Reported speech constructions in Chuvash: A corpus- and elicitation-based study

Voprosy Jazykoznanija. 2026. No. 1. P. 74–104.

Knyazev M.

The paper is a descriptive survey of reported speech constructions in standard and Maloe Ka-rachkino (Poshkart) Chuvash based on a typological questionnaire. On the basis of corpus data, it isshown that reported speech constructions vary depending on whether reported speech is introduced bya complementizer-like element in combination with an ordinary speech verb; directly by the gram-maticalized / semi-lexical verb ‘say’; by a lexical verb without the complementizer in a paratacticstructure; by a lexical verb in combination with a “resumptive / quotative” use of the verb ‘say’ (in afinite form). Perspectival properties, related to the interpretation of indexical elements within reportedspeech (from the point of view of the current vs. reported speech situation), are examined based onelicited data. The data show that, unlike European languages with a clear-cut distinction between di-rect and indirect speech, the choice of perspective in Chuvash is not correlated with the type of con-struction (at least for major morphosyntactic types) but is an independent property of speech reports.Yet, there is also evidence for an underlying direct vs. indirect distinction from the ban on mixing ofperspectives within the same reported speech. Further interesting features are discussed, including dif-ferences between ‘say’ and ordinary speech verbs, the status of the ‘say’-based complementizer, anda special logophoric-like construction.

Keywords: citation, тюркские языки, quotative, косвенная речь, цитатив, reported speech, чувашский язык, Chuvash, Turkic, цитация