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In linguistics, evidentiality is a modality that allows (or requires) speakers to specify why they believe a given statement—i.e. what kind of evidence they have for it. These kinds of evidence might be divided into such categories as: Broadly conceived, linguistics is the scientific study of human language, and a linguist is someone who engages in this study. ...
In music, modality is the subject concerning certain diatonic scales known as modes (e. ...
Evidence can mean: Any objectively demonstrable circumstance which tends to indicate or disprove a proposition, see scientific method and reality. ...
- Direct experience
- Sensory observation (especially visual)
- Inference or supposition (including confidence)
- Hearsay
Evidentiality is often expressed as an affix or auxiliary verb. An affix is a morpheme that is attached to a base morpheme to form a word. ...
In linguistics, an auxiliary verb or helping verb is a verb whose function it is to give further semantic information about the main verb which follows it. ...
Examples of evidentiality in English
Consider these English sentences: The English language is a West Germanic language that originates in England. ...
- I am hungry.
- Bob is hungry.
We are unlikely to say the second unless someone (perhaps Bob himself) has told us that Bob is hungry. If we are simply assuming that Bob is hungry based on the way he looks, we are more likely to say something like: - Bob looks hungry.
- Bob seems hungry.
Here, the fact that we are relying on sensory evidence, rather than direct experience, is conveyed by our use of the word look or seem.
Another type of evidentiality is expressed in English with adverbs. Consider the differences between: An adverb is a part of speech that normally serves to modify verbs, adjectives, other adverbs, clauses, and sentences. ...
- It'll be OK.
- It'll probably be OK.
The probably communicates that while the speaker believes it will be OK, she is not entirely certain.
Evidentiality is not considered a true grammatical category in English because it is expressed in diverse ways and is optional. In contrast, many other languages (including Quechua, Yukaghir, and the constructed language Láadan require the speaker to mark the main verb or the sentence as a whole for evidentiality, or offer an optional set of affixes for indirect evidentiality, with direct experience being the default assumed mode of evidentiality. Quechua (Standard Quechua, Runasimi Language of People) is an Native American language of South America. ...
The Yukaghir, or Yukagirs (Юкагиры in Russian; self-designation: одул (odul), деткиль (detkil)) are a people in East Siberia, living in the basin of the Kolyma River. ...
An artificial or constructed language (known colloquially as a conlang among aficionados), is a language whose phonology, grammar and vocabulary are specifically devised by an individual or small group, rather than having naturally evolved as part of a culture as with natural languages. ...
Láadan is a constructed language created by Suzette Haden Elgin in 1982 to test the Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis for women, specifically to determine if Western natural languages were better suited for expressing the views of men than women. ...
One form of evidentiality found as a grammatical category in some languages is the quotative evidential mood, which expresses that the speaker has heard the information expressed by a third party. This mood is best translated into English with "I've heard that..." or "Reportedly". For example, the Peruvian language Shipibo has a quotative marker ronqui as in:
- cai-ronqui reocoocainyantanque
- going_QUOTATIVE he_turned_over
- 'Reportedly, while he was going (in his boat), he turned over.' (Faust 1973)
External links
References Faust, Norma (1973). Lecciones para el aprendizaje del idioma Shipibo-Conibo. Lima: Summer Institute of Linguistics. . Lima is the capital and largest city in Peru. ...
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