A Morphosyntactically Tagged Corpus for Plains Cree

This chapter focuses on the article system in Michif. Articles are particularly problematic for the French DP/Plains Cree VP split posited for Michif (Bakker 1997). Despite being French-derived, the Michif articles do not behave like their French counterparts. Michif definite articles occupy a lower position within the DP than French definite articles do, and Michif lacks definiteness, despite having borrowed both the definite and indefinite articles. Even more problematically, the singular definite articles are used to Algonquianize non-Algonquian vocabulary—both within the DP and the VP. Thus, a piece of French morphosyntax has been appropriated to create structures that can be interpreted within Algonquian syntax, providing more evidence that ultimately the Michif DP is Algonquian, rather than French.

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Plains Cree: A Grammatical Study

Language ◽

10.2307/412580 ◽

1976 ◽

Vol 52 (2) ◽

pp. 516

Author(s):

Regna Darnell ◽

H. Christoph Wolfart

Keyword(s):

Plains Cree

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Two Plains Cree Tales

Journal of American Folklore ◽

10.2307/535155 ◽

1921 ◽

Vol 34 (133) ◽

pp. 320

Author(s):

James A. Teit

Keyword(s):

Plains Cree

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Language Change, Variation, and Universals

10.1093/oso/9780198865391.001.0001 ◽

2021 ◽

Author(s):

Peter W. Culicover

Keyword(s):

Argument Structure ◽

Language Change ◽

Conceptual Structure ◽

Human Mind ◽

Plains Cree ◽

Theoretical Foundations ◽

Parameter Theory ◽

Grammatical Functions ◽

The Way

This volume is about how human languages get to be the way they are, why they are different from one another in some ways and not others, and why they change in the ways that they do. Given that language is a universal creation of the human mind, the puzzle is why there are different languages at all, why we don’t all speak the same language. And while there is considerable variation, there are ways in which grammars show consistent patterns. The solution to these puzzles, the author proposes, is a constructional one. Grammars consist of constructions that carry out the function of expressing universal conceptual structure. While there are in principle many different ways of accomplishing this task, the constructions that languages actually use are under pressure to reduce complexity. The result is that there is constructional change in the direction of less complexity, and grammatical patterns emerge that reflect conceptual universals. The volume consists of three parts. Part I establishes the theoretical foundations: situating universals in conceptual structure, formally defining constructions, and characterizing constructional complexity. Part II explores variation in argument structure, grammatical functions, and A′ constructions, drawing on data from a variety of languages, including English and Plains Cree. Part III looks at constructional change, focusing primarily on English and German. The study ends with some observations and speculations on parameter theory, analogy, the origins of typological patterns, and Greenbergian ‘universals’.

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