This chapter deals with the types of arguments and modifiers there are in the distribution of reference phrases in both English and Mandinka. It demonstrates how grammatical modifiers such as determiners, quantifiers, negation and adjectival modifiers are used to modify reference phrases in the two languages. It also captures the occurrence of some modifiers (e.g. relative clauses) and clausal arguments at the complex RP level.
1.1. RP Operators
The RP operators include both grammatical and lexical modifiers; they are used with nouns to contribute to their semantic interpretations. Following Van Valin and Lapolla (1997), the RP operators subsume determiners (articles, demonstratives and deitics), quantifiers, negation and adjectival modifiers (p. 56).
1.1.1. Determiners
The use of determiners with nouns in a grammar of operation is given meticulous analyses inasmuch as these provide additional information that modifies the meaning expressed by bare nouns. Determiners can modify the semantic contents of nouns in various ways depending on the type of modifier a bare noun appears with. Then, to see more clearly the use of determiners with nouns in the two languages, let us start our analysis by articles.
Articles are generally divided into two different types: the definite and indefinite articles.
Depending on the particularities of languages, articles are used in different ways in the layered structure of the RP so as to give some semantic contributions. The following examples taken from English and Mandinka will tell us more:
(22) a. The man DEF kee Keó
b. A man INDEF kee
Kee c. Mus-óo woman-DEF The woman
d. Musu
woman A woman
As we can see from the examples above, English uses both the definite article the and the indefinite article a (or an when used before a vowel sound) in the RP initial position; this position of articles in the layered structure of the English reference phrase is of prime importance because if this changes, it affects the meaning of the latter. For example, it will be meaningless and ungrammatical to put in this language something like ⃰man the, ⃰manthe, ⃰mana, ⃰man a. The position of the operators the and a plays an important role in their interpretations vis-à-vis their head nouns. This shows the significance of the interaction that exists between syntax and semantics in the creation of meaningful constructions.
In (22a), the definite article the is used to give to the reference phrase a semantic modification that gives the hearer an understanding that is different from that given by the bare noun man. The operator the indicates that the referent of the noun man the utterance is about is known by the addressee; this meaning cannot be conveyed by the noun on its own. The absence of the modifier does not render the phrase meaningless but when it is used it does give another orientation in terms of interpretation. One should bear in mind that through the use of the English modifier the, we generally understand that the element that is talked about has a referent that is specified or known. In this way, there is the expression of uniqueness in the speaker‟s or addressee‟s mind.
As far as a (or an before a vowel sound) is concerned, it gives another semantic modification to the reference phrase. In this connection, let us analyze the use of this operator in (22b). With this example, the article a is used to give another understanding of what the word man refers to. The modification brought by a is that the choice is open, so to paraphrase
Adamczewski and Gabilan (1992), who put that with the use of a, the choice is made among other choices, meaning no one knows the exact referent of the noun it is used with; the idea that is presented is that this is about one element that is not specified (p. 110).
Another semantic contribution that is given by a in a man is that the noun man is countable, a man refers to one man not more, which also gives another piece of information in the interpretation of the utterance. The same modifier can also be used with a noun to present new information. For example, a man can be used in an utterance when it is presented to the addressee for the first time. Then, after the first introduction of the utterance with the modifier a, the second one within the same context appears with the definite article the to indicate that that piece of information is already known by the addressee.
Since there are different classes of nouns, we also see it very important to deal with the case of English proper nouns with the articles the and a. Including the names of people, places and even objects, English proper nouns “do not normally26 take a preceding determiner or modifying element (*the Jack, *a Sarah), nor a plural ending (*the Janets)” (Aarts, 2001, p. 30).
