A GRAMMAR OF KARBI by LINDA ANNA KONNERTH A DISSERTATION Presented to the Department of Linguistics and the Graduate School of the University of Oregon in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy March 2014 ii DISSERTATION APPROVAL PAGE Student: Linda Anna Konnerth Title: A Grammar of Karbi This dissertation has been accepted and approved in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Doctor of Philosophy degree in the Department of Linguistics by: Scott DeLancey Chair Spike Gildea Core Member Doris Payne Core Member Zhuo Jing-Schmidt Institutional Representative and Kimberly Andrews Espy Vice President for Research and Innovation; Dean of the Graduate School Original approval signatures are on file with the University of Oregon Graduate School. Degree awarded March 2014 iii 1. © 2014 Linda Anna Konnerth 2. iv DISSERTATION ABSTRACT Linda Anna Konnerth Doctor of Philosophy Department of Linguistics March 2014 Title: A Grammar of Karbi Karbi is a Tibeto-Burman (TB) language spoken by half a million people in the Karbi Anglong district in Assam, Northeast India, and surrounding areas in the extended Brahmaputra Valley area. It is an agglutinating, verb-final language. This dissertation offers a description of the dialect spoken in the hills of the Karbi Anglong district. It is primarily based on a corpus that was created during a total of fifteen months of original fieldwork, while building on and expanding on research reported by Grüßner in 1978. While the exact phylogenetic status of Karbi inside TB has remained controversial, this dissertation points out various putative links to other TB languages. The most intriguing aspect of Karbi phonology is the tone system, which carries a low functional load. While three tones can be contrasted on monosyllabic roots, the rich agglutinating morphology of Karbi allows the formation of polysyllabic words, at which level tones lose most of their phonemicity, while still leaving systematic phonetic traces. Nouns and verbs represent the two major word classes of Karbi at the root level; property-concept terms represent a subclass of verbs. At the heart of Karbi morphosyntax, there are two prefixes of Proto-TB provenance that have diachronically shaped the grammar of the language: the possessive prefix a- and the nominalizer ke-. Possessive a- attaches to nouns that are modified by preposed elements and represents the most frequent morpheme in the corpus. Nominalization involving ke- forms the basis for a variety of predicate constructions, including most of Karbi subordination as well as a number of main clause constructions. In addition to nominalization, subordination commonly involves clause chaining. v Noun phrases may be marked for their clausal role via - ‘non-subject’ or - ‘locative’ but frequently remain unmarked for role. Their pragmatic status can be indicated with information structure markers for topic, focus, and additivity. Commonly used discourse constructions include elaborate expressions and parallelism more generally, general extenders, copy verb constructions, as well as a number of final particles. Audio files are available of the texts given in the appendices, particular examples illustrating phonological issues, and phonetic recordings of tone minimal sets. vi CURRICULUM VITAE NAME OF AUTHOR: Linda Anna Konnerth GRADUATE AND UNDERGRADUATE SCHOOLS ATTENDED: University of Oregon, Eugene Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität, München, Germany DEGREES AWARDED: Doctor of Philosophy, Linguistics, 2014, University of Oregon Master of Arts, Linguistics, 2009, University of Oregon Zwischenprüfung, Linguistics, 2005, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität AREAS OF SPECIAL INTEREST: Typology, Historical and Comparative Linguistics, Morphosyntax, Discourse Pragmatics, Semantics, Tibeto-Burman Languages, Descriptive Linguistics, Northeast Indian Languages, Southeast Asian Languages PROFESSIONAL EXPERIENCE: Graduate Teaching Fellow, Department of Linguistics and Department of German and Scandinavian, University of Oregon, Fall 2007 - Winter 2014 GRANTS, AWARDS, AND HONORS: Graduate Dissertation Fellowship, The Oregon Humanities Center, University of Oregon, 2013 First Prize in 3 Minute Thesis (3MT) Competition, University of Oregon, 2013 Doctoral Dissertation Research Improvement Grant, National Science Foundation, BCS-0951749, 2010-2012 Small Professional Grant, Center for Asian and Pacific Studies, University of Oregon, 2012, 2010, 2008 vii Gary E. Smith Summer Professional Development Award, funding attendance of the Summer Linguistic Institute ‘Language in the World’ of the Linguistic Society of America at the University of Colorado at Boulder, 2011 Graduate Student Research Grant for the project ‘The Status of Women in Karbi Society,’ Center for the Study of Women in Society, University of Oregon, 2011 Fellowship to attend SWL IV conference in Lyon, France, SWL IV organizing committee, CNRS and Université Lumière Lyon II, 2010 Jahresstipendium für Studierende aller Fächer [One-year scholarship for students of all subjects], Deutscher Akademischer Austausch Dienst (DAAD)/German Academic Exchange Service, 2006 – 2007 PUBLICATIONS: Hyslop, Gwendolyn, Linda Konnerth, Stephen Morey, and Priyankoo Sarmah. in press. North East Indian Linguistics Volume 6. Canberra: Australian National University, Asia-Pacific Linguistics Open Access. Konnerth, Linda, and Amos Teo. in press. “Acoustic-statistical and perceptual investigations of Karbi tones: A peculiar case of incomplete neutralisation of F0.” In North East Indian Linguistics Volume 6, edited by Gwendolyn Hyslop, Linda Konnerth, Stephen Morey, and Priyankoo Sarmah. Canberra: Australian National University, Asia-Pacific Linguistics Open Access. Konnerth, Linda. in press. “Additive and additional functions of Karbi (Tibeto- Burman) =t .” Proceedings of the Thirty-Eighth Annual Meeting of the Berkeley Linguistics Society. Konnerth, Linda. 2013. “Report on the 46th International Conference on Sino- Tibetan Languages and Linguistics (ICSTLL).” Linguistics of the Tibeto- Burman Area 36.2, 139-41. Konnerth, Linda. 2012. “The nominalizing velar prefix *gV- in Tibeto-Burman languages of Northeast India.” In North East Indian Linguistics Volume 4, edited by Gwendolyn Hyslop, Stephen Morey, and Mark W. Post, 58-80. New Delhi: Foundation/Cambridge University Press India. Konnerth, Linda. 2012. “Book notice of Nominalization in Asian Languages: Diachronic and Typological Perspectives by F. H. Yap, K. Grunow-Hårsta, J. Wrona (Eds.).” e-Language. viii Konnerth, Linda. 2011. “Functions of nominalization in Karbi.” In North East Indian Linguistics Volume 3, edited by Gwendolyn Hyslop, Stephen Morey, and Mark W. Post, 120-34. New Delhi: Foundation/Cambridge University Press India. Konnerth, Linda. 2011. “Review of A Grammar of Sunwar: Descriptive grammar, paradigms, texts and glossary by Dörte Borchers.” Studies in Language 35.2, 451-7. Konnerth, Linda, and Dan Wood. 2008. “Report on NEILS 3.” Linguistics of the Tibeto-Burman Area 30.2, 173-6. ix ACKNOWLEDGMENTS My deepest gratitude goes to my advisor Scott DeLancey. Scott has been my true mentor ever since I came to Oregon in 2006. In addition to sharing his knowledge, Scott has always supported me, inspired me, and led me back to see the big picture when I was lost in details. The Karbi descriptive grammar project was born in 2007 when members of the Karbi Lammet Amei (Karbi Literary Association) contacted Scott. This was serendipitous, as Scott had just weeks earlier given me Karl-Heinz Grüßner’s 1978 grammar of Karbi phonology and morphology to look at; I happily took on this exciting project. Before my first trip to India, I was able to get in touch with Karl-Heinz and visited him in Tübingen, Germany, where he let me into the magical realm of his attic. I spent several hours perusing his notes, transcriptions, and other Karbi materials he had collected. I cannot possibly thank Karl-Heinz enough for his generosity, encouragement, and the friendly welcome I received from him and his family, both in Tübingen and in Shillong. During my first trip to India I met Sikari Tisso, who was to become my main language consultant and collaborator, and who made everything possible. His dedication and tireless efforts make him a true hero for all who value the wonderful language and culture of the Karbi people. While this project was ongoing, his son passed away too young; this dissertation is also dedicated to the memory of Sarpo Rongkhelan Tisso. I am deeply grateful to UV Jose. His enormous knowledge of the languages in the area and of the people speaking them as well as his generosity and advice and logistical support inspired and helped me during all this time. Many thanks also to Brother Benjamin Ingti Kathar, who shared his language and warm friendship with me. This project would not have existed without the effort of the Karbi Lammet Amei to preserve their beautiful and rich language and inherent culture and knowledge for future generations. Khorsing Teron as well as Dharamsing Teron (not actually a KLA member) volunteered much time and effort to the project. Thanks also to Hokursing Rongpi, and to Budheswar Timung (Nowgong KLA). Due to space limitations, other Karbi speakers that have made this project possible are acknowledged in §2.3.1. I would like to thank Amphu Rongpipi, Klirdap Teronpi, Serdihun Beypi, Larshika Tissopi, and Sarlomet Tisso, who all greatly contributed to the project by preparing transcriptions, struggling through translations, and helping with the analysis. x None of my research would have been possible without a place for me to stay. In Diphu, Kro hem always had their doors open for me: Sashikola Hansepi, Member Kro, Ruplin, Sintu, Rasinza, and Sampri. Jirsong Asong in Diphu also offered me a warm and friendly place to stay - many thanks to Fr. Vinod! In Umswai, I stayed with the wonderful Hanse family: Albina Teronpi, Holiwel Hanse, Hunmily, Basapi, John, and Platinum. Closer to home, my dissertation committee has offered great feedback that has given me plenty of food for thought: thank you to Spike Gildea, Doris Payne, and Zhuo Jing-Schmidt! I would also like to thank everybody else in the wonderful Linguistics Department at the University of Oregon, where I always received support, friendship, and encouragement from all sides. I feel more fortunate than I can put in words to have been able to learn from the great faculty at UO along with my fellow grad students, as well as from these same grad students, in particular Shahar Shirtz, Amos Teo, Danielle Barth, Anna Pucilowski, and Dan Wood. I am also particularly thankful to Gwen Hyslop, who was always willing to help, give advice, and, of course, talk Tibeto-Burman. In addition, I wish to express my gratitude to Wolfgang Schulze at the Ludwig-Maximilians- Universität München, who made it possible for me to come to the UO in the first place. I am grateful to a number of other linguists who have given me feedback on my work and have inspired me, in particular, Northeast Indianists Mark Post, Stephen Morey, and Jyotiprakash Tamuli; Tibeto-Burmanists David Bradley, Christina Willis, Dave Peterson, Stephen Watters, and Robert Schikowski; as well as Antoine Guillaume. This research was funded in part by National Science Foundation Grant # BCS- 0951749. At the UO, further support was provided by the Center for the Study of Women in Society; the Center for Asian and Pacific Studies; and the Oregon Humanities Center. Finally, I have always had incredible support from home in Germany. If I am any good at explaining linguistic issues to non-linguists, it is because I got to practice many many many times with my mom, who miraculously always wanted to know more. I have received love, encouragement, and advice from Roswitha, Arthur, Arne, Sascha, Irmi, Juli, Franzi, and everybody else in my extended family and of my wonderful friends; they all have sustained me throughout all these years and especially in the last months of writing this dissertation. Lastly, thank you, Eric, for everything - your help, your humor, your understanding, your support, your encouragement, your love, every step of the way. xi To the Karbi people xii TABLE OF CONTENTS Chapter Page I. INTRODUCTION .................................................................................................... 1 1.1. Karbi People, Language, and Culture ............................................................. 2 1.1.1. Names and ISO Codes for the Karbi Language ................................... 2 1.1.2. Number of Speakers and Geographical Spread of Karbi ..................... 2 1.1.3. Aspects of Karbi Traditional Culture and Social Organization ........... 4 1.1.4. The Karbi Lammet Amei (KLA) .......................................................... 6 1.1.5. The Karbi Anglong District ................................................................. 6 1.2. Karbi in Tibeto-Burman .................................................................................. 7 1.2.1. Tibeto-Burman Languages of Northeast India .................................... 7 1.2.2. Karbi in Tibeto-Burman Classification Proposals ............................... 8 1.3. The Role of Contact in the Development of Karbi ......................................... 10 1.4. Varieties of the Karbi Language ..................................................................... 12 1.4.1. Plains Karbi (“Amri Karbi”) and Hills Karbi ...................................... 13 1.4.2. Relationships between the Hills Karbi ‘Dialects’ ................................ 15 1.4.3. Hills Karbi: Differences between Rongkhang (Hills Karbi; Diphu) and Amri (Hills Karbi; Western Karbi Anglong) Dialects ................... 16 1.4.4. Variation in Lexemes ........................................................................... 17 1.5. Sociolinguistic Profile of Language Endangerment ....................................... 17 1.5.1. Setting Factors ..................................................................................... 18 1.5.1.1. Education ................................................................................. 18 1.5.1.2. Virtual and Physical Infrastructure .......................................... 18 1.5.1.3. Government.............................................................................. 19 1.5.1.4. Media ....................................................................................... 19 1.5.2. Contact and Change ............................................................................. 19 1.5.3. Domains/Vitality/Attitudes .................................................................. 20 1.5.3.1. Domains ................................................................................... 20 1.5.3.2. Vitality ..................................................................................... 21 1.5.3.3. Attitudes ................................................................................... 21 xiii Chapter Page 1.5.4. Official Policy Concerning the Language ............................................ 21 1.5.5. Summary of Degree of Endangerment ................................................ 21 1.5.6. Current and Suggested Future Remedial Action ................................. 22 1.6. Karbi Oral Literature and the Karbi Song Language ...................................... 22 1.6.1. Karbi Oral Literature............................................................................ 22 1.6.2. Karbi Song Language .......................................................................... 23 1.7. Previous Study of Karbi Grammar ................................................................. 24 1.7.1. Early Work on Karbi ............................................................................ 24 1.7.2. Karl-Heinz Grüßner’s Work ................................................................ 25 1.7.3. Longkam Teron’s Work ....................................................................... 26 1.7.4. Other Resources on Karbi Grammar and Lexicon ............................... 26 1.8. Writing in Karbi and Conventions Followed in This Grammar ..................... 27 1.9. Organization of This Grammar ....................................................................... 29 II. METHODOLOGY AND DATA ............................................................................ 31 2.1. Approach and Theoretical Framework ........................................................... 31 2.1.1. Functional-Typological Framework .................................................... 32 2.1.2. Collaboration with the Language Community ..................................... 33 2.1.3. Historical-Comparative Perspective .................................................... 33 2.2. Corpus ............................................................................................................. 34 2.2.1. Data Types ........................................................................................... 34 2.2.1.1. Texts / Recording Session Based Data .................................... 34 2.2.1.1.1. Relationships between Text / Recording Session Based Data Types ........................................................ 