从“哪”到“不” : 云南迪庆藏语否定标记的语法化

Abstract

This article argues that a newly emerged, third negative prefix /ka-/ in rGyalthang Tibetan (Yunnan) has been acquired through a grammaticalisation process from a lexical word ‘where’ to a negative prefix. It principally describes Choswateng Tibetan (rGyalthang subgroup of Khams Tibetan), which uses three negative prefixes /ȵə-/, /ma-/, and /ka-/. The third prefix /ka-/ functions as either an emphasised negation in the egophoric evidential category or an inferential negation for the sensory evidential category from the pragmatic perspective, and it does not co-occur with a statemental evidential category, in particular, a copulative statemental verb stem /ˊreʔ/. The article suggests that the expression with the third negative prefix originates from the structure of a rhetorical question, reflecting morphophonological, syntactic, and pragmatic features. A parallel expression is also frequently found in the local Chinese (Yunnanese). However, the degree of grammaticalisation is more in Khams Tibetan than Yunnanese. The development of interrogative words into verb prefixes is a typologically rare phenomenon of grammaticalisation, and its mechanism needs to be explored from a cross-linguistic perspective.