| This proposal launches a research program into the theoretical status and the terminological basis of evidentiality systems. Research will be conducted along three complementary axes: Postdoc project: Unveiling the network of evidentials: Terminology, theory, and typology An inquiry into the terminological and criterial basis of evidential descriptors, the relationships between evidential categories, sentence types, and other linguistic categories. Ph.D. project 1. Evidentials in the languages of South America: Semantic diversity, typology and genesis An inquiry into the semantic distinctions in the domain of evidentiality, the genesis and typology of evidential categories, and the way they relate to other grammatical domains, as attested in the languages of South America. Ph.D. project 2. Evidentiality in Romance and Germanic: Grammatical possibilities and limits An inquiry into the syntactic and semantic properties and restrictions on the grammatical expression of evidentiality in adverbs, auxiliaries/ raising verbs, and parentheticals. All projects will be carried out at Leiden University, where they will be jointly supervised by the program leaders, Prof. dr Willem Adelaar and Prof. dr Johan Rooryck. The research team will be regularly advised by the members of the international advisory board, recognized specialists in the domain of evidentiality. |
