The Acquisition of Inflection in Q’anjob’al Maya
Most studies on the acquisition of verbal inflection have examined languages with a single verb suffix. This book offers a study on the acquisition of verb inflections in Q’anjob’al Maya. Q’anjob’al has separate inflections for aspect, subject and object agreement, and status suffixes. The subject and object inflections display a split ergative pattern. The subjects of intransitive verbs with aspect markers take absolutive markers, whereas the subjects of aspectless intransitive verbs take ergative markers. The acquisition of three types of clauses is explored in detail (imperatives, indicatives, and aspectless complements). The data come from longitudinal spontaneous speech of three monolingual Q’anjob’al children aged 1;8–3;5. This book contributes unique data to the debate on the acquisition of finite and non-finite verbs as well as adding to our understanding of the acquisition of split ergative patterns. The book is of interest to researchers and students working on linguistics and language acquisition.
[Trends in Language Acquisition Research, 14] 2015. xiii, 144 pp.
Publishing status: Available
© John Benjamins
Table of Contents
Acknowledgements
|
xi–xii
|
Abbreviations
|
xiii–xiv
|
Chapter 1. Introduction
|
1–30
|
Chapter 2. Theoretical background
|
31–46
|
Chapter 3. Methodology
|
47–56
|
Chapter 4. Acquisition of intransitive verbs
|
57–82
|
Chapter 5. Acquisition of transitive verbs
|
83–112
|
Chapter 6. Phonological effects and word order
|
113–122
|
Chapter 7. General conclusions
|
123–132
|
References
|
133–142
|
Index
|
143–144
|
“This book represents an important contribution to first language acquisition studies by presenting a detailed investigation of the acquisition of the Mayan language Q'anjob'al. Based on fieldwork in Guatemala, this meticulous study brings to the field a wealth of new data from an understudied language. Q'anjob'al is of special interest because of its split ergative agreement system and complex verb morphology. Mateo Pedro expertly traces the course of acquisition of subject and object agreement, transitivity marking, and aspect morphology and highlights the role of phonology in the acquisition of morphology and syntax. The book is of interest not only to Mayanists, but to those engaged in first language acquisition research in general because Mateo Pedro uses the Q'anjob'al data to evaluate several theories of first language acquisition that are on the market. The theoretical conclusions are supported by quantitative measures. This book will serve as a stepping-off point for future studies in the acquisition of Mayan languages.”
Harold Torrence, University of California, Los Angeles
“This is a landmark work in Mayan linguistics and in the study of morphological acquisition. Mateo Pedro has collected an impressively rich data set on the acquisition of verbal inflection in Q'anjob'al, drawn from a diverse array of clause types. The book deftly synthesizes data, analysis, and theory, bringing novel Mayan data to bear on more general debates in the field of language development. This work represents a substantial contribution to the comparatively small (but growing) literature on language acquisition in non-Indo-European languages.”
Ryan Bennett, Yale University
“
The Acquisition of inflection in Q’anjob’al, a Mayan language spoken in Guatemala, by Pedro Mateo Pedro offers a new window into the acquisition of the functional lexicon (agreement, person, aspect) in a language with a rich morphosyntactic system and split ergativity. It shows that in spite of the complexity of the system, children already possess some knowledge of it at age 2;0, and selectively omit some inflectional morphemes. Mateo Pedro not only contributes new longitudinal data from a neglected language and a detailed analysis of them, but also discusses them against the background of studies on other Mayan languages, providing a very insightful and comprehensive description. Finally, he shows how his data contribute to our advancement of knowledge by challenging current models of children’s acquisition of inflection. Anyone who wants to understand language acquisition and come to the right generalization has to broaden her/his perspectives and become acquainted with the rich variety of linguistic systems that children can face. This book is of great import in this direction.”