35 2.2.1.1.2. Discussion of the Distinction between Primary and Derived Data ................................................................ 36 2.2.1.2. Context-Free Elicitation Data .................................................. 37 2.2.1.3. Lexical Database ...................................................................... 38 2.2.2. Data Formats and Software .................................................................. 38 2.3. Primary Data Collection ................................................................................. 40 xiv Chapter Page 2.3.1. Acknowledgment of Karbi Speakers that Facilitated Data Collection ............................................................................................. 41 2.3.2. Data Collecting Team .......................................................................... 42 2.3.3. Recorded Speakers: IRB Procedure and Ethics ................................... 42 2.3.4. Recorded Genres .................................................................................. 43 2.3.5. Recording Procedures and Settings ..................................................... 45 2.3.5.1. Audio-Recording Formats ....................................................... 45 2.3.5.2. Recording Settings ................................................................... 45 2.3.5.3. Recording Equipment .............................................................. 46 2.4. Data Processing: From Primary to Derived Data ........................................... 47 2.4.1. Workflow: Preparing and Processing Media Files .............................. 47 2.4.2. Annotation............................................................................................ 49 2.4.2.1. Segmentation............................................................................ 49 2.4.2.2. Transcription ............................................................................ 50 2.4.2.3. Parsing and Glosses ................................................................. 50 2.4.2.4. Free Translation ....................................................................... 51 2.4.2.5. Ethnographic and Linguistic Notes .......................................... 51 2.4.3. Representation of Text Examples in this Dissertation ......................... 51 III. PHONOLOGY ....................................................................................................... 54 3.1. Consonants ...................................................................................................... 54 3.1.1. Consonant Onsets................................................................................. 55 3.1.1.1. Stop Onset Minimal Sets ......................................................... 58 3.1.1.2. Fricative Onset Minimal Set .................................................... 59 3.1.1.3. Sonorant Onset Minimal Sets .................................................. 59 3.1.1.4. Marginal Onset Consonants and Consonant Clusters .............. 60 3.1.2. Consonant Codas ................................................................................. 60 3.1.2.1. Stop Coda Minimal Set ............................................................ 61 3.1.2.2. Sonorant Coda Minimal Set ..................................................... 61 3.1.2.3. Marginal Coda Consonants ...................................................... 62 xv Chapter Page 3.2. Vowels ............................................................................................................ 62 3.2.1. Hills Amri Karbi Sixth Vowel ............................................................. 63 3.2.2. Marginal Vowels and Phonetic Variation ............................................ 65 3.3. Syllable ........................................................................................................... 66 3.4. Palatal Glide Coda versus Diphthongs ........................................................... 69 3.5. Tone ................................................................................................................ 70 3.5.1. Tone Minimal Sets: Monosyllabic Roots ............................................ 72 3.5.2. Tone Minimal Sets: Disyllabic Roots .................................................. 74 3.5.3. Phonological Basis of the Tone System............................................... 75 3.5.4. Low Functional Load ........................................................................... 76 3.5.4.1. Native Speakers’ Difficulty to Identify Tone Categories ........ 77 3.5.4.2. Low Contrastiveness ................................................................ 78 3.5.4.3. Large Amount of Contextuality ............................................... 78 3.5.4.4. Speaker Differences in Realization of Mid versus High Tones ........................................................................................ 79 3.5.4.5. Production-Perception Mismatch............................................. 80 3.5.4.6. Prosodic Tone Changes and Indeterminability ........................ 81 3.5.5. Tone Sandhi Effects ............................................................................. 83 3.5.6. Tone and Phonological and Morphological Units ............................... 84 3.5.7. Tone (Changes) in Compounds ........................................................... 86 3.5.8. Strategies Used for Identifying Tones of Roots and Suffixes .............. 87 3.5.8.1. Syllable under Investigation Is the Last Syllable of the Word and Non-Stopped ..................................................................... 87 3.5.8.2. Syllable under Investigation Followed by - ‘realis’.............. 88 3.5.8.3. Syllable under Investigation Followed by - ‘NEG’ .............. 88 3.5.9. Representation of Tone in This Grammar ........................................... 89 3.5.10. Remarks on Historically Grammatical Functions of Tone .................. 90 3.6. Stress ............................................................................................................... 91 3.7. Characteristics of Hypoarticulated Speech ..................................................... 93 xvi Chapter Page 3.7.1. /t/  Ø / ___ v, l ................................................................................ 93 3.7.2. Imperative Onsets: /n/  [α nasal] / [α nasal] ___ ............................ 93 3.7.3. - ‘IRR2?’, - ‘?’, -si ‘?’  a / ___ - ‘still’, - ‘HORT’ ........ 94 3.8. Phonological Shapes of Morpheme Types ..................................................... 94 3.8.1. Roots .................................................................................................... 94 3.8.2. Suffixes ................................................................................................ 94 3.8.3. Prefixes ................................................................................................ 95 3.8.4. Clitics ................................................................................................... 95 3.8.5. Interjections.......................................................................................... 96 3.8.6. Reduplication ....................................................................................... 97 3.8.6.1. Reduplication of Stems (without Vowel Change) ................... 97 3.8.6.2. Reduplication of Stems with Vowel Change ........................... 98 3.8.6.3. Negation: Onset Reduplication of Last Stem Syllable ............ 98 3.9. Morphophonemics .......................................................................................... 99 3.9.1. Tone Changes....................................................................................... 100 3.9.1.1. Stem Tone Change Induced by che- ‘reflexive/reciprocal’ and cho- ‘auto-benefactive/malefactive’ .................................. 100 3.9.1.2. Stem Tone Change Induced by Possessive Prefixes ................ 101 3.9.1.3. Derivational Suffix Tone Change ............................................ 102 3.9.1.4. Idiosyncratic Tone Allomorphy ............................................... 103 3.9.2. Prefix Allomorphs and Prefix-Induced Stem Vowel Deletion ............ 104 3.9.2.1. Prefix Vowels: ke- ‘NMLZ’, pV- ‘CAUS’, che- ‘RR’, cho- ‘AUTO.BEN/MAL’, a- ‘POSS’ ...................................................... 104 3.9.2.2. cho- ‘auto-benefactive/malefactive’ and che- ‘reflexive/reciprocal’: Differences in Phonological Strength .................................................................................... 111 IV. WORD CLASSES ................................................................................................. 113 4.1. Nouns and Verbs ............................................................................................. 113 4.1.1. Morphosyntactic Criteria for Nouns and Verbs at the Root Level ...... 114 xvii Chapter Page 4.1.2. Lack of Word Class Distinctions with Suffixal Aspect, Modality, and Negation ........................................................................................ 115 4.1.3. Summary: Nouns and Verbs in Karbi .................................................. 118 4.2. Verbs and ‘Adjectival Verbs’: The Status of Property-Concept Terms ......... 119 4.2.1. Basic Property Concept Terms (PCTs) ................................................ 120 4.2.2. Possible Property-Concept Term (PCT) Criteria: Gradability, Intensification, Adverb Derivation ...................................................... 122 4.2.3. Possible Verbhood Criteria: Aspectual and Modal Suffixes, Directives ............................................................................................. 125 4.2.4. Noun Modification ............................................................................... 126 4.2.5. Summary: Basic Property-Concept Terms (PCTs) .............................. 128 4.2.6. Marginal Types of Property-Concept Term (PCT) Constructions ...... 129 4.3. Summary: The Clausal Functions of Nouns, Verbs, and Property-Concept Terms (PCTs) .................................................................................................. 133 4.4. Noun Subclasses ............................................................................................. 134 4.4.1. Classifiers ............................................................................................. 135 4.4.1.1. Sortal Classifiers ...................................................................... 137 4.4.1.1.1. Typical Classifiers ....................................................... 137 4.4.1.1.2. Not Fully Grammaticalized Classifier ‘CLF:HUM:PL’ ................................................................ 139 4.4.1.2. Mensural Classifiers................................................................. 140 4.4.1.2.1. Typical Classifiers ....................................................... 140 4.4.1.2.2. Not Fully Grammaticalized Classifiers ........................ 142 4.4.1.3. Self-Referential Classifiers ...................................................... 142 4.4.1.4. Human and Animal Classifiers and Personification ................ 144 4.4.2. Nouns That Are Counted with Numerals Only (without Classifiers) ............................................................................. 146 4.4.3. Human/Personified vs. Non-Human/Non-Personified ........................ 148 4.4.4. Relator Nouns ...................................................................................... 149 xviii Chapter Page 4.4.4.1. General Relator Noun - ‘LOCATIVE’ ................................. 152 4.4.4.2. Locational Relator Nouns ........................................................ 155 4.4.4.3. Locational/Temporal Relator Nouns........................................ 158 4.4.4.4. Temporal Relator Nouns .......................................................... 159 4.4.4.5. Causal Relator Nouns .............................................................. 160 4.4.4.6. Relator Nouns with Other Functions ....................................... 161 4.4.4.7. Further Grammaticalization of Relator Nouns ........................ 162 4.4.4.7.1. Subordinators ............................................................... 162 4.4.4.7.2. Adverbs ........................................................................ 164 4.4.5. Bound Noun Roots ............................................................................... 165 4.4.5.1. Body Part Terms ...................................................................... 165 4.4.5.2. Kinship Terms .......................................................................... 165 4.4.5.3. Other Inalienably Possessed Items ........................................... 166 4.4.6. Other Possible Noun Classes with Frozen Prefixes (Grüßner 1978: 44-6) ........................................................................................... 166 4.4.7. Collective Noun Roots ......................................................................... 166 4.5. Pro-Forms ....................................................................................................... 166 4.5.1. Personal Pronouns and Personal Possessive Prefixes .......................... 167 4.5.2. Reflexive/Reciprocal Pronouns ........................................................... 169 4.5.3. Demonstratives .................................................................................... 172 4.5.4. Interrogative Pronouns and Pro-Adverbs, and Positive Polarity Indefinite Construction ........................................................................ 174 4.5.4.1. Positive Indefinite Construction with - ‘indefinite’ ............. 176 4.5.4.2. Interrogative Pronouns in Indirect Questions .......................... 177 4.5.4.3. Co-Relative Construction......................................................... 177 4.5.5. Parallelism between Demonstrative and Interrogative Adverbs .......... 178 4.5.6. Pronouns and Pro-Adverbs of Universal Quantification ..................... 179 4.6. Verb Subclasses .............................................................................................. 181 4.6.1. Property-Concept Terms ...................................................................... 181 xix Chapter Page 4.6.2. Copulas ................................................................................................ 181 4.6.2.1. Existential and Locative Copulas............................................. 181 4.6.2.1.1. Positive and Negative ....................................... 182 4.6.2.1.2. Quantifying Copula ng ‘exist much’.......................... 185 4.6.2.2. Negative Equational Copula ............................................. 185 4.7. Frozen Prefixes in Disyllabic Verb and Noun Roots ...................................... 186 4.7.1. Frozen Prefix ing- ................................................................................ 186 4.7.2. Frozen Prefix ar- .................................................................................. 188 4.7.3. Other Possible Frozen Prefixes in Disyllabic Noun and Verb Roots .................................................................................................... 188 4.8. Minor Word Classes ....................................................................................... 188 4.8.1. Adverbs ................................................................................................ 188 4.8.1.1. Temporal Adverbs ................................................................... 189 4.8.1.1.1. Day and Year Ordinals................................................. 189 4.8.1.1.2. Other Underived Temporal Adverbs ........................... 191 4.8.1.1.3. Temporal Adverbs with - ‘every’ ......................... 191 4.8.1.1.4. Intensifier Reduplication Construction ........................ 191 4.8.1.2. Locative Adverbs ..................................................................... 192 4.8.1.3. Other Adverbs .......................................................................... 192 4.8.2. Numerals .............................................................................................. 192 4.8.3. Subordinators and Coordinators .......................................................... 194 V. NOMINAL MORPHOLOGY................................................................................. 197 5.1. Overview: Noun Stems and Noun Words ....................................................... 197 5.2. Compounding .................................................................................................. 198 5.2.1. Simple Root Compounding.................................................................. 198 5.2.2. Higher Level Elaborate Expression Compounding ............................. 199 5.3. Nominal Prefixes ............................................................................................ 200 5.3.1. General Possessive or ‘Modified’ Prefix a- ‘POSS’.............................. 200 5.3.2. Personal Possessive Prefixes................................................................ 203 xx Chapter Page 5.3.3. Verbalizer pe- ~ pa- ............................................................................. 