Keywords: modal particles, sentence types, particle borrowing, pragmatics
This article considers the model of adaptation of the Russian modal particle ведь in three Eastern Finno-Ugric languages: Udmurt, Komi (Zyryan), and Erzya. We focus on contextual (sentence type) restrictions that hold for VED’ in the source language and aim at finding how particle (in its phonetic variants) behaves in the corresponding contexts in the recipient languages. The analysis is based on the results of a questionnaire where native speakers were asked to evaluate the naturalness of the use of the particle VED’ as well as its indigenous counterparts. We analyzed the following sentence types: assertive sentences, polar questions, tag questions, constituent questions, exclamative sentences, and orders. The results show that the restrictions observed for the Russian ведь are generally looser in the recipient languages in most sentence types. The contexts where the particle is ungrammatical are those where a lexically or syntactically expressed question operator is used. We propose an explanation based on the semantics of the particle why these contexts do not allow for its use.
Iuliia Zubova (b. 1984), MA, University of Tartu, Junior Research Fellow in the Udmurt Language (Jakobi 2, 51005 Tartu), iuliia.zubova@ut.ee
Denys Teptiuk (b. 1992), PhD, University of Tartu, Research Fellow in the Mordvinic Languages (Jakobi 2, 51005 Tartu), denys.teptiuk@ut.ee
Triin Todesk (b. 1988), MA, University of Tartu, Junior Research Fellow in the Komi Language (Jakobi 2, 51005 Tartu), PhD-studies (Uralic languages), triin.todesk@ut.ee
Eda-Riin Tuuling (b. 1993), MA, University of Tartu, Junior Research Fellow in the Komi Language (Jakobi 2, 51005 Tartu), PhD-studies (Uralic languages), eda-riin.tuuling@ut.ee
