The Semitic "Perfect" and the Problem of the Third Person Zero Morpheme.
In many languages, third person forms in a verbal paradigm are unmarked, and scholars have suggested that such cases are either a result of loss or nondevelopment. In this paper I will argue that in the perfect/stative paradigm in Semitic, the third person morphology is a result of nondevelopment. I...
| Publicado en: | Journal of the American Oriental Society Vol. 145; no. 2; pp. 327 - 348 |
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| Formato: | Artículo |
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American Society for Premodern Asia (ASPA)
Apr-Jun2025
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| Acceso en línea: | Ver este registro en EBSCOhost |
| Sumario: | In many languages, third person forms in a verbal paradigm are unmarked, and scholars have suggested that such cases are either a result of loss or nondevelopment. In this paper I will argue that in the perfect/stative paradigm in Semitic, the third person morphology is a result of nondevelopment. I suggest that these forms are constructed as predicative adjectives, without person markers, because Semitic never developed third person nominative pronouns. I further discuss other innovative verbal formations in Semitic and show that when subject clitics are noncanonical, for example in Neo-Aramaic, third person forms are clearly marked. |
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