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

Masahiko NOSE Reitaku University, Japan

Workshop on the Representation of Time in Asian Languages 26-28 October 2011, Academia Sinica, Taipei, Taiwan

The slides are available: http://www.scribd.com/mnose/

Overview of this talk 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. Sample languages in PNG Tense Temporal expressions Grammatical Complexity Conclusion

Amondawa in Amazon: They do not even have words for "time", "week", "month", or "year"

Sample languages in Papua New Guinea Manambu

(Sepik)

Jabm
(Austronesian)

Amele
(Trans-New Guinea)

Tok Pisin
(English-based creole)

Generated by WALS Language Viewer

1: Previous studies: Time, temporal in grammar

Haspelmath 1997, Hagge 2010.

Typology of Temporal Adverbials Locative to Temporal (inessive, pre-/postessive, perlative): (Bre & Pratt-Hartmann
2002:89)

Svorou 1991, Lakoff & Johnson 1980

Space and Time can be considered together (based on cognitive semantics)

Contrastive study: time expressions

Verb-based, verbal inflections

Tense: past, present, future
Comrie (1985), Chung & Timberlake (1985)

Noun-based, and adverbs

With Grammatical forms: at 6 oclock, on Monday Lexical: today, this morning, tomorrow
Andersen & Keenan (1985), Haspelmath (1997)

Clause level: when I was a boy, since he came here

Contrastive study: materials and method Materials

Descriptive grammars My field notes: Amele and Tok Pisin

Investigation
Verbal: Tense forms: Nominal, adverbial: Temporal expressions:
Grams: temporal inessive(at noon), preessive(before), postessive (after) and perlative (until/for) Lexical: now, day/night, Monday and year

Tense: investigation in terms of complexity (9) Measuring complexity in temporal terms:

a. morphologically rich tense inflections mean more complex b. lacking tense marking or tense inflection means less complex

(9a): Amele and Manambu (9b): Jabm and Tok Pisin

Tense: results 1; metrical tenses in Amele (9a): Verbal tenses with metrical system (3) Present tense: Ija hu-gi-na. "I come."
I come-1SG-present Todays past: Ija hu-g-a. "I came (today)." Yesterdays past: Ija hu-g-an. "I came (yesterday)." Remote past: Ija ho-om. "I came (some days ago)." Future: Ija hug-en. I will come (4): Tense markers are integrated in verbal inflections

Tense: results 2; Jabm has two moods

(9b): Tenseless
(5) Jabm: a. Ksm. realis: "you speak, you spoke, you have spoken." b. sm. irrealis:" you will speak, you would speak, speak!"

With help of temporal adverbs: today, now (galoc)

Verb-based, summary (10) Complexity scale of the four languages:

Tense:

morphological tense > auxiliary > no tense marker

Amele >>> Manambu >>> Tok Pisin >>> Jabm

Tok Pisin: using temporal auxiliaries

(8a) Mi bin (Past tense marker) go long taun. I wnet to town (bai: future tense marker)

Temporal expressions: grams (9) Measuring complexity in temporal expressions:

c. temporal expressions with certain grammatical elements (case, suffix, preposition, or postposition) mean more complex d. temporal expressions of lexicon (temporal nouns, temporal clauses, adverbs) mean less complex

(9c): Manambu, Amele, (partly) Tok Pisin (9d): Jabm, (partly) Tok Pisin

Table 1: Temporal usages of inessive, preessive, postessive, and perlative

Amele
Inessive postp.: na 4 kilok-na at 4 oclock qasil-na in morning locative suffix:-a gele in the morning Preessive Adverb (partly postp): hedocob week osol hedocob a week ago Perlative postp.: na 2 minut-na for 2 minutes verbal: gurric an beya until sun rises verbal: gd (it verbal: nd verbal: tm (it ll reached) (itll reach) last) gd gele nd le tm jala tlc the day before the next day 3 years long Adverb (partly Adverb (partly allative case:-Vr postp): ta:y postp): kukr a:r mugul before, in front, after, later for about 3 ahead no example days no example Adverb + prep: adverb (partly prep.: long bipo + long prep): bihain long 2 minut Bipo long Tripela day bihain for 2 minutes wanpela wiik 3 days later a week ago Postessive Adverb (partly postp): hedocob deel ied hedocob 3 days later

Jabm

Manambu locative case: -a:m nbl-a:m later on today

Tok Pisin

prep.: long long 4 kilok at 4 oclock

Results1: Temporal inessive (at noon, on Monday)

Amele: postposition: na (at, in, on, for)
4 kilok-na at 4 oclock, qasil-na in morning

Jabm: locative suffix:-a (location, direction)

gele - in the morning

Manambu: locative case: -a:m (location, time)

nbl-a:m later on today

Tok Pisin: preposition: long (at, in, on, for, with)

long 4 kilok at 4 oclock

Results2: Temporal preessive (before, ago)