203 5.4. Nominal Suffixes ............................................................................................ 205 5.4.1. Gender Suffixes -p and -p ................................................................. 205 5.4.1.1. Female and Augmentative - .................................................. 206 5.4.1.2. Male (and Non-Productive Modifier-Deriving) - ................ 207 5.4.1.3. Augmentative and Modifier-Deriving - and - ................... 208 5.4.2. Diminutive - ..................................................................................... 209 5.4.3. Gender/Augmentative and Diminutive Suffixes in Names of Animal(/Plant) Subspecies ................................................................... 209 5.4.4. Human Plural - r .............................................................................. 210 5.4.5. Superlative - ...................................................................................... 211 5.5. Reduplication .................................................................................................. 212 5.5.1. Dual ...................................................................................................... 212 5.5.2. (Distributive) Plural ............................................................................. 213 VI. VERBAL MORPHOLOGY .................................................................................. 215 6.1. Compounding .................................................................................................. 215 6.2. Overview: Position Classes in the Karbi Verb ............................................... 215 6.2.1. Derivational and Inflectional Affixes, and the Verb Stem .................. 217 6.2.2. Pre-Root Slots ...................................................................................... 217 6.2.3. Post-Root Slots..................................................................................... 220 6.2.3.1. Cooccurrence Restriction between Negative - and Irrealis - and - (Slots 8 and 10) ...................................................... 222 6.2.3.2. Slot 9 - ‘experiential’ .......................................................... 222 6.2.3.3. Slot 10 - ‘still’ and - - ‘IRR2-STILL’ .......................... 222 6.3. Proclitic Slot: Non-Subject Speech Act Participant Cross-Referencing and Cislocative Marking ....................................................................................... 223 6.3.1. Non-Subject Speech Act Participant Marking ..................................... 223 6.3.1.1. Introduction .............................................................................. 224 6.3.1.2. Cross-Referencing SAP Primary Objects ................................ 224 xxi Chapter Page 6.3.1.3. Cross-Referencing SAP in Non-Core Roles ............................ 228 6.3.1.4. Summary .................................................................................. 229 6.3.2. Cislocative Marking ............................................................................. 229 6.3.2.1. Directional................................................................................ 230 6.3.2.2. Associated Motion (‘come and V’).......................................... 232 6.3.2.3. Semantic Extensions ................................................................ 233 6.3.2.4. Summary: Cislocative Marking ............................................... 234 6.3.3. Summary .............................................................................................. 235 6.4. Prefixal Derivational Morphology .................................................................. 237 6.4.1. Nominalizer ke- .................................................................................... 237 6.4.2. Causative pe- ~ pa- .............................................................................. 238 6.4.3. Reflexive/Reciprocal che- .................................................................... 239 6.4.4. Auto-Benefactive/Malefactive cho- ..................................................... 243 6.4.5. On the Functional Overlap between Reflexive/Reciprocal che- and Auto-Benefactive/Malefactive cho- ..................................................... 244 6.5. Suffixal Predicate Derivations ........................................................................ 245 6.5.1. Overview .............................................................................................. 245 6.5.1.1. Structural Properties................................................................. 245 6.5.1.1.1. Scope of Negation and Reduplication .......................... 245 6.5.1.1.2. Discontinuous Predicate Derivations ........................... 248 6.5.1.1.3. Productivity .................................................................. 248 6.5.1.2. Origins of Predicate Derivations .............................................. 250 6.5.1.3. Functional Categories of Karbi Predicate Derivations ............ 250 6.5.2. Manner ................................................................................................. 251 6.5.2.1. Non-Ideophonic Manner .......................................................... 251 6.5.2.2. Ideophonic Manner .................................................................. 251 6.5.2.3. Degree or Extent ...................................................................... 252 6.5.2.3.1. Quantification Derivations ........................................... 253 xxii Chapter Page 6.5.2.3.2. Comparative - - t and Superlative - - ....................................................................... 253 6.5.3. Result ................................................................................................... 254 6.5.4. Direction, (Associated) Motion, Path .................................................. 255 6.5.5. Argument and Argument Structure Related Functions ........................ 258 6.5.5.1. Argument Quantification ......................................................... 258 6.5.5.2. Argument Structure Highlighting ............................................ 260 6.5.5.2.1. Benefactive/Malefactive - ......................................... 260 6.5.5.2.2. Instrumental, Comitative - .......................................... 261 6.5.5.3. Argument Classification .......................................................... 262 6.5.5.4. Argument Structure Changing ................................................. 263 6.5.6. Aspect/Aktionsart and Time ................................................................ 263 6.5.6.1. Overview .................................................................................. 263 6.5.6.2. Perfect - t ................................................................................. 264 6.5.6.3. Continuative - - ......................................................... 264 6.5.6.4. Perfective2 -t ...................................................................... 265 6.5.6.5. Completive - ....................................................................... 266 6.5.6.6. Perfective3 - t ......................................................................... 267 6.5.6.7. Durative - ........................................................................ 267 6.5.7. Other Functions .................................................................................... 267 6.5.7.1. Involvement - ~- ‘JOIN’ ................................................. 267 6.5.7.2. Formal - ................................................................................. 270 6.6. Reduplication .................................................................................................. 271 6.6.1. Habitual ................................................................................................ 271 6.6.2. Argument Plurality and Iterative ......................................................... 271 6.6.3. Intensification ...................................................................................... 272 6.7. Negative - (Onset Reduplication) ............................................................... 273 6.8. Post-Stem Aspect: Exhaustive Perfective - t and Experiential - ............. 273 6.8.1. Exhaustive Perfective - t ................................................................... 273 xxiii Chapter Page 6.8.2. Experiential - ................................................................................... 275 6.9. Mood: Realis and Irrealis ................................................................................ 276 6.9.1. Realis - .............................................................................................. 276 6.9.1.1. Overview of Verbal Functions ................................................. 276 6.9.1.2. Action Verbs: The Argument against ‘Past Tense’ ................. 277 6.9.1.3. Copular and Property-Concept Term (PCT) Verbs - Change of State ..................................................................................... 279 6.9.1.4. Indicating a Logical Relationship: Cause and Result .............. 280 6.9.1.5. Correcting a Wrong Assumption ............................................. 282 6.9.1.6. Summary .................................................................................. 284 6.9.1.7. Realis - on Nominal Predicates and Focus =lo .................... 284 6.9.2. Irrealis Marking: - and - ................................................................. 287 6.9.2.1. Functions Common to - and - ............................................ 288 6.9.2.1.1. Future Marking ............................................................ 288 6.9.2.1.2. Habitual Marking in Procedural Texts ......................... 289 6.9.2.1.3. Hypothetical and Counterfactuals ................................ 290 6.9.2.1.4. Epistemic Reading ....................................................... 291 6.9.2.1.5. Expressing Necessity/Obligation ................................. 292 6.9.2.1.6. Expressing Desiderative............................................... 293 6.9.2.1.7. Subordinate Purpose Clause Marking .......................... 294 6.9.2.2. Past Habitual Marking via - ................................................. 294 6.9.2.3. Summary .................................................................................. 294 6.10. Subordinating Verbal Suffixes ...................................................................... 295 6.10.1. Non-Final Marker: Realis -si and Irrealis -ra (Clause-Chaining) ........ 295 6.10.2. Non-Final -pen ..................................................................................... 296 6.10.3. Conditional -te ..................................................................................... 298 6.10.4. Marker of Complement Clauses Functioning as Indirect Questions: - ‘indefinite’ ..................................................................................... 298 6.11. Aspect II: - ‘still’.................................................................................... 299 xxiv Chapter Page 6.12. Non-Declarative Speech Act Suffixes .......................................................... 300 VII. THE NOUN PHRASE ......................................................................................... 301 7.1. Elements of the Karbi Noun Phrase ................................................................ 301 7.1.1. Overview: Karbi Noun Phrase Structure ............................................. 301 7.1.2. Occurrence of Other Elements in Head Noun Slot .............................. 302 7.1.2.1. Conjunctive Coordination Constructions ................................. 302 7.1.2.1.1. Juxtaposition ................................................................ 302 7.1.2.1.2. With Coordinator =pen or .................................. 303 7.1.2.2. Quotative pu ............................................................................. 304 7.1.3. The Noun Phrase Delimiter ...................................................... 306 7.2. Evidence for Karbi Noun Phrase Structure ..................................................... 306 7.2.1. Overview .............................................................................................. 306 7.2.2. Data ...................................................................................................... 307 7.3. Diachronic Significance of the Possessive Construction ................................ 310 7.4. Possessive a- Marking of Head Nouns ........................................................... 312 7.5. Preposed Modifiers ......................................................................................... 315 7.5.1. Demonstratives .................................................................................... 316 7.5.2. Possessives ........................................................................................... 316 7.5.3. Other Preposed Modifiers .................................................................... 318 7.5.3.1. Interrogative Pronouns and Derived Indefinites ...................... 318 7.5.3.2. Adverbials ................................................................................ 320 7.5.3.3. Clausal Modifiers ..................................................................... 321 7.6. Postposed Modifier: Plural Marking Noun -t ............................................ 321 7.7. Modifiers that Occur Preposed or Postposed .................................................. 322 7.7.1. Deverbal Modifiers: PCT-Based Modifiers and Relative Clauses ...... 322 7.7.1.1. Post-Head PCT-Based Modifiers and Pre-Head Relative Clauses ..................................................................................... 323 7.7.1.2. Pre-Head PCT-Based Modifiers (and Post-Head Relative Clauses) .................................................................................... 324 xxv Chapter Page 7.7.2. Enumeration Constructions .................................................................. 328 7.7.2.1. Four Basic Enumeration Constructions ................................... 329 7.7.2.1.1. Typical Classifier Construction ................................... 329 7.7.2.1.2. Self-Referential Classifier Construction ...................... 330 7.7.2.1.3. Not Fully Grammaticalized Classifier Construction .... 330 7.7.2.1.4. Non-Classifier (Direct Enumeration) Construction ..... 331 7.7.2.2. Pre- vs. Post-Head Order ......................................................... 332 7.7.2.3. Anaphoric Use of Classifiers ................................................... 333 7.7.2.4. Juxtaposition of Two Numerals or Classifier-Numeral Words to Indicate Indefiniteness or Vagueness .................................. 334 7.7.2.5. ‘Another’ Additive Construction ............................................. 335 7.7.2.6. Constructions Based on ‘One’ Enumeration ............................ 336 7.7.2.6.1. Preposed ‘One’ Enumeration as an Indefinite Article Construction ................................................................. 336 7.7.2.6.2. Indefinite Pronoun Construction .................................. 336 7.7.2.6.3. Postposed ‘One’ Enumeration Expressing ‘Whole’ .... 337 7.7.2.6.4. Postposed ‘One’ Enumeration Expressing ‘Same’ ...... 337 7.8. Noun Phrase Clitics......................................................................................... 338 7.8.1. Comitative, Instrumental, Ablative =pen ............................................ 339 7.8.2. Nominal Quantifier Constructions Based on = ‘this much; all’ ...... 341 7.8.3. Additive, Topic, and Focus Clitics ...................................................... 343 7.8.3.1. Additive =t ............................................................................. 343 7.8.3.1.1. Overview of Functions ................................................. 343 7.8.3.1.2. Simple Additive ‘Also’ ................................................ 343 7.8.3.1.3. Bisyndetic Coordination .............................................. 344 7.8.3.1.4. Scalar Additive ‘Even’ ................................................. 345 7.8.3.1.5. Universal Quantification .............................................. 345 7.8.3.1.6. Intensifier Verb Construction ...................................... 346 7.8.3.1.7. Discourse (Information Structure) Function ................ 346 xxvi Chapter Page 7.8.3.2. Topic and Focus Clitics ........................................................... 346 VIII. MONOCLAUSAL PREDICATE CONSTRUCTIONS ..................................... 347 8.1. Overview ......................................................................................................... 347 8.1.1. Non-Verbal Predicate Constructions and Verbal vs. Nominal Negation Constructions ........................................................................ 347 8.1.2. Verbal and Nominal Predicate Negation ............................................. 348 8.2. Modal and Other Markers at the Monoclausal End of the Complementation Scale ................................................................................................................ 350 8.2.1. Overview .............................................................................................. 