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Nouns and verbs in Chintang: children's usage and surrounding adult speech*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 August 2011

SABINE STOLL ,
BALTHASAR BICKEL ,
ELENA LIEVEN ,
NETRA P. PAUDYAL ,
GOMA BANJADE ,
TOYA N. BHATTA ,
MARTIN GAENSZLE ,
JUDITH PETTIGREW ,
ICHCHHA PURNA RAI  and
MANOJ RAI
...Show all authors
SABINE STOLL
Affiliation:
Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig
BALTHASAR BICKEL
Affiliation:
University of Leipzig
ELENA LIEVEN
Affiliation:
Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig
NETRA P. PAUDYAL
Affiliation:
University of Leipzig
GOMA BANJADE
Affiliation:
Chintang and Puma Documentation Project, Kathmandu
TOYA N. BHATTA
Affiliation:
Chintang and Puma Documentation Project, Kathmandu
MARTIN GAENSZLE
Affiliation:
Chintang and Puma Documentation Project, Kathmandu
JUDITH PETTIGREW
Affiliation:
Chintang and Puma Documentation Project, Kathmandu
ICHCHHA PURNA RAI
Affiliation:
Chintang and Puma Documentation Project, Kathmandu
MANOJ RAI
Affiliation:
Chintang and Puma Documentation Project, Kathmandu
NOVEL KISHORE RAI
Affiliation:
Chintang and Puma Documentation Project, Kathmandu
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Abstract

Analyzing the development of the noun-to-verb ratio in a longitudinal corpus of four Chintang (Sino-Tibetan) children, we find that up to about age four, children have a significantly higher ratio than adults. Previous cross-linguistic research rules out an explanation of this in terms of a universal noun bias; instead, a likely cause is that Chintang verb morphology is polysynthetic and difficult to learn. This hypothesis is supported by the fact that the development of Chintang children's noun-to-verb ratio correlates significantly with the extent to which they show a similar flexibility with verbal morphology to that of the surrounding adults, as measured by morphological paradigm entropy. While this development levels off around age three, children continue to have a higher overall noun-to-verb ratio than adults. A likely explanation lies in the kinds of activities that children are engaged in and that are almost completely separate from adults' activities in this culture.

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Articles
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Journal of Child Language , Volume 39 , Issue 2 , March 2012 , pp. 284 - 321
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2011

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