Amele: Adverb (partly postposition): hedocob
week osol hedocob a week ago

Jabm: verbal: gd (it reached)

gd gele the day before

Manambu: Adverb (partly postposition): ta:y before, in front, ahead

no example

Tok Pisin: Adverb + preposition: bipo + long

Bipo long wanpela wiik a week ago

Table 2: Temporal concepts in the four sample languages: Lexical (adverbial) means
now
Amele

day/night

Monday

year

Mande (from geel, yaar (from Tok Tok Pisin) Pisin yia) galoc (also gel/gbe? not available jala (from Jabm German today) Jahr) Manamb kta not available nabi (alsosun)/ u ga:n Tok Pisin nau de/nait Mande yia

qila (also deel/witic today)

Temporal expressions: lexicon Temporal words: now, year

Amele Jabm Manambu Tok Pisin now qila (also today) galoc (also today) Kta nau year geel, yaar (from Tok Pisin yia) jala (from German Jahr) nabi yia

Temporal expressions: summary (10) Complexity scale of the four languages:

b. Temporal expressions: grammatical marking > limited grammatical words > lexical/verbal temporal Manambu >>Amele, Tok Pisin >>>Jabm

Borrowed temporals (year in Amele, Jabm)

Cultural conditions From English, German, or neighboring languages

Complexity: more grammaticalized, more complex

McWhorter (2001):
the grammatical complexity (phonemic, morphological, syntactic and semantic complexities) is measurable

Andersson (1998:56)
(s)implicity in one part of the language may be balanced by complexity in another part.

Tense and temporal expressions

(9a-d): verbal tenses and grammatical temporals

Complexity: alignment (10) Complexity scale of the four languages:

c. Overall evaluation of temporal complexity: tense/grammatical means > partly developed tense/partly grammaticalized > no tense/temporal nouns, adverbs Amele, Manambu >>> Tok Pisin >>> Jabm

Possibly: within the limits of variation

Hungarian >>> Amele, Manambu Jabm = other Austronesian >> Burmese

Conclusion Complexity can explain the degree of measuring tenses and temporal expressions Simple < ---------> Complex Jabm < Tok Pisin < Manambu / Amele

the indigenous languages in Papua New Guinea lack several calendar-based temporal expressions, they borrow these expressions mainly from Tok Pisin.

References (selected):
Aikhenvald, Alexandra. Y. 2008. The Manambu language of East Sepik, Papua New Guinea. Oxford: Oxford University Press. 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. Haspelmath Martin, Matthew S. Dryer, David Gil, and Bernard Comrie (eds.). 2005. The World Atlas of Language Structures(WALS). Oxford: Oxford University Press. 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. 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.

Thank you for your attention.

Acknowledgments:
CASIO Science Promotion Foundation, 2011-2012 Grant-in-aid for Young Scientists (B), Japan Society for Promotion of Science, 2011-2013 Amele & Tok Pisin: Villagers in Sein, Madang Province, Papua New Guinea Contact: nousemasa@facebook

Temporal expressions in this study

Inessive
on, in, at

Pre/postessive
before/after, ago/later

Perlative
For, until, by

Digital/Calendar At five oclock Analog/Classical In morning

23 20110725 Nose Osaka

A week ago (preessive) 3 days later (postessive)

for 3 minutes until dawn

Data 1: Results in Amele a. In-essive: postposition na b. pre-/post-essive: adverbial hedocob c. perlative: postposition na and verb-based
Inessive Pre/post-essive Perlative
on, in, at before/after, ago/later for, until, by

Digital/Calendar 5 kilokna Analog/Classical Qasil/ Qasil-na

24

Week osol (1) 3 minut-na hedocob/ hedoia Deel (day) ied Gurric an beya (until (3) hedocob sun rises)

Noun-based/ Verb-based Temporal in Amele

Noun-based temporal
1: temporal adverbs: casac (first), qila (now, today) 2: noun + postposition: qasil-na (morning-in) 3: others: loanwords from Tok Pisin, Mande (Monday)

Classical time and new time (calendar-based):

cabi gel (year, literally "garden fence"): Roberts (1987:195) Now spoken "Yaar<Year" and geel
25

Observations: traditional versus. loanwords Traditional usages:

ahine (noon), deel (day), wesu (afternoon), cuha (Sunday)

Borrowed from Tok Pisin: by necessity

wik (week), Ogus (August), Mande (Monday), Tunde, Trinde,

Complex forms and others:

1 minut-na (for/in one minute, with postposition), two kilok esaue (half past two), ahinec saab (midday food: loan translation from Tok Pisin "belo kaikai; (lunch))
26

Loanword typology (Haspelmath & Tadmor 2009:30-31)

Time: sain Now: qila Day: deel Night: witi Morning: qasil Afternoon: wesu Today: qila Tomorrow: uqadec
20110725 Nose Osaka

Hour: aua Clock: kilok Week: wiik Sunday: cuha Monday: Mande Month: muun Year: yaar, geel Season: sain
27

Functions of postposition na
Roberts (1987:160): at, in, on, with, of
Ija na jo (my house): of 187: Uba jo dunuh (inside) na teia (He went up into the house): at 188: Mala jo igoc (peak) na bilia (The chicken sat on top of the house): on 168: Ija man sonon-ec sigin (knife) na quga (I killed the snake with knife): with (instrumental)

We cannot identify a typical function

28 20110725 Nose Osaka