Adverbial subordination strategies in the Chaco and beyond

RIK VAN GIJN; LUCIA GOLLUSCIO; HEBE GONZÁLEZ; ALEJANDRA VIDAL

Encuentro; SSILA/Linguistic Society of America Annual Meeting; 2013

Previous research has shown that the languages of the Chaco area (south Bolivia, Paraguay, and northern Argentina) share phonological and grammatical features (Comrie et al. 2010), independently of the genetic affiliation of the languages. The on-going work on areal features in the Chaco has so far not focused on syntactic features. With this contribution we want to complement the existing results by looking at adverbial clause formation in the Chaco, in particular as opposed to surrounding areas. Looking at subordination strategies in general in South American languages from an areal perspective seems a promising endeavor, because in spite of the extreme linguistic diversity of the continent and the alleged conservatism of subordinate clauses (see e.g. Ross 1973, Bybee 2001), recurring strategies are found across language families (see van Gijn et al. 2011). For the Chaco area, adverbial subordination strategies are of particular interest. Many languages in neighboring areas like the Andeas (Torero 2002), and the Guaporé-Mamoré area (Crevels & Van der Voort 2008) have a preference for nominalized structures, whereas most Chaco languages have a preference for more ?verbal?, paratactic structures for adverbial relations. Moreover, these neighboring languages often mark switch reference for some of their adverbial clauses, a feature absent in the Chaco (Ciccone et al. 2008). The use of serial verb constructions for e.g. manner or purpose-of-motion relations - not uncommon in the Chaco area- seem to be a more Amazonian feature (see Aikhenvald 2011, Van Gijn et al. 2011: 17). Vilela is somewhat deviant in that it makes use of converbial constructions for some of its adverbial relations (Golluscio 2010), which is perhaps more reminiscent of Quechuan strategies. In short, adverbial subordination strategies in the languages of the Chaco seem to present a mix of structures that partly sets the area apart from neighboring areas, and partly connects it to different neighboring areas. This situation warrants, in our opinion, taking a closer look at adverbial subordination strategies in languages of the Chaco and neighboring languages.