Table Of ContentSerge Sagna
Cross-Categorial Classification
Empirical Approaches
to Language Typology
Editors
Georg Bossong
Kristine Hildebrandt
Jean-Christophe Verstraete
Volume 60
Serge Sagna
Cross-Categorial
Classification
Nouns and Verbs in Eegimaa
ISBN 978-3-11-059506-2
e-ISBN (PDF) 978-3-11-063632-1
e-ISBN (EPUB) 978-3-11-063276-7
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Preface
This book provides a description of a typologically unusual phenomenon of overt
classification of both nouns and verbs using the same linguistic means. My goal
in this research is to demonstrate that such a cross‑categorial use of the same
classificatory devices is not random. Rather, it reflects a semantic categorisation
of entities and events/states that nouns and verbs denote, respectively. Many of
the ideas presented here are either existing ideas that are debated in typological
research on noun class/gender systems, or they are novel. For example, the best
way to analyse African noun class systems in order to make them more compara‑
ble to typologically similar agreement‑based systems of nominal classification is
debated. This book addresses this issue by offering a new approach to analysing
complex noun class and agreement systems like that of Eegimaa. It includes a
detailed study of the complex interactions in gender and number feature values
which appear in agreement mismatches triggered by lexical hybrids. The anal‑
ysis is done from the perspective of canonical typology. Canonical typology is
also used to analyse Eegimaa non‑finite verbs and their classification into several
overt verb classes. The role that semantic principles play in the grouping of nouns
into classes is also highly controversial in Niger‑Congo noun class systems. My
investigation of the semantic properties of the Eegimaa overt nominal classifica‑
tion system shows that physical properties like shape and culture‑specific factors
are fundamental principles underlying the semantic categorisation of entities
denoted by nouns. I also show that the classification of verbs in their non‑finite
form has underlying semantic motivations. However, with verbs and the events/
states they denote culture‑specific factors are the dominant principles of catego‑
risation.
The idea that the use of the same linguistic means to classify nouns and verbs
in their non‑finite forms reflects a semantic categorisation of events and states is
a novel idea I developed following a discussion of Eegimaa non‑finite verbs with
Eva Schultze‑Berndt in 2004. My subsequent research on this topic revealed that
the classification of verbs is also intimately linked to that of nouns and relates
to other aspects of Eegimaa grammar, such as complementation, non‑finiteness,
transitivity hierarchy distinctions, pluractionality and event individuation. It also
reveals the existence of parallels between the nominal and verbal domains based
on features such as boundedness.
https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110636321-202
Acknowledgements
This book has required funding and much input from colleagues and friends who
have helped me to improve my analysis and the presentation of my chapters.
People I thank here for their help do not necessarily agree with all my conclusions
and should not be taken as responsible for the claims made in this book. The book
is based on a project funded by the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC)
under the Future Research Leaders funding scheme (Grant number K001922/1).
Naturally, I thank the ESRC for making this research possible. It was completed
while working on a child language acquisition project funded by the ESRC and
the Arts and Humanities Research Council (ESRC/AHRC ES/P000304/1). I also
thank the ESRC and the AHRC for their support. The project of which this book is
an output was based at the Surrey Morphology Group (SMG), where I was intro‑
duced to canonical typology and where I developed many of the ideas presented
in this book. I would like to express my heartfelt gratitude to the members of my
research committee, namely, Greville Corbett, Matthew Baerman and Oliver Bond
for their comments on early drafts of the chapters of this book. I extend my thanks
to the other members or affiliated members of the SMG for comments and sugges‑
tions during dry‑runs before conferences: Maris Camilleri, Marina Chumakina,
Sebastian Fedden, Tim Feist, Michael Franjieh, Patricia Cabredo Hofherr, Alexan‑
dra Grandison, Alexander Krasovitsky, Irina Monich, Enrique Palancar, Tatiana
Reid, Penny Everson and Lisa Mack. I am indebted to Eva Schultze‑Berndt for
helping me shape my early ideas on the overt verb classification hypothesis, and
for insightful comments and suggestions since I began analysing data on this
topic. I would like to express my profound gratitude to Marilyn Vihman, Virve
Vihman and Dunstan Brown for reading and commenting on different chapters of
this book and for their support during the time I took off from our child language
acquisition project to complete the book. A special thank you to Marilyn for the
regular video calls to discuss various aspects of the form and content of the chap‑
ters she read.
