Ukrainian Indefinite Pronouns and Language Typology

Abstract

The present article offers an empirical analysis of Ukrainian indefinite pronouns and adverbs based on data from the GRAC corpus. The proposed analysis has ramifications for Ukrainian linguistics, Slavic linguistics, and language typology. With regard to Ukrainian linguistics, we identify substantial frequency differences and suggest distinguishing between a “core” system including the indefiniteness markers de-, -s’ and bud’-, and three “peripheral” markers, viz. -nebud’, aby-, and kazna. From the perspective of Slavic linguistics, the proposed analysis facilitates comparison with other Slavic languages, such as Polish and Russian. Our analysis pinpoints a number of similarities across Ukrainian, Polish and Russian, but also demonstrates that Ukrainian has a distinct system that merits investigation in its own right. For language typology, the analysis we propose shows how frequency information can be integrated in semantic maps, which arguably makes semantic
maps a more powerful tool for cross-linguistic comparison.