Title: “Complement Adjectival Clauses in Tamil: A Construction, and Analysis, and a Warning”
Date: May 12th, 2024
Description: In 1969 Annamalai introduced a distinction between two kinds of noun complement clauses: relative clauses and complement adjectival clauses (CACs). Both make crucial use of the peyareccam, commonly known as the adjectival or relative participle. The study of relative clauses has continued apace in Tamil and other Dravidian languages while the analysis of complement adjectival clauses has lagged behind. This essay builds on Annamalai’s work on Tamil CACs, expanding it with new characterizations and extending it to other Dravidian languages. We analyze a structure that has largely gone unnoticed but is nonetheless well integrated into Dravidian grammar. The essay concludes with an admonition about how a poor choice in terminology—namely, relative participle—can thrust a construction into a blind spot for linguists and others.
Title: “Trimorphous Verb Bases in Betta Kurumba”
Date: April 6th, 2024
Description: see abstract.
Title: “From the Zagros to the Ghats: Remembering Dr. David McAlpin”
Date: March 9th, 2024
Description: Surya Sanjay reviewed Dr. McAlpin’s major articles, and Suresh Kolichala presented the findings of a new book by Filippo Pedron that challenges the Zagrosian hypothesis.
Title: “Of Gems and Coral: Indic Influence on Dravidian Morphology”
Date: December 16th, 2023
Description: this discussion touched upon various aspects of how contact with Indic (Indo-Aryan) languages of the north affected morphological change in Dravidian languages.
Presenter: Surya Sanjay
Title: “Verb Morphology in Tulu-Koraga and Implications in Comparative Dravidian Linguistics”
Date: July 15th, 2023 & October 14th, 2023
Description: a description of the yet-undescribed Old Tulu verb is given, alongside comparative analysis with related languages.
Presenter: Masato Kobayashi
Title: “Asyndetic Conditional Clauses in Brahui”
Date: July 15th, 2023
Description: this talk discusses and aberrant syntactic construction found in Brahui, sometimes classified as a North Dravidian language, and compares it with similar forms in Kurux and Malto.
Presenter: Sanford Steever
Title: “Some Observations on Dravidian Historical Morphology”
Date: April 29th, 2023 & June 10th, 2023
Description: discusses various morphological categories and peculiarities across Dravidian languages.
Presenter: Suresh Kolichala
Title: “Classification of South-Central Dravidian Languages”
Date: March 25th, 2023
Description: some morphological bases for the South-Central Dravidian subgroup are reconsidered.
Presenter: Gail Coelho
Title: “Betta Kurumba Verb Stems: Some Historical Changes”
Date: January 29th, 2023
Description: aspects of Betta Kurumba past stem formation and allomorphy are explained through comparisons with closely related languages in the South Dravidian subgroup.
Presenter: Masato Kobayashi
Title: “Kurux-Malto Verb Bases and the Origins of the Kurux Base-Final ʔ”
Date: December 18th, 2022
Description: aspects of Kuṛux-Malto past stem formation and allomorphy are explained through comparisons with other Dravidian languages.
Presenter: David McAlpin
Title: “Morphology in Proto-Zagrosian”
Date: November 19th, 2022
Description: further evidence is provided to establish a genetic link between Brahui and Elamite, in a suggestion that the two are related at a more recent stage than Brahui and the rest of Dravidian. Special attention is paid to irregular verb roots in Brahui.
Presenter: Surya Sanjay
Title: “Historical Verb Morphology in Toda”
Date: October 22nd, 2022
Description known sound changes and comparative evidence are used to internally reconstruct “Pre-Toda” finite forms, in an attempt to make the language’s morphology more accessible to the comparative Dravidianist.