This is explained by the fact that a proper noun generally refers to a referent that is already known by the participants in a particular context of discourse. Aarts writes that if proper nouns are called Referring Expressions, it is “because when they are uttered in a particular context, they uniquely refer to one individual (or place or object) in the world of discourse”.27
Contrary to English, the modification of Mandinka reference phrases by the use of articles conventionally occurs in two forms. Among these forms, there is one that can play functions that can be compared to those conveyed by both the English articles the and a depending on the context in which an utterance is produced. For example, in (22c), the noun Musóo “the woman or a woman” appears with the -o suffix form, whereas this is missing from (22d) where there is the realization of Musu “woman” that represents a bare noun. The -o suffix in Musóo may give to this noun a modification that plays an important role in the interpretation of the meaning of the utterance. With the presence of the -o suffix, the Mandinka noun Musóo can be grasped as either the woman, a woman or simply woman. Then, there is no fixed rule that can tell us which specific interpretation to give to this. The most important thing that can help one decide is the context in
26 The word “normally” is used here because the author has specified that in certain circumstances, this is possible.
which this occurs. In Mandinka, when a bare noun ends in long vowels like aa and oo, it is the accent pattern that shows whether this is specified or not.
It is a little bit confusing to deal with the o suffix in (22c) while Musóo ends in double -oo; the question that arises here is where does the other -o come from? It is important to specify that when a Mandinka bare noun ends in a short vowel, the -o suffix becomes -oo as we can see in the examples below:
(23) a. i + o falí “donkey” + o → falóo b. u + o bulu “arm” + o → bulóo c. a + o kaba “bottle” + o → kabóo d. e + o kelé “fight” + o → kélóo
In Mandinka, when a bare noun ends in ŋ, you simply add the -o suffix to this. For example, this is the case in:
(24) a. siŋ “foot” + o → siŋo b. kuŋ “head” + o → kuŋo c. saŋ “sky” + o → saŋo d. kúlúŋ “boat” + o → kúlúŋo
When a bare noun ends in one of the following long vowels: ee, ii, uu, aa, the -o suffix form becomes respectively -eo, -io, -uo, -aa, as is illustrated in the examples below:
(25) a. kée “man” + o → kéo/kewó b. nii “soul” + o → nio/niyó c. suu “horse” + o → sùo/suwó d. kaccaa “talk” + o → kaccaa
Following Creissels and Sambou (2013), one should notice that bare nouns ended in short vowels combine with the -o suffix to give specified forms whose final part is -oo, whereas the distinction between bare nouns ended in long vowels is not affected by the affixing of the determination marker (p.173). With stem forms ended in long vowels such as -aa and -oo, one should be aware of the fact that the bare noun is not distinguished from the specified form; in this case, the only clue that helps to know whether a noun is modified by the -o suffix or not is the syllable final tone. In such a situation, one is at least sure of the direct correspondence of the Mandinka specifier to the English noun phrase modifier the without relying on the context.
(26) a. baa goat b. báa the goat c. doo job d. dóo the job
Now let us turn to the bare noun itself, another form that is also worth analyzing. In Mandinka, it is very rare to see a bare noun occurring on its own. The context in which this is possible is when the noun is used as the name of a person. For example, you can put Musu
“woman” as a name you use to address somebody or to put the emphasis on the character of a person or that of an animal in animal stories, so to paraphrase (Rowlands, 1959, p. 37).
In this language, proper nouns usually behave like bare nouns; they do not appear with the so-called -o suffix definite article marker. If Mandinka proper nouns cannot be modified by the -o suffix, it is because they give semantic contents whose referents the participants are already aware of in the real world. Following Creissels and Sambou (2013), an occurrence that would affect the meaning of Mandinka proper nouns is related to the pitch that is put on the final syllable (p. 48).
One should remember that contrary to English that clearly makes the distinction between the two types of operators at the simple reference phrase level (the definite and indefinite articles), Mandinka mainly uses an -o suffix that can coincide either with the English modifiers the or a depending upon the context in which the utterance occurs. In English, the RP modifiers the and a are used to express definiteness and indefiniteness, respectively. In Mandinka, whether the noun taking the -o suffix receives a definite interpretation or an indefinite reading depends on
the context of communication. Since there are many types of determiners in particular languages, let us now deal with the case of demonstratives RRG looks upon as another type of RP operators.
