Mazandarani Simple, Double and Triple Plurals:
Types and Levels of Markedness and Pragmatic Considerations
Muhammad-Reza Fakhr-Rohani
fakhr_rohani@yahoo.co.uk
Abstract
Mazandarani is an Iranian language, specifically a northwestern Iranian dialect, spoken
mainly in northern Iran along the eastern part of the Caspian coastline, hence a Caspian
dialect, i.e. a dialect of “the Caspian group”. Mazandarani is rarely used in formal
correspondence, although some local publications may use it for articles that are meant to
entertain. When they do so, it is written using the current Persian script. The geographical
distribution of Mazandarani is not limited to the Mazandaran Province and the western
part of the Golestan Province; even the local people of the northern outskirts and villages
of Tehran speak in Mazandarani.
As for the present study, the examples indicated and analyzed here are based on field
research conducted at Nowkandeh, a small town located in the Golestan Province, at
about 47 kms to the west of Gorgan, the capital city of the province. Although it has been
recognized as a town, it still has all the characteristics of a typical Mazandarani rural area
with regard to the lifestyle of the people.
Since there is no mass vs. count noun distinction in Mazandarani, almost all nouns can
be pluralized. (The plural marker is always stressed.) In Mazandarani, the productive
plural marker is -a, e.g. divar ‘wall’: divar-a ‘walls’. When the final segment of a noun is
a high front vowel, i.e. /i/, an intervocalic semivowel precedes the plural marker -a, hence
-(y)a, e.g. tehrani ‘Tehranian’: tehrani-ya ‘Tehranians’. If the final segment of a noun is
low back vowel, then a /h/sound functions as the intervocalic consonant, e.g. kija ‘girl’:
kija-ha ‘girls’; dayi ‘uncle on mother side’: dayi-a ‘uncles’. The same holds true with
regard to a noun that ends with the central vowel //, e.g. kuch ‘lane’: kuch-ha ‘lanes’.
In addition to -a, there is also another pluralizer, viz. –shan, which is less productive,
hence more restricted in usage. Apart from its usage which changes third person singular
subject pronoun ve ‘she or he’ into its corresponding plural form ve-shan ‘they’, it also
pluralizes some categories of nouns, which collectively share the semantic feature
[+human]. Examples of these categories are as follows: 1. Personal or given names, e.g.
zara ‘Zahra’: zara-shan, 2. Kinship terms: ami ‘uncle on father side’: ami-shan; 3.
Occupational terms, de(h)an ‘farmer’: de(h)an-shan ‘farmers’; 4. Other nouns such as
equivalents of hmsae: hmsae-shan ‘neighbour: neighbours’, and sabkhan :
sabkhan-shan ‘land lord: land lords’.
To sum up, Mazandarani has at least two plural markers, hence two distinct ways of
pluralization.* A noun can be pluralized by adding -a as well as -shan; however, a noun,
which is pluralized in these two different ways, conveys different meanings. For
example, dayi ‘uncle on mother side’ can be pluralized as both dayi-a and dayi-shan. The
former is just a plural form, but the second one conveys not one’s uncle individually, but
it concerns, and includes, the uncle’s family or even his close friends as well. Granted
that generally speaking the plural form is regarded marked and the singular unmarked
(e.g. Corbett, 2001, p. 154; and Haspelmath, 2002, p. 238), out of the two plural markers
already mentioned, -a has wider applications, hence an unmarked pluralizer and -shan
has distributional restrictions, hence a marked plural marker. In terms of heaviness of
marks (Waugh and Lafford, 1994, p. 2379), -shan is heavier by far than -a.
There are also several instances of double pluralization. This process concerns both
personal or given names and plural subject pronouns. A personal or given name can be
double pluralized, e.g. m(h)di ‘Mahdi’: m(h)di-shan-a; mmmd ‘Muhammad’:
mmmd-shan-a. The same may be done with kinship terms, e.g. me dayi-shan-a ‘my
uncle-PL-Pl’, and te mar-shan-a ‘your mother-PL-PL’. Noteworthy is that when a
kinship term is double pluralized, it is almost always preceded by a personal possessive
adjective which signifies the one to whom the double pluralized referent belongs. It must
be noted that the order of these plural markers cannot be reversed, because the resultant
pluralized form may be meaningless or it might even sound insulting. However, if the
name signifies a family name, or basically and traditionally a tribal name or designation,
whether favourable or unfavourable, the order is reversed. Examples of this kind include
jer-a-shan ‘the Ghajer tribe-PL-PL’, or jigi-a-shan ‘Jigi-PL-PL’. The latter forms of
double plurals stress on those who belong to the tribe or family mentioned.
Mazandarani plural subject pronouns are also doubled. This is done by adding -a to
them: man ‘we’ changes to man-a ‘we-PL’; shman ‘you’ changes to shman-a
‘you-PL’; and veshan ‘they’ changes to veshan-a ‘they-PL’. These forms convey respect,
emphasis, inclusion, or exclusion.
In addition to double pluralization, there is also triple pluralization. Even a double
pluralized noun may be pluralized once more, provided that none of the plural markers
appear in juxtaposition with each other. In such an instance a noun first takes the
unmarked, productive plural marker -a, then the marked, less productive plural marker shan, and then again the -a pluralizer. Examples of this sort include the following: me
amm-(h)a-shan-a ‘my aunt-PL-PL-PL’.
Pragmatically, these various instances of pluralization, whether simple, double, or triple,
are indicative of the speaker’s attitude toward, and level of emphasis and/or
particularization of, the referent and his or her family, relatives, or friends and the type of
behaviour, tradition, or beliefs the speaker attributes to them collectively.
*
Nouns pluralized with -jat make up a quite limited number of words. They may show the influence of
Persian in Mazandarani.
There are still further noteworthy points in the phenomenon under study: Admitting that
there is “a continuum of ‘markedness’” (Cook and Newson, 1996, p. 73), that “there are
hierarchies of markedness” (Waugh and Lafford, 1994, p. 2380), and that “there is a scale
from more to less marked.” (ibid.).On the basis of this, a hierarchy of marked forms is
observable; in other words, there are levels of markedness. First, there is a dichotomy of
singular vs. simple plural. Secondly, simple plurals can be dissected into less marked
plurals that take -a, and more marked ones that take -shan. Thirdly, double plural markers
are divided into two categories: 1. -a + -shan, and 2. -shan + -a. Finally, triple plurals
only appears in the following ways: -a + -shan + -a; however, the rest of possible
combinations which never appear are as follows: 1. *-a + -a + -shan, 2. *-shan + -a +
-a, 3. *-shan + -a + -shan, 4. * -shan + -shan + -a, and *-a + -shan + -shan. A tentative
analysis may be as follows: In Mazandarani triple plurals, no two identical plural markers
can follow each other, and preference is for using as less heavy marks as possible.
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