Body part collocations (AKA psycho-collocations)in Thulung (Kiranti, Eastern Nepal)

Résumé En

Thulung, a Kiranti language (Sino-Tibetan/Trans-Himalayan, Eastern Nepal), has a number of complex predicates, mostly used for the expression of emotions and moods, which are made up of a body part (including abstract notions, such as mind and energy) plus verb. An example from Thulung is given in (1):(1) gu-ka a:ma nʌ: khu-irʉ 3SG-ERG 1SG.POSS mind steal-3SG>3SG.PST ‘I was deceived by him.’ [lit. He stole my mind]In the Mainland Southeast Asia linguistic area, these types of predicates are labeled psycho-collocations (Matisoff 1986; Vittrant 2013; Vittrant & Watkins 2019), and they constitute an important areal feature. Similarly constructed expressions form a significant part of the lexical repertoire of Kiranti languages, even though they have rarely been described for these languages (Bickel 1997 is a notable exception). In this talk, I will describe the 35 psycho-collocations I have collected in Thulung, presenting the range of body parts; the subtypes of psycho-collocations; the morphosyntactic patterns exhibited, looking specifically at the coding of the body part and of the experiencer in these expressions.ReferencesBickel, Balthasar. 1997. The possessive of experience in Belhare. In David Bradley (ed.), Tibeto-Burman languages of the Himalayas, 135–155. Canberra: Pacific Linguistics.Matisoff, James. 1986. Hearts and minds in South-East asian languages and English : an essay in the comparative lexical semantics of psycho-collocations. Cahiers de Linguistique Asie Orientale 15(1). 5–57.Vittrant, Alice. 2013. Psycho-collocational expressives in Burmese. In Williams, Jeffrey (ed.), The Aesthetics of Grammar: Sound and Meaning in the Languages of Mainland Southeast Asia, 255–279. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Vittrant, Alice & Justin Watkins (eds.). 2019. The Mainland Southeast Asia Linguistic Area (Trends in Linguistics Studies and Monographs 314). Berlin/Boston: Mouton de Gruyter.