knows that in every language “good” is an adjective, since it describes a state’. This person simply hadn’t mastered the basic principles of linguistic analysis.
It does appear that every language has open classes of words which can be felicitously named noun, verb, and adjective, although the defining crite- ria vary between languages, as do their full semantic and functional ranges. (These topics are discussed in detail in Chapters 11 and 12 of Volume 2.) Most languages have complement clauses, which can substitute for an NP in object slot. (Compare English I know [the truth about Mary]o, with an NP as O (transitive object) argument, and I know [that Mary is a secret agent]o, with a complement clause in this slot.) But, as described in Chapter18, some languages lack complement clauses per se, instead utilizing a variety of other construction types as ‘complementation strategies’.
Just as with word classes, one must be careful to analyse construction types on the basis of internal criteria for the language under study. I read one grammar recently where a range of quite different construction types were all labelled ‘complement clauses’. This was puzzling until I realized that they were all the translation equivalents into the language of complement clauses in German, the native language of the author of the grammar. A complement clause construction in one language is not necessarily translated by a comple- ment clause construction in another; this part of that grammar is thus deeply flawed.
What a linguist must avoid is translating the sentences of some exotic language into English or French or Spanish or German or Chinese, and then analysing the translations. These translations are simply an aid to understand- ing. In every aspect of grammatical work, analytic decisions must be made within the language under study, based on criteria internal to the system of the language.
1.9 Grammar and meaning
The world teems with a myriad of contrasts and distinctions, but a grammar provides a rather limited scheme of organization. The consequence is that one system in a grammar may be used simultaneously to represent a number of distinct contrasts of meaning. This can be illustrated by noun classes in Dyirbal, and then by complement clauses in English.
Every noun in Dyirbal belongs to one of four noun classes (or genders), marked by an article-like determiner. According rough labels to the classes, the determiners are—in absolutive case form—bayi masculine, balan femi- nine, balam edible plants, and bala neuter. The first step is to establish the
Table 1.3. Examples of noun class membership in Dyirbal
class I, bayi class II, balan class III, balam class IV, bala men women parts of the body kangaroos, dingo meat
possums
most fishes some fishes some birds most birds moon sun, stars
storms, rainbow wind anything connected stones, mud
with fire or water
some spears some spears some spears some trees all edible fruit most trees and vines
and vegetables with no edible parts fighting ground place, hill
noun classes, and which class each individual noun belongs to; the criterion here—internal to the grammar—involves co-occurrence with a determiner. On completing this step, we can study the membership of the four classes, as summarized in Table1.3.
Class III is fairly straightforward—non-flesh foodstuffs. Membership of the other three classes appears quite heterogeneous—most animals and fishes are in class I but some are in class II; most birds in class II but some are in class I; some spears in class I, some are in class II and others in class IV; most trees with non-edible parts are in class IV but some are in class II; and so on. The idea occurs that perhaps there is no overall general principle to class membership. But this would mean that a child would have to learn the class of each noun on an individual basis, like a cipher. Languages do not work in this way. There is a semantic basis to each part of every grammar. (There may well be some exceptions, irregularities that have to be learnt one by one, but these are always a fairly minor encumbrance.)
The key to solving this puzzle consists in not commencing with the mem- bership of each noun class and trying to see what is common to the list (in fact, nothing is). The alternative—and rewarding—course of action is to begin with examination of semantic distinctions in the world, and cultural perceptions of the language community, and see how these are mapped onto the grammatical category of noun classes.
The principles of noun class assignment in Dyirbal can largely be explained in terms of (a) certain basic concepts associated with the classes; and (b) two culturally motivated rules for transferring class membership.
1.9 grammar and meaning 29 The basic concepts associated with the classes are:
Class I (determiner bayi): animateness; (human) masculinity Class II (determiner balan): (human) femininity; water; fire; fighting Class III (determiner balam): non-flesh food
Class IV (determiner bala): none (this is a residue class, available for everything else)
The first transfer rule is: if some noun has characteristic X, on the basis of which its noun class membership would be expected to be decided, but has— through belief or legend—some association with characteristic Y, then it will belong to the noun class corresponding to Y (rather than that corresponding to X).
Humans are always specified for sex; other animate beings are not. Thus all (nouns referring to) human males (for example ‘boy’, ‘Aboriginal doctor’) are class I, and all human females are class II. Animals and fishes are prototypically class I, by virtue of their animacy. However, birds are believed to be the spirits of dead human females and are, by the transfer rule, class II. Certain birds are excepted from this (and are not included under the generic term balan dundu ‘bird’). These birds have, as individuals rather than as a class, a role in dreamtime creation legends: thus the three species of willy wagtail are believed to be men, and are class I. The spangled drongo is in legend the bringer of fire (from the clutches of the rainbow-snake); fire is in class II and so is this bird. And similarly in half a dozen other instances.
Anything connected with water and fire (including light and the stars) is in class II. But the moon and sun are, in legend, believed to be husband and wife. By the transfer rule, the moon is class I, for masculine, and the sun class II, for feminine. Wind, having none of the characteristics ‘animateness’, ‘fire’, ‘water’, or ‘fighting’, is in the residue class, IV. But storms and the rainbow are men in legend, and are thus class I.
