Está en la página 1de 11

Tense and temporal expressions in Papua New Guinea: a contrastive study*

Masahiko Nose (nousemasa@gmail.com) Reitaku University, Japan Abstract This study investigates temporal usages and meanings in four typologically and genealogically distinct languages spoken in Papua New Guinea: Amele, Manambu, Jabm, and Tok Pisin. This study focuses on the temporal expressions, specifically tenses and several temporal relations, in these languages and examines their functional characteristics. The tenses and temporal expressions observed in these languages vary widely and range morphologically from simple to complex. These variations suggest that each language has its own viewpoint of temporal concepts. Nevertheless, the languages usages and functional motivations can be subsumed within the limits of typological variation. Key words: tense, temporal expressions, grammatical complexity, Papua New Guinea 1. Introduction This study contrasts four typologically and genealogically different languages spoken in Papua New Guinea: Amele, Jabm, Manambu, and Tok Pisin. It clarifies temporal usages and meanings in these languages, specifically tenses and several temporal relations, and examines the characteristics of temporal expressions. Dailymail reports that according to the large-scale scientific research in Amazonia directed by Chris Sinha, a professor at the University of Portsmouth, The Amondawa people of Brazil do not even have words for 'time,' 'week,' 'month,' or 'year.' Similarly, Nose (2011) points out that the Amele of Papua New Guinea do not have calendar-based temporal expressions, such as oclock, minute, or Monday, and have borrowed such words from Tok Pisin. Thus, although the concepts of time and temporal expressions have been considered essential in various grammars, it is necessary to examine their language possibilities and limitations. This study focuses on verb- and noun-based forms including temporal adverbs; tenses (past, present, and future) and temporal expressions such as at noon, until tomorrow, or yesterday. Tenses are basically related to verb inflections, and temporal relations (i.e., temporal adverbs) are regarded as peripherals of syntax. Temporal relations are either constructed from nouns and grammatical morphemes (prepositions, postpositions, or cases) such as at noon and 6 ji-kara (from six oclock in Japanese) or expressed lexically such as shang4 zhou1 (last week in Chinese). Particularly, this study classifies the noun-based forms in varied semantic types: temporal inessive, preessive, postessive, and perlative meanings. Alternately, the study excludes the examination of aspects (perfective and imperfective) and temporal clauses such as when I was a child or after he went to Europe. By comparing the grammatical ratios between verb- and noun-based forms, this study discusses tenses and temporal expressions in terms of grammatical complexities (cf. McWhorter 2001). Moreover, this study distinguishes tenses from temporal relations in terms of cultural and functional views. It concludes that tenses and temporal expressions vary widely among the four sample languages and range morphologically from simple to complex; nevertheless, their usages and functional motivations can be subsumed within the limits of typological variation. 2. Languages in New Guinea and research method An overview of the worlds languages shows diverse distributions from location to location, dense in one area while sparse in another. New Guinea Island is one of the dense areas that has

around 1,000 indigenous languages, as shown in Figure 1.

Figure 1: Language distribution in New Guinea Island, generated by WALS language viewer The languages spoken on this Island can be classified into three types: The first type is called Papuan or New Guinea languages that are the oldest languages dating back approximately 30,00050,000 years. The languages falling under type are different from one another, and their grammars and lexicon vary from place to place. The second type is the Austronesian languages, spoken along the coastal area of New Guinea Island and in the neighboring islands of New Britain, New Ireland, and others. People who speak Austronesian languages are considered to have emigrated from Taiwan to the Philippines, New Guinea Island, and other Pacific islands via sea route approximately 3,0005,000 years ago. The third type ais the lingua franca languages: Indonesian, spoken in Western New Guinea (Irian Jaya), and English and Tok Pisin, spoken in Papua New Guinea. This study particularly selects typologically and genealogically diverse languages as samples. First, the study seeks to observe the general characteristics of temporal expressions in New Guinea and to choose different language families, including Tok Pisin, which is an English-based creole. In addition, it focuses on the availability of descriptive grammars and data. The four sample languages shown in (1) are spoken in Papua New Guinea and are useful for a small typology or contrastive study clarifying grammatical differences. (1) Four sample languages and their language family names (also see Figure 1): Amele: Trans-New Guinea Manambu: Sepik Jabm: Austronesian Tok Pisin: English-based creole Amele is a Trans-New Guinea language, spoken in the lowland of Madang Province by around 5,000 people. Manambu is a Sepik language, spoken in East Sepik Province by nearly 2000 speakers. Jabm is an Austronesian language, spoken in the coastal area of Morobe Province by approximately 2,000 speakers. Tok Pisin is spoken across Papua New Guinea and is a lingua franca among Papua New Guinea people. However, it is not spoken in Western New Guinea Island of Indonesia and Western Province of Papua New Guinea. This study will investigate the following temporal expressions in the four sample languages. First, it will examine whether the sample languages have verb-based temporal forms: tenses. If they have tenses, it will describe the type of semantic and morphological tense forms they have. If they do not have any tense form, it will look at how they express the functions of tenses.

