Ways of expressing comparative relations in the southern dialects of the Selkup language

The paper discusses the means of expressing comparison in the syntactic constructions of the southern dialects of the Selkup language. Research materials used include folklore and every-day texts of native speakers of the southern Selkup dialects, documented by linguists of the Tomsk school under the guidance of Professor A. P. Dulzon. The analysis reveals a limited use of comparison as an expressive means, with comparative syntactic structures showing considerable typological resemblance to Russian equivalents. This phenomenon is attributed to long-standing Selkup-Russian bilingualism in southern dialect communities facilitated by interlingual analogy. The author not only examines the ways of expressing comparative relations of similarity and resemblance but also considers the means of expressing comparative relations of difference. It was found that the indicators of the comparative relation of similarity include the postpositions like tare, tar, chare, and char’e (like, as, like someone, in accordance) and the postposition šak (accordingly), commonly used in combination with nouns and pronouns in the genitive of impersonal and possessive forms. Notably, these postpositions have lost their etymological connection with full-meaning words. Also used is the verb püdugu (to resemble someone). Comparative relations of difference are expressed using specific syntactic constructions with the deferential case of the standard of comparison, similar to other Samoyedic languages. The long-term Selkup-Russian bilingualism of the speakers of the southern dialects resulted in syntactic constructions with the comparative conjunction kak” (as) borrowed from Russian and the conjunction kydyn” (as) that emerged due to semantic calcification.

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