350 8.2.2. Remarks on the Complementation Scale in Karbi ............................... 351 8.2.3. Morphosyntactic Tests for Structural Properties of Modals ................ 353 8.2.3.1. Under Scope of Nominalization along with Main Verb Root? ........................................................................................ 353 8.2.3.2. Follow Adverbial Construction [V] main verb [pa-V] adv? .......... 354 8.2.3.3. Be Modified Itself by a Predicate Derivation? ........................ 354 8.2.4. Morphophonological Evidence ............................................................ 355 8.2.5. The Modals .......................................................................................... 356 8.2.5.1. Deontic (-)n ‘need, must’ ................................................... 356 8.2.5.2. Non-Control (-) ‘GET’ ....................................................... 358 8.2.5.2.1. Function ....................................................................... 358 8.2.5.2.2. Structure and Distribution ............................................ 360 8.2.5.3. Skillful Ability - t -)t ‘know how’ ............................ 361 8.2.5.4. Physical Ability (-) - ‘be able’ ..................................... 362 8.2.5.5. Other Markers .......................................................................... 363 8.3. Adverbial Constructions ................................................................................. 365 8.3.1. Overview .............................................................................................. 365 8.3.2. Causative Adverbial Construction [V] main verb [pa-V] adverbial ............. 366 8.3.3. Nominalization Adverbial Construction [ke-V] main verb [V] adverbial ..... 367 8.3.4. Non-Final Preposed Adverbial Constructions ..................................... 368 xxvii Chapter Page 8.3.4.1. Non-Final -pen Construction [ke-V-pen] adverbial [V] main verb .................................................. 368 8.3.4.2. Non-PCT Root Construction [ke-V-si] adverbial [V] main verb ....... 369 8.4. Periphrastic Constructions Based on Copulas. ............................................... 371 8.4.1. Progressive Construction with Non-Final Suffix -si plus Copula .......................................................................................................... 371 8.4.2. Copula Argument Quantification Construction ................................... 372 8.5. Complex Motion Constructions ...................................................................... 374 8.6. ‘Noun plus Verb’ Predicate Constructions ..................................................... 375 8.6.1. Non-Possessed Noun Incorporation ..................................................... 375 8.6.2. Psycho-Collocations and Possessed Noun Incorporation .................... 377 8.6.3. Light Verb Construction ...................................................................... 381 8.6.4. Cognate Object Construction ............................................................... 381 8.6.5. Other Constructions ............................................................................. 382 8.7. Other Complex Predicate Constructions Discussed Elsewhere ...................... 382 IX. NOMINALIZATION ............................................................................................ 384 9.1. Derivational Nominalization ........................................................................... 384 9.2. Property-Concept Term (PCT)-Based Noun Modification ............................. 386 9.3. Relativization .................................................................................................. 388 9.3.1. Standard (Externally-Headed, Pre-Head) Relativization ..................... 388 9.3.1.1. Relativization on Different Clause Participants ....................... 389 9.3.1.2. Irrealis-Marked Relative Clauses ............................................. 393 9.3.1.3. Head Noun Occurring with Personal Possessive Prefix .......... 394 9.3.2. Internally-Headed (or Post-Head) Relativization ................................ 395 9.4. Complementation ............................................................................................ 397 9.4.1. Standard Complementation .................................................................. 397 9.4.2. Irrealis-Marked Complement Clauses ................................................. 400 9.4.2.1. Irrealis-Marked Complement Clauses with Purpose/Non-Subject Marker - ........................................ 401 xxviii Chapter Page 9.4.2.2. Irrealis-Marked Complement Clause with Noun Phrase Delimiter ....................................................................... 402 9.4.3. Functional Types of Complement-Taking Verbs ................................ 402 9.5. Adverbial Subordination ................................................................................. 403 9.5.1. Nominalized Adverbial Subordination: Subordinators from Relator Nouns ................................................................................................... 403 9.5.2. Semantic Types .................................................................................... 404 9.5.3. Adverbial Subordination Constructions with Additional Marking ...... 411 9.6. Irrealis-Marked Nominalized Subordinate Clauses ........................................ 411 9.7. Main Clause Constructions ............................................................................. 414 9.7.1. Nominalization plus Existential Copula Construction ......................... 414 9.7.2. Adverbial Constructions ...................................................................... 418 9.7.3. Diachronic Nominalization Constructions in Main Clause Grammar .............................................................................................. 418 9.7.3.1. Focus Constructions ................................................................. 418 9.7.3.1.1. Inconsistent Occurrence of ke- ..................................... 419 9.7.3.1.2. General Argument Focus Construction ....................... 420 9.7.3.1.3. Content Question Focus Construction ......................... 421 9.7.3.1.4. Co-Relative Focus Construction .................................. 421 9.7.3.1.5. Historical Development ............................................... 422 9.7.3.2. Imperfective Construction ....................................................... 424 9.7.3.3. Ambiguity between Focus and Imperfective Interpretation .... 427 9.8. Inconsistent Occurrence of ke- ‘nominalizer’ in Nominalization Constructions .................................................................................................. 428 X. CLAUSE PARTICIPANTS .................................................................................... 432 10.1. Preliminaries ................................................................................................. 432 10.1.1. Terminology ......................................................................................... 432 10.1.2. The Argument-Oblique Continuum and the Syntax, Semantics, and Pragmatics in Role Marking ................................................................ 433 xxix Chapter Page 10.2. The Predicate: Defining Argument Roles ..................................................... 435 10.2.1. Argument Roles in Typical Declarative Clause ................................... 435 10.2.1.1. Monovalent Predicate: Unmarked S Argument ....................... 436 10.2.1.2. Bivalent Predicates: Marking of A and O Arguments ............. 437 10.2.1.3. Trivalent Predicates: Marking of A, R, and T Arguments ....... 438 10.2.1.3.1. R-Centered Trivalent Construction .............................. 438 10.2.1.3.2. T-Centered Trivalent Constructions ............................ 439 10.2.1.4. Alignment in Typical Declarative Clauses .............................. 444 10.2.2. Declarative Clause Constructions with Non-Typical Role Marking of Arguments ............................................................................................ 445 10.2.2.1. Motion Constructions with Unmarked and - Marked Goals ........................................................................................ 445 10.2.2.2. ‘Need’ Construction ................................................................. 448 10.2.2.3. Existential Copula Constructions: Simple Locative and Possessive Constructions ......................................................... 448 10.2.2.3.1. Simple Locative Construction...................................... 448 10.2.2.3.2. Predicational Possession Construction with Unmarked A/Possessor and Possessive-Marked O/Possessed ...... 450 10.2.2.3.3. Predicational Possession Construction with Locative- Marked A and Unmarked O Argument ....................... 452 10.2.2.4. (Affected) Possessor Construction ........................................... 452 10.2.2.5. Comparative Constructions ...................................................... 454 10.2.3. Predicates with Derivationally Changed Argument Structure ............. 455 10.2.3.1. Causative pe-~pa- .................................................................... 455 10.2.3.2. Benefactive/Malefactive (Affective) - .................................. 457 10.2.4. Person: Non-Subject Speech Act Participant Indexing on the Verb.... 459 10.2.5. Other Grammatical Relations Constructions ....................................... 460 10.3. Overview: Clause Participant Marking ......................................................... 461 10.4. Lexical Noun Phrase versus Pronoun versus Zero Anaphora ....................... 462 xxx Chapter Page 10.4.1. Lexical Noun Phrase ............................................................................ 462 10.4.2. Pronoun ................................................................................................ 463 10.4.3. Zero Anaphora ..................................................................................... 464 10.5. Noun Phrase Delimiter ....................................................................... 466 10.5.1. Distribution of Noun Phrase Delimiter ..................................... 467 10.5.2. Analysis as Noun Phrase Delimiter vs. Syntactic Head Noun............. 469 10.5.3. Coocurrence of with Role Markers ........................................... 471 10.5.4. Cooccurrence of with Information Structure Clitics ................. 473 10.6. Role Marking ................................................................................................ 474 10.6.1. Unmarked Noun Phrases...................................................................... 475 10.6.1.1. S Argument .............................................................................. 475 10.6.1.2. A Argument ............................................................................. 476 10.6.1.3. O-Low Argument ..................................................................... 476 10.6.1.4. T Argument .............................................................................. 477 10.6.1.5. R Argument (T-Centered Trivalent Constructions) ................. 477 10.6.1.6. Goal/Locative Argument/Participant of Motion Verbs ........... 478 10.6.1.7. ‘Oblique’ or Semantic Role ..................................................... 479 10.6.2. Functions of ‘Non-Subject’ - ....................................................... 480 10.6.2.1. O-High Argument .................................................................... 481 10.6.2.2. R Argument (R-Centered Trivalent Construction) .................. 482 10.6.2.3. T Argument (T-Centered Trivalent Constructions) ................. 482 10.6.2.4. Semantic Marking with ‘need’ ........................................ 483 10.6.2.5. Marking the Standard of Comparison ...................................... 483 10.6.2.6. Oblique Participant .................................................................. 483 10.6.3. Functions of ‘Locative’ - .............................................................. 486 10.6.3.1. Locative/Goal R Argument (T-Centered Trivalent Constructions) .......................................................................... 486 10.6.3.2. Locative O-like Argument ....................................................... 486 10.6.3.3. Motion Verb Locative/Goal ..................................................... 487 xxxi Chapter Page 10.6.3.4. Semantic Marking with Possessor Construction...................... 488 10.6.4. Semantically Marked Participants ....................................................... 489 10.6.4.1. Semantically Specific Marking of Functionally Core Roles ... 489 10.6.4.1.1. Comitative, Instrumental, Ablative =pen .................... 489 10.6.4.1.2. Goal Arguments Marked with Semantically Specific Relator Nouns .............................................................. 491 10.6.4.2. Semantically Specific Relator Noun Marking of Obliques ..... 491 10.6.5. Differential Marking ............................................................................ 492 10.6.6. Marking Variation: Construal Differences? ......................................... 493 10.6.6.1. -t ‘RR-meet’................................................................... 493 10.6.6.2. - ‘ask-GO’ .................................................................... 495 10.7. Information Structure Marking ..................................................................... 496 10.7.1. Topic =ke ............................................................................................. 496 10.7.2. Additive =t ......................................................................................... 499 10.7.3. Realis Focus =si ................................................................................... 503 10.7.4. Irrealis Focus =le ................................................................................. 506 10.7.5. Relationships between Information Structure Clitics .......................... 508 10.7.6. Other Information Status Constructions .............................................. 511 10.7.6.1. Constituent Order ..................................................................... 511 10.7.6.2. New Participant Marking ......................................................... 514 10.7.6.3. Restrictive Focus Markers ....................................................... 514 XI. CLAUSE TYPES AND CLAUSE COMBINING. ............................................... 519 11.1. Non-Declarative Main Clause Types ............................................................ 519 11.1.1 Interrogatives ....................................................................................... 519 11.1.1.1. Question Particle =ma ............................................................. 520 11.1.1.2. Content Questions with Interrogative Pronouns and Adverbs .................................................................................... 520 11.1.1.2.1. Verb Occurring without =ma ...................................... 521 11.1.1.2.2. Verb Occurring with =ma ............................................ 522 xxxii Chapter Page 11.1.1.3. Polar Interrogatives and Disjunctive Interrogatives ................ 523 11.1.1.4. Polar Interrogatives .................................................................. 523 11.1.1.4.1. Polar Interrogatives with =ma ..................................... 523 11.1.1.4.2. Polar Interrogatives with Prosody Only ....................... 524 11.1.1.5. Disjunctive Interrogatives ........................................................ 526 11.1.1.5.1. Type 1: A=ma A-NEG .................................................. 527 11.1.1.5.2. Type 2: A=ma B .......................................................... 527 11.1.1.5.3. Type 3: A=ma B=ma .................................................. 528 11.1.1.5.4. Type 4: A=ma ma B=ma ............................................. 528 11.1.1.6. Interrogative Assumption =bo ................................................. 529 11.1.1.7. Tag Question ........................................................................ 530 11.1.1.8. Feedback Request with ...................................................... 530 11.1.2. Imperatives and Prohibitives................................................................ 531 11.1.2.1. Bare Stem Imperative .............................................................. 531 11.1.2.2. Informal Conditioned Imperative - ..................................... 532 11.1.2.3. Conditioned Imperative - ................................................... 533 11.1.2.4. Conative Imperative -t ......................................................... 534 11.1.2.5. Unconditioned Imperative -t .................................................. 534 11.1.2.6. Imperatives - , -t , and -t and Grüßner's (1978) Account of Politeness Differences ......................................................... 535 11.1.2.7. Prohibitive - ........................................................................... 536 11.1.2.8. Prohibitive Construction via Combination of Prohibitive and Imperative Suffix ..................................................................... 