Identifying meaningful elements Summary

We have discussed three types of reasoning that can be used to identify the meaningful elements of an utterance (whether parts of a word or words in a sentence): minimal contrast, recurring partials, and pattern matching. In practice, when working on a new body of data, we often use all three at once, without stopping to think which method we use for which element. Sometimes, however, it is important to be able to state explicitly the pattern of reasoning which we use to arrive at certain conclusions. For example, suppose that one of our early hypotheses about the language is contradicted by further data. We need to be able to go back and determine what evidence that hypothesis was based on so that we can re-evaluate that evidence in the light of additional information. This will help us to decide whether the hypothesis can be modified to account for all the facts, or whether it needs to be abandoned entirely. Grammatical analysis involves an endless process of “guess and check”–forming hypotheses, testing them against further data, and modifying or abandoning those which do not work.

Using the methods of recurring partials and minimal contrast, we have identified the following meaningful elements in the Isthmus Zapotec examples:

(11) ñee             ‘foot’                   ka–       (plural marker)

        ʒigi              ‘chin’                 –be      ‘his’

        ʒike             ‘shoulder’         –luʔ      ‘your(sg)’

                                                    –tu        ‘your(pl)’

                                                    –du        ‘ou

In predicting the existence of a word kañeeluʔ, which should mean ‘your feet,’ we also made use of a hypothesis about how these elements combine with each other; but we did not explicitly state this hypothesis. That is, we have not yet tried to define the order of elements in a Zapotec word. In Representing word structure and Analyzing position classes we will introduce a way of representing this kind of information.

اخر الاخبار

اخبار العتبة العباسية المقدسة

شعبة الشهداء والجرحى تباشر مرحلة التدقيق الشامل لأكثر من 10 آلاف إضبارة مؤرشفة

قسم الشؤون الفكرية يصدر كتابًا تخصصيًّا في إعراب الصحيفة السجادية وبيانها

أكاديمية التطوير الإداري تنظم ورشة عن الإتيكيت الوظيفي لطلبتها

سماحة السيد الصافي يزور معهد الكفيل للنطق والتأهيل المدرسي ويشيد بالدور الإنساني والتربوي لملاكاته

المزيد

الآخبار الصحية

العلاج بالماء البارد.. باحثون يكشفون فوائده الصحية

من دون صالة رياضية.. عادة بسيطة لتحسين الصحة وخسارة الوزن

لصحة القلب وتفادي السرطان.. استهلك هذا النوع من الطعام

دراسة تحذر من خطر شرب القهوة في أكواب البلاستيك

المزيد

الآخبار التكنلوجية

إنجاز طبي تاريخي.. جراحة قلب بلا شق في الصدر

اليابان.. مراحيض توفر فحص للحالة الصحية عبر "تحليل البراز" !

اختراق واسع لمنصة "إنستغرام".. ونشر بيانات على "الدارك ويب"

علماء يحذرون: هكذا سيفنى كوكب الأرض

المزيد

مواضيع ذات صلة

Anaphora vs. deixis

Grammatical case vs. semantic case

Semantic roles and Grammatical Relations Conclusion

Arguments and semantic roles

Semantic roles and Grammatical Relations

Constituency

Identifying meaningful elements within words

Identifying meaningful elements Identifying word meanings

Consequences of modifying Gunlogsons 2001 model

A case study of the semantics of clear - Factivity revisited

A case study of the semantics of clear - The analysis

A case study of the semantics of clear - Vagueness