Diessel (1999) puts that demonstratives are place or spatial deictics that show the relative distance of an object, location or person vis-à-vis the deictic center (p. 36).28 He distinguishes
“two demonstratives that are deictically contrastive: a proximal demonstrative referring to an entity near the deictic center and a distal demonstrative denoting a referent that is located at some distance to the deictic center”.29 Then, English and Mandinka have demonstratives that are used, at the reference phrase level, to serve some specific syntactic and pragmatic functions while characterized by specific semantic features. Both English and Mandinka make a two-way distinction between demonstratives.
English demonstratives are this, that, these, those. Each of these demonstratives is used at the reference phrase level to convey some information that modifies the semantic content of the utterance to some extent.
(27) a. This book Ñíŋ kitaabu
Ñíŋ kitaabóo b. That house wo súu Wo súwo
c. These teacher-s ñíŋ.PL karandirilaa-PLM Ñíŋ karandirilaalu d. Those car-s wo.PL moto-PLM Wo motóolu
28 He defines the deictic center as being usually associated with the location of the speaker.
29Ibid., 2
In (27 a, b, c and d), we can see that English uses all its four types of demonstratives in the RP-initial position. It is ungrammatical to say, in this language, something like *book this,
*house that, *teachers these or *cars those. This ungrammaticality is caused by the fact that English demonstratives cannot be put in the RP final position, and if this happens, they fail to play their functions. For example, in *book this, one can understand the semantics of book on its own but it is very difficult to construe the sense of the demonstrative this that is put in the final position of the phrase. Accordingly, the position of demonstratives is crucial in the interpretation of the English RPs so to agree with Van Valin and Lapolla (1997), who write that, in English, when demonstratives “occur as NP modifiers, they occur in the NP-initial position” (p. 62).
The modifier this in (27a) indicates that the referent book is near the reference point30, this means that it locates the book in a place that is not far from the speaker in terms of space or time.
This book can be contrasted with That house in (27b) that appears with another semantic modification. As far as That in (27b) is concerned, it locates the referent house in a different place if we compare it to the element book that is preceded by this in (27a). That shows that the referent house is far from the interlocutor in terms of space or time. What is interesting about this linguistic phenomenon is that with the use of the English operators This and That, the two RPs This book and That house have different interpretations vis-à-vis the reference point.
Examples (27c and d) containing the demonstratives these and those are nothing else than the derivative forms of this and that, respectively. Being the plural forms of the latter, there is no semantic difference between them in terms of location. This means that this refers to a referent that is near the reference point and these refers to referents that are near the reference point as well. That indicates that the referent is far from the reference point and those shows that the referents are far from the reference point too. In fact, if the operators these and those are used in the RP initial position instead of this and that, the difference is at the level of the number that specifies that there is more than one referent. In English, this change in the choice of operators is what triggers the suffixation of an -s at the end of the coreR.
Another notion that seems to be conveyed by demonstratives is that of definiteness even if we should pinpoint that Van Valin and Lapolla consider articles as being “pure operators inside
the core, while (adnominal) demonstratives are treated as independent pronouns31 that may „occur as NP modifier‟ outside the core”.32 We have shown earlier that the English indefinite article a is used with a noun to present new information and that when it comes to re-using that piece of information within the same speech, the operation is done with the use of the definite article the.
This process seems to be the same as that that occurs between this and that, hence there is an indication of the speaker‟s assumption about the identifiability of the referent by the hearer.
Like English, Mandinka also uses two main demonstratives ñíŋ and wo with respectively their plural forms ñinnu and wolú that are used in interesting and contrastive ways vis-à-vis their English counterparts.