536 11.1.3. Hortatives ............................................................................................. 537 11.1.3.1. General Hortative - .......................................................... 537 11.1.3.2. Jussive Construction with Causative pa- and Hortative - ........................................................................................ 539 11.1.3.3. Extended Forms: Emphatic Hortative - g and Conative Hortative - ..................................................................... 540 xxxiii Chapter Page 11.2. Non-Nominalized Subordinate Clause Types ............................................... 542 11.2.1. Non-Final Clauses in Clause Chains.................................................... 542 11.2.1.1. Morphologically Marked Clauses: -si ‘non-final:realis’, -ra ‘non-final:irrealis’, -pen ‘non-final:with’ ................................ 542 11.2.1.2. Prosodically Marked Clauses ................................................... 545 11.2.2. Complement Clauses ........................................................................... 546 11.2.2.1. Verb Juxtaposition ................................................................... 547 11.2.2.2. Indirect Questions .................................................................... 548 11.2.2.3. Topic =ke Marked Complement Clauses ................................ 549 11.2.2.4. Quotative pu and pusi Complementizers ................................. 549 11.2.3. Adverbial Clauses ................................................................................ 550 11.2.3.1. Conditional -te ......................................................................... 550 11.2.3.2. Purpose Clauses with Quotative Complementizers ................. 551 11.2.3.3. Concessive sit et ................................................................ 551 11.3. Irrealis Clause Types: Irrealis-Sensitivity in Non-Final and Focus Markers ......................................................................................................... 552 11.3.1. Overview .............................................................................................. 552 11.3.2. Non-Declarative Speech Acts .............................................................. 553 11.3.3. Negation ............................................................................................... 555 11.3.4. Deontic Clauses (Expressing Necessity/Obligation; with ‘need, must’) ................................................................................................... 556 11.3.5. Conditional Subordinate Clauses ......................................................... 556 11.4. Non-Nominalized Insubordination (Formally Non-Finite Declarative Main Clause Types)................................................................................................ 557 11.4.1. Main Clauses Marked with =ke ‘topic’: Background Information Construction ......................................................................................... 557 11.4.2. Main Clauses Marked with pu ‘quotative’: Desiderative Construction ......................................................................................... 558 11.4.3. Stand-Alone Indirect Questions ........................................................... 559 xxxiv Chapter Page 11.5. Clause Coordination...................................................................................... 560 11.5.1. Conjunctive Coordination .................................................................... 561 11.5.1.1. Conjunctive Coordinator ‘and’ ...................................... 561 11.5.1.2. Additive Particle Clause/VP Coordination Constructions ....... 561 11.5.1.3. Clausal NP Coordination ......................................................... 562 11.5.2. Disjunctive Coordination ..................................................................... 563 11.5.3. Adversative Coordination .................................................................... 564 11.6. Lack of a Syntactic Pivot .............................................................................. 565 XII. DISCOURSE CONSTRUCTIONS ...................................................................... 566 12.1. Discourse Structuring Constructions ............................................................ 566 12.1.1. Clause Parallelism ................................................................................ 566 12.1.2. Tail-Head Linkage ............................................................................... 568 12.1.3. Discourse Connectors .......................................................................... 570 12.1.4. Discourse Structuring Markers e and ’ ........................................... 571 12.2. Rhetorical Constructions ............................................................................... 574 12.2.1. General Extender Constructions .......................................................... 574 12.2.2. Elaborate Expression Constructions .................................................... 578 12.2.2.1. Forms of Elaborate Expressions .............................................. 579 12.2.2.2. Embedding into Parallelism or Compound Construction ........ 582 12.2.2.3. Functions of Elaborate Expressions ......................................... 584 12.2.3. Copy Verb Constructions ..................................................................... 586 12.2.3.1. Assertive (with =ke ‘topic’) ..................................................... 586 12.2.3.2. Intensifier Declarative (with =t ‘additive’)............................ 589 12.2.3.3. Intensifier Non-Declarative (with =le ‘focus:irrealis) ............. 590 12.2.3.4. Perseverance Construction (with =ma ‘question particle’) ..... 591 12.2.4. Constructions with Negative Equational Copula .......................... 592 12.2.4.1. Disagreement Construction Based on Quasi-Reduplication and Negative Equational Copula ............................................. 592 xxxv Chapter Page 12.2.4.2. Nominalization-based Intensifier Construction ke-V- .............................................................................. 593 12.2.5. Prosodic Emphasis ............................................................................... 594 12.3. Particles ......................................................................................................... 595 12.3.1. Quotative pu ......................................................................................... 595 12.3.1.1. Reportative Function of pu ...................................................... 596 12.3.1.2. Desiderative Function of pu ..................................................... 597 12.3.2. Reportative t ............................................................................... 598 12.3.3. Dubitatives and t i .................................................................... 599 12.3.4. Always t t ............................................................................................ 601 12.3.5. Emphatic ti ........................................................................................... 602 12.3.6. Interactive Emphatic ho ....................................................................... 604 12.3.7. Vocative ............................................................................................ 605 12.3.8. Exclamative Function of Irrealis Focus =le ........................................ 606 12.3.9. Afterthought =he ................................................................................. 607 12.3.10. Background Information: =ke ‘topic’ Marked Main Clauses............ 609 12.3.11. Common Ground Marker =mati ........................................................ 612 12.3.12. Narrative Style ........................................................................... 613 12.4. Honorific and Formality Marking ................................................................. 615 12.4.1. Honorific - on Pronouns and Addressing Words ............................... 615 12.4.2. Formal - on Predicates ...................................................................... 615 12.4.3. Honorific - - on Kinship Terms .............................................. 617 12.5. Interjections................................................................................................... 617 12.6. Hesitation and Correction Words.................................................................. 619 12.6.1. Hesitation Words and mane ( ‘Karbi hills’) for a number of decades. The district was first formed in 1951, although at that time, the North Cachar Hills to the south of the present- day western and eastern part still belonged to the district (then called ‘United Mikir and North Cachar Hills District’). In 1970, the two parts were separated, and the ‘Mikir Hills’ district was renamed as Karbi Anglong in 1976, with Diphu in the eastern part as the capital. Karbi Anglong is the largest district of Assam.5 5 This information comes from http://www.karbianglong.nic.in/, which is the official website of the Karbi Anglong District Administration, accessed on February 3, 2014. 7 1.2. Karbi in Tibeto-Burman While there has never been any doubt that Karbi is a Tibeto-Burman language, the exact phylogenetic status inside Tibeto-Burman has not been possible to determine. This is despite the fact that information on Karbi has been available early on (§1.7.1), and that it has been considered in the early large-scale Tibeto-Burman classification proposals as well as in the modern, detailed comparative work. The difficulties of working out the exact phylogenetic status of Karbi are likely in large part due to a history of language contact and grammatical reorganization as a result of it (§1.3). 1.2.1. Tibeto-Burman Languages of Northeast India Northeast India is home to the greatest diversity of Tibeto-Burman languages, including languages from several different branches, such as Bradley's (2002) Western, Sal, and Central branches, see Figure 5. Figure 5. Classification of Tibeto-Burman according to Bradley (2002) Bradley’s Sal branch is a more inclusive version of this branch whose name was coined by Burling (1983), but renamed later more transparently as the ‘Bodo-Konyak- Jinghpaw’ branch (Burling 2003). Besides this Bodo-Konyak-Jinghpaw subbranch, 8 Burling’s (2003) attempt at classifying the Tibeto-Burman languages of Northeast India includes a substantial number of other low-level branches, whose higher-level groupings remain far from clear. As seen in the classification of the languages of the ‘Eastern Border’ in Figure 6, Karbi has in this context always been one of two languages (the other being Meithei, the state language of Manipur) that have been particularly difficult to associate with one of the other low-level branches. Figure 6. Burling’s (2003:184) ‘Relationships among the languages of the Eastern Border 1.2.2. Karbi in Tibeto-Burman Classification Proposals Karbi (then referred to as ‘Mikir’) was included in the Linguistic Survey of India (LSI) by Grierson and Konow in the early 20th century (Grierson 1903), which represents 9 the first attempt at classifying Tibeto-Burman languages. Already at that time, there was a fair amount of information available on the language. In the LSI, it is noted that Karbi “has received some attention from the missionaries who work among them”, and “we have a vocabulary and some short pamphlets written in it and an admirable grammar with selected texts from the pen of the late Sir Charles Lyall” (Grierson 1903:69). A classificatory problem Grierson and Konow encountered is noted in the next two sentences: In Volume III, Part ii of the Survey I have classed Mikir as falling within the N g -Bodo Sub-Group. The language has affinities with Bodo, but subsequent investigation has shown that it is much more closely connected with Kuki, and that it should be classed […] as belonging to the N g -Kuki Sub-Group, in which it occupies a somewhat independent position. While the absence of a closer link between Karbi and Bodo-Garo6 has not been controversial since, there are three other groups in particular that have been linked to Karbi: Meithei, Naga, and Kuki-Chin (the latter two of which were put into one group, going back to the LSI, see above).7 However, the evidence that underlies the grouping of Karbi with Meithei might better be analyzed as borrowings (§1.3). The putative grouping with Naga is complicated due to the fact that it is not currently clear at all what ‘Naga’ actually is, as there is a long-standing confusion of ethnic and linguistic labels surrounding the term ‘Naga’ (Burling 2003) (i.e., using ethnic labels as linguistic labels, see also §1.4.2 for a similar problem within Karbi ‘dialects’). A possible link to Kuki-Chin currently appears promising. As pointed out in various places throughout this dissertation, particular links to Kuki-Chin exist, for example with respect to: the negative equational copula (§4.6.2.2); the cislocative as well as speech act participant non-subject marking (§6.3.1.4); the reflexive/reciprocal prefix (§6.4.3); and the focus marker =si (§9.7.3.1.5), among other constructions. However, working out the exact details as well as implications of these 6 Bodo-Garo languages form a “compact, low-level branch of Tibeto-Burman” (DeLancey 2012). The few similarities that exist between Karbi and Bodo-Garo, such as the Karbi ke- nominalizer that is a cognate of a Bodo-Garo adjectival prefix (Konnerth 2009, 2012), stem from a very high node, possibly Proto-Tibeto- Burman. 7 There also was a proposal by Bauman (1976) to consider Karbi the missing link in a connection between Kuki-Chin and Lepcha. 10 similarities and apparent cognates is a matter of future research. This will likely include the difficult work of carefully disentangling areally from genetically shared features. In sum, it has remained difficult to come up with a classification proposal that places Karbi in a closer relationship with one of the (geographically) neighboring branches. This is despite early availability of information on Karbi grammar and lexicon (§1.7.1), but certainly has to be seen in the context of the remaining lack of information on some of the Kuki-Chin and so-called ‘Naga’ languages. What appears quite obvious, however, is that a major factor in obscuring the relationships between Karbi and other Tibeto-Burman languages has been language contact and contact-induced changes in Karbi grammar and lexicon. In particular, it has been known since the Linguistic Survey of India that Karbi has been in close contact (and, in fact, the closest contact of all TB languages) with the Austroasiatic Khasi languages to the west in Meghalaya. 1.3. The Role of Contact in the Development of Karbi DeLancey (2012) offers a creolization account for the origins of the Bodo-Garo branch of Tibeto-Burman, which likely applies in the historical development of Karbi as well, as in fact also suggested by DeLancey. At a smaller scale than Bodo-Garo, Karbi shares the ethnolinguistic profile of a language a) spoken by a relatively large number of people (in the local linguistic context), b) spread across a relatively large area, and c) extending into the plains (as opposed to being only spoken in the hills) (see §1.1.2).8 While Bodo-Garo is argued to have an origin in a lingua franca in DeLancey’s proposal, such an extreme case of contact influence does not need to be assumed in the case of Karbi. However, a considerable impact from contact has to be part of the history of Karbi. Specifically, there is robust evidence of changes in Karbi grammar and lexicon 8 This was also noted as a striking difference between the Karbis and other ethnic groups by Walker (1925) in the preface to his dictionary. He says, “[…] the Mikirs are among the more numerous of the Assam frontier races, and […] they are scattered over a wide area, from Golaghat to Kamrup and the Khasi Hills beyond Gauhati, and from the Cachar plains near Silchar to the forests north of Bishnath in Darrang […].” A similar remark about the relatively wide geographic spread of the Karbis in the local context stems from the Linguistic Survey of India, where it is noted that “it cannot be doubted that in former times the Mikirs occupied a comparatively large tract of country in the lower hills and adjoining lowlands of the central portion of the range stretching from the Garo Hills to the Patkoi” (Grierson 1903:69). 