Resolving gender conflict: The strategies of dialect speakers in Split, Croatia

1
Resolving gender conflictThe strategies of
dialect speakers in Split, Croatia

• Andrea Sims
• asims_at_ling.ohio-state.edu
• I owe thanks to the many people who have
  commented on parts of this work, but most of all
  Jeff Mielke, and the members of Changelings, the
  Slavic Linguistics Forum, and my committees
  Brian Joseph, Daniel Collins, Keith Johnson and
  Charles Gribble.
• This work was supported in part by a G. Michael
  Riley Scholarship, a Graduate Student
  International Dissertation Research Travel Grant,
  the Kenneth E. Naylor Professorship and the
  Department of Linguistics, all at Ohio State
  University.

2
Introduction

• This paper investigates the pattern of declension
  of masculine a-stem nouns among a group of
  speakers living in Split, Croatia.
• Contrary to previous descriptions, some speakers
  decline a subset of these nouns according to the
  masculine o-stem pattern.
• Frequency, animacy and agreement are explored as
  factors.

3
What is gender conflict?

• Agreement targets show different morphological
  gender than controlling noun.
• ex. ??????? ????-? 'a good doctor (f)'
• The "conflict" is between natural gender (i.e.
  real-world sex) and grammatical gender.

4
What is gender conflict for Slavic masculine
a-stems?

• Masculine a-stems refer to males
• ex. S/C sluga 'male servant' (cf. slugarica)
  
• and often have masculine agreement
• ex. S/C dobar sluga 'a good male servant'
• but (traditionally) show the canonically feminine
  (i.e. a-stem) morphological pattern

5
Previous Accounts

• Several theories (e.g. Corbett 1991, Kathol
  1999, Weschler Zlati? 2000) have been proposed
  to explain natural-gender agreement, but little
  attention has been paid to the possibility of
  morphological variation for the nouns.

6
But do speakers connect natural and morphological
gender?
7
The connection between natural and morphological
gender through agreement

• The Agreement Hierarchy (Corbett 1983, 1991)
• reflects the influence of natural gender.
• attributive personal pronoun

8
The connection between natural and morphological
gender through agreement

• Va oba slu?e sotonin?
• you both.m servants.f satan.adj.f
• 'You both are servants of Satan' (Supr. 75.1)
• (Huntley 1993)
• Rade na?e pape. Oni
• work our.f fathers.f they.m
• 'Our fathers are working. They'

9

• Why might we expect resolution
• of this "conflict"?
• And what would it look like?

10
The case of Polish
11
Masculine a-stem declension

• kolega 'colleague'
• Nom kolega koledzy
• Gen kolegi kolego?w
• Dat koledze kolegom
• Acc koleg? kolego?w
• Voc kolego koledzy
• Inst koleg? kolegami
• Loc koledze kolegach

12
Feminine a-stem declension

• ?ona 'woman'
• Nom ?ona ?ony
• Gen ?ony ?on
• Dat ?onie ?onom
• Acc ?on? ?ony
• Voc ?ono ?ony
• Inst ?on? ?onami
• Loc ?onie ?onach

13
Masculine a-stem declension

• kolega 'colleague'
• Nom kolega koledzy
• Gen kolegi
• Dat koledze kolegom
• Acc koleg?
• Voc kolego koledzy
• Inst koleg? kolegami
• Loc koledze kolegach

14
Masculine a-stem declension

• kolega 'colleague'
• Nom
• Gen kolego?w
• Dat
• Acc kolego?w
• Voc
• Inst
• Loc

15
Some variations(Rothstein 1993, Swan 1983)

• Personal names (e.g. Fredro) often not declined.
• Names some epicenes show Npl -owie.
• Some soft stems (e.g. -ist/-yst) have Npl -e
  (fem).
• Personal marking (i.e. acc gen) in plural for
  some (e.g. kolega), but not others (e.g. poeta).
• Genpl either -?w (masc. personal) or -? (fem).
• Zero ending more common for pejoratives
• Overall lexically specific
• e.g. Genpl m??czyzn 'man'

16
Some variations(Rothstein 1993, Swan 1983)

• A few words (e.g. s?dzia 'judge') have a
  different
• declension.
• Nom s?dzia s?dziowie
• Gen s?dziego s?dzio?w
• Dat s?dziemu s?dziom
• Acc s?dziego s?dzio?w
• Voc s?dzio s?dziowie
• Inst s?dzi? s?dziami
• Loc s?dzi(m) s?dziach

