Talk: Premodality

On the Quest for Modality in Hittite

A tentative definition of modality may be to see it as "the grammaticalization of speaker’s attitudes and opinions" (Magni 2010: ). Modality therefore concerns all utterances that do not assert anything in our actual world, rather they describe an irreal world of possibilty or necessity. Research has focused mostly on the two formal categories that prevail in SAE-languages, i.e. mood and modal verbs. But how does a language encode modality that uses neither of these strategies prominently?

Hittite, the oldest known Indo-European (IE) language spoken around 3500 years ago in modern-day Turkey, may be such a case. It has a very simple mood system, consisting only of an indicative and imperative. Similarly, there is no widespread usage of modal verbs. It may be even doubtful to categorise any verbs as modal in Hittite.

As a first approach to modality in Hittite, which up till now has been understudied (see however Zorman 2010), I am surveying the claimed premodal and modal verbs of Hittite in my Master's thesis. In my talk, I will shortly introduce the theory behind modal utterances, present usual development paths to modality, and quickly survey the different strategies of expressing modality in Hittite. In the main part, I will present first results from my Master's thesis. Everything presented will still be work in progress, however, so that any feedback is appreciated.

Out of the three big verbal categories (tense, aspect, and modality), modality is the least researched one. While its research got resurgence in modern times through some typological and theoretical publications (i.a. Nuyts, Palmer), resaerch within modality has turned out to be more complicated as it actually can't be neatly confined to verbal or even formal constraints. As such an functional category, Palmer called modality a "super category".

Modality's definition varies widely from author to author, though a tentative definition may be to see it as "the grammaticalization of speaker’s attitudes and opinions" (Magni 2010: ). Modality concerns all utterances that do not assert anything in our actual world, rather they describe an irreal world of possibilty or necessity. Languages feature a wide range of means to represent modality. Research has focused mostly on the two formal categories that prevail in SAE-languages, i.e. mood and modal verbs. But how does a language encode modality that uses neither of these strategies prominently?

Hittite, the oldest known Indo-European (IE) language spoken around 3500 years ago in modern-day Turkey, may be such a case. In contrast to most old IE languages, it has a very simple mood system, consisting only of an indicative and imperative, meaning there is no subjunctive or optative, that may be used for modal utterances. Similarly, there is no widespread usage of modal verbs. It may be even doubtful to categorise any verbs as modal in Hittite.

As a first approach to modality in Hittite, which up till now has been understudied (see however Zorman 2010), I am surveying the claimed premodal and modal verbs of Hittite in my Master's thesis. In my talk, I will shortly introduce the theory behind modal utterances, present usual development paths to modality, and quickly survey the different strategies of expressing modality in Hittite. In the main part, I will present first results from my Master's thesis. Everything presented will still be work in progress, however, so that any feedback is appreciated.

Info

Day: 2025-05-16
Start time: 12:00
Duration: 00:30
Room: GWZ 2.216
Track: Historical Linguistics
Language: en

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