Linguist Forum

Specializations => Typology and Descriptive Linguistics => Topic started by: zaba on December 04, 2014, 10:22:39 AM

Title: marking plurality
Post by: zaba on December 04, 2014, 10:22:39 AM

are there languages where:
1. singular and paucal both marked in one way (or not)
2. plural is marked another way

Or is that typologically unheard of?

Title: Re: marking plurality
Post by: Daniel on December 04, 2014, 12:08:40 PM

So there's no distinction between sg/pauc? In other words, you have just categories paucal and plural?

Not supposed to happen, according to this:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Implicational_hierarchy#Morphology

I don't know of any particular examples.

I would be entirely surprised by a language that has a paucal/multal distinction only. The "one some many" type is fairly well attested. Is "one" privileged in every culture? I don't know.