I would like to thank Kristine Hildebrandt, the editors of EALT and an anon‑
ymous reviewer for their insightful comments on my manuscript. I also thank
Kristin Boergen and Birgit Sievert for helping me prepare the manuscript for
printing.
I also thank Philip J. Jaggar for his feedback from my early days working on
the topics investigated here and for comments on some parts of this book. Thanks
to Alena Witzlack‑Makarevich for answering my never‑ending questions on R,
Catherine Laing for helping on some R issues and Mark Allassonnière‑Tang for
producing the maps in Appendix A. For punctual questions and discussions on
aspects of the work discussed here, and for feedback on some ideas developed
https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110636321-203
VIII Acknowledgements
here, I thank Felix Ameka, Hannah Gibson, Maarten Mous, John David Sapir and
Norbert Vanek.
The chapters presented in this book were developed from multiple talks
presented at different conferences, workshops and seminars between 2006 and
2019. For the feedback and insights I received, I thank the participants at four
COST Action 31 workshops (Stability and Adaptation of Classification Systems
in a Cross‑Cultural Perspective) organised by Tekla Wiebush at: Humboldt Uni‑
versity – Berlin 2006, Åarhus University 2009, The Hebrew University – Jerusa‑
lem 2010, and Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales – Paris 2010 (Final
Conference). I also thank the audience at the 10th International Cognitive Lin‑
guistics Conference – Krakow University 2007, the 3rd Language Documentation
and Linguistic Theory (LDLT 2011) – SOAS, the 54th Linguistic Association of
Great Britain (LAGB 2013) – SOAS, two meetings of the Association for Linguis‑
tic Typology (ALT 2013 Leipzig, & ALT 2015 Albuquerque), the 43rd Colloquium
on African Languages and Linguistics (CALL 2013) – Leiden University, the 45th
Annual Conference on African Linguistics (ACAL 2014) – University of Kansas,
the 5th UK cognitive Linguistics Conference (UKCLC 2014) – Lancaster University,
two World Congresses of African Linguistics (WOCAL, Kyoto 2015 & Rabat 2018)
and the Many Facets of Agreement conference – University of Zurich 2019. I thank
Tom Güldemann and the audience at a departmental seminar presented at the
Department of Asian and African Studies, University of Humboldt in 2010, and
Ellen Contini‑Morava and John David Sapir and the audience at the presentation
at the Department of Anthropology, University of Virginia in 2014. I thank William
Guippori Diatta for sharing data from his botanical research on Eegimaa plants,
which I include in my analysis of the noun class system.
Chapters II and VII are slightly revised versions of journal articles published
in the Italian Journal of Linguistics (Sagna 2017) and Studies in African Linguis‑
tics (Sagna 2019a), respectively. I thank these journals for allowing me to include
these chapters here.
I have a personal dept to many people who have helped me in different ways
during the data collections, analysis and writing up of this book.
A very special mention to my many language consultants and my family in
Senegal for looking after me and for answering my endless questions. I thank
par ticularly Romélie Bassène, Gilbert Abouleute Sagna, Rolande Virginie Sagna,
Catherine Bassène, Hilaire Bassène, Paul Honoré Bassène, Egnakky Bassène, Jean
Christophe (Firiso) Bassène, Jerôme Alainda Bassène, and Aimé Tendeng. Without
them writing this book would not have been possible. I also thank Anne‑Cecile and
Thierry for giving me a nice space in their Bolong Passion Bed & Breakfast and for
looking after me during my writing retreats in Cap Skiring.
Acknowledgements IX
I reserve a very special thank you to my son Amay Speekendbrink‑Sagna and
my wife Zoe Speekendbrink for their patience, support and love during my long
periods of absence to write this book. I extend this thank you to the Speekenbrink
Family. Finally, I would like to express my gratitude to Candide Simard and Philip
Hutton for welcoming me into their home during my time at the SMG.
I dedicate this book to my father, Maurice Nazaire Sagna, who passed away in
September 2021, shortly before the publication of this book. His help was invalu‑
able for my data collection and analysis. I also dedicate this book to Abasse Sory
Bassène, Haresa Manga and Ignace Tendeng, three of my most regular language
consultants who passed away before this book was completed , and to Jean Jacques
Acoly Sagna (my brother), Marthe Raïssa Sagna (my sister), Françoise Guŋesi
Tendeng, Diara Ndiaye and many other cousins and friends who were among the
2000 people who died in the “African Titanic” (“Le Jóola” ferry). Their spirits have
accompanied me throughout the writing of this book.
