Polycategoriality and zero derivation
Insights from Central Alaskan Yup’ik Eskimo
The possibility of polycategorial lexical items, unspecified for category, raises interesting issues. One is the predictability of semantic relationships between polycategorial forms in predicating and referring uses. Another is the language-internal generality of the phenomenon, whether it necessarily holds of all units at a particular level. A third is its cross-linguistic generality and potential association with certain typological features. These issues are examined with examples from a language exhibiting striking similarities to the Mayan languages for which polycategoriality has recently been argued. Central Alaskan Yup’ik Eskimo appears to show robust polycategoriality at the root, stem, word, and clause level. A closer look indicates that the story is actually more interesting, and that the universality of polycategoriality remains an open question.
Article outline
- 1.Polycategoriality
- 2.Central Alaskan Yup’ik Eskimo
- 2.1Yup’ik roots
- 2.2Derived stems
- 2.3Fully inflected words
- 2.4Earlier monocategorial proposal
- 3.A closer look
- 3.1Roots
- 3.2Derived stems
- 3.3Inflected words
- 4.Syntax
- 5.Conclusion
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Note
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References
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