11 (as well as, in fact, culture and social organization9) due to contact with the Khasi languages (Grierson 1903; Grüßner 1978; Joseph 2009). This branch of Austroasiatic is centered in a region to the west of the Karbi-speaking area, across the border in the state of Meghalaya. More research on the Khasi branch is needed in order to be able to connect a particular language more closely to extensive contact with Karbi. At this point, specifically the language (and ethnic group) referred to as Jaintia or Pnar appears to be the one closest linked to contact with Karbi. In addition to contact with the Khasi languages, there is some evidence hinting at a possible contact scenario with Meithei. The one strong piece of evidence is the peculiarity of numerals ‘eight’ and ‘nine’ being morphologically complex forms that translate as ‘ten minus two’ and ‘ten minus one’ (§4.8.2). This subtractive construction for ‘eight’ and ‘nine’ is not attested so far in any other language in the region. The corresponding constructions in Karbi and Meithei look calqued, since the individual morphemes do not correspond. Another strong piece of evidence is that Meithei has a female -pi suffix corresponding to Karbi - ‘female’ (§5.4.1.1). This is noteworthy because it is not a typical Tibeto-Burman form and to my knowledge not attested anywhere else in the family.10 In addition to the evidence from numerals and the female suffix, there are several other correspondences that could potentially contribute to a model of Karbi-Meithei contact (without being strong evidence). For example, the Karbi word ‘meat’ is peculiar because the more common Tibeto-Burman root for a word ‘flesh’ is something like Matisoff’s (2003) reconstructed *sya. Now the Meithei word for ‘pig’ is (Chelliah 1997), and considering that pork is the major and favorite type of meat eaten by the Karbis, might be a borrowing from this Meithei word for ‘pig’. At the same time, the Meithei is similar to roots for the word ‘pig’ in other Tibeto-Burman languages. 9 As pointed out by Grüßner (1978), a number of lexical items referring to social organization as well as the kingdom system are borrowings from Khasi, obviously suggesting that the concept was borrowed along with the word. Examples include - ‘king’ (with the male suffix - ) from Khasi lyngdoh ‘priest’, and the word k for ‘clan’. 10 The typical Tibeto-Burman female suffix has a bilabial nasal. For example, in Tibetan, the male and female suffixes are -pa and -ma, respectively. 12 Matisoff (2003) here reconstructs *pwak (the Karbi word is . Therefore, this does not represent strong evidence for a borrowing from Meithei into Karbi.11 1.4. Varieties of the Karbi Language While the details of the Karbi dialect situation are outside the scope of this dissertation, it appears that there is a high degree of homogeneity - perhaps surprisingly so, given the large geographic spread of the language. This was also noted by Walker (1925) as he writes in the preface to his dictionary that “in spite of the fact […] that [the Karbis] are scattered over a wide area, […], the language is practically one and the same throughout.” The highly simplified ‘big picture’ of the dialect situation, is that there is a major dividing line (political as much as, or even more than, linguistic in nature) between the Hills Karbis (Karbis from Karbi Anglong (KA)) and the Plains Karbis (Karbis mostly living in the plains of Assam largely north of KA), as discussed in §1.4.1. Within each of these major two varieties, there is relatively little dialectal variation. However, investigating the nature of dialectal variation is complicated due to the application of dialect labels by Karbi native speakers, which are grounded in historical ethnic/familial and/or geographical affiliation, as outlined in §1.4.2. Following this discussion, §1.4.3 further discusses two of these dialect labels from the Hills Karbi variety: the Rongkhang or Ronghang dialect, which (with apparently wide-spread acceptance) is being used as the basis for standardization; and the Hills (not Plains) Amri Karbi dialect, which is spoken in the western part of Karbi Anglong, where the traditional-cultural center of the Karbis lies. Finally, §1.4.4 offers a list of some lexemes that have been found to exhibit (mostly, vowel) alternations in the speech of different native speakers, without, however, actually appearing to represent dialect isoglosses. Note that besides these geographical and historical/ethnic dialect groups, there appears to be some evidence for a Christian sociolect (possibly specifically in the Tika region), with some slight differences in lexicon and grammar from the non-Christian 11 In addition, there is also a demonstrative si in Meithei (Chelliah 1997) that represents an alternative (or possibly ultimately the same) cognate for the focus marker =si in Karbi (which is suggested to be connected to an equational copula si(i) in Central Kuki-Chin in §9.7.3.1.5). 13 sociolect (see §1.7.2 on Grüßner’s work, which was based on a variety with some such features). All of these issues pertaining to linguistic varieties of Karbi require further research. In the discussion of varieties of the Karbi language, in the following subsections as well as in the entire dissertation, I want to emphasize that not a single word is written with a political motive behind it. My goal has always been to describe the linguistic landscape in a scientific way and to be as neutral as possible when it comes to the politics that are, of course, tied to it in real life. I truly hope that no part of the discussion of the different varieties of the Karbi language is offensive to anybody. 1.4.1. Plains Karbi (“Amri Karbi”) and Hills Karbi The Plains Karbi variety spoken in the Kamrup and Marigaon districts of Assam as well as partly in the Ri-Bhoi district of Meghalaya is commonly referred to as ‘Amri Karbi’ in the linguistic literature and in the Ethnologue (Lewis, Simons, and Fennig 2013). However, it should be noted right away that Karbis identifying with the western subvariety of Hills Karbi use the same name for themselves, possibly because of an ultimately shared geographical origin and/or common ancestors (§1.4.3). Members of the Karbi Lammet Amei (§1.1.4) have expressed their concern to me over the use of the name Amri for the Plains Karbi variety, while this name is embraced by many speakers of this variety. The term ‘Dumra’ or ‘Dumrali’ is also used to refer to this variety of the Karbi language and the people that speak it. In the following discussion, I will use the geographically based terms ‘Plains Karbi’ and ‘Hills Karbi’ to refer to the two major linguistic varieties of the Karbi language, which, again, include further ‘sub’-varieties based on linguistic features, which are, however, not as different from one another as are the two major varieties. Although these geographic terms are not ideal either since there are Karbis living in the plains who do not speak the ‘Plains Karbi’ variety, I follow M. Teron and Tumung (2007) in using ‘Plains Karbi’ and ‘Hills Karbi’ in these ways, as the terminological debate is currently still ongoing and there simply is no ideal set of terms to use at this point. Note that the name Amri refers to a historical administrative unit in the Karbi kingdom, and, as mentioned above, in addition to Plains Karbis, the group of Hills Karbis living in the 14 western part of the Karbi Anglong district also identify with this name, see §1.4.2 and §1.4.3 below. There is a strong political movement on part of the Plains Karbis to consider their variety of Karbi a different language rather than just a different dialect from the variety of Karbi that is spoken in the Hills. This likely has to do with the unequal power relations between the two groups. While there are close to half a million native speakers of Hills Karbi that have autonomy in the Karbi Anglong district, the Plains Karbi speaking population is scattered across a number of districts, and a 2003 figure reported by the Ethnologue estimates the number of speakers at a total of 125,000 (Lewis, Simons, and Fennig 2013).12 According to my Hills Karbi language consultants, there is a high degree of mutual intelligibility between the Hills and Plains Karbi. This is especially true for Hills Karbi speakers that are fluent in Assamese (which most people living in the urban areas are), as the Plains Karbi variety has a large number of Assamese loans due to closer contact with Assamese in the plains. It is also noted in the Ethnologue that “some Amri Karbi villages shifted completely to Assamese due to intermarriage and the perception that Assamese is preferred for children to do well in school.” In addition to the larger number of Assamese loans, some of the more noticeable ways in which Plains Karbi is different from Hills Karbi are the following. First, there are differences between the song language (§1.6.2) and the ordinary language. Specifically, Plains Karbi uses lexemes in ordinary, colloquial speech, which are only used in the song language of Hills Karbi, and vice versa. A phonological difference is that Plains Karbi has preserved coda /l/, which in Hills Karbi has changed into diphthongs or glide codas, depending on the analysis (see §3.1.2 and §3.4). In the domain of morphology, there are two salient differences. First, the unusual onset-reduplicative negative suffix - in Hills Karbi (§3.8.6.3) corresponds to just -e without the onset reduplication in Plains Karbi. Second, the Hills Karbi negative existential copula is , while Plains Karbi instead uses the form ingjong (§4.6.2.1.1). 12 It is not clear what the basis is for this figure provided by the Ethnologue. The Census data of close to a half a million native speakers of Karbi do not specify whether a distinction was made between Hills and Plains Karbi (and hence it likely was not). 15 With respect to syntax, there are two frequently occurring Plains Karbi constructions that are not used in Hills Karbi. On the one hand, the positive existential copula is often used following a bare stem. It is not clear to my Hills Karbi language consultants what the function of this construction is, but it is very striking to them. On the other hand, habitual aspect is marked by the suffix -man in Plains Karbi, where in Hills Karbi simply the bare stem is used. Within the Plains Karbi variety, there is also some amount of dialectal variation. For example, in the Ri-Bhoi district of Meghalaya, the Bhoi Mynri variant is spoken. A good resource on the Plains Karbi variety is the trilingual dictionary edited by M. Teron and Tumung (2007), which includes both Plains and Hills Karbi forms of each lexical item, as well as translations into Assamese and English. 1.4.2. Relationships between the Hills Karbi ‘Dialects’ There are four ‘dialect’ labels that are used by Hills Karbi native speakers to identify their own and other people’s speech: Amri, Rongkhang (or Ronghang), Chinthong, and Killing. Originally, however, these labels are connected to historical administrative units of the Karbi kingdom and the people that lived in these administrative units. Therefore, while there certainly is a historical connection between an individual’s affiliation to one of these groups and the variety s/he speaks, this is not always the case anymore in the year 2014. Since this discussion of these different groups is only for the purpose of sketching out the linguistic landscape, everything said here comes through the lense of linguistic variation and is considered in its relevance to linguistic varieties. I would like to acknowledge that it is shorthand to speak of ‘Amri Karbi’ or ‘Rongkhang Karbi’ and that the more accurate way of referring to the people that identify with these names is to say Amri aso ‘children / inhabitants of Amri’ and Rongkhang aso ‘children / inhabitants of Rongkhang.’ According to Dharamsing Teron (p.c.), the following can be said about these ‘dialect’ groups: The three major groups are Amri, Rongkhang, and Chinthong. The Killing group appears to be a part of the Rongkhang group. The Amri group was the first to migrate into 16 the present-day Karbi Anglong area. They split up and some of them went to present-day western Karbi Anglong (i.e., the group discussed in §1.4.3), while others moved into the plains (i.e., the Plains Karbis, discussed above in §1.4.1). The Rongkhang group is mostly located in the southern portion of the eastern part of Karbi Anglong, where the district capital Diphu is located. This group became the most dominant and influential group, which is why the Rongkhang ‘dialect’ is currently considered the standard dialect. Note, however, that linguistically, it is not possible for my language consultants to pinpoint defining differences between Rongkhang and the ‘dialects’ of eastern Karbi Anglong and the area to the south, i.e., Chinthong, and Killing. (The Killing group is geographically centered in places such as Kheroni, Jyrikyndeng, and further into the North Cachar Hills area.) 1.4.3. Hills Karbi: Differences between Rongkhang (Hills Karbi; Diphu) and Amri (Hills Karbi; Western Karbi Anglong) Dialects While any particular differences between the Rongkhang dialect and other dialects to the north and the south are not easy to discern for my language consultants (although among themselves, they may identify with different dialect groups, see §1.4.2 above), there are a number of differences between, on the one hand, Rongkhang and the other putative dialects, and, on the other hand, the Amri dialect in western Karbi Anglong. These differences are not only lexical in nature, but also include two systematic phonological differences. First, the Amri dialect has a sixth phonemic vowel, which is a high to mid-high, front, centralized /ɪ/ (§3.2.1). Second, the Amri dialect has preserved /ei/ and the /ai/ diphthongs (or vowels /e/ and /a/ with palatal glide coda, see §3.4), while the Rongkhang dialect has merged them to /ai/ (§3.2). In addition, there are number of differences in other grammatical domains as well. For example, the pe-~pa- ‘causative’ prefix is seemingly only ever produced as pa- in the Amri dialect, i.e. without any allomorphy (see §3.9.2.1). Another difference is that that ‘afterthought’ particle =he (§12.3.9) is more frequently used in Amri speech, and that the particle is prominently used as a marker of narrative style specifically in this dialect (§12.3.12). 17 1.4.4. Variation in Lexemes Table 1 provides lists of sample lexemes, of which there are two (or more) variants based on vowel alternations. No study has been conducted yet to see whether these alternation patterns somehow align in the speech of individual native speakers. Table 1. Vowel alternations Alternation Gloss /i/ /e/ /a/ /o/ /u/ i~e~u ‘banana’ i~e ‘trade’ ‘match’ ‘eggplant’ ‘main people in charge’ t t ‘king( coda by some Karbis - however, it is sometimes the low tone that is represented by this orthographic coda (e.g., neh ‘1EXCL’), and sometimes the mid tone (e.g., meh ‘fire’). Another proposal specifically aiming at the representation of the mid tone in nasal coda syllables was to write an orthographic homorganic stop, e.g., (a-)tump for the plural word with a bilabial nasal coda, (a-)phant for the non-subject marker with an alveolar nasal coda, or langk for ‘water’ for a velar nasal coda. Except for where the representation is not systematic or phonological (i.e., the attempts so far at representing tone), all of these issues are mostly political in nature and there is no right or wrong in linguistic terms. In this dissertation, I follow the orthography Grüßner (1978) used. This has the following implications for the four orthography problems outlined above: For a) word boundaries, clitics are written as one word with the element that they are phonologically bound to. For b) capitalization after adding prefixes, the above representation is used, i.e., lower case prefix with capitalized proper noun stem (i.e., aKarbipi). With respect to c) syllable boundaries, the apostrophe is used, i.e., ’ for the 22 The other situation where this issue arises is when a multisyllabic word contains a consonant combination of /pl/, /pr/, /kl/, or /kr/ between two vowels, where the two consonants could be split up as coda plus initial or an open syllable followed by a consonant cluster. 29 example word from above. Finally, for d), the representation of tone, Grüßner’s approach with diacritical marks is used: the grave for low tone (e.g., low tone t ‘die’); the acute for high tone (e.g., t ‘snatch, grab’); and the macron23 for mid tone (e.g., t ‘be short’). In this dissertation, examples are offered with both a word line and a morpheme line, where tone is only indicated in the morpheme line but not in the word line. The details of the representation of tone is further discussed in §3.5.9; the details of the representation of data in general in this dissertation is further discussed in §2.4.3. 1.9. Organization of This Grammar This dissertation is organized as follows. Chapter II discusses the theoretical framework and methodological approach employed in this dissertation, as well as the data that were collected and produced as part of this research, and that are used as a basis for the grammatical description. Chapter III is dedicated to Karbi phonology, a large portion of which concerns the Karbi tone system, which poses difficulties for thorough description due to its low functional load. Karbi morphology is dealt with in Chapters IV through VI. Chapter IV establishes basic facts about Karbi word classes or parts of speech, while Chapter V and Chapter VI discuss nominal morphology and verbal morphology, respectively. In Chapters VII and VIII, syntactic issues concerning the noun phrase and predicate constructions are discussed. Chapter IX is solely dedicated to nominalization and nominalization-based constructions, as nominalization represents a major structural device with functional application in a number of different domains of grammar (including simple derivation of nouns from verbs, noun phrase modification, monoclausal predicate constructions, as well as clause combining). The status of clausal participants, and the distinction between arguments and obliques (or the relative absence thereof), as well as the constructions they occur in is the topic of Chapter X. 23 Note that in his dictionary manuscript, Grüßner also sometimes used the circumflex for the mid tone, e.g., representing ‘be short’ as thî. 30 A discussion of clause types and clause combining, including non-declarative speech acts, is offered in Chapter XI. Finally, Chapter XII provides an overview of the major constructions that have functions on the level of the larger discourse. 