Second, this study investigates the limited numbers of temporal meanings and examines noun-based temporal forms and temporal adverbs. 3. Previous studies and characteristics of temporal expressions This section summarizes the previous studies of temporal expressions and clarifies the characteristics of tenses and temporal expressions in terms of linguistic typology. First, I introduce previous studies of verb-based temporal expressions that are more or less limited to examining tense and aspect. Comrie (1985) describes the nature of tense in grammar, and Chung & Timberlake (1985) examine tense from a cross-linguistic perspective, observing aspect and mood, and show varieties and possibilities of tense forms. They claim that some languages are poor in tense functions (Lakhota and Chamorro) and have strong relation among tense, aspect, and mood, whereas other languages are rich in tense meanings (the Wishram-Wasco dialect of Chinook, ChiBemba and Bantu) and have a metrical tense system consisting of the remote past, far past, recent past, and immediate past tenses. Second, I review previous studies of temporal expressions, particularly noun-based and temporal adverbs. It is difficult to cover everything related to temporal adverbs, and studies of temporal adverbs and adverbials are so extensive that they are occasionally called the dustbin of grammar. Moreover, these adverbs and adverbials exist partly in the area of grammar and partly lexicon. Kurzon (2008) concentrates on the usage of the word ago from a cross-linguistic perspective and shows that its usages are ambiguous between grammar and lexicon. Bre & Pratt-Hartmann (2002) discuss usages of noun-based temporal forms and temporal adverbs (including tense and aspect) in terms of formal semantics. In (2), Bre & Pratt-Hartmann (2002: 8994) illustrate that temporal prepositions can be classified into the following three groups: (2) Temporal prepositions: Bre & Pratt-Hartmann (2002: 89) those that fix the time of the main event to be the same as that of the interval given in the prepositional phrase: AT, ON, IN, DURING, and THROUGHOUT those that fix the time to be earlier or later than the prep interval: AFTER and BEFORE those that fix the time to be in a range with the prep interval at one end and usually the time of reference at the other: SINCE, UNTIL, TILL, and BY Third, I examine the various studies on the typology of temporal expressions. Anderson and Keenan (1985) describe temporal expressions in terms of deixis, and Haspelmaths (1997) study attempts to summarize temporal usages from space to time cross-linguistically. Heine and Kuteva (2002), Hagge (2010), and Haspelmath (1997) consider relationships between space and time to explain mechanisms of cross-linguistic grammaticalization from space to time. Hagge (2010) is a typological study of adpositions (prepositions and postpositions) and illustrates that semantic temporal extensions from space to time are applicable in several temporal functions, which are basically related to locative meanings: inessive (at noon, on Monday), preessive (before Christmas, 2 days ago), postessive (after breakfast, a week later), and perlative (for 3 days, until dawn). It is not unusual that formal variations exist in expressing temporal relations among the languages, and their mechanisms are partly similar yet varied. In grammatical terms, the languages have cases, prepositions, postpositions, and even ambiguous forms (not fully grammaticalized) for expressing temporal relations (cf. Wierzbicka 1993). Clearly, few studies describe both verb- and noun-based temporal expressions, which is necessary to completely understand a languages grammar. Moreover, a new trend has emerged to explore how people construe temporal concepts in grammar, as reflected by the study of Amondawa.

4. Data and classifying temporal relations This section derives data for the temporal expressions of each language by separately examining verb- and noun-based forms. It utilizes the descriptive grammars and field data of each language and investigates verb-based temporal forms (tenses) and noun-based temporal forms (temporal expressions and concepts). For verb-based forms, this study examines tense forms semantically and morphologically. First, I investigate Amele, which has a rich system of tenses, and tense markings are indicated by a verbal suffix. The tense system in Amele is metrical in that tenses express an approximate and subjective measure of the interval between the frame and the tense locus (Chung & Timberlake 1985:208). The system includes the present, todays past, yesterdays past, remote past, habitual past, future tense, and relative future tense (Roberts 1987:223229). An example of the present tense is shown in (3a), of todays past tense in (3b), of yesterdays past tense in (3c), and of the remote past tense in (3d). (3) Amele: a. Ija hu-gi-na I come-1SG-present I come. b. Ija hu-g-a I come-1SG-todays P I came (today). c. Ija hu-g-an. I come-1SG-yesterdays P I came (yesterday). d. Ija ho-om. I come-1SG-remote P I came (some days ago). In (3b), the today's past tense makera is observed, and the tense marker is integrated in the inflections of person and number, as shown in (4). (4) Todays past tense in Amele: fec (to see; Roberts 1987:224) 1st person singular: fi-g-a 2nd person singular: fa-g-a 3rd person singular : fe-i-a 1st person dual: fo-w-a 2nd/3rd person dual: fe-si-a 1st person plural: fo-q-a 2nd/3rd person plural: fe-ig-a Next, I examine Jabm, an Austronesian language, which lacks the tense forms as other Austronesian languages do. Lacking tense forms, Jabm distinguishes realis and irrealis moods (Bradshaw & Czobor 2005:12, Ross 2002). Realis represents present, imperfect, and perfect situations, whereas irrealis represents future, imperative, and subjunctive situations. Bradshaw & Czobor (2005:12) illustrate the contrast between realis and irrealis, and suggests that there is no motivation for expressing a tense system in Jabm and the difference of moods is expressed in the verbal inflection, as shown in (5). (5) Jabm: a. Ksm.

realis: you speak, you spoke, you have spoken. b. sm. irrealis: you will speak, you would speak, speak! In (5), temporal adverbs such as yesterday, today, and at 12 oclock can be added to specify the reference of time. Next, I examine Manambu, a Sepik language, whose grammatical features are different from Trans-New Guinea languages. According to Aikhenvald (2008:254-255), Manambu has inflected tense markers and distinguishes between tensed and non-tensed forms. Tensed forms consist of past and versatile tenses. The past tense -d- indicates a few days ago or earlier than that, and the versatile tense -tua- indicates the recent past, near future, and present. See the following examples (6ac): (6) Manambu (glossing simplified): a. wa-ku Kuimagan Lai ata yaya-d-d, ... say-COMPL.SS Kuimagan Lai then carry-3SG.SUBJ.P-3SG.BAS.P Having said (this), Kuimagan then carried Lai, .... b. wun-a yi-n yi-tua I-3SG. NOM go-SEQ come-1SGSUBJ.VT. + 3SG.BAS.VT As for me, I am going away. c. kuprap- ya:b-ad, tp-yak-tua-d bad-LK road-3SG.NOM be.closed-1SG.SUBJ.VT-3SG.BAS.VT It is a bad road, I have closed it off. In (6a), the past tense -d- represents past action. In (6b), the tense marker -tua- indicates an ongoing event, which, in (6c) also represents an event that took place recently. Although that Manambu has tense markers, their usages are more limited than those in Amele. Versatile tenses can express several temporal situations; however, they depend on the contexts and pragmatic situations or the support of temporal adverbs. Finally, I examine the tense system of Tok Pisin (Mihalic 1986 and the authors field data). As indicated about Jabm, Tok Pisin also does not have a formal tense marker, and in speech, people can express past events in present (unmarked) verb forms by adding the temporal adverbs asde for yesterday or tumora for tomorrow. However, Tok Pisin uses auxiliaries for expressing tenses (Mihalic 1986) and for the more formal level of grammar. In (7), the present tense is realized by the unmarked go to go. (7) Tok Pisin: Mi go long taun I go PREP town I go to town. The past tense marker in Tok Pisin is bin and in (8a), bin go expresses a precise uncompleted action; however, the form can also indicate a specific past event. Further, the future marker bai or baimbai indicates a future event in (8b). Presumably, bin has been grammaticalized from been in English, and baimbai from by and by (bai is a shortened form of baimbai). (8) Tok Pisin: a. Mi bin go long taun I P go PREP town I went to town. b. Bai (baimbai) mi go long taun