17
Some variations(Rothstein 1993, Swan 1983)

• A few words (e.g. s?dzia 'judge') have a
  different
• declension.
• Nom s?dzia
• Gen
• Dat s?dziom
• Acc
• Voc s?dzio
• Inst s?dzi?
• Loc s?dzi s?dziach

18
Some variations(Rothstein 1993, Swan 1983)

• A few words (e.g. s?dzia 'judge') have a
  different
• declension.
• Nom s?dziowie
• Gen s?dziego s?dzio?w
• Dat s?dziemu
• Acc s?dziego s?dzio?w
• Voc s?dziowie
• Inst s?dziami
• Loc s?dzim

19
Conclusions

• Polish masculine a-stems underwent partial shift
  from historically fem. (a-stem) pattern to
  canonically masc. (o-stem) pattern.
• Pattern perhaps best described as
  lexically-specific.
• Change in Genitive and Accusative plural suggests
  animacy as a factor.

20
The case of Czech

• Epicene a-stems
• lakota 'skinflint'
• mizera 'scoundrel'
• moula 'dolt, oaf'
• k?oura 'cry-baby'
• matla 'dawdler'
• n?fuka 'snob'
• necuda 'shameless
• person'

• Masculine a-stems
• sluha 'servant'
• turista 'tourist'
• hrdina 'hero'
• modernista 'modernist'
• kolega 'colleague'
• komponista 'composer'
• gazda 'proprietor,
• landlord'

21
Masculine a-stem declension

• hrdina 'hero'
•  
• Nom hrdin-a hrdin-ov?
• Gen hrdin-y hrdin-?
• Dat hrdin-ovi hrdin-?m
• Acc hrdin-u hrdin-y
• Voc hrdin-o hrdin-ov?
• Inst hrdin-ou hrdin-y
• Loc hrdin-ovi hrdin-ech

22
Feminine a-stem declension

• kniha 'book'
• Nom knih-a knih-y
• Gen knih-y knih-?
• Dat kniz-e knih-?m
• Acc knih-u knih-y
• Voc knih-o knih-y
• Inst knih-ou knih-ami
• Loc kniz-e knih-?ch

23
Masculine o-stem declension

• student 'student'
• Nom student student-i
• Gen student-a student-?
• Dat student-ovi student-?m
• Acc student-a student-y
• Voc student-e student-i
• Inst student-em student-y
• Loc student-ovi student-ech

24
Masculine a-stems following the "feminine"

• hrdina 'hero'
•  
• Nom hrdin-a
• Gen hrdin-y
• Dat
• Acc hrdin-u
• Voc hrdin-o
• Inst hrdin-ou
• Loc

25
Masculine a-stems following the "masculine"

• hrdina 'hero'
•  
• Nom hrdin-ov? (-i)
• Gen hrdin-?
• Dat hrdin-ovi hrdin-?m
• Acc hrdin-y
• Voc hrdin-ov?
• Inst hrdin-y
• Loc hrdin-ovi hrdin-ech

26
Conclusions

• Cz masculine a-stems underwent partial shift from
  historically fem. (a-stem) pattern to canonically
  masc. (o-stem) pattern.
• Use of "masculine" in Dative/Locative singular
  suggests animacy is a factor.
• Switch in the plural suggests frequency is a
  factor.

27
Some ideas of the role of frequency in language
change

• Direct causation
• Indirect correlation
• Frequency as "guide"
• Frequency as "constraint"

28
Direct Causation

• Grammaticalization theory
• e.g. Hopper Traugott 1993
• Frequent forms are subject to "wearing down"
  phonetically, leading free words to become
  morphemes.
• Lexical diffusion
• e.g. Hooper 1976, Ogura Wang 1996, Phillips
  2001
• "Physiologically" motivated changes affect the
  most frequent words first.
•  Direct connection limited to phonetically-driven
  changes (i.e. no reference to the lexicon).

29
Indirect correlation Frequency as "guide"

• If the lexicon is structured based on frequency,
  frequency will indirectly impact the path of a
  change through the lexicon when independent
  causation exists.
• e.g. Alegre Gordon 1998 Bybee 1985, 1988
  Stemberger MacWhinney 1988
• Prediction Language change will begin with
  infrequent forms, progressing to the frequent
  ones.

30
Indirect correlation Frequency as "guide"
31
Indirect correlation Frequency as constraint

• Frequency may serve as a constraint on a
  variation pattern by inhibiting high frequency
  forms from varying, but allowing any pattern
  among low frequency tokens.
• Perhaps resulting from saliency of high frequency
  forms, but not of low frequency forms
  (enforcement of norms).

