Causatives in Surgut Khanty and beyond

The zoom-link:
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/4526127048
Meeting ID: 452 612 7048

The syntax of causatives has been a marginal topic in studies on Surgut Khanty (but see Csepregi 2023). However, the discussion of causative morphology is a part of previous grammatical descriptions (cf. Honti 1984). Our aim is to provide a morphosyntactic profile of Surgut Khanty causatives with a brief comparison to other Ob-Ugric languages. The talk consists of two parts; first we will introduce the valence-changing strategies used with different verb pairs in Surgut Khanty following existing classifications (Nichols et al. 2004, Grünthal et al. 2021) then we will focus on the encoding of verbs and arguments in causative constructions.
Uralic languages are known for preferring transitivizing strategies over detransitivizing ones and Surgut Khanty doesn’t seem to be an exception. In a set of 20 verb pairs including meanings like ‘to laugh’ – ‘to make laugh’ or ‘to sleep’ – ‘to make sleep’ 14 are instances of valence increase where a transitivizing (causative) suffix is attached to the stem: pyt- ‘to become angry’ – pyt-ʌtə ‘to make angry’. Data also show some instances of less frequent strategies including de-transitivisation (čewi-ʌə- ‘to go into hiding’ – čewi- ‘to hide’) and the usage of suppletive (wu- ‘to see’ – ʌejəʌ-tə- ‘to show’) or ambitransitive (kös- ‘to break (intr. and tr.)’) forms. It is important that there are several verb pairs where we found variation; the latter meanings can also be expressed by using a causative suffix for instance. We will discuss these competing examples in more details.
Following the above results, one would expect that causative constructions contain verbs formed with transitivizing, i. e. causative suffixes, but our data provided by two native informants reveal a different picture. Causative constructions denote a macro-situation consisting of two micro-situations: “(i) the causing event, in which the causer does or initiates something; and (ii) the caused event, in which the causee carries out an action, or undergoes a change of condition or state as a result of the causer’s action” (Song 2001: 257). Intransitive verbs do indeed take the causative suffix -pt, -ʌt as in example (1) but transitive verbs almost exclusively appear in a periphrastic construction (2):

(1)     köʌ-nam        qoʌəntə-ʌəɣ        ńewrem    aŋki-ʌ
        word-apr    listen-ptcp.neg        child mother-poss.3sg
        pyt-əʌtə-ʌ.
        be_angry-caus-prs.3sg
        ‘The misbehaving child makes his/her mother angry.’ (elicited)

(2)    aŋki    järnas    jɔnt-taɣə    part-əʌ.
        mother    dress    sew-inf        order-prs.3sg
        ‘The mother is having a dress made.’ (Csepregi 2015)


This pattern is well-known cross-linguistically and can also be found in other Uralic languages. However, the question arises whether it is a result of language contact or language-internal development. In our talk, we will discuss this issue as well as some other questions concerning argument marking and the status of the auxiliary/light verb part- ‘to order’.

References
Csepregi, Márta 2015. Periphrastic causatives (Surgut Khanty). In Havas, Ferenc & Márta Csepregi & Nikolett F. Gulyás & Szilvia Németh, Typological Database of the Ugric Languages. Budapest: ELTE Finnugor Tanszék. (http://en.utdb.nullpoint.info/type/surgut-khanty/periphrastic-causatives/intpfrcc)
Csepregi, Márta 2023. Khanty. In Abondolo, Daniel & Riitta-Liisa Valijärvi (eds.), The Uralic languages. Second edition, 703–752. London: Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781315625096-16
Grünthal, Riho & Heini Arjava & Jyri Lehtinen & Johanna Nichols 2021. Basic causative verb patterns in Uralic: Retention and renewal in grammar and lexicon. In Luraghi, Silvia – Elisa Roma (eds.), Valency over time: Diachronic perspectives on valency patterns and valency orientation, 209–234. Berlin: De Gruyter. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110755657-007
Honti László 1984. Chrestomathia Ostiacica. Budapest: Tankönyvkiadó.
Nichols, Johanna & David A. Peterson & Jonathan Barnes. 2004. Transitivizing and detransitivizing languages. Linguistic Typology 8(2): 149–211.
Song, Jae Jung 2001. Linguistic typology: Morphology and syntax. Harlow: Pearson Education.