Today we started our journey into syntax with valency. You want to see some applicatives? Check out that paper by Elena Mihas. Wow! Tomorrow a reporter from a German radio station will be in our class. If you’d like to not be in class because of that, please let me know ahead of time, and we’ll figure out an alternative.

Material From Today’s Class

PDFs

• Class Slides
• Elena Mihas “Grammaticalization of the Generalized Kampan Applicative -ako”

Links

• Something I wrote about Tagalog
• An example of an applicative plus a passive in a relative clause

• WALS Chapter on Relative Clauses
• WALS Chapter on Interrogative Phrases

Practice

• By class time tomorrow, I want you to have a list of at least 10 potentially tradable nouns that are unique to your culture, and then I want you to bring them to class. (You don’t necessarily need to have a physical paper—the list can be virtual—but it might help if you have a physical paper.) Here are some examples of what I mean by tradable nouns:
  • Plants
  • Trees (when they’re small you can put them in a pot!)
  • Precious gems
  • Different types of stone/building material
  • Fish
  • Domesticated mammals
  • Birds (maybe “trade” is a poor word, but those dudes can fly!)
  • Textiles/clothes
  • Food items
  • Fruit
  • Flowers
  • Jewelry/ornaments
  • Weapons
  • Types of vessels
  • Trinkets
  • Other (as long as fits the general description I gave)

  You can post these to the #lexicon channel if you want, but the most important thing is that you bring your words to class (and also be in class if you possibly can). If you know you can’t be in class, then please do post them to #lexicon.

Mastery

• (None Today)

Backburner

• Here’s MA7 early.
• Here’s MA8, on your morphosyntax.
• I would also like to reveal to you your final assignment. Take a look and see what you think.