[citation needed] Polysynthetic languages can be agglutinative or fusional depending on whether they encode one or multiple grammatical categories per affix.
[citation needed] The term was invented by Peter Stephen Du Ponceau, who considered polysynthesis, as characterized by sentence words and noun incorporation, a defining feature of all indigenous languages of the Americas.
Recently, Mark C. Baker has suggested formally defining polysynthesis as a macro-parameter within Noam Chomsky's principles and parameters theory of grammar.
Other linguists question the basic utility of the concept for typology since it covers many separate morphological types that have little else in common.
There are some dependent-marking languages that may be considered to be polysynthetic because they use case stacking to achieve similar effects, and very long words.
'[5]From Classical Ainu of Japan, another polysynthetic, incorporating, and agglutinating language: ウサオプㇲペUsaopuspeアエヤィコツ゚ィマシラㇺスィパaeyaykotuymasiramsuypaウサオプㇲペ アエヤィコツ゚ィマシラㇺスィパUsaopuspe aeyaykotuymasiramsuypausa-variousopusperumors a-1Se-APLyay-REFLko-APLtuyma-farsi-REFLram-heartsuy-swaypaITERusa- opuspe {} a- e- yay- ko- tuyma- si- ram- suy- pavarious rumors {} 1S APL REFL APL far REFL heart sway ITER'I wonder about various rumors.'
The following verb shows how the verb is marked for subject, patient, object, and indirect object: ni-1Smits-2Steː-someonetla-somethingmaki-giveltiː-CAUSsFUTni- mits- teː- tla- maki- ltiː- s1S 2S someone something give CAUS FUT"I shall make somebody give something to you"[7]The Australian language Tiwi is also considered highly polysynthetic: Pi-3Pti-3S.Fwuliyondji-dead.wallabyrrurlimpirr-carry.on.shouldersaniPST.HABPi- ti- wuliyondji- rrurlimpirr- ani3P 3S.F dead.wallaby carry.on.shoulders PST.HAB"They would carry the dead wallaby on their shoulders.
"[8]And the Iroquoian language Mohawk: sa-again-honwa-PAST-nhoton-3S.F>2S.M-kw-open.door-a-reversive-hsefor.PERFsa- honwa- nhoton- kw- a- hseagain- PAST- 3S.F>2S.M- open.door- reversive- for.PERF"she opened the door for him again"[9]An example from Western Greenlandic, an exclusively suffixing polysynthetic language: aliikku-entertainmentsersu-providei--llammas-SEMITRANSsua-one.good.ata-COPnerar-say.thatta-REFLssa-FUTgaluar-sure.butpaal-3P/3Slibutaliikku- sersu- i- llammas- sua- a- nerar- ta- ssa- galuar- paal- lientertainment provide - SEMITRANS one.good.at COP say.that REFL FUT sure.but 3P/3S but'However, they will say that he is a great entertainer, but…'[10]The term "polysynthesis" was first used by Peter Stephen DuPonceau (a.k.a.
Pierre Étienne Du Ponceau) in 1819 as a term to describe the structural characteristics of American languages:[11] Three principal results have forcibly struck my mind...
They are the following: The manner in which words are compounded in that particular mode of speech, the great number and variety of ideas which it has the power of expressing in one single word; particularly by means of the verbs; all these stamp its character for abundance, strength, and comprehensiveness of expression, in such a manner, that those accidents must be considered as included in the general descriptive term polysynthetic.I have explained elsewhere what I mean by a polysynthetic or syntactic construction of language....
By an analogous combination of various parts of speech, particularly by means of the verb, so that its various forms and inflections will express not only the principal action, but the greatest possible number of the moral ideas and physical objects connected with it, and will combine itself to the greatest extent with those conceptions which are the subject of other parts of speech, and in other languages require to be expressed by separate and distinct words.... Their most remarkable external appearance is that of long polysyllabic words, which being compounded in the manner I have stated, express much at once.The term was made popular in a posthumously published work by Wilhelm von Humboldt (1836),[2] and it was long considered that all the indigenous languages of the Americas were of the same type.
Humboldt considered language structure to be an expression of the psychological stage of evolution of a people, and since Native Americans were considered uncivilized, polysynthesis came to be seen as the lowest stage of grammatical evolution, characterized by a lack of rigorous rules and clear organization known in European languages.
Duponceau himself had argued that the complex polysynthetic nature of American languages was a relic of a more civilized past, and that this suggested that the Indians of his time had degenerated from a previous advanced stage.
[13] The ethnologist Daniel Garrison Brinton, the first professor of anthropology in the US, followed Duponceau, Gallatin and Humboldt in seeing polysynthesis, which he distinguished from incorporation, as a defining feature of all the languages of the Americas.
This latter peculiarity marks it off altogether from the processes of agglutination and collocation.Their absence has not been demonstrated in any [language] of which we have sufficient and authentic material on which to base a decision.
The opinion of Du Ponceau and Humboldt, therefore, that these processes belong to the ground-plan of American languages, and are their leading characteristics, must be regarded as still uncontroverted in any instance.In the 1890s the question of whether polysynthesis could be considered a general characteristic of Native American languages became a hotly contested issue as Brinton debated the question with John Hewitt.
If the hypothesis were correct, it would mean that free standing nouns in such languages did not constitute syntactical arguments, but simply adjoined specifiers or adjuncts.
[20] In 1996 Mark C. Baker proposed a definition of polysynthesis as a syntactic macroparameter within Noam Chomsky's "principles and parameters" program.
Johanna Mattissen suggests that polysynthetic languages can be fundamentally divided into two typological categories, which differ in the way morphemes are organised to form words.
They also use these bound morphemes to make other nouns and verbs from a basic root, which can lead to very complex word forms without non-lexical suffixes.
[22] Affixally polysynthetic languages do not use noun incorporation or verb serialisation, since this violates the rule concerning the number of roots allowable per word.