FUT I I will go to town.

go

PREP town

Further, I investigate noun-based forms and temporal adverbs by gathering temporal data of references to time and temporal concepts. Particularly, I distinguish the temporal inessive, preessive, postessive, and perlative following Hagge (2010) and Bre & Pratt-Hartmann (2002). The results of noun-based temporal forms are shown in Table 1. Perlative Amele postp.: na 2 minut-na for 2 minutes verbal: gurric an beya until sun rises Jabm locative verbal: gd (it verbal: nd verbal: tm (it suffix:-a reached) (itll reach) ll last) gele gd gele nd le tm jala tlc in the morning the day before the next day 3 years long Manambu locative case: Adverb (partly Adverb (partly allative case:-Vr -a:m postp): ta:y postp): kukr a:r mugul before, in front, after, later for about 3 nbl-a:m ahead no example days later on today no example Tok Pisin prep.: long Adverb + prep: adverb (partly prep.: long long 4 kilok bipo + long prep): bihain long 2 minut at 4 oclock Bipo long Tripela day for 2 minutes wanpela wiik bihain a week ago 3 days later Table 1: Temporal usages of inessive, preessive, postessive, and perlative From Table 1 it is evident that we can find cases, postpositions, prepositions, and suffixes for marking noun-based temporal forms in all languages; however, it is unusual that no verb-based forms exist in the languages other than Jabm, in which verb-based forms are used for preessive, postessive, and perlative meanings. In Amele, the postposition na is used for inessive and perlative meanings. This postposition is polysemous, covering at, in, on with, of, etc. In contrast, hedocob in the preessive and postessive forms is a partly grammaticalized adverb. It is notable that this form of the word is derived from the verb hedoc, meaning to finish; however, it can also carry meanings of before and after. In Jabm, although the locative suffixa expresses the temporal points of the inessive, the verb-based forms are dominant. In Manambu, there are many case markings. The locative case carries the inessive meaning, and the allative case carries the perlative meaning. Although adverbs appear in the preessive and postessive meanings, the meanings before and after are considered partly grammaticalized as postpositions. Unfortunately, appropriate examples of the preessive and postessive were not found in Aikhenvald (2008). In Tok Pisin, the multifunctional preposition long is observed in inessive, preessive, and perlative meanings (cf. Kurzon 2002). The adverbial elements bipo and bihain are used for preessive and postessive meanings, in particular, and these elements seem to be partly grammaticalized as temporal grammatical words. This study indicates two directions of temporal expressions: one is Inessive postp.: na 4 kilok-na at 4 oclock qasil-na in morning Preessive Adverb (partly postp): hedocob week osol hedocob a week ago Postessive Adverb (partly postp): hedocob deel ied hedocob 3 days later

the direction of using grammatical (or partly grammaticalized) words for describing temporal relations, and another is that of keeping their usage in lexicon or adverbs. Furthermore, this study investigates temporal concepts and temporal adverbs on a lexical level and specifically chooses four elements (nouns or adverbs): now, day/night, Monday, and year. The contrastive results are illustrated in Table 2. now qila today) galoc today) kta day/night (also deel/witic (also gel/gbe? Monday Mande (from Tok Pisin) not available year geel, yaar (from Tok Pisin yia) jala (from German Jahr) nabi yia

Amele Jabm Manambu

(also not available sun)/ga:n Tok Pisin nau de/nait Mande Table 2: Temporal concepts in the four sample languages

