Assamese Verb Serialization in Functional, Areal-Typological and Diachronic Perspective

Abstract

In Southeast Asian and West African linguistics, clauses containing multiple chained verbs are typically referred to as "serial verb constructions". In the South Asian linguistic tradition, the closest analogue to the serial verb construction is often labeled a "compound" or "explicator compound" verb (Brown 1997; Burton-Page 1957; Hacker 1961; Hook 1974; Kachru and Pandharipande 1980; Nespital 1989), to some a subtype of "converb" construction or "conjunctive participial" (Bisang 1995 and references therein). Qualified use of the term "serialization" has occasionally been introduced (Kachru 1979; Kachru 1993; Pandharipande 1993; Steever 1989). However, a detailed comparative study of multi-verb constructions in e.g. South and Southeast Asian languages remains to be conducted.