The whole unit which results from the predicative operation signaled via juxtaposition is here hypothesized to be a nominal in the sense of an ontological unit, a whole set of
blended elements into a new whole. In metaphorical blending, the process takes place within the mind and we expect very little overt linguistic structure to indicate that this blending
process has taken place.
One particularly striking piece of linguistic evidence that a blending process has taken place in referential structure is the behavior of some cases of anaphora. This type of anaphora
is inter-textual and links the “objects” created within the text via linguistic or metaphorical processes. Ontological objects are then referred to as “things” by the use of deictic pronouns.
They can be thoughts, arguments, evidence, procedures, points, and various types of analysis or perceptions that are presented as part of the build-up of the text, or are part of the work to
establish the ground from which argument or explanation is based. While this type of analysis is common within composition or creative writing classes, it is often missing from a linguistic
understanding of text processing. The linguist’s formation of “linguistic reality,” the structures of the text, will differ substantially from the worlds of argument or points that the
text itself creates. What is interesting in Burmese is that the creation process of linguistic reality is grammatically manifest and observable within the word, phrase, clause, sentence,
paragraph, and text structure. There is often a mapping of the processes that construct meaning. That map is the structured text.
The “objects” called into being by a text, here called nominals, are reified units having the sense of a whole. As reified linguistic units, often labeled as deverbal nouns,
nominalization has in the past been taken in reference to the clause Lees 1960, Chomsky 1970, Vendler 1967 or to embedded varieties of such. What sets this study apart from
previous views of nominalization is that this process is not restricted to clause-level grammatical units but encompasses sentences and paragraphs, extending to the text as a
whole as an object marked by postpositional particles whose scope is the whole text.
1.7 Bifurcation as the Preferred Burmese Pattern
Bifurcation is the binary structural complement of semantic doublets in Burmese. These are the two word semantic pairs which are the normal stuff of ordinary Burmese conversation and
text. Doubling of nouns and verbs is a preferred pattern found throughout Burmese text, which tends to present the world of experience by casting that experience in a balancing
process of symmetry. One linguistic manifestation is found in the two-element compounds composed of pairs from the same semantic domain
pifppf
cang cac be clear + examine = ‘in
fact’;
xyfwl
htap tu repeat + be like = ‘identical’;
bGJvGJ
bhwai: lwai: hang down + swing =
‘in a pendular manner’. The product of this preference for balancing is compounding— compound nouns, compound verbs, semantic and phonological doublets, rhyming pairs,
repetition of structural patterns, broad patterns of textual units that balance out each other and, thus, create harmony and a sense of wholeness to the discourse unit. The sensory
experience presented in the doublets of sight, taste, sound, and body motion are all areas of linguistic expression which are often presented in nominalized constructions as a means of
conveying indirectly a new experience to the audience, who has the joy of the intellectual and sensory process of conceptual blending.
1.8 Summary
In this chapter key concepts have been introduced that serve to establish the ground of the expanded investigation of nominalization in Burmese. These are:
a. separate ontological level of linguistic processes, b. juxtaposition as an essential pattern of nominal structure,
c. the role of conceptual integration in juxtaposed nominals, d. the role of the grammatical postpositional particle as an operator and inherent
nominalizer, e. abstract objects and ontological nominals, and
f. the pattern of bifurcation as a structuring principle of grammar. Chapter 2 discusses the linguistic affiliation of Burmese along with some of the
sociolinguistic aspects of dialects and diglossia. A brief overview of underlying issues of constituency in Burmese phonology, semantics, and grammar, as well as a sketch of types of
nominalization, is presented also.
Chapter 3 presents a more detailed analysis of Burmese grammatical categories and focuses particularly on the word category in Burmese as the basis for constructions which are
summarily presented—Word, Expression, and Sentence. Chapter 4 examines nominalization in greater detail, providing background studies
and issues in nominalization, and then looks more closely at Burmese nominalization, both grammatical and semantic, and the role of the prototype nominalizing particle
onf
sany.
Chapter 5 examines two texts in Burmese and demonstrates the role of nominalization in the information structure and discusses the simple abstract patterns of ontological
nominalization underlying highly complex patterns of constituency. Chapter 6 summarizes the study, examines some of its shortcomings, and presents
some topics for further research.
2 Overview of Burmese
2.1 Linguistic Affiliation of Burmese