Overall, borrowings of calendar-based temporal concepts for Monday and year are observed in Amele. However, no word can be found for Monday in Jabm or Manambu; the speakers of these languages possibly use the word Mande borrowed from Tok Pisin. There are several notable points: In Amele and Jabm, the word for now can include the meaning today. In Amele, there is more than one word for year: the traditional word geel (cabi geel garden fence) and the borrowed word yaar. This study claims that although there is a rich lexicon of traditional temporal concepts in Amele, calendar-based usages are liable to be borrowed from Tok Pisin or other foreign languages. In this section, tense usages are summarized in terms of the following points: First, the distinctions among past, present, and future; and second, the morphological characteristics of tense forms. Tense markers in Amele and Manambu are represented by verbal inflections, which make a simple distinction between the present and past tenses. These languages have relatively distinct morphological tense forms. Amele has the richest morphological tenses, including todays past, yesterdays past, and the remote past (Roberts 1987). In contrast, Jabm lacks any tense marker, and Tok Pisin has a limited usage of tense forms. These tenseless languages specify tenses by adding auxiliaries or temporal adverbs such as yesterday and tomorrow. Temporal expressions are examined in terms of several temporal points (inessive, preessive, postessive, and perlative) and their morphology. A number of grammatical forms are used for describing temporal relations. Tok Pisin preferably uses the multifunctional preposition long, whereas Amele uses the multifunctional postposition na. Moreover, Amele utilizes borrowed words such as minut and Mande. In contrast, Jabm depends on verbs and adverbs and Manambu prefers using locative cases. 5. Discussion This section discusses the data observed in this study in terms of the complexity of grammar. It attempts to align the sample languages in New Guinea in accordance with their grammatical complexities. McWhorter (2001) states that grammatical complexity (which includes phonemic, morphological, syntactic, and semantic complexities) is measurable. He further claims that creole languages are developed over a relatively short time, and they are insufficiently grammaticalized; as a result, they are less complex than older languages. Thus, I attempt to measure the complexity of temporal expressions, taking McWhorters (2001) study into consideration. One basic principle is that the more grammaticalized a language, the more

complex it is. The complexity conditions are summarized in (9). (9) Conditions for measuring complexity in temporal expressions a. morphologically rich tense inflections indicate greater complexity b. a lack of tense markings or tense inflections indicates lesser complexity c. temporal expressions with certain grammatical elements (cases, suffixes, prepositions, or postpositions) indicate greater complexity d. temporal expressions of lexicon (temporal nouns, temporal clauses, and adverbs) indicate lesser complexity In (9a) and (9b), although the grammatical features of aspect and mood are lacking, tense forms can be evaluated cross-linguistically. Verb-based temporal forms can be evaluated in terms of verbal inflections and distinctions. Considering noun-based and temporal adverbs, this study claims that certain grammatical elements that connect temporal concepts (cases, suffixes, prepositions, or postpositions) are more complex than simple temporal expressions such as temporal adverbs and partly grammaticalized adverbials (for instance, in considering in morning versus morning and in my childhood versus when I was a boy, the former expressions are more complex than the latter ones) (cf. Wierzbicka 1993). In (10), this study evaluates the four languages in accordance with the complexity scale (9). (10) Complexity scale of the four languages a. Tense: morphological tense > auxiliary > no tense marker Amele > Manambu >>> Tok Pisin > Jabm b. Temporal expressions: grammatical marking > limited grammatical words > lexical/verbal temporal Manambu > Amele, Tok Pisin >>> Jabm c. Overall evaluation of temporal complexity: tense/grammatical means > partly developed tense/partly grammaticalized > no tense/temporal nouns and adverbs Amele, Manambu >>> Tok Pisin >>> Jabm First, the languages with morphological tenses (Amele and Manambu) are more complex under the conditions (9a, b). In contrast, although the simplest language is Jabm, it is well known that many Austronesian languages are tenseless. In (10b), I evaluate temporal expression based on Table 2, and the scale is aligned between Manambu and Jabm. The grammatical elements marking temporal nouns and concepts differ among case, suffix, preposition, or postposition, and they basically include certain semantic extensions from space to time (cf. Heine & Kuteva 2002). However, it is doubtful which form (case, suffix, preposition, or postposition) is the most complex. Amele, Manambu, and Tok Pisin are grammatically complex in (10b), and Jabm is undeveloped in the temporal expressions. Finally, this study integrates overall evaluation of temporal expressions in (10c) and finds the grammatical and lexical elements carried to express temporal expressions, as shown in (11). (11) Possibilities of using temporal expression: noun-based or adverbs a. temporal adverbs and temporal nouns (lexical) b. partly grammaticalized elements (partly grammatical and partly adverbial) c. grammatical elements of grammaticalization from space to time (appearing with locative case and location-based adverbial such as before and back) d. verb-based or clause level Considering the possibilities of the expressions listed in (11), the most complex language has

