Question on Marathi phonology (Dravidian digression)

[Robert Zydenbos]

Am Montag 23 August 2004 04:15 schrieb George Hart:

> In Tamil, there are several verbs that make a transitive by doubling
> an intervocalic stop -- ooTu, run, ooTTu, drive; aaTu, move, aaTTu,
> cause to move; maaRu, change (int.), maaRRu change (tr) -- there are
> a few others. This in effect changes the consonant from voiced (ooTu)
> to unvoiced (ooTTu) -- the opposite of the case in Marathi.  I don't
> know Kannada or Telugu well enough to say how this phenomenon is
> reflected in those languages, but I would not be surprised if there
> was something similar.  There were certainly many Kannada speakers
> who switched to Marathi, [...]

In Tamil this phenomenon is graphically visible as doubling, which in 
effect also means devoicing; there is something similar in derivative 
forms in Kannada, but it is only a devoicing. Such devoicing is seen, 
e.g., in the case of certain nouns derived from verbs: ooDu to run, 
ooTa running (verbal noun), aaDu to play, aaTa playing.

The change from intransitive to transitive (or, in some cases, from 
transitive to causative), however, in Kannada is not made by means of a 
doubling of the stop, but by means of a typical suffix -isu. Thus ooDu 
to run, ooDisu to drive away / chase off; aaDu to play, aaDisu to make 
s.o. play. (Allomorphs also exist, like -su and -esu.)

It is true that many former Kannada speakers switched to Marathi (a 
process that is still going on in the southernmost parts of 
Maharashtra, where the younger generation for economic reasons abandons 
the ancestral language and Marathifies itself), and tenth-century 
Kannada literature tells us that the Kannada language frontier at that 
time was near the Godavari river. But in this particular case of 
causatives / transitives, I don't think we can attribute the phenomenon 
to Kannada influence (as a Kannada enthusiast, I would like to add: 
'unfortunately' :-) ).

RZ

-- 
Prof. Dr. Robert J. Zydenbos
Department für Asienstudien - Indologie / Philosophie-Department
Universität München
Deutschland