v1.1 !lafh+>x cN:L:S:G a+ x:0 n4d:2d !B A--- E-- L--- N0 Id/s/v/c k- ia--@:+ p+ s+@ m-- o+ P--- S++ Neo-Khitanese

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Re: Different ways to do serial verbs

Post by Imralu »

Swahili kind of has something like this except all the forms are finite. Verbs marked with -ki- "SITUATIONAL" are equivalent to both the verb in an if-clause and also more or less to present participles. I suppose it may not be all that interesting, since we can do this participle stuff in English too, but in Swahili, there is still mandatory subject marking.

Nilikuja nikikimbia.
ni-li-ku-j-a ni-ki-kimbi-a
1s-PST-EXT-come-Ø 1s-SIT-run-Ø

I came running.

Ulikuja ukikimbia.
u-li-ku-j-a u-ki-kimbi-a
2s-PST-EXT-come-Ø 2s-SIT-run-Ø

You came running.
Glossing Abbreviations: COMP = comparative, C = complementiser, ACS / ICS = accessible / inaccessible, GDV = gerundive, SPEC / NSPC = specific / non-specific
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