Emergence Of Optional Accusative Case Marking In Khoe Languages
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Date
2018-04-24
Authors
McGregor, William
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Abstract
A number of languages of the Khoe family – one of three genetic lineages comprising southern African Khoisan – show an accusative marker, typically a postposition which in its elsewhere form has the shape (-)(ʔ)à. In all languages for which adequate data is available, this postposition is optional on object NPs, at least in some circumstances. A few proposals have been made for the grammaticalisation of this marker, notably by Kilian-Hatz (2008: 55; 2013: 376–378). However, not only are these proposals specific to the Khwe language, but also they fail to account for the fact that (-)(ʔ)à marks the accusative and that it is optional. In this paper I widen the net to the Khoe family as a whole, and consider the synchronic situations for the usage of the marker (-)(ʔ)à and its putative cognates in those languages for which pertinent data is available. This is used to motivate a diachronic proposal concerning the grammaticalisation of (-)(ʔ)à in the modern languages. Specifically, it is proposed that the accusative marker began life as a presentative copula; this served to index an item, drawing the addressee’s attention to it. It later became an optional accusative marker via grammaticalisation processes akin to those outlined in McGregor (2008; 2010; 2013; 2017) for the development of optional ergative case markers in some Australian languages. Thus the grammaticalisation scenario proposed is consistent with pathways of development of other optional case-markers.
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Keywords
backgrounding, prominence, Khoe family