Feature GB114: Is there a phonologically bound reflexive marker on the verb?

Patrons: Jakob Lesage

Description ⇫

Summary

A reflexive marker indicates that a participant is coreferential with another participant in the clause or sentence. This marker may indicate both reflexive and reciprocal functions. If a ‘middle-voice’ marker is used to mark reflexive functions, it also counts as a reflexive marker. Reduplication of verbs also counts. The reflexive construction needs to be productive, not limited to a small set of likely lexicalized verbs in the language, to trigger 1 for this feature. This question targets lexical verbs, anything that happens with auxiliaries is not relevant for this feature.

Procedure

  1. Code 1 if the grammar discusses a productive reflexive marker that is phonologically bound to the verb. Middle voice markers that are obligatory in reflexive constructions also count as reflexive markers.
  2. Code 1 if the grammar discusses a marker that is phonologically bound to the verb and it encodes both reflexive and reciprocal functions.
  3. Code 0 if the grammar discusses reciprocal markers or a phonologically independent reflexive marker, but does not mention a phonologically bound reflexive marker on verbs. Write 'not mentioned' in the comment column.
  4. Code 0 if the grammar only discusses unproductive reflexive markers on verbs.
  5. Code 0 if an otherwise comprehensive grammar does not discuss reflexive markers. Write ‘not mentioned’ in the comment column.
  6. Code ? if there is not enough data or analysis in the available sources to determine whether there is a bound reflexive marker on verbs or whether it is productive.

Examples

Hokkaido Ainu (ISO 639-3: ain, Glottolog: ainu1240)

Hokkaido Ainu has a reflexive prefix yay- (Tamura 2000: 204). This language is coded 1 for this feature.

kik        ‘to hit’
yay-kik    ‘to hit oneself’

nuyna      ‘to hide’
yay-nuya   ‘to hide oneself’

Yimas (ISO 639-3: yee, Glottolog: yima1243)

Yimas does not have any specialized reflexives, and receives a 0 value for this feature: "Yimas lacks any coherent way of forming reflexive constructions" (Foley 1991: 286).

Rapanui (ISO 639-3: rap, Glottolog: rapa1244)

Rapanui does not have a specialized reflexive form, and receives a value of 0. Semantically reflexive clauses are just expressed with the regular pronoun for the person performing the action (Kieviet 2017: 432–433).

¿Ko    haŋa    'ā     koe    mo    hore   atu    i     a   koe?
PRF    want    CONT   2SG    for   cut    away   ACC   ART 2SG
‘Do you want to cut yourself?’ (Kieviet 2017: 432)

Further reading

Geniušienė, Emma S. 1987. The typology of reflexives. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.

Haspelmath, Martin & The APiCS Consortium. 2013. Reflexive constructions. In Susanne Maria Michaelis, Philippe Maurer, Martin Haspelmath & Magnus Huber (eds), The atlas of pidgin and creole language structures, 346–349. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

König, Ekkehard & Volker Gast. 2008. Reciprocity and reflexivity: Description, typology, and theory. In Ekkehard König & Volker Gast (eds), Reciprocals and reflexives: Theoretical and typological explorations, 1–31. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.

Zúñiga, Fernando & Seppo Kittilä. 2019. Grammatical voice. (Cambridge Textbooks in Linguistics, 59). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

References

Foley, William. 1991. The Yimas language of New Guinea. Stanford: Stanford University Press.

Kieviet, Paulus. 2017. A grammar of Rapa Nui. Berlin: Language Science Press.

Tamura, Suzuko. 2000. The Ainu language. (ICHEL Linguistic Studies, 2.) Tokyo: Sanseido.


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Values ⇫

Name Glottocode Family Macroarea Contributor Value Source Comment