grammatical tenses and clear grammatical forms (cases, prepositions, or postpositions, probably based on space, (11c)). The least complex language carries no formal tense and depends on temporal nouns and adverbs to indicate temporal expressions (11a, d). On this scale, Jabm is the simplest and Tok Pisin is not the simplest language. Though Tok Pisin is a seemingly simple language, it marks several kinds of partly grammaticalized temporal expressions by using the preposition long. The fact that old New Guinea languages such as Amele and Manambu are more complex supports McWhorters claim that older languages involve more complexity. This study has shown that the temporal usages of the four sample languages are diverse and these languages can be aligned in accordance with their grammatical complexity. However, the diversity of their usages in New Guinea is relative in terms of the other world languages. There are many languages with richer tense systems (ChiBemeba; Chung & Timberlake 1985:208, and other Trans-New Guinea languages) and many without formal tenses (other Austronesian languages and Sino-Tibetan, for instance, Burmese; Comrie 1985:5053). In addition, the temporal expressions of these four languages can be subsumed in the possibilities of grammar (Haspelmath 1997). Thus, the overall temporal phenomena of the four languages are not rare. The remaining problem is that almost all people in Papua New Guinea are bilingual, speaking an indigenous language (Amele, Manambu, or Jabm) and the lingua franca (Tok Pisin). Thus, for example, in Amele society, people may say 4 kilok-na ija nuiga I go at 4 oclock to fellow villagers and use the phrase mi go long 4 kilok when speaking to other people. The New Guinea people can switch between two typologically different languages without any trouble, although the temporal expressions and exact references of time differ between the two. As shown in Tables 1 and 2, the indigenous languages borrow several kinds of temporal expressions and concepts from Tok Pisin or other contact languages. In particular, Amele borrows many calendar-based temporal lexicons from Tok Pisin (Nose 2011). Arguably, the indigenous languages in New Guinea have different characteristics of temporal variations, although parts of them are lacking. In bilingual societies, they borrow the necessary temporal expressions from other languages and compensate for the missing expressions. 6. Conclusion In conclusion, tenses and temporal expressions vary widely among the four sample languages and range morphologically from simple to complex. The more complex languages are Amele and Manambu, the languages with longer histories in the New Guinea Island. These use morphological tenses and grammatical forms (cases or mulitfunctional postposition) to mark temporal nouns. The simpler languages are Tok Pisin and Jabm, with shorter histories. These languages are tenseless or use additional tense markers and depend mainly on temporal adverbs or partly grammaticalized markers. These facts indicate that each language has its own motivation for temporal systems and concepts. Moreover, as the indigenous languages in Papua New Guinea lack several calendar-based temporal expressions, they borrow these expressions mainly from Tok Pisin. Nevertheless, their usages and functional characteristics can be subsumed within the limits of typological variation. Moreover, it is necessary to take into account the borrowings of temporal concepts from other contact languages and the bilingual situations of New Guinea. Notes * I acknowledge the sponsorship of the CASIO Science Promotion Foundation and appreciate the Grant-in-aid for Young Scientists (B) received from the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science. I would like to thank Neret Tamo and the villagers in Sein, Madang Province, Papua New Guinea for their data and kindness. I claim sole responsibility for any errors. Abbreviations: BAS basic cross-referencing; COML completive; DS different subject; FUT future; LK linker; NOM nominative; P past; POSTP postposition; PREP preposition; SEQ sequencing; SS same subject;

SUBJ subject; VT versatile tense; SG singular; PL plural; and 1, 2, and 3 1st, 2nd, and 3rd person, respectively.

