LING 1100 Lecture Notes - Lecture 7: Euphemism, Assibilation, Mediopassive Voice
25 Feb 2016
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Today"s focus: change is inevitable and natural, change leads to variation. Proto-polynesian to hawai"ian: linguists constructed the ancestor words, t"s became k"s, k"s became glottal stops. Using logic, we can prove this because if t"s became ks first, all ks would have become glottal stops and there would be no k"s lef: s"s became h"s, hawai"i was originally savaiki. Morphological change: morphology can be lost. Example: old english to modern english verb agreement. S/he walketh she walks: morphology can be gained. Ancient greek to modern greek future: ancient greek to modern greek future, thel o hina, i want so that i write, i want to write" graph o. Phonology: thel o hina > thelo na > the na > tha na > tha: tha grafo, [fut] i write, i will write". Going to gonna: cannot be the verb of motion, simply replaces the future tense. Evidence for semantic change: written records from earlier stages in the history of the language.