32
Indirect correlation Frequency as constraint
33
Testing the predictions

• Masculine a-stem nouns among dialect speakers in
  Split, Croatia

34
Serbian and Croatian masculine and epicene
a-stems

• Masculine a-stems
• gazda 'landlord'
• sudija 'judge'
• voda 'leader'
• papa 'Pope'
• kolega 'colleague'
• sluga 'servant'
• buregdija 'maker/seller of burek'

• Epicene a-stems
• izb(j)eglica 'refugee'
• pristaa 'follower'
• mu?terija 'customer'
• pristalica 'follower'
• ubojica 'murderer'
• luda 'crazy person'
• varalica 'imposter'

35
Agreement for masculine a-stems

• Prescriptively masculine in singular, feminine in
  plural.
• Ponekad sam slu?ao svog kolegu
  sometimes aux listened my.sg.M
  colleague.sg.F 'Sometimes I listened to
  my colleague.'
•  
• Ponekad sam slu?ao svoje kolege
  sometimes aux listened
  my.pl.F colleague.pl.F 'Sometimes I listened to
  my colleagues.'

36
Agreement for masculine a-stems

• In reality there is a tendency for masculine
• (i.e. natural gender) agreement to be extended
  to plural (Corbett 1991, Browne 1993, Weschler
  and Zlati? 2000), with masculine agreement
  posited to be on the increase (Corbett 1991,
  Beli? 1924).
•  

37
With such a varied agreement pattern, we might
wonder whether the (nominal) morphology follows
the syntax...
38
Masculine a-stem declension

• mlado?enja 'bridegroom'
• Nom mlado?enja mlado?enje
• Gen mlado?enje mlado?enja
• Dat mlado?enji mlado?enjama
• Acc mlado?enju mlado?enje
• Voc mlado?enjo mlado?enje
• Inst mlado?enjom mlado?enjama
• Loc mlado?enji mlado?enjama

39
Feminine a-stem declension

• ?ena 'woman'
• Nom ena ene
• Gen ene ena
• Dat eni enama
• Acc enu ene
• Voc eno ene
• Inst enom enama
• Loc eni enama

40
Methodology Questionnaire composition

• 336 masc./epicene a-stem nouns gathered (Benson
  1994)
• Frequencies from Croatian National Corpus
• Group and token frequencies
• 9 million word balanced textual corpus
• Syntactic frames test
• Masculine a-stems
• 5-10 top 25 group frequency
• 5-10 bottom 25 group frequency
• Feminine a-stems
• 5 high frequency, 5 low frequency
• Each contrastive case/number combination tested
  twice per word.
• Tokens attested only once were thrown out.

41
Methodology Informants

• 11 informants, comprising 4 families from
  Radunica neighborhood in Split, Croatia.
• Ages 21-65
• 5 women, 6 men
• 7 youngest informants (21-41)
• some college experience (1 exception)
• no a-stem variation shown
• 4 oldest informants (45-65)
• 4-8 years formal schooling
• all showed variation

42
And now some data!

• (Four oldest informants only)

43
Only (prescriptive) "feminine" declension
possible

• Njene lijene
  slugi/sluzi/sluge
• her.nom.pl.F lazy.nom.pl.F servants.nom.M/M/F
• nisu htjele raditi.
• aux.neg want.past.pl.F work
• 'Her lazy servants didn't want to work.'

44
Only (prescriptive) "feminine" declension
possible

• Moj gazd/gazda, komu
  
• my.nom.sg.M landlord.nom.M/F who.dat.M
• posu?ujem novac, nije simpatican covjek.
• owe.1.sg money neg.is kind man.
• 'My landlord, to whom I owe money, is not a kind
• man.'

45
Only (prescriptive) "feminine" declension
possible

• Dao sam pismo svojim kolegima/kolegama.
• gave AUX letter self's.dat colleagues.dat.M/F
• 'I gave the letter to my colleagues.'

46
Both "masculine" and "feminine" declension
possible

• Posmatrao sam jakog
  drvosjeca/drvosjecu
• watched aux.1.sg strong.M lumberjack.acc.sg.M/
  F
• dok je obarao drvo.
• while AUX cut.M tree
• 'I watched the strong lumberjack while he cut
  down the tree.'

47
Both "masculine" and "feminine" declension
possible

• Poslat ?u pismo lovokradicima/lovokradicama.
• send FUT letter lumber poacher.dat.pl.M/F
• 'I will send a letter to the lumber poachers.'
•  
• vlast nad sveznalicima/sveznalicama.
• power over know-it-all.inst.pl.M/F
• 'power over the know-it-alls...'

48
Both "masculine" and "feminine" declension
possible

• Govorimo o ne?enju/ne?enji.
• talk.1.pl about bachelor.loc.sg.M/F
• 'We are talking about the bachelor.'

49
Only innovative "masculine" declension allowed

• Ho?e na?i lovokradivca/lovokradicu/lovokradivcu
  , da
• want find lumber poacher.acc.sg.M/F/F
  so that
• 'They want to find the poacher so that...'
•  
• U zoolokom vrtu moja kcerka voli gledati
  gorila/gorilu.
• At zoo my daughter like
  watch gorila.acc.M/F
• 'At the zoo my daughter likes to watch the
  gorilla.'

50
Only innovative "masculine" declension allowed

• Ne mora? vjerovati parala?u/parala?i.
• not should believe liar.dat.sg.M/F
• 'You shouldn't believe that consummate liar.'
• Tra?im parala?ca/parala?u/parala?cu.
• search for liar.acc.sg.M/F/F
• 'I am looking for the consummate liar.'

51
Question Is frequency playing a role in the
lexically-specific nature of the variation?
52
But first, we need to consider other factors

• Animacy
• Agreement

53
Czech masc. a-stems following the "masculine"

• hrdina 'hero'
•  
• Nom hrdin-ov?
• Gen hrdin-?
• Dat hrdin-ovi hrdin-?m
• Acc hrdin-y
• Voc hrdin-ov?
• Inst hrdin-y
• Loc hrdin-ovi hrdin-ech

54
The (lack of) importance of animacyTable 1.
Innovation by case/number combination
55
Agreement

• Younger informants typically did not allow
  masculine
• agreement for adjectives in the plural (i.e.
  where
• proscribed).
• Njene/i lijene/i sluge nisu
  htjele/i raditi.
• her.F/M lazy.F/M servants not.aux want.F/M
  work.
• 'Her lazy servants didn't want to work.'

56
Agreement

• Older informants were generally more accepting of
• masculine agreement in the plural.
• Njene/i lijene/i sluge nisu
  htjele/i raditi.
• her.F/M lazy.F/M servants not.aux want.F/M
  work.
• 'Her lazy servants didn't want to work.'

57
Agreement

• However, there was no indication that agreement
  had
• a direct effect on declension of a-stem nouns.
• ljubav (lijepog) mlado?enja
• love handsome.M bridegroom
• 'the love of the handsome bridegroom.'

58
Conclusions

• While preliminary observations suggest that
  greater acceptance of masculine agreement
  correlates with innovative masculine declension,
  further research would be needed to fully
  understand the role of agreement.

59
FrequencyChart 3. Frequency vs. variation of
masculine a-stem nouns
60
Indirect correlation Frequency as "guide"
61
Indirect correlation Frequency as constraint
62
Conclusions

• For some dialect speakers of Split, masculine
  a-stem nouns can vary between the (prescriptive)
  a-stem declension and an innovative o-stem
  pattern.
• Frequency is a factor in language change, but not
  necessarily the mechanism which is implied by,
  e.g., connectionist models of the lexicon.
• The data is consistent with the idea that the
  correlation between frequency and innovative
  declension results from extralinguistic factors
  of language use.
• This may represent declension following
  agreement, thus resolving an apparently perceived
  gender conflict.

63
References

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67
Frequency (tokens/million) from the Czech
National Corpus
68
Case frequencies in Czech (Jel?nek et al 1961)

• Case Frequency Masc. a-stem declension
• Nsg, Gsg, Asg 15-22.5 feminine
• Isg 5-8.5 feminine
• Lsg, Gpl, Npl, Apl 5-8.5 masculine
• Dsg 3.5 masculine
• Lpl, Ipl 2.25 masculine
• Vsg 1.75 feminine
• Vpl 0.25 masculine

69
Masculine a-stem gender conflict in OCS

• samogo vladyko?
• self.masc.acc.animate lord.fem.acc
• 'the lord himself' (Supr. 491.5)
•  
• juno?o? krasna
• youth.fem.acc handsome.masc.acc.animate
• 'a handsome youth' (Supr. 187.3)
• (Lunt 1974)

70
Number "conflict" in OCS(Huntley 1993)

• v?s???e?narod?? s?brav??
  s??stoja?o??
• All.sg crowd.sg having gathered.sg were
  standing.pl
• popzorujo??te
• watching.pl
• 'And all the crowd, having gathered, were
  standing
• watching.'
• (Supr. 117.14)