Things concerned with fighting are, as a rule, class II—most fighting imple- ments and the fighting ground itself. Thus fighting spears (which are also used for hunting game such as kangaroos) are class II. But multi-pronged spears, used solely for spearing fish, are (like fishing lines) in class I, the same class as fish. And big short spears—used for neither fighting nor fishing—are, like the sticks used for digging up yams, class IV.
The second transfer rule is: if a subset of a set of nouns has some particular important property which the rest of the set does not have, then the subset may be assigned to a different noun class from the rest of the set, to mark this property. The property is most often ‘harmfulness’.
Fishes are generally class I, but two particularly dangerous fishes (which can harm a bather), the stone fish and the toad fish, are—by the second rule—in
class II (note that these fishes are not included under the generic term bayi jabu ‘fish’). Trees, bushes, and vines with no edible parts are in class IV, except for two harmful plants, the stinging tree and the stinging nettle vine, which are in class II. In each of these instances, the harmful subset is in class II, whereas the rest of the set is in class I (for fishes) or class IV (for plants). Most birds are in class II; however, hawks—the only birds which eat other birds—are, by the second rule, in class I.
This account has listed only some of the nouns involved; similar explana- tions apply to others. The class-concept correspondences and the two rules do provide a simple and efficient explanation for the general organization of Dyirbal nouns into the four noun classes. There are, however, some assign- ments which are at present without explanation (for example, why is dingo in class II?). This is what might be expected. For any part of a grammar, it is generally possible to provide a principled semantic explanation for the way it is; but there are usually just a few points for which explanation is lacking (irregularities, or exceptions). These may be items which originally had a semantic basis, but then lost this as the language evolved. Future change is likely to eliminate the irregularities, producing a more rational system. (But, just as some regularities are being normalized, others are likely to be evolving. Since a language is always in a state of change, it is never likely to completely tidy up the semantic rationale underlying its grammar.)
We can now consider complement clauses in English. There are four basic types, one marked by clause-initial that, one by -ing on the complement clause verb, and a couple by to before the verb. They are illustrated in
(3) Mary remembered [that she had fed the cat] (4) Mary remembered [feeding the cat]
(5) Mary remembered [to feed the cat] (6) Mary remembered [the cat to be greedy]
Each complement clause has a distinctive meaning, as can be seen from (3–6). A that clause, as in (3), refers to an activity or event as a single unit, without any reference to its internal composition or time duration. In con- trast, aning clause, as in (4) refers to an activity as extended in time, relating to the way in which it unfolds. In (3), Mary just remembers the fact of feeding the cat; in (4) she recalls the details of this—opening the packet of cat food, emptying it onto the dish, spilling some on the floor, and so on.
Sentence (5) is an instance of a Modal to complement clause, referring to someone becoming involved in the activity; it has a similar meaning to athat clause which includes a modal (here, Mary remembered that she should feed the cat). In a Modalto construction, main and complement clauses can have
1.9 grammar and meaning 31
Table 1.4. Sample of verbs taking the four main types of complement clause in English
that ing Modalto Judgementto admire admire forget consider assume consider hate forget consider dislike know imagine dislike enjoy learn know forget favour like learn hate forget love remember imagine hate remember
know imagine learn like like love love remember remember suppose
different subjects, with that of the complement clause then being introduced by for (for example, His mother remembered for John to fill in the entry form). A quite different type of complement clause, a Judgement to type, is illustrated in (6); here the subject of the main clause offers a judgement concerning the subject of the complement clause (these must be different); no for can be included in a Judgementto clause.
The next step is to list the verbs which take each of the four varieties of complement clause. The full lists would each run to several hundred items; a sample is provided in Table1.4. Some verbs occur in all four columns of Table 1.4, some just in three or two or one column. Just looking down each column, there is no one feature common to all verbs in the list. This is the same conclusion we reached on looking down the lists of members of the noun classes in Dyirbal, in Table 1.3. If one tries to look for a link between these grammatical properties and the semantics of their members and approaches this from the grammatical side, nothing emerges. The revealing course, as with Dyirbal noun classes, is to start by considering the meanings of verbs and see how these are mapped onto the grammar, with respect to the meanings of complement clauses.
As described in §1.11, the words in the lexicon of a language naturally fall into a number of sets, which can be called ‘semantic types’. All the words in each type have a common element of meaning, and they all share certain grammatical properties. The sample of verbs in Table 1.4 comes from two semantic types associated with the verb class,thinking and liking. We can
first consider thethinking type. There are a number of subtypes, each with slightly different meanings and complement clause possibilities.
thinking type
(a) Verbs which refer to someone’s mind just focusing on some person, thing, state, or happening; they include consider ‘think about some actual or possible state of affairs (and its consequences)’ and imagine ‘think of something as if it were true’. Verbs in this subtype takethat, ing, and Judgement to complement clauses; for example, I imagined [that Mary won the prize], I imagined [Mary’s winning the prize], I hadn’t imagined [Mary to be so clever].
