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Albert
ALVAREZ-GONZALEZ

Anthropology Linguistics - Mexico

Research topics

PROJECT

Nominalizers in Uto-Aztecan languages : Origins, evolution and functions

This research is focused on nominalizers in Uto-Aztecan languages, which correspond to a family of languages spoken in North and Central America. Nominalizers are affixes that are attached to a base in order to derive a nominal constituent. These affixes are important in world’s languages because they contribute to the development of language complexity. They can be used for creating new words in a language (in this case, nominalizers are working at the level of lexical morphology, and the derived nominal constituents are thus complex lexical items associated with lexical complexity), but they can also be involved in the construction of grammar (syntactic complexity), in particular in the domain of clause combination (in this case, nominalizers are working at the level of morphosyntax, and the nominalized constructions are thus functioning as subordinate clauses embedded in a complex clause).

The aim of this project is to identify the different synchronic functions associated with these nominalizers in Uto-Aztecan languages and to propose the origins of these markers as well as the contexts and the evolutionary paths involved in their emergence and development.

Activities / Resume

BIOGRAPHY

Albert Alvarez Gonzalez is professor and researcher at the University of Sonora (Mexico).
He received his PhD in Linguistics from the University of Nice-Sophia Antipolis (France) in 2000. After several years dedicated to applied linguistics (mostly, in the domain of translation and language teaching), he has specialized in the description of amerindian languages. His main interests are the word-formation processes and the morphosyntax of Uto-Aztecan languages (United States of America, Mexico) from a typological and functional perspective, with particular focus on the overlaps between both domains.
He has especially studied the phenomena associated with verb valency changes as well as the processes of subordination in Cahitan languages, a sub-group of Uto-Aztecan languages spoken in Northwestern Mexico.
 

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Books

  • Alvarez, Albert & Henri Zinglé. 2010. Dictionnaire combinatoire de l’espagnol: expressions adverbiales, Maison du Dictionnaire : Paris.
  • Estrada Fernández, Zarina & Alvarez Gonzalez, Albert. 2008. Parlons yaqui. L’Harmattan : Paris.

Edited books

  • Álvarez González, Albert, Estrada Fernández, Zarina & Chamoreau, Claudine (eds.). 2019. Diverse Scenarios of Syntactic Complexity. John Benjamins Publishing: Amsterdam/Philadelphia.
  • Álvarez González, Albert & Ía Navarro (eds.). 2017. Verb Valency Changes : Theoretical and typological perspectives. John Benjamins Publishing: Amsterdam/Philadelphia.
  • Estrada Fernández, Zarina, Wichmann, Søren, Chamoreau, Claudine & Alvarez Gonzalez, Albert (eds.). 2008, Studies in voice and transitivity (Estudios de voz y transitividad). LINCOM Europa: Muenchen.

Books chapters :

  • Juárez, Cristian & Álvarez González, Albert. 2021. Explaining the antipassive-causative syncretism in Mocoví (Guaycuruan). In Janic, Katarzyna & Witzlack-Makarevich, Alena. Antipassive. Typology, diachrony, and related constructions, John Benjamins Publishing : Amsterdam/Philadelphia. 315-347.
  • Álvarez González, Albert. 2019. From discourse to syntax : The use of the discourse marker bwe in the creation of interclausal connectives in Yaqui. In Álvarez González, Albert, Estrada Fernández, Zarina & Chamoreau, Claudine (eds.). Diverse Scenarios of Syntactic Complexity. John Benjamins Publishing: Amsterdam/Philadelphia. 217-247.
  • Álvarez González, Albert, 2019, The ‘relative’ illusion and the origin of non-subject nominalizers in Cahita (Uto-Aztecan). In Zariquey, Roberto, Shibatani, Masayoshi & Fleck, David W. (eds.). Nominalization in the Languages of the Americas, John Benjamins Publishing: Amsterdam/Philadelphia. 301-344.
  • Álvarez González, Albert. 2017. Valency-changing operations in Yaqui resultatives. In Álvarez González, Albert & Navarro, Ía (eds.), Verb Valency Changes : Theoretical and typological perspectives, John Benjamins Publishing: Amsterdam/Philadelphia. 133-164.
  • Manuel Peregrina Llanes, Álvarez González, Albert & Estrada Fernández, Zarina. 2017. Transitivity and valency-changing operations in Huasteca Nahuatl. In Álvarez González, Albert & Navarro, Ía (eds.). Verb Valency Changes : Theoretical and typological perspectives. John Benjamins Publishing: Amsterdam/Philadelphia. 81-106.
  • Cristian Juárez & Álvarez González, Albert. 2017. The antipassive marking in Mocoví : Forms and functions. In Álvarez González, Albert & Navarro, Ía (eds.). Verb Valency Changes : Theoretical and typological perspectives. John Benjamins Publishing: Amsterdam/Philadelphia. 227-256.
  • Álvarez González, Albert, 2017, Affective Predicates in Yaqui: Lexicogenesis and Morphosyntax. In Tersis Nicole & Boyeldieu, Pascal (eds.), Langage de l'émotion, variations linguistiques et culturelles, Peeters: Paris.
  • Álvarez González, Albert, 2016, The evolution of grammatical nominalizations in Cahita Languages. In Chamoreau, Claudine & Estrada Fernández, Zarina (eds.). Finiteness and Nominalization. John Benjamins Publishing: Amsterdam/Philadelphia. 107-139.
  • Alvarez Gonzalez, Albert. 2012. Relative clauses and nominalizations in Yaqui. In Comrie, Bernard & Estrada-Fernández, Zarina (eds.), Relative clauses in Languages of the Americas: A typological overview. John Benjamins Publishing: Amsterdam/Philadelphia, 67-95.

Articles in journals:

  • Alvarez Gonzalez, Albert. 2020. Discourse coherence in narratives and conversations : A case study in Yaqui (Uto-Aztecan). Anthropological Linguistics. 61: 2. Indiana University : Bloomington.
  • Muchembled, Fany & Alvarez Gonzalez, Albert. 2019. Prédication possessive en langues uto-aztèques du sud, Faits de Langues 49, Issue 2, 131-154. Brill: Leiden.
  • Alvarez Gonzalez, Albert. 2015. Sincretismo entre beneficiario, causa y propósito. Evolución de las funciones de betchi’ibo en yaqui, Amerindia Revue d'Ethnolinguistique Amérindienne 37 (2), 69-96, A.E.A: Paris.
  • Alvarez Gonzalez, Albert & Muchembled, Fany. 2015. Verbos posesivos en taracahita : esquemas fuentes y rutas evolutivas, Amerindia Revue d'Ethnolinguistique Amérindienne 37 (2), 97-120, A.E.A: Paris.
  • Alvarez Gonzalez, Albert & Muchembled, Fany. 2014. Les classificateurs possessifs en langues uto-aztèques: catégorisations et évolutions, Revue La Linguistique 49 (2013/2), 11-31, PUF: Paris.
  • Alvarez Gonzalez, Albert. 2013. Aide à la création lexicale en langue de minorité: problèmes et perspectives de l'application ZSTATION en langue yaqui, Amerindia Revue d'Ethnolinguistique Amérindienne 36 (2012), 51-80.