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Article published In:
Source-Goal (a)symmetries across languages
Edited by Anetta Kopecka and Marine Vuillermet
[Studies in Language 45:1] 2021
► pp. 203–234

Asymmetries in Path expression in Ye’kwana

ORCID logo | Structure et Dynamique des Langues (CNRS) | University of Oregon

Ye’kwana is an Amazonian language of the Cariban family spoken by a group of about 8,700 people in Venezuela and Brazil. This paper explores the expression of Path in spontaneous motion events based on spoken data collected for the documentation and description of the language including data collected with the Trajectoire elicitation material (Ishibashi et al. 2006).

In Ye’kwana, Path is mainly expressed by postpositional and adverbial stems: there is a rich inventory of 80 postpositions all compatible with locative and either allative or perlative uses and 29 spatial adverbs, most of deictic nature. Source is expressed with a dedicated suffix (-nno) which combines with almost all the spatial postpositions and adverbs. The data show that the asymmetries in the expression of Path are not only found between Source and Goal but also need to include the expression of Medium for which the language has dedicated forms.

Keywords: motion events, Cariban languages, adpositions, adverbs, perlatives
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.The language and the corpus
  • 3.Morphological and semantic asymmetries in Ye’kwana
  • 4.Combining verbs with Source, Medium and Goal expressions
    • 4.1Motion verbs and spatial adverbials in the Trajectoire corpus
    • 4.2Motion verbs and spatial adverbials in the spontaneous corpus
    • 4.3Pragmatic effects in the expression of Path
  • 5.Expressions of Path in a separate clause
    • 5.1Path in a copular clause
    • 5.2Path in a subordinate clause
  • 6.Discussion
  • Acknowledgements
  • Notes
  • Abbreviations
  • References
Published online: 22 December 2020
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/sl.18023.cac
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