A Quantitative Study of Voice in Malagasy

Keenan, Edward L.; Manorohanta, Cecile

doi:10.1353/ol.2001.0007

Cited by 35 publications

(5 citation statements)

References 10 publications

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“…39 occur much more often in the input and this promotes an earlier development. As noted by Keenan and Manorohanta (2001), in adult English passives occur at a rate of about 9% (based on written texts) while in adult Malagasy TT clauses occur at a much higher rate, as shown in Table 9. Generally speaking, frequency-based explanations of order of acquisition are problematic.…”

Section: Frequency Effects In the Acquisition Of The Malagasy Voicesmentioning

confidence: 78%

“…We compared the child frequencies to the frequency of the different voice types in adult-to-adult language (henceforth AL) and also to the frequencies of the different voice types in child-directed adult language (henceforth CDL). Because we did not have transcripts of adult (to adult) discourse we relied on Keenan and Manorohanta's (2001) calculations of the frequencies of the different voice types in AL Malagasy. Keenan and Manorohanta's data are based on two romance novels.…”

Section: The Order Of Acquisition Of the Different Voicesmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Acquisition of the Malagasy voicing system: implications for the adult grammar

Hyams¹,

Ntelitheos²,

Manorohanta

2006

Nat Language Linguistic Theory

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In this paper we discuss the acquisition of the voicing system of Malagasy, an Austronesian language. Our study is based on the longitudinal data of 3 children ages 19 to 32 months, and is to our knowledge the first systematic investigation of the acquisition of Malagasy. The Malagasy voicing system has a distinctive morphology and involves the promotion of an argument (actor, theme, instrument, etc.) to a referentially and syntactically prominent position, typically clause-final. We look at two competing accounts of the Malagasy voicing system, one in which the promoted argument is analyzed as a subject and the promotion operation an instance of A-movement (Guilfoyle, Hung & Travis 1992) and a more recent account in which Malagasy is analyzed as a V2-like language in which the promoted argument is a topic and the promotion an instance of A'-movement (Pearson 2001(Pearson , 2005. Both these analyses have clear implications for acquisition, which we examine in this paper. Our acquisition results favor the analysis of the promoted argument as an A'-element. We also show that there is a developmental stage in Malagasy that parallels the root infinitive (RI) stage widely observed in various European languages. Apparent differences between the Germanic RIs and the analogous phenomenon in Malagasy are derived from differences in the functional structure associated with a voicing system as opposed to an agreement system. Malagasy Acquisition.3

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Section: Frequency Effects In the Acquisition Of The Malagasy Voicesmentioning

confidence: 78%

Section: The Order Of Acquisition Of the Different Voicesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Acquisition of the Malagasy voicing system: implications for the adult grammar

Hyams¹,

Ntelitheos²,

Manorohanta

2006

Nat Language Linguistic Theory

Self Cite

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“…As has been long noted in the literature, however, so-called voice in Malagasy is not the same as English passive and therefore the translations remain active. Keenan and Manorohanta (2001) show that in text counts, active and passive are equally prevalent. Pearson (2005) argues that the subject position is an Abar position.…”

Section: Notesmentioning

confidence: 90%

On the presence versus absence of determiners in Malagasy

Paul¹

2009

Linguistik Aktuell/Linguistics Today

124

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This article explores definiteness as expressed by the determiner system of Malagasy. In particular, noun phrases with and without an overt determiner are compared in terms of familiarity, uniqueness, and other semantic notions commonly associated with definiteness. It is shown that the determiner does not uniformly signal definiteness (as typically understood) and that bare noun phrases can be interpreted as either definite or indefinite. The determiner instead signals the familiarity of the discourse referent of the DP and the absence of a determiner signals a nonfamiliar DP. In certain syntactic positions, however, where the determiner is either required or banned, the interpretation of DPs is underdetermined.

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“…7 Though not traditionally reported as a PV morpheme, the prefix voa-is also used when the theme is the trigger, as shown in (5c). This prefix has been analyzed as the telic counterpart to the PV -Vn suffix (see Manorohanta 2001 andTravis 2005 for more discussion on voa-in Malagasy).…”

Section: Malagasy Background: Word Order and Voice Morphologymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…In the literature, this postverbal agent is described as being genitive (see e.g. Paul 1996;Keenan & Manorohanta 2001).…”

Section: Distribution Of N-bondingmentioning

confidence: 99%

Malagasy N-bonding: A licensing approach

Ting

2023

Glossa: A Journal of General Linguistics

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This paper provides an account of N-bonding in Malagasy, a predicate-initial Austronesian language of Madagascar. N-bonding refers to a morphological process in which material from nominal arguments is morphologically bound to certain heads (Keenan 2000). I argue that N-bonding can be analyzed as a reflection of head-head adjunction configurations which can be derived in Malagasy through Local Dislocation (Embick & Noyer 2007; Levin 2015; Erlewine 2018), a post-syntactic operation that yields a complex head. Following Levin 2015, I assume that Local Dislocation is implemented in Malagasy due to licensing constraints. More specifically, I show that N-bonding occurs in all constructions in which an argument cannot be licensed by the structural mechanisms available in the language. The resulting head-head configuration then feeds a language- specific morphophonological operation that inserts a bundle of features which surface as the N-bonding element. This approach not only accounts for the distribution of N-bonding and is consistent with the observed phonological patterns, but also offers an alternative view of underlying clausal structure and voice morphology in Malagasy.

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A Quantitative Study of Voice in Malagasy

Cited by 35 publications

References 10 publications

Acquisition of the Malagasy voicing system: implications for the adult grammar

Acquisition of the Malagasy voicing system: implications for the adult grammar

On the presence versus absence of determiners in Malagasy

Malagasy N-bonding: A licensing approach

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