The Morphosyntax and Morphosemantics of Pluractionality

Dear Colleagues,

I invite the submission of proposals for contributions to this Special Issue, entitled “The Morphosyntax and Morphosemantics of Pluractionality”. The term pluractionality was originally coined by Paul Newman, who defined it as “plurality or multiplicity of the verb’s action” (Newman 1990: 53), as found in Chadic languages. The grammatical expression of event plurality, marked on the verb or in the VP, had been previously studied, leading to seminal work that examined the aspectual meanings of pluractional items as well as possible parameters of variation within this domain (Dressler 1968; Cusic 1981). Subsequent work has focused on examining the range of semantic values of pluractionals as well as on understanding the typological scope of this phenomenon (e.g., Lasersohn 1995, Corbett 2000, Van Geenhoven 2004, 2005; Wood 2007; Laca and Cabredo-Hofherr 2012; Mattiola 2019, 2000). While pluractional markers are more often present in languages of North America, Africa, and Oceania, increasing work in this area has shown its widespread presence across languages. This body of research has led not just to a reevaluation of well-known aspectual concepts like frequentative and iterative, but also to a better understanding of the cross-categorial notion of plurality.

The goal of this Special Issue is to showcase current research on pluractionality that explicitly engages with core questions in this field, e.g., what are the boundaries of the concept of pluractionality, and what makes some phenomena hard to classify? How do pluractionality parameters interact with other semantic domains (cf. Cusic’s relative measure parameter, which involves notions of degree or intensification and relates to general expectations)? Are there recurrent patterns in diachronic sources of pluractionals (cf. Frajzyngier 1997)? Should pluractionality be treated as belonging within grammatical aspect or rather as lexical aspect/Aktionsart? How has the study of pluractionality deepened our knowledge of events, especially regarding the notions of identity and difference in this domain? This Special Issue also welcomes contributions that advance our understanding of the relation between pluractionality and notions like distributivity and reciprocity.

We request that, prior to submitting a manuscript, interested authors initially submit a proposed title and an abstract of 500 words summarizing their intended contribution. Please send it to the Guest Editor (pamaral@iu.edu) or to the Languages Editorial Office (languages@mdpi.com). Abstracts will be reviewed by the Guest Editor for the purpose of ensuring a proper fit within the scope of the Special Issue. Full manuscripts will undergo double-blind peer review.

Tentative completion schedule:

• Abstract submission deadline: 1 September 2025
• Notification of abstract acceptance: 15 October 2025
• Full manuscript deadline: 15 December 2025

References

Cabredo-Hofherr, Patricia, & Laca, Brenda. (2012). Introduction—Event plurality, verbal plurality and distributivity. In P. Cabredo-Hofherr & B. Laca (Eds.), Verbal plurality and distributivity, 1–24. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.

Corbett, Greville. (2000). Number. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Cusic, Daniel. (1981). Verbal plurality and aspect. Ph.D. dissertation, Stanford University, Stanford, CA.

Dressler, Wolfgang. (1968). Studien sur verbalen pluralität: Iterativum, distributivum, durativum, intensivum in der allgemeinen Grammatik, in Lateinischen und Hethitischen. Wien: Hermann Böhlaus Nachf.

Frajzyngier, Zygmunt. (1997). Grammaticalization of number: From demonstratives to nominal and verbal plural. Linguistic Typology, 1(2), 193–242.

Lasersohn, Peter. (1995). Plurality, conjunction and events. Dordrecht: Kluwer.

Mattiola, Simone. (2019). Typology of pluractional constructions in the languages of the world. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.

Mattiola, Simone. (2020). Pluractionality: A cross-linguistic perspective. Language and Linguistics Compass

Newman, Paul. (1990). Nominal and verbal plurality in Chadic. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.

Van Geenhoven, Veerle. (2004). For-adverbials, frequentative aspect and pluractionality. Natural Language Semantics, 12, 135–190.

Van Geenhoven, Veerle. (2005). Atelicity, pluractionality, and adverbial quantification. In H. Verkuyl, H. de Swart.

Wood, Esther J. (2007). The semantic typology of pluractionality. Ph.D. dissertation, UC Berkeley, Berkeley, CA.

Prof. Dr. Patrícia Amaral
Guest Editor

Manuscript Submission Information

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Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a double-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Languages is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 1400 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

• pluractionality
• verbal number
• nominal number
• plurality
• event internal
• event external
• aspect
• imperfective
• iterative
• frequentative
• habitual
• reduplication
• affixation