Doctoral Dissertation Research: The Syntax and Semantics of Mebengokre Nominalizations

博士论文研究：Mebengokre 名词化的语法和语义

• 批准号: 0639870
• 负责人: Sabine Iatridou
• 金额: --
• 依托单位: Massachusetts Institute of Technology
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2007
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2007-03-01 至 2008-08-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=0639870&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Doctoral; Dissertation; Research; Syntax; Semantics

This doctoral dissertation research project aims to describe and propose an analysis of the structure and meaning of clauses headed by words other than verbs in Mebengokre, a virtually undescribed language from the Je family spoken in the eastern Amazon region of Brazil. In particular, the research focuses on how clauses headed by nouns or adjectives are interpreted in time. The initial hypothesis is that the use of nouns or adjectives derived from verbs to produce certain effects on interpretation is not a peculiarity of Mebengokre, but can actually be seen in many constructions cross-linguistically, and may hold the key to the interpretation of certain tenses of English, such as the present perfect or the present progressive, which involve an "adjectival" form of the verb in a construction with an auxiliary. Mebengokre is especially helpful in understanding such constructions, since their component parts can be seen more transparently than in English and other languages.The description by means of original fieldwork of languages which are threatened with extinction within a few generations, as is the case with Mebengokre, can be likened, in terms of scientific relevance, to the gathering of information on endangered plant and animal species: such data may provide answers to questions raised by linguistic theory after the extinction of the languages, in addition to being essential to any effort by communities in preserving or revitalizing their languages. The present study, in addition to addressing the theoretical point described above, aims to provide adequate documentation of certain core aspects of the grammar of the Mebengokre language.

这个博士论文的研究项目旨在描述和提出一个由Mebengokre，一个几乎没有描述的语言从Je家族在巴西亚马逊东部地区所说的话以外的动词为首的句子的结构和意义的分析。特别是，研究重点是如何以名词或形容词为首的小句的时间解释。最初的假设是，使用从动词派生的名词或形容词对解释产生一定的影响并不是Mebengokre的特点，但实际上可以在跨语言的许多结构中看到，并且可能是解释英语某些时态的关键，例如现在完成时或现在进行时，这涉及动词的“形容词”形式与助动词的结构。Mebengokre特别有助于理解这种结构，因为它们的组成部分比英语和其他语言更容易被看到。通过原始田野调查来描述在几代人内濒临灭绝的语言，就像Mebengokre的情况一样，从科学意义上讲，可以比作收集濒危植物和动物物种的信息：这些数据除了对社区保护或振兴其语言的任何努力至关重要之外，还可以回答语言学理论在语言灭绝后提出的问题。本研究报告除了讨论上述理论问题外，还旨在为Mebengokre语语法的某些核心方面提供充分的文献资料。