(b) Where there is some doubt as to whether what is being thought about is true. Verbs include assume, suppose; they only take athat complement. (c) Where someone has in mind, or tries to get in mind, something about the past. Verbs include remember and forget, accepting all four varieties of complement clause.
(d) Where someone is aware of some fact, or body of information, or method of doing something. Verbs include know and learn, tak- ing that, Judgement to, and Modal to (but not ing) complement clauses.
It will be seen that all verbs in the thinking type occur with a that complement clause; the subtypes vary as to which (if any) other types of complement clause they take.
liking type
All verbs in this type may occur with aning complement clause referring to some habitual or durative activity. Some verbs may also take athat clause referring to the fact that something happens. A smaller group may also take a Modalto clause, referring to the potentiality of something happening. It is hard to draw firm distinctions within this type (as was done forthinking verbs). We can roughly distinguish three sets:
(a) Verbs with the most general meanings—including like, love, and hate— which can take that, ing, and Modal to complement clauses. For example:
(7) Mary likes (it) [that John plays the clarinet] (8) Mary likes [John(’s) playing the clarinet] (9) Mary likes [John to play the clarinet]
1.9 grammar and meaning 33
Table 1.5. Complement clauses co-occurring with a selection of thinking and lik- ing verbs
that ing Modalto Judgementto thinking type
(a) consider, imagine – (b) assume, suppose – – – (c) remember, forget (d) know, learn – liking type
(a) like, love, hate – (b) dislike, admire – – (c) enjoy, favour – – –
Sentence (7) could be used if Mary thinks every boy should play an instrument, (8) if she likes listening to him play it, and (9) if she is pleased for him to play it because it takes his attention away from video games.
(b) Verbs—such as dislike and admire—which have a slightly more restricted sense and would not generally be used to refer to some poten- tiality of action. They can be used with that and ing complement clauses but scarcely with the Modalto variety; a sentence such as∗I dislike [John to play the clarinet] is not felicitous.
(c) Verbs—including enjoy and favour—which relate to an unfolding activ- ity and are basically restricted to aning complement clause.
The complement-clause-taking possibilities of these thinking and liking verbs are set out in Table 1.5. This array codifies—and our discussion explains—what verbs (with which meanings) occur with what complement types (with which meaning). There are, as may have been noticed, further matters of detail. For example,liking verbs often take it before a that clause. Tables1.4 and 1.5 have dealt with a small selection of those verbs which take complement clauses in English. Others come from the semantic typesatten- tion (verbs such as see and hear), deciding, speaking, annoying, acting, happening, comparing, relating, beginning, trying, hurrying, daring, wanting, postponing, making, helping, seem, and matter. (A full account is in Dixon2005a.) But this sample well illustrates what is involved, and the way in which explanation can be provided for the lists in Table1.4.
Each of these illustrations shows how a large number of meaning con- trasts are mapped onto a restricted set of grammatical choices. The four noun classes in Dyirbal code masculine/feminine, animate/inanimate, edible/ inedible, flesh/non-flesh food, harmful/non-harmful, whether something is
related to fighting, and all manner of cultural associations. The four main varieties of complement clauses in English relate to differences of meaning across a score of distinct semantic types of verbs. For example, compare the meaning difference between I like [to eat mangoes] (but scarcely ever get the opportunity) and I like [eating mangoes] (and indulge in this to excess), and that between I tried [to play the piano] (but couldn’t get the hang of it at all) and I tried [playing the piano] (for a couple of years, but then decided I had better things to do with my time).
It is appropriate to summarize the story thus far.
1. The communication of meaning is the main reason for the existence of language. Describing and explaining how meaning is encoded in lan- guage is the prime task of linguistics.
2. Different languages express meanings—within their grammars and lexicons—in different ways. One cannot, from the meaning of a word, say what its grammatical status is in any language.
3. A grammar is an integrated system in which every part ‘holds together’ with every other part. The statement of a grammar is a product of analy- sis (not something god-given, which can be uniquely discovered) and each analytic decision must be justified by explicit criteria internal to the grammar. The hallmark of a good linguist lies in considering alternative solutions to a problem, assessing the pros and cons of each, and deciding which is the most appropriate solution for a particular purpose. (Other views of ‘linguistic analysis’ are discussed in Chapter4.)
4. Once the grammar has been constructed, the meanings associated with its categories and construction types are investigated. In many instances, a variety of diverse meaning distinctions are coded into a single gram- matical category. Regarded from within the grammar, the meaning basis of a grammatical construct will not be evident. Looked at from the outside, it can be perceived how a number of different types of meaning contrasts are superimposed on a single system in the grammar.
In essence, a grammar is an abstract system of interlocking elements. However, it must be mapped onto what is often called ‘surface syntax’—a sequence of sentences, each made up of clauses, in turn made up of phrases, these being made up of words, which may be made up of morphemes, each with a phonological form, which has phonetic realization. These constituents must, perforce, be pronounced in a certain order. But this is simply the realization of an underlying set of relations. It is the underlying relations themselves which reveal the basic working of the grammar, and it is this which must be the prime object of study for linguists. The following section explains the underlying