Events
CSSN talk: Idan Caspi
Idan Caspi will give a talk entitled “Hebrew N+N Toponyms and Animacy” at the Canadian Society for the Study of Names Annual Meeting on 8 June at 4pm.
Abstract
I argue that many Hebrew toponyms are structurally decomposable, patterning with independently attested grammatical constructions and correlating with animacy. Specifically, Hebrew toponyms often occur as N1+N2 sequences (1a-b), suspiciously similar to non-toponymic N1+N2 sequences known as construct state (CS) phrases, a type of genitival construction (2):
(1a) yam ha-melax
sea the-salt
‘Dead Sea’
(1b) tel aviv
mound spring
‘Tel Aviv’
(2) misrad ha-menahel
office the-manager
‘The manager’s office’
To what extent can the N1+N2 toponyms in (1) be defined structurally along the same lines as CSs (2)? I show that N1+N2 toponyms are reducible only to two of Borer’s (2011) CS sub-classes: M(odificiational)-constructs (1a) and compounds (1b), and that they resist reduction to R(eferential)-constructs (2). Toponymic M-constructs involve a property-modification relation between N1 and N2, whereas toponymic compounds are associated with meaning that is not predictable from their nominal subcomponents. This suggests that N1+N2 toponyms do not constitute a uniform class.
This division is not accidental: toponymic M-constructs typically denote geographically salient natural ontologies (e.g., seas, mountains), where some semantic transparency is preserved. Toponymic compounds are more common with inhabited places (e.g., cities, villages), where such transparency is lacking. I propose that this contrast correlates with animacy, broadly understood as the presence of human populations in geographical places; a distinction that mirrors Van Langendonck’s (2007) hierarchy for proper names more generally. Finally, cross-linguistic evidence supporting this generalization and its limitations will also be discussed.
References:
Borer, H. (2011). Compounds: The view from Hebrew. In R. Lieber & P. Štekauer (Eds.), The Oxford handbook of compounding (pp. 491–511). Oxford University Press.
Van Langendonck, W. (2007). Theory and typology of proper names (Vol. 168). Walter de Gruyter.