Prospective Construction in Kla-Dan from a Diachronic Perspective

This paper deals with the etymology and the evolution path of one of the two future tense constructions (the First Future construction) in Kla-Dan, a South Mande language. In order to propose a hypothesis on the origin of the construction and its semantic evolution, firstly, the data of other languages of the same subgroup are involved, and secondly, an analysis of the meaning of the First Future displaced to the past by a retrospective shift marker is provided. The First Future construction is reconstructed for the proto-language of the Dan-Mano-Goo-Tura subgroup. In Goo and Tura, it has the standard prospective meaning; in Mano and Dan-Gweta, the construction has extended its use towards the area of the futural meanings. Dan-Blo is the only language of the subgroup where the reflex of the prospective construction is absent; in this language, it has apparently been replaced by a new periphrastic prospective construction. In combination with the retrospective shift marker, the First Future construction in Kla-Dan has an avertive meaning and is also used in the two parts of irreal conditional constructions. This path of semantic evolution is typical for prospectives in the past. The First Future construction shares the semantic domain of the future with another construction which is also reconstructed for the Proto-Dan-Mano-Goo-Tura and has recently extended its use over a wide range of futural meanings. Based on the data of the closely related languages, this construction should be considered as progressive. From the synchronic point of view, no difference in meaning of the two future tense constructions of Kla-Dan can be found. At the same time the first construction, which is originally prospective can be considered as the main way to express the meaning of the future, whereas the Second Future construction is much less frequent and is only attested in elicited examples.