A New Typology of Determiners: A Bantu–Salish Connection
Wednesday March 25
12:30 to 1:30 pm
In person: Arts 368
For the Zoom link, please email: icer.ok@ubc.ca
Everyone is welcome to attend!
Abstract
Determiners (articles) have traditionally been analyzed as encoding either definiteness (e.g.,English) or speci-ficity (e.g., Turkish). However, research on Indigenous languages of British Columbia shows that their deter-miner systems do not encode these familiar distinctions (Matthewson 1998; Gillon 2006; Lyon 2011). I present new evidence from Nata (Bantu) demonstrating that determiner choice likewise fails to track definiteness or specificity. Instead, I argue that the contrast reflects the speaker’s (un)willingness to commit to the existence of a referent for the noun phrase (Gambarage 2019). I further argue that Nata and St’at’imcets (Lillooet; Salish) share a semantic core centered on existential commitment. Despite these parallels, structural differences be-tween the two languages yield distinct strategies of encoding commitment to the existence of a referent. These findings motivate a new typology of determiners that moves beyond the definiteness/specificity dichotomy and refines our understanding of cross-linguistic variation in determiner semantics.
Bio
Dr. Joash Gambarage is a general linguist originally from Tanzania whose research and teaching span linguis-tic anthropology, syntax–semantics, language documentation, African languages and cultures, African Studies, applied linguistics, and Swahili pedagogy. Since 2021, he has been teaching at UBCV, and this year he has taught at UBCO. He has delivered ten different courses, including Linguistic Anthropology, Syntax, African Languages and Cultures, African Studies, and Swahili. Dr. Gambarage has published several peer-reviewed articles, book chapters, and a book on language pedagogy which integrates storytelling and grammar-based songs to enhance learning and engagement.