31 CHAPTER II 2. METHODOLOGY AND DATA This chapter deals with the methodology and general approach to grammar writing that underlies this dissertation, as well as the various data-theoretical aspects and practical workflows involved in the collection and organization of the data that this grammar is based on. Most of the existing literature on linguistic data management has been published within the fields of language documentation (Himmelmann 1998; Gippert, Himmelmann, and Mosel 2006; Himmelmann 2006a; Woodbury 2011) and the description of (especially endangered) languages (Austin and Sallabank 2011). While this grammar of Karbi is primarily aimed to be a descriptive resource, attempts were made to incorporate the insights from the recently emerged (or, as some would argue, revived) field of ‘language documentation’ (or ‘documentary linguistics’). This chapter begins with a discussion of the general approach and theoretical framework underlying this grammar (§2.1). In §2.2, an overview of the corpus, including data types and data formats is offered. Aspects of primary data collection are discussed in §2.3, while §2.4 deals with the processing of primary data to derive annotation files representin the main corpus for this dissertation. 2.1. Approach and Theoretical Framework The approach taken in this dissertation contains three major components. First, it is firmly rooted in a functional-typological framework. Second, it embraces collaboration with the language community as the best approach for data collection and analysis. Third, the analysis presented in this descriptive grammar gains explanatory force through a historical-comparative perspective on the grammatical constructions that are discussed. 32 2.1.1. Functional-Typological Framework First and most importantly, this dissertation is based on a functional-typological framework. This approach permeates all aspects in the design, data collection, and analysis and write-up. For the design and data collection aspects, this framework puts an overarching emphasis on a data-driven and inductive, as well as data-rich approach to document how Karbi is actually spoken in a wide variety of natural uses of the language. As a result, the vast majority of examples that are offered in this dissertation to illustrate a particular point come from naturally produced speech rather than elicitation via translation from English. Elicitation serves an important purpose in supplementing information that did not happen to be provided in data from natural speech, but it should always be treated with the necessary caution. The implications of using this framework for the analysis and argumentation consist in the understanding that there most typically are functional motivations for patterns and that there are also functional motivations for exceptions to patterns. For example, Karbi classifiers generally do not mark a distinction between singular and plural: the same classifier is used when counting one or many items of a particular kind. This is functionally motivated because classifiers only ever occur with numerals to form classifier-numeral words in Karbi (§4.4.1). Therefore, having different classifier forms to distinguish singular from plural would be redundant. However, there is one case in which there actually are two forms that are used for classifying the same entity: humans (or personified animals or objects in folk stories, §4.4.1.4). For humans, there are two classifiers, the singular classifier t and the plural classifier . On a first level of explanation, there are two forms for the human classifier, because t actually is a borrowing from Khasi (Joseph 2009). On a deeper level of explanation, however, it is functionally motivated that the classifier (set) for humans is more special than most if not all other classifiers and is also the most frequently used classifier (set) in the corpus. The functional-typological approach takes function and use seriously. From there, as this approach considers language a tool for a language community, the typological component is relevant: It motivates why some aspects of language are shaped similarly 33 cross-linguistically, which is due to the shared aspects of human life everywhere in the world. But it also motivates why other aspects of language are shaped differently cross- linguistically, which is due the aspects of human life that are different in different parts of the world, just as there exist different cultures. 2.1.2. Collaboration with the Language Community This dissertation project was initiated by the Karbi community through the Karbi Lammet Amei (KLA; §1.1.4), and was therefore collaborative in nature from the beginning. Due to this close collaboration with the KLA, numerous aspects of data collection and processing were enhanced. For example, the KLA (and specifically my closest collaborator Sikari Tisso) identified speakers that were able to tell particular stories and provide particular information. Due to the KLA’s own interest in the success of the project, they (and again, most importantly Sikari Tisso) also greatly helped with all aspects of the practical realization and facilitation of the project, which always represents a major and time- consuming task in fieldwork (which at times is even impossible for an outsider linguist without collaborators from within the community). 2.1.3. Historical-Comparative Perspective The historical-comparative approach to linguistic explanation understands grammatical constructions as being shaped by their historical origins, which can often be investigated by conducting comparative research. For example, there are main clause constructions in Karbi that feature the ke- prefix that functions as the main nominalizer in the language, without having an inflected element to render the clause finite (§9.7.3). The historical perspective taken in that section aims to explain how that ke- prefix in those constructions can still be diachronically analyzed as the nominalizer, even though it has to be analyzed as a different element synchronically. A specifically comparative component to explanation is part of the analysis for the focus type of diachronic nominalization construction. This construction can be accounted for with recourse to a copular form that does not exist in Karbi but does exist in the related Kuki-Chin branch of Tibeto-Burman. 34 2.2. Corpus 2.2.1. Data Types The data that were collected and generated for this grammar are organized into three subcorpora, as laid out in Table 2. They are 1) data based on individual recording sessions; 2) context-free elicitation data; and 3) the lexical database. All of these data are - or are based on - spoken data. Additionally, three other types of data were available: 4) data from Grüßner's (1978) work and specifically his transcriptions and translations of audio data he had collected, which, therefore, are also spoken data, 5) an extensive dictionary manuscript that Grüßner provided me, containing 240 pages of morphemes with indication of tone, and 6) data extracted from written texts, mostly school textbooks. Table 2. Subcorpora of Karbi data SUBCORPUS CONTENT 1. Texts / Recording session data Audio/Video recordings (and images) along with their transcriptions, translations, and analyses 2. Elicitation data Elicitation based on grammatical, phonological, or lexical topics 3. Lexical database Database including all morphemes occurring in recordings (4. Grüßner's (1978) data) Transcriptions / translations of audio recordings; individual examples (5. Grüßner's dictionary manuscript) Manuscript of a dictionary of 240 pages with tones represented (6. Written text data) Mostly from school textbooks, but also from other published sources 2.2.1.1. Texts / Recording Session Based Data The most important data type are the data from recording sessions, as they represent the most natural use of the language (§2.1.1). Most of the time and effort spent on this dissertation research were devoted to the transcription, translation and analysis of the speech recordings. Within this data type, I distinguish between primary or media data and derived data or annotations. Within the derived data type, I distinguish between the two types of representation/translation and grammatical annotation as shown in Table 3. 35 Table 3. Recording session based data types Primary data / media data Audio recordings Video recordings Derived data / annotations Representation & Translation Transcription Translation Analysis Grammatical annotation Parsed Karbi words English glosses for Karbi morphemes Part-of-speech labels for Karbi morphemes Grammatical / cultural notes Text-based elicitation As detailed in Appendix H, which shows the metadata for those texts that were fully transcribed, translated, analyzed and further annotated, the primary data that these texts are based on consist of a total of 01:21:36 (hh:mm:ss) of media files that include video, and a total of 00:40:02 of audio-only recordings, for a total of about two hours. As for the data derived from these media data, the two hours of spoken language are represented by a total of approximately 12,500 transcribed Karbi words. 2.2.1.1.1. Relationships between Text / Recording Session Based Data Types For visualization purposes, a simplified account of the relationships between the text / recording session based data types and processing procedures is modeled in Figure 7. It consists of three levels as indicated on the left-hand side: the media, basic annotation, and analysis levels. Generally, oval fields represent different data types, although the two types of media data are lumped together since they are supposed to document the same recording session, with video enriching the audio data as available. Arrows generally originate in one data type that 'is needed/used for' another data type. Figure 7 represents that on the basic annotation level, transcription and translation data are derived from media data. The translation may in theory be based solely on the audio data, but in my experience is often aided by reading the transcription, which is what the arrow with the dotted line represents. Between the basic annotation and analysis levels (both of which are actually annotation types), the arrows go in both directions. This is because the data derived from 36 the media files can be said to mutually inform one another. For example, the analysis (very broadly speaking, i.e. consisting of parsing, glossing, assigning part of speech labels, etc.) is derived from the transcription, translation, and media files, while also in return informing transcription and translation. Media Level Basic Annotation Level Analysis Level Figure 7. Relationships between recording session based data types / processing procedures 2.2.1.1.2. Discussion of the Distinction between Primary and Derived Data A distinction between primary data and data from how primary data is further processed (i.e., derived data), as done in Table 3 above, is typically made in the language documentation literature, although the dividing line may be drawn in different ways. For example, Himmelmann seemingly distinguishes between primary data and their transcription and translation on the one hand and the analysis on the other hand in an earlier publication (1998:161–2), but in a later publication (Himmelmann 2006a:14) distinguishes between primary data consisting of "recordings/records of observable linguistic behavior and metalinguistic knowledge (possible basic formats: session and lexical database)" and the "apparatus", which consists of metadata and annotations (including transcription, translation, and "further linguistic and ethnographic glossing and Audio (Video) / (Images) Transcription Translation Analysis 37 commentary"). That is, Himmelmann also distinguishes between essentially three types of data (primary - transcription and translation - analysis), but puts the transcription and translation in earlier work with the primary data and in later work with the analysis. As represented in Table 3, I consider transcription and translation derived data or annotations just like the different types of grammatical annotations (see also Schultze-Berndt 2006). Primary data in my conceptualization are media data, i.e. audio and video recordings as well as images such as photographs of the speakers and of the recording session. The idea is that primary data are the most objective, 'raw' data. Derived data are derived from primary data and include transcription and translation on the one hand, and analysis of the texts on the other hand. We can distinguish here the former two from the latter in that transcription and translation are still more objective and can be fairly easily carried out by trained research assistants, while the analysis requires a fully trained linguist. The analysis may include grammatical annotations such as the parsed Karbi text, morpheme-by-morpheme glosses and part of speech tags as well as grammatical and cultural notes for different layers of syntactic analysis of the given parts of a text and ethnolinguistic commentary. The analysis may also include separate files with elicitation based on the given parts of a text. Although there is a sense that we can distinguish between primary and derived data, where primary data are objective and 'raw', while further data that are derived from the primary data consist of more (inter)subjective analysis and interpretation that may turn out to be incorrect or flawed, this distinction is actually blurred. In fact, even with the primary, 'raw' media data, no true objectivity is guaranteed, since even here, subjective decisions about where to set up the camera and microphones and what types of microphones to choose have an impact on the resulting recordings (Good 2011). 2.2.1.2. Context-Free Elicitation Data Context-free elicitation data were collected on phonological and grammatical topics, although grammatical topics are mostly investigated through textual examples and elicitation based on those. An example of context-free elicitation are elicited clauses that include comparative constructions or clauses that include indefinite quantifiers in order to learn more about these particular grammatical constructions. 38 Phonological elicitation was mostly aimed at the Karbi tone system, e.g., eliciting roots that undergo morphophonemic changes due to adding certain prefixes, or elicitation of words with similar tone patterns. 2.2.1.3. Lexical Database The lexical database has been built up parallel to the text database of recording session based data due to the way the software Toolbox, which was used for grammatical annotations, works. Therefore, the lexical database includes all morphemes that occur in the recorded texts with some additional opportunistic data entries. It is a basic lexical database, which will require further work to be usable as a dictionary. As of now, entries generally only consist of the Karbi morpheme, an English gloss, a part of speech label, and in some cases additional grammatical, lexical, or cultural notes. 2.2.2. Data Formats and Software Data formats ideally depend on their purpose: a) for the purpose of working with the data; b) for the purpose of presenting the data within the academic research community or the Karbi community; or, c) for archiving and longevity of the data (Johnson 2004, 146; Austin 2006, 96–7; Good 2011, 227–8). Table 4 summarizes what formats are used for what data type depending on the respective goal. For the master copies of all types of files, archival formats were chosen following best practices, which recommend the use of uncompressed, widely used, non- proprietary formats in order to ensure long-term preservation and avoid loss of quality (Bird and Simons 2003; Johnson 2004; Austin 2006). The choice of working format depends on the software used, and in the case of these Karbi data involve, for example, the .eaf format, which is the format the ELAN software generates.24 Still the working format should also be uncompressed, i.e. be of the highest possible quality, for example the working format for audio recordings is the uncompressed .wav format, which is also the archiving format. Video files, on the other hand, involve three different working formats. The .mts format is the high definition format that is generated by the video camera used for this project (the Canon Vixia HF S- 24 Note, however, that the .eaf format is in fact a type of XML format (see MPI LAT). 