The verbal reciprocal suffix in Turkic languages and the development of its different values (original) (raw)

This paper studies different values of the so-called reciprocal suffix -š in Turkic languages and argues contra V. Nedjalkov (2006, 2007a) that the reciprocal value has developed from the sociative one. In Turkic languages, reciprocals can either be realized morphologically, via affixation on the verb, or syntactically, by use of a reciprocal pronoun. The morphological formation involves the derivational suffix -š, which is a shared feature of all Turkic languages and remains fairly productive in most of them. Beside its use to form reciprocals, -š displays a wide range of values: sociative, assistive, competitive, marker of 3rd plural, iterative, intensive, anticausative, autocausative, among others. These values have been thoroughly discussed especially in V.Nedjalkov 2007b. According to V.Nedjalkov, the sociative meaning would have developed later from the reciprocal one (2006:19-20, 2007a:245-247). His main argument is that we may find languages for which the sociative marker is more morphologically complex than the reciprocal one (when they do not resort to the same form to realize the two values), which suggests that the first would have developed from the second; but the opposite situation is not attested. In this paper, we take the opposite stance and argue that reciprocal has developed from the sociative, while the original value of the suffix was most probably a marker of “collective plurality”. Our claim is supported by a survey of the values of -š in Turkic languages, both from a synchronic and diachronic perspective, and the study of facts in other non related languages.