Chapter 5
From an adverb/postposition ‘behind’ to a discourse marker
The particle reχu in Andi
Timur Maisak | Institute of Linguistic, Russian Academy of Sciences | HSE University (Moscow, Russia)
The paper describes two uses of the discourse particle reχu in Andi (Nakh-Daghestanian, Avar-Andic), namely the consecutive, or sequential, use found in the non-final clauses of multiclausal sentences and reinforcing the idea of temporal sequence (‘and then’), and the pragmatic use with retrospective contrastive meaning, predominantly found in imperatives and questions. A diachronic scenario is proposed for the development of the particle: first from spatial adverb/postposition ‘behind’ to temporal adverb/postposition ‘after’, then from clause-initial ‘then’ to clause-final sequential marker, then from longer to shorter sequential marker and, finally, from enclitic sequential marker to enclitic pragmatic particle. This evolution is accompanied by semantic, morphosyntactic and phonological changes typical of grammaticalization, and is supported by both intragenetic evidence and cross-linguistic parallels.
Article outline
- 1.Introduction
- 2.The Andi language: Basic information
- 3.Two uses of the particle reχu: Consecutive and discourse-pragmatic
- 3.1reχu as a consecutive marker
- 3.2reχu as a discourse-pragmatic marker
- Questions
- Imperatives
- Exclamatives
- Declaratives
- 3.3Ambiguous cases: reχu in multiclausal imperatives and speech reports
- 4.Looking for the grammaticalization source
- 4.1reχudu as a final sequential connective
- 4.2reχudu as a clause-initial sequential connective ‘then’
- 4.3reχudu as a temporal postposition ‘after’
- 4.4cl-eχudu as a spatial adverb/postposition ‘behind’
- 5.Discussion: From an adverb/postposition to a particle
- 6.Conclusion
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Acknowledgements
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Notes
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Abbreviations
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Sources
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References