(28) a. Ñíŋ kuf-ôo DEM bag-DEF
This bag b. Wo jat-óo
that lion-DEF That lion c. Ñin-nu this-PLM These ones d. Wo-lú
that-PLM
Those ones
Mandinka uses its demonstratives ñíŋ and wo in the RP-initial position. In doing so, they are used to modify the RP as a whole. Dramé (1981) demonstrates that ñíŋ “this” is used to indicate closeness to the speaker, whereas wo “that” is used to indicate remoteness from the speaker (p. 32). In RRG terms, we will go further by putting that ñíŋ shows that the referent it is used with is near the reference point, whereas wo indicates that the referent is located at some
31 Van Valin and Lapolla opine that demonstratives are pronominal in nature and this is the reason why, here in this thesis, we are not interested in their different types (adnominal demonstratives and pronominal demonstratives).
32 Ibid.
distance from the reference point. In this sense, ñíŋ and wo play similar roles as their English counterparts this and that.
Both in Ñíŋ kufôo in (28a) and Wo jatóo in (28b), the operators Ñíŋ and Wo express the location of the referents vis-à-vis the reference points. In doing so, there is an interaction between syntax and semantics. For instance, if one puts something like kufôo ñíŋ and *jatóo wo, the former gives another meaning, whereas the latter becomes meaningless. The difference in interpretation found in kufôo ñíŋ and the ungrammaticality presented in *jatóo wo are explained by the fact that, like English, Mandinka demonstratives ñíŋ and wo occur in the RP initial position and not in its final position.
If ñíŋ is put at the RP-initial position, it still functions as a determiner but with a different meaning according to Creissels and Sambou (2013), who explain that muróo ñíŋ means “the knife in question” (p. 194). In this sense, they capture ñíŋ as an anaphoric determiner. In this manner, it is important to keep in mind that if the Mandinka demonstrative ñíŋ is put at the RP-final position, it means something like “is about” or “in question”; as such, it helps place a kind of emphasis or focus on the noun it follows.
In Mandinka, the demonstratives ñíŋ and wo usually co-occur with the -o suffix within the same RP. The -o suffix is put at the end of the core noun and not at the end of the demonstrative itself. This phenomenon can be seen in ñíŋ kuf-ôo “*this bag the” and wo jatóo “*that lion the”, something that is impossible in the English language. Being in the framework of an RP, demonstratives never take the so called definite article -o or the Mandinka plural marker -lu as is attested by the ungrammaticality of the following data:
(29) a. *Ñíŋ-o / wo-o fal-óo This-DEF/ that-DEF donkey-DEF *This the / that the donkey b. *Ñǐn-nu / wo-lu fal-óo-lu This-PLM / that-PLM donkey-DEF-PLM These/those donkeys
A case in which ñíŋ and wo take the plural marker -lu is when they occur alone, meaning when they do not co-occur with any head noun. This is what is shown in (28c and d). We should
specify that this occurrence is possible with the plural marker -lu but as far as the -o suffix is concerned, it cannot be added to neither the demonstrative ñíŋ nor wo in such a use. Not only can ñinnu and wolu stand alone but each one of them can also be used as subject within a core.
Whether they are used within a core, in an RP or alone, what is interesting to bear in mind is that ñinnu and wolu indicate respectively referents that are located near the interlocutor and those that are located at some distance from the “deictic center”.
In a nutshell, let us say that English and Mandinka have two deictically contrastive demonstratives that can both be put in the plural form. The difference is that Mandinka demonstratives can be pluralized if and only if they do not co-occur with a coreR; when the latter is present, it has the property of taking the plural marker -lu that is always preceded by the -o suffix. Mandinka demonstratives co-occur with the so-called definite article marker, the -o suffix placed at the end of the head noun, whereas English does not allow this to its articles a and the with its demonstratives. The two languages use their demonstratives in the RP-initial position
In a nutshell, let us say that English and Mandinka have two deictically contrastive demonstratives that can both be put in the plural form. The difference is that Mandinka demonstratives can be pluralized if and only if they do not co-occur with a coreR; when the latter is present, it has the property of taking the plural marker -lu that is always preceded by the -o suffix. Mandinka demonstratives co-occur with the so-called definite article marker, the -o suffix placed at the end of the head noun, whereas English does not allow this to its articles a and the with its demonstratives. The two languages use their demonstratives in the RP-initial position