39 10). This format is neither a good working, nor presentation, nor archiving format and therefore has to be converted first. As a working format, a smaller format is advantageous since it requires less storage space and runs faster. For the current project, high resolution video data were not required and so we typically used smaller .wmv or .avi formats as the working format as they are supported by ELAN. The presentation format is largely intended to serve Karbi community members. Therefore, the important consideration is to try and make the files small and portable and widely accessible. That means that unlike the working and archiving formats, the presentation format does not have to be of the highest possible quality but it is more important that data transfer is easy and that the data do not get modified. Therefore, .mp3 for audio or .pdf files for text data are preferred presentation formats. Table 4. Data types and archiving, working, and presentation formats Type Working format Archiving format Presentation format Audio recordings .wav .mp3 Video recordings .mts, .wmv, .avi .mp4 .wmv, .avi, .mp4 Images .jpg .tif .jpg Transcriptions .eaf, .txt .xml .eaf, .doc Translations .eaf, .txt .xml .eaf, .doc Grammatical annotations .eaf, .txt .xml .eaf, .doc Lexical database .txt, .doc .xml .doc, .pdf Text data25 .txt; .doc, .xls .rtf, .csv .doc, .xls, .pdf Table 5 provides a list of all software used in the course of the project. For basic text annotation, ELAN26 was used. ELAN (the ‘EUDICO Linguistic Annotator’) is software developed by the Language Archiving Technology (LAT) group of the Max Planck Institute (MPI) for Psycholinguistics in Nijmegen, The Netherlands. The other main software, which was used for linguistic analysis and the creation of a lexical database, is Toolbox.27 Toolbox was developed by the Summer Institute of Linguistics 25 Text data includes data types such as elicitation data, tabular data, coding schemes, concordance / examples lists, and questionnaire responses. 26 ELAN, developed by the Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics, Nijmegen, The Netherlands: http://www.lat-mpi.eu/tools/elan/ 27 Toolbox, developed by SIL International: http://www.sil.org/computing/toolbox/ 40 (SIL). For phonetic analysis, Praat28 was used. In order to edit audio files, the freely available Audacity29 software was used. In order to extract audio from video files, the VLC media player30 software was used. Lastly, to write texts and create tables, Microsoft Word and Microsoft Excel were also used. Table 5. Working and presentation software used for different data types Type Working software Presentation software Audio recordings Audacity, ELAN, Praat, Emu Audacity Video recordings VLC media player, ELAN VLC media player Images N/A Transcriptions ELAN ELAN Translations Toolbox, ELAN Grammatical annotations Toolbox Lexical database Toolbox, MS Word MS Word, Adobe Reader, (Lexique Pro) Text data MS Word, Toolbox, MS Excel MS Word, MS Excel, Adobe Reader 2.3. Primary Data Collection Data collection was carried out over a total of 15 months consisting of five phases: January - March 2009 (phase 1); February - May 2010 (phase 2); January - March 2011 (phase 3); September - December 2011 (phase 4); September - December 2012 (phase 5). Specifically, phase 1 mostly consisted of word elicitation aimed at Karbi phonology and simple sentence elicitation without recording much. During phase 2 a festival to celebrate Karbi culture took place in the local capital Diphu. This festival brought a number of village elders to Diphu, about ten of who agreed to be recorded, performing a variety of genres. We were able to record them in a recording studio in Diphu and collected a lot of primary data in the form of recording sessions involving both audio and video data. These data are mostly folk stories as well as some procedural texts. 28 Praat, developed by Paul Boersma and David Weenink: http://www.fon.hum.uva.nl/praat/ 29 Audacity, developed by Dominic Mazzoni and Roger Dannenberg at Carnegie Mellon University: http://audacity.sourceforge.net/ 30 VLC media player, developed by the VideoLAN Project: http://www.videolan.org/vlc/ 41 A lot of song data were also recorded during phase 2, which, however, have not been analyzed yet since Karbi song language is entirely different from the ordinary language and requires further research (§1.6.2). During phase 3 some additional phonological data were collected. As part of phase 4, a one-week recording trip was carried out in November 2011, which resulted in a number of recorded interviews, conversations, narrations of local histories and folk stories, most of them pertaining to a research project dedicated to investigating the status of women in Karbi society. During the final stage of phase 5, a few other texts were collected, including an on-line narration of the Pear Story (Chafe 1980). 2.3.1. Acknowledgment of Karbi Speakers that Facilitated Data Collection I would like to acknowledge the participation and support from the following people: Maloti Rongpharpi, Kache Rongpharpi, the Assistant Teachers at Lorulangso LP School: Punyalata Ingtipi and Rani Teronpi, Maggie Katharpi, Chandra Kanta Terang, Puspa Engtipi, Kahan Terangpi, and Dr. Janta Pator (Diphu); Burnesh Milikpi, Keshop Terang, Jugal Timung, Rajen Kro, Dim Teron, and Hemari Rongpi (Jyrikyndeng); Aren Ingti, Pretty Ingtipi, and Kamal Chandra Kro (Dongkamokam); Chandra Sing Tisso (Podumsarpo); Harsing Ronghang, Ronghang Lindok and his assistants (Ronghang Rongbong); Longsing Tokbi (Amtereng); Bidyaram Rongpi (Hamren); Dhansing Terang, Kare Rongpipi, and Harsing Kro (Boythalangso); Anjan Teron and Dhaniram Ingleng (Bhoksong); Modon Kro (Rambangla); Sarthe Phangcho (Putsari Hindu arong); Mahin Phangcho (Umpanai); Hem’ari Ingjai (Pharkong Abi); Sika Hansepi (Men Terang); Kache Kropi (Balijuri); Chandra Sing Teron; Kasang Teronpi (Dingso Terang); Rongbang Teron and Seng Tisso (Ujandongka); Welisbon Ronghipi (Umswai Model); Longsing Bey (Murap, Umlaper); Joysing Tokbi (Laru aum, Umlaper); the people of Sohliya (Meghalaya); Owen Terang and the people of Marmein (Meghalaya); Dhiren Ingti and Dhiren Ronghang (Kamrup); Khayasing Hanse (Bokoli); Sarhon Ronghang, KLA; Sangvai Teronpi and Hangmiji Hanse (Hongkram); Dr. Mansing Rongpi, MLA, Dispur; and Father Joseph Teron, Don Bosco. Kardom. 42 2.3.2. Data Collecting Team The data collecting team consists first and foremost of Mr. Sikari Tisso, who represents the Karbi Lammet Amei (§1.1.4). As my main collaborator on this project, he was involved in and/or facilitated almost every recording session. He also interviewed various Karbi speakers for this project. Mr. Tisso was born in 1955 and grew up in Western Karbi Anglong but moved to Diphu in his late twenties. He says of himself that he now speaks an idiolect where he mostly speaks the main Diphu dialect of Karbi interspersed with several features of the Western Karbi Anglong Amri dialect that he grew up speaking. Furthermore partially involved in the primary data collection efforts were especially Mr. Bhudeswar Timung, as well as Ms. Amphu Rongpipi, and the Kro and Hanse families in Diphu and Umswai, respectively. Mr. Bhudeswar Timung played an important role in the data collection trip of November 2011, where he interviewed speakers and also facilitated data collection otherwise. He currently lives and is originally from Socheng in eastern Karbi Anglong. He speaks the standard (Rongkhang) dialect of Karbi. Ms. Amphu Rongpipi facilitated the collection of recordings from her mother, Puspa Ingtipi, and her grandmother, Kahan Terangpi. She and her family are from Diphu and speak the standard dialect. The Kro family has been my main host family. I stayed with them and enjoyed their generous hospitality for large periods of my time in Karbi Anglong. I was able to record Mrs. Sashikola Hansepi and Ms. Rasinza Kropi of the Kro family. The Hanse family was my host family in Umswai, West Karbi Anglong for a few weeks in fall 2011 and fall 2012. They also facilitated the recording of native Karbi speakers of Umswai. 2.3.3. Recorded Speakers: IRB Procedure and Ethics Metadata information about the fifteen speakers of the fully annotated texts that represent the main corpus for this dissertation is provided in Appendix H. Before recording sessions, the data collection team made sure to obtain informed consent from the speaker(s) that we were going to record following standard practice (see for example Dwyer 2006:43-5) as well as fulfilling requirements imposed by the University of Oregon's Institutional Research Board (IRB). To that end, consent forms were created in 43 English and translated into Karbi, which are attached as Appendix I.31 The consent forms gave speakers the following explicit options: 1) Do you want to be acknowledged or remain anonymous? 2) Is it okay for us to video record you? a) no, b) yes, but only if the video is used for linguistic analysis but not for public access, c) yes and public access is fine 3) For each one of the following three types of data individually: 1) video data, 2) audio data, 3) transcriptions of video/audio data; what type of access do you agree to? a) no access, b) access restricted, to be determined by Karbi Lammet Amei, c) public The speakers were asked to check the appropriate and sign and date. Although Dwyer (2006:44) reports that in certain cultural settings "written forms may breed mistrust" and that they "may wisely be viewed with suspicion", my experience was that the written consent forms were actually viewed as carrying prestige, and one of my host families asked for another copy to keep and told other people about it in my presence. 2.3.4. Recorded Genres Both from a documentary and descriptive linguistics perspective it is desirable to collect texts from as many different types of genres as practically feasible (which, however, does impose a very real limit) since certain aspects of grammar and certain constructions may only be used in particular speech genres. Since speech genres vary according to a number of different parameters, one of the goals of documentary linguistics is to discover what parameters may be crucially involved in defining significantly different speech genres. One parameter suggested to play an important role by Himmelmann (1998:176ff.) is spontaneity. The list of genres collected for this corpus is provided in Table 6 organized according to this parameter of spontaneity (see also Appendix H, where the genre of each fully annotated recording is identified). In addition to degree of spontaneity and genre, Table 6 also includes a column of ‘category’, which is divided into ‘monologue’ and ‘dialogue’. Generally, dialogues are more spontaneous, because it is usually not possible to predict what the interlocutor will say. 31 A good idea would have been to have designated fields on the consent form for speaker metadata. 44 Table 6. Text genres Spontaneity Category Genre Less spontaneous More spontaneous Monologue Folk tale Procedural text Personal narrative Pear story Dialogue Interview/Conversation The folk tales are the least spontaneously produced genre, as they follow a given plot line and to some degree probably also particular structural patterns. Despite this (in some sense, undesirably) low level of spontaneity, this genre was recorded the most: Not only was it very important for the Karbi Lammet Amei (§1.1.4) to record as many folk tales as possible, but this genre also has a high priority from a documentary viewpoint as it represents the major component of the Karbi oral literature (§1.6.1). As such, it is important for academic disciplines besides linguistics, such as anthropology, ethnography, or folklore studies, and, it can also provide information on the cultural-linguistic history of the Karbis, thus relating back to being of immediate concern to linguistics. Procedural texts may or may not be as spontaneous as folk tales. Some of the procedural texts in the main corpus narrate traditional cultural practices that are likely to be retold and transmitted, and therefore not spontaneous. An example is the text about the alkaline food kangmoi ahan that involves burning jhum fields and picking up the ashes as an ingredient (‘SiH, KH’). Other procedural texts, however, such as the recipe for pork with fermented bamboo shoots (‘PI, BPR’), are clearly spontaneously produced. Personal narratives are intermediate with respect to spontaneity. The two personal narratives in the main corpus, ‘SH, CSM’ and ‘SiT, HF’, both represent retellings of trips to festivals the day before. In both cases, the speakers retell the events from their memories without much planning or outlining, but due to the nature of them being monologues, less spontaneity is involved. The Pear Story (Chafe 1980) was recorded as an on-line narration: The speaker was telling what was happening as he was watching the video clip. Therefore, this was all spontaneous. Finally, another recording made from a spontaneously produced genre, which was fully annotated, were about two thirds of an interview between two speakers. While the 45 interviewer had an outline with questions he wanted to ask, everything produced on part of the interviewee was fully spontaneous. 2.3.5. Recording Procedures and Settings 2.3.5.1. Audio-Recording Formats To ensure highest quality, audio recordings were created in .wav format with a sampling rate of 48 kHz with a bit depth of 16 or 24 following best practices that recommend at least 44.1 kHz and 16 bits (Johnson 2004, 147; Austin 2006, 107), while anticipating that 48 kHz and 24 bits will be the future archival standard for audio files (Nathan 2011, 260). During all recording sessions, the actually recorded audio was monitored by using headphones (Austin 2006:90). 2.3.5.2. Recording Settings Another aspect involved in the attempt to collect high quality audio data has to do with the recording setting. A notorious difficulty in collecting high quality audio data in the fieldwork context is the level of background noise. This was certainly the case for this project, where it often seemed impossible to escape the constant background noise.32 However, early on in the project, Sikari Tisso was able to identify a sound studio in Diphu, owned privately by Mr. Chandra Kanta Terang, who made it available for recordings for this dissertation research. As a consequence, a number of recordings were made in the sound studio in order to get audio data of better quality by eliminating most of the background noise. However, a new issue (of unclear ramifications) that arose as a result of solving the background noise problem, was that this recording studio would get hot and stuffy after awhile since it did not have any direct opening to the outside. Due to the stuffiness, other native Karbi speakers were not very motivated to join the recording sessions, resulting in several sessions that were recorded with speakers one-on-one, which is not ideal considering the goal of obtaining data in natural settings. Nonetheless, it is not clear 32 Specifically, background noise such as animal sounds, people chatting or singing, children crying, people physically working on some project, echo inside rooms, noisy electricity or generators, fans, etc. 46 what type of impact (if any) this procedure had on the speech or grammar used in the recordings obtained that way. It might be the case that some speakers were actually more comfortable being in a dark room by themselves without other people gathering around them and watching them. 2.3.5.3. Recording Equipment The recording equipment that was used includes a high definition video camera, two different digital audio recorders, and various microphones for use in different recording contexts (for details, see metadata spread sheet in Appendix H). More often than not, a session was recorded both with the video camera and with the audio recorder to ensure high quality audio data.33 A variety of microphones were used, including a cardioid condenser hand-held microphone, an omni-directional condenser hand-held microphone, 2 lavalier clip-on omni-directional condenser microphones, one head-mounted unidirectional dynamic microphone, and one omni-directional dynamic hand-held microphone (see metadata spread sheet in Appendix H for exact models). The most versatile and most often used microphone was the hand-held condenser microphone, which was used in various settings. Depending on the model used on a given the trip, the hand-held condenser microphone picked up sound either in a cardioid or an omni-directional pattern, both of which can be used to record several speakers, and thanks to the above-mentioned recording setting in a recording studio (§2.3.5.2), the omni-directional microphone did not pick up too much background noise in the recordings obtained in that setting. The condenser omni-directional microphone (which has enhanced capabilities of picking up sound due to additional battery / phantom power) proved a lot more useful than the dynamