Verbal numeral classifiers in languages of Eastern Eurasia : A typological survey

This article presents a typological survey of verbal numeral classifiers (VNCs) in languages of Eastern Eurasia. As classifiers of occurrence (e.g., to V once, to V twice), VNCs are prevalent in languages of East Asia and Southeast Asia, yet the phenomenon has been largely overlooked in typological...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Honkasalo, Sami, Yurayong, Chingduang
Other Authors: Department of Languages, Asian Languages, General Linguistics
Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
Language:English
Published: de Gruyter 2024
Subjects:
Online Access:http://hdl.handle.net/10138/586339
Description
Summary:This article presents a typological survey of verbal numeral classifiers (VNCs) in languages of Eastern Eurasia. As classifiers of occurrence (e.g., to V once, to V twice), VNCs are prevalent in languages of East Asia and Southeast Asia, yet the phenomenon has been largely overlooked in typological studies that have overwhelmingly focused on the adnominal use of numeral classifiers. Analyzing a sample of 543 linguistic varieties, the study categorizes the language families of Eastern Eurasia into three groups based on their use of VNCs: 1) VNCs consistently present in all languages (e.g., Tai-Kadai); 2) VNCs present in some languages (e.g., Sino-Tibetan); and 3) VNCs consistently absent (e.g., Yukaghir). Additionally, the meanings of VNCs are shown to follow a non-random distribution by centering on certain semantic fields, such as quantifying hits with ‘verbs of violence’. The study aims to offer the first step toward an areal typological study of VNCs, highlighting the importance of including this phenomenon in future descriptive work. Peer reviewed