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This volume constitutes the first in-depth, systematic study of varieties of headless relative clauses in fifteen languages from five language families, all Mesoamerican languages spoken in Mexico and Guatemala and one Chibchan language spoken in Honduras. Headless relative clauses are clauses that often resemble interrogative clauses or headed relative clauses in their morpho-syntactic shape, but whose meaning brings them close to nominal constructions. For the vast majority of the languages in this volume, many of which are endangered and all of which are understudied, the work presented here represents the only published material on the subject.
List of contents
- Preface
- Acknowledgments
- List of Contributors
- List of Abbreviations
- Chapter 1. Introducing Headless Relative Clauses and the findings from Mesoamerican languages Ivano Caponigro
- Chapter 2. Headless Relative Clauses in Southeastern Tepehuan (O'dam) Gabriela García Salido
- Chapter 3. Headless Relative Clauses in Tlaxcala Nahuatl Lucero Flores-Nájera
- Chapter 4. Headless Relative Clauses in Acazulco Otomi Néstor Hernández-Green
- Chapter 5. Headless Relative Clauses in Matlatzinca Enrique L. Palancar and Leonardo Carranza Martínez
- Chapter 6. Headless Relative Clauses in Iliatenco Me'phaa Philip T. Duncan and Harold Torrence
- Chapter 7. Headless Relative Clauses in San Pedro Mixtepec Zapotec Pafnuncio Antonio-Ramos
- Chapter 8. Headless Relative Clauses in K'iche' Telma Angelina Can Pixabaj
- Chapter 9. Headless Relative Clauses in Q'anjob'al Eladio Mateo Toledo
- Chapter 10. Headless Relative Clauses in Chuj Justin Royer
- Chapter 11. Headless Relative Clauses in Ch'ol Juan Jesús Vázquez Álvarez and Jessica Coon
- Chapter 12. Headless Relative Clauses in Tseltalan Gilles Polian and Judith Aissen
- Chapter 13. Headless Relative Clauses in Yucatec Maya Scott AnderBois and Miguel Oscar Chan Dzul
- Chapter 14. Headless Relative Clauses in Sierra Popoluca Wendy López Márquez
- Chapter 15. Headless Relative Clauses in Pesh Claudine Chamoreau
- Index
About the author
Ivano Caponigro is Associate Professor of linguistics at the University of California, San Diego. He is interested in formal semantics and its interfaces with syntax and pragmatics across languages. He has conducted extensive crosslinguistic work on relative clauses and wh- clauses, with special emphasis on free relative clauses and other headless relative clauses.
Harold Torrence is Associate Professor of linguistics at the University of California, Los Angeles. His research focuses on the syntax and morphology of African and Mesoamerican languages. He has worked extensively on wh- questions, relativization, focus, and complementation.
Roberto Zavala Maldonado is Professor of linguistics at the Centro de Investigaciones y Estudios Superiores en Antropología Social (CIESAS) in San Cristobal de Las Casas, Chiapas, Mexico. He is interested in Mesoamerican languages, typology, language documentation, syntax, and lexicography. He has conducted extensive research on several
morphosyntactic aspects of Mayan and Mixe-Zoquean languages.
Summary
Headless relative clauses have received little attention in the linguistic literature, despite the many morpho-syntactic and semantic puzzles they raise. These clauses have been even more neglected in the study of Mesoamerican languages.
Headless Relative Clauses in Mesoamerican Languages constitutes the first in-depth, systematic study of the topic. Spanning fifteen languages from five language families, it is the broadest crosslinguistic study of headless relative clauses yet conducted. For most of these languages there is no previous descriptive or documentary material on wh-constructions in general, let alone headless relative clauses. Many of the languages are threatened or endangered; all are understudied.
Each chapter in this volume constitutes an original contribution to typological and theoretical linguistics. The first chapter provides a comprehensive introduction to the varieties of headless relative clauses and their importance to the study of human language, while the other chapters are language-specific and follow a uniform format to facilitate comparisons and generalizations across languages. Through the collective work of a team of twenty-one scholars, Headless Relative Clauses in Mesoamerican Languages presents a clear and systematic introduction to relative and interrogative clauses in Mesoamerican languages.
Additional text
This book is a crowning achievement of research on headless relatives, a model of the micro-typological approach to language, and an inspiring example of careful semantic work on lesser-known languages. By showing how much can be accomplished in describing such languages, the authors set an important precedent for future studies in cross-linguistic semantics. The introduction to the book stands out as a state-of-the art overview of headless relatives, from the questions that need to be asked to a painstaking analysis of their semantic properties. An absolute must for semanticists, syntacticians interested in relativization, typologists, and Mesoamerican scholars.