Dailymail online (May, 20, 2011) 'No concept of time: The Amazonian tribe where nobody has an age and words like 'month' and 'year' don't exist'
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-1389070/Amazon-Amondawa-tribe-age-words-like-month-year-dont-exist.html

According to Comrie, Matthews, and Polinsky (2003:103), not all Austronesian languages spoken in New Guinea Island are Papuan languages. In Papuan languages, the following groups are described as a phylum: Trans-New Guinea (507 languages), West Papuan (24 languages), East Papuan (27 languages), Torricelli (48 languages), Sepik-Ramu (98 languages), and Minor phyla or isolate (37 languages). The languages and number of the speakers are taken from Lewis, M. Paul (ed.). 2009. Ethnologue: Languages of the world, 16th edition. Dallas, Tex.: SIL International. Online version (Amele, Manambu, and Jabm: accessed on 2011-08-05). This type of verb-based temporal form is observed in Trans-New Guinea languages; examples from Usan are as follows: (i) Usan: Trans-New Guinea (Reesink 1987:7071): a. Ai gbgb earth see.SS-reduplication in the afternoon b. Urigerma it becomes light.DS at dawn Hungarian (Finno-Ugric) has a rich case system and one special case, the temporal case, -kor. This temporal case marks only temporal meanings such as 12 ra-kor for at 12 oclock and Karcsony-kor for on Christmas day. Considering the condition (9c), Hungarian is the most complex language in that it has a special case marking only for temporal meanings. Andersson (1998:56) claims that [s]implicity in one part of the language may be balanced by complexity in another part. Possibly, Jabm is an exception to McWhorters claim, or there is a need to measure tense, aspect, and mood altogether.

References Aikhenvald, Alexandra. Y. 2008. The Manambu language of East Sepik, Papua New Guinea. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Anderson, Stephen. R. & Edward L. Keenan. 1985. Deixis. In: Shopen, Timothy (ed.). Language typology and syntactic description, III, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press: 259-308. Andersson, Lars-Gunnar. 1998. Some languages are harder than others. In: Bauer Laurie, & Peter Trudgill (eds.). Language Myths. London: Penguin Books. Bradshaw, Joel. & Francisc. Czobor. 2005. Otto Dempwolffs Grammar of the Jabm Language in New Guinea. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press. Bre, David S. & Ian E. Pratt-Hartmann. 2002. Temporal semantics of prepositions in context. In: Feigenbaum, Susanne, & Dennis Kurzon (eds.): 75-114. Chung, Sandra. & Alan Timberlake. 1985. Tense, aspect, and mood. In: Shopen, Timothy(ed.). Language typology and syntactic description, III, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press: 202-258. Comrie, Bernard. 1985. Tense. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Comrie, Bernard, Stephen Matthews, & Maria Polinsky (eds.). 2003. The Atlas of Languages (revised edition). New York: A Quatro Book. Feigenbaum, Susanne, & Dennis Kurzon (eds.). 2002. Prepositions in their syntactic, semantic and pragmatic context. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins Hagge, Claude. 2010. Adpositions. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Haspelmath, Martin. 1997. From Space to Time: temporal adverbials in the Worlds Languages. Munich: Lincom Europa. Haspelmath Martin, Matthew S. Dryer, David Gil, and Bernard Comrie (eds.). 2005. The World Atlas of Language Structures(WALS). Oxford: Oxford University Press. Heine, Bernd. & Tania Kuteva. 2002. World Lexicon of Grammaticalization. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Kurzon, Dennis. 2002. Preposition as functor: the case of long in Bislama. In: Feigenbaum, Susanne. & Dennis Kurzon (eds.): 231-248. Kurzon, Dennis. 2008. Ago and its grammatical status in English and other languages. In: Kurzon, Dennis & Silvia Adler (eds.). Adpositions. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins: 209-227. McWhorter, John C. 2001. The Worlds simplest grammars are creole grammars. Linguistic Typology 5:125-166. Mihalic, Francis. 1986. The Jacaranda Dictionary and Grammar of Melanesian Pidgin. Milton: The Jacaranda Press/Web Books. Nose, Masahiko. 2011. Grammaticalization of temporal expressions in Amele: a diachronic account. Paper presented at The 20th International Conference of Historical Linguistics. National Museum of Ethnology, Osaka, Japan. Reesink, Ger P. 1987. Structures and their functions in Usan: a Papuan language of Papua New Guinea. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins. Roberts, John R. 1987. Amele. London/New York/Sydney: Croom Helm. Ross, Malcolm. 2002. Jabm. In: Lynch, John, Malcolm Ross, & Terry Crowley, (eds.). The Oceanic languages. Richmond/Surrey: Curzon Press: 270-298. Wierzbicka, Anna. 1993. Why do we say in April, on Thursday, at 10 o'clock?: In search of an explanation. Studies in Language 17:437-454.

También podría gustarte