Maria Teresa Guasti, University of Milano-Bicocca
“
The Acquisition of Inflection in Q’anjob’al Maya by Pedro Mateo Pedro establishes a new direction for research on language acquisition. Verb inflection in Q’anjob’al is significant for its system of extended ergative subject marking. Intransitive verbs in aspect-marked contexts have absolutive subject markers whereas intransitive verbs in aspectless contexts have ergative subject markers. Children must distinguish between these different contexts of complementation in order to acquire person marking in Q’anjob’al successfully. Mateo Pedro shows how Q’anjob’al children acquire the different parts of the Q’anjob’al verb complex in a coordinated fashion. Readers will gain an understanding of how acquisition proceeds in a polysynthetic language and its implications for acquisition theory.”
Clifton Pye, University of Kansas
“Mateo Pedro’s study is unique in many ways. It is the most thorough study of the acquisition of inflection in a Mayan language, since most research has focused primarily on inflection in indicative clauses. Methodologically, this study is based on one of the richest longitudinal databases of child acquisition in an indigenous minority language. Lastly, Mateo Pedro's findings are meticulously tested against current theoretical models about early inflection acquisition, revealing the power of the “Right-Edge Principle” in accounting for early Mayan acquisition.”
Lourdes de León, CIESAS-Sureste, Mexico
“
The Acquisition of Inflection in Q’anjob’al Maya is an excellent example of the insights that can be gained by testing existing theoretical approaches to acquisition on less familiar languages––in this case, the rich inflectional system of Q’anjob’al. Through careful longitudinal studies of three Q’anjob’al-speaking children, Pedro Mateo Pedro combines careful empirical description and documentation with new theoretical insights. This book will be of great value to scholars in the areas of acquisition, Mayan linguistics, and experimental work on understudied languages more generally.”
Jessica Coon, McGill University
“Pedro Mateo Pedro’s important book adds to the growing body of work on L1 acquisition of Mayan languages. This careful study of the acquisition of Q'anjob'al verb inflection brings findings from a morphologically complex, split-ergative language to bear on theories of morpheme omission in early child language. Mateo Pedro shows a significant role for phonology in morpheme omission, and demonstrates that current theories based on morphological or syntactic simplification are inadequate. Clearly, many more studies of exactly this kind, on typologically diverse languages, are needed if we are to reach an understanding of how children acquire language.”
Judith Aissen, UC Santa Cruz
Cited by
Cited by 2 other publications
Mateo Pedro, Pedro
This list is based on CrossRef data as of 29 january 2021. Please note that it may not be complete. Sources presented here have been supplied by the respective publishers. Any errors therein should be reported to them.
References
References
Acuerdo Gubernativo
1046-87, Guatemalan Law.
Aksu-Koç, Ayhan & Slobin, Dan
Allen, Shanley
Babyonyshev, Maria
Bernstein Ratner, N. & Pye, Clifton
Blaha Pfeiler, Barbara & Carrillo Carreón, Carlos
Blom, Elma
Bricker, Victoria
Bromberg, Hilary Sara & Wexler, Kenneth
Brown, Penelope
2013 La estructura conversacional y la adquisición del lenguaje: El papel de la repetición en el habla de los adultos y niños tzeltales. In Nuevos senderos en el studio de la adquisición de lenguas mesoamericanas: Estructura, narrativa y socialización, Lourdes de León Pasquel (ed.), 35–82. Mexico: CIESAS.
Brown, Penelope, Pfeiler, Bárbara, de León, Lourdes & Pye, Clifton
Carrillo Carreón, Carlos
2005 La adquisición de los pronombres de referencia cruzada en el maya yacateco: Estudio de caso. MA thesis, Universidad Autónoma de Yucatán.
Clemens, L.E., Coon, Jessica, Mateo Pedro, Pedro, Morgan, Adám, Polinsky, María, Tandet, Gabrielle & Wagers, Matt
Coon, Jessica
Coon, Jessica, Mateo Pedro, Pedro & Preminger, Omer
Coon, Jessica and Mateo Pedro, Pedro
De León Pasquel, Lourdes
2013 Negritos, ánimas y tapacaminos: La emergencia de la narrativa y la socialización del narrador en la infancia tsotsil zinacanteca. In Nuevos senderos en el estudio de la adquisición de lenguas mesoamericanas, Lourdes de León Pasquel (ed.), 121–164. Mexico: Centro de Investigaciones y Estudios Superiores en Antropología Social.
De Leon, Lourdes
2001 Why Tzotzil (Mayan) children prefer verbs: The role of linguistic and cultural factors over cognitive determinants. In Research on Child Language Acquisition. Proceedings of the 8th Conference of the International Association for the Study of Child Language, Margareta Almgren, Adoni Barrena, Maria-Jose Ezeizabarrena, Itziar Idiazabal & Brian MacWhinney (eds), 947–969. Somerville MA: Cascadilla Press.
De León, Lourdes
Ud Deen, Kamil
Demuth, Katherine
2001 Prosodic constraints on morphological development. In Approaches to Bootstrapping: Phonological, Syntactic and Neurophysiological Aspects of Early Language Acquisition [Language Acquisition and Language Disorders Series 24], Jürgen Weissenborn & Barbara Höhle (eds), 3–21. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. 

Espantzay Serech, Carmelina
2006 Proceso de adquisición del Kaqchikel: Un caso de estudio. Undergraduate thesis, Universidad Rafael Landívar.
Espinosa Ochoa, Mary Rosa
Fernández Martínez, A.
Flores Vera, M.A.
Francisco Pascual, Adán
2007 Transitividad y dependencia sintáctica y discursiva en Q’anjob’al. MA thesis, Centro de Investigaciones y Estudios Superiores en Antropología Social.
Francisco Pascual, Adán, Toledo, B’alam Mateo & Zavala, Roberto
2007 Complementos en Q’anjob’al y la Unión de Cláusulas. Paper presented at the Taller de Complementación II, Guatemala, July-August 2007.
Gagliardi, Annie, Mateo Pedro, Pedro & Polinsky, Maria
2014 The acquisition of relative clauses in Q’anjob’al. Paper presented at the Third Formal Approaches to Mayan Linguistics (FAMLi3), Mexico, December 2014.
2013 The acquisition of relative clauses in Q’anjob’al Mayan. Paper presented at the 38th Boston University Conference on Language Development, Boston, November 2013.
Mueller Gathercole, Virginia C., Sebastián, Eugenia & Soto, Pilar
Hamann, Cornelia
Ingram, David & Thompson, William
Kaufman, Terrence
Martín Briceño, E.
1998 Jugar y conjugar. La flexión verbal temprana en la adquisición del maya yucateco. Un estudio de caso. Undergraduate thesis, Universidad Autónoma de Yucatán.
Martínez Pérez, Margarita
Mateo Pedro, Pedro
2010b Adquisición de la negación en Q’anjob’al. In
Proceedings of the Conference on Indigenous Languages of Latin America-IV
.
2005 The Acquisition of Inflection in Q’anjob’al. MA thesis, University of Kansas.
Mateo Pedro, Pedro, Pye, Clifton & Arcos López, Nicolás
Mateo Pedro, Pedro, Pérez Jorge, Gaspar & Alonzo Gómez, Nicolás
Mateo Pedro, Pedro, Gagliardi, Annie & Polinsky, Maria
2014 La adquisición de cláusulas relativas en Q’anjob’al. Paper presented at Form and Analysis in Mayan Linguistics (FAMLi 3), Mexico, December 2014.
Mateo Toledo, Eladio
2003 Ergatividad mixta en Q’anjob’al Maya: Un reanálisis. http://www.utexas.edu/cola/llilas/centers/cilla/qanjobal/kona.htm
Mondloch, J.L.
Mora-Marín, David F.
Pérez Vail, José Reginaldo
Pfeiler, Barbara
Pfeiler, Barbara & Carrillo Carreón, Carlos
Pfeiler, Barbara & Pye, Clifton
2013 El método comparativo: una propuesta para la investigación de la adquisición del lenguaje. In Planteamientos metodológicos interdisciplinarios, Andreas Koechert, Barbara Pfeiler, & Alexander W. Voss (eds), 23–45. Graz & Chetumal D.F., Mexico: ACPUB Academic Publishers/Universidad de Quintana Roo.
Pfeiler, Barbara & Briceño, Martín
Phillips, Colin
Pinker, Steven
Pizzuto, Elena & Chaselli, Maria
Poeppel, David & Wexler, Kenneth
Powers, Susan M.
Pye, Clifton
Pye, Clifton, Pfeiler, Barbara & Mateo Pedro, Pedro
Pye, Clifton, Pfeiler, Barbara, Mateo Pedro, Pedro & Stengel, Donald
To appear.
Mayan Language Acquisition
. In The Mayan Languages, Judith Aissen, Norca C. England, Roberto Zavala Maldonado (eds)
Pye, Clifton & Pfeiler, Barbara
Pye, Clifton, Barbara Pfeiler, & Pedro Mateo Pedro
2008 The acquisition of status suffixes in three Mayan languages. Paper presented at The Society for the Study of the Indigenous Languages of the Americas
, January 2008.
Pye, Clifton, Pfeiler, Barbara, de León, Lourdes, Brown, Penelope & Mateo Pedro, Pedro
Pye, Clifton, Ingram, David & List, Helen
Pye, Clifton, Mateo Pedro, Pedro, Pfeiler, Barbara, López Ramírez, Ana, Gutiérrez Sánchez, Pedro, Stengel, Donald & Pye, Charles
2008 Adquisición de consonantes iniciales en cinco lenguas mayas: Un análisis fonológico. In
Proceedings of the IX Encuentro Internacional de Lingüística en el Noroeste
, Hermosillo, Mexico.
Pye, Clifton & Mateo Pedro, Pedro
2006 Estudio comparativo de la adquisición del sistema ergativo en dos lenguas mayas.
Proceedings of the II Congreso de Idiomas Indígenas de Latinoamérica
.
Pye, Clifton & Quixtan Poz, Pedro
Raymundo González, S., Francisco, Adán, Mateo Toledo, B’alam & Mateo Pedro, Pedro
Rice, Mabel L., Wexler, Kenneth & Cleave, Patricia L.
Rizzi, Luigi
Robertson, John S.
Ross Montejo, Benicio Antonio & Delgado Rojas, Edna Patricia
Salustri, Manola & Hyams, Nina
Schütze, Carson T.
Schütze, Carson T. & Wexler, Kenneth
Shneidman, Laura Ann
Shneidman, Laura Ann & Goldin-Meadow, Susan
Song, Jae Yung, Sundara, Megha, & Demuth, Katherine
Straight, Stephen H.
Stromswold, Karin
Stross, Brian
UNESCO
2009 Atlas of the World’s Language in Danger. http://www.unesco.org/culture/ich/index.php?pg=00139 24 February 2009.
Vázquez Sánchez, Bernabé & de León Pasquel, Lourdes
2013 La amenza: Análisis de una práctica discursive de socialización infantile en una comunidad maya ch’ol de Tumbalá, Chiapas. In Nuevos senderos en el estudio de la adquisición de lenguas mesoamericanas, Lourdes de León Pasquel (ed.), 165–211. Mexico: Centro de Investigaciones y Estudios Superiores en Antropología Social.
Weverink, Meike
Wexler, Kenneth
Subjects
Linguistics
BIC Subject: CFK – Grammar, syntax
BISAC Subject: LAN009000 – LANGUAGE ARTS & DISCIPLINES / Linguistics / General