Classifiers in Yurok, Wiyot, and Algonquian

The Evolution of Algic Verbal Stem Structure: New Evidence from Yurok

1. The Algic language family consists of the Algonquian language family and its relatives Wiyot and Yurok, two native languages of northwestern California. In this paper, I will use internal reconstruction to propose an account of the evolution of verbal stem structure in the early prehistory of Yurok; the earliest stages in this development probably occurred in Proto-Algic. Thus, while the evi...

On The End of the Ritwan Controversy

The proposal by Sapir (1913) that Wiyot and Yurok, two languages of northwestern California previously grouped together as“Ritwan” by Dixon and Kroeber (1913), are related to the Algonquian languages occupies a special place in the history of linguistics, for two related reasons: because, unlikely though it seemed, it proved to be true, and because it provides an important example of the issues...

Clitic-Agreement Doubling in Yurok

Abstract In Clitic-Agreement Doubling, Φ-features of the same verbal argument are simultaneously expressed by pronominal clitics and verbal agreement. The Algic language Yurok (Robins, 1958) exhibits CliticAgreement Doubling (CAD) in specific syntactic contexts requiring clitics in addition to agreement, but provides also strategies to avoid this type of redundancy by suppressing otherwise expe...

The semantics of Yurok Intensive infixation*

A Comparison of the Obviation Systems of Kutenai and Algonquian

In recent years, the term ‘obviation’ has been applied to phenomena in a variety of languages on the basis of perceived similarity to the phenomenon in Algonquian languages to which, I assume, the term was originally applied. An example of a descriptive use of the term occurs in Dayley (1989: 136), who applies the terms ‘obviative’ and ‘proximate’ to two categories of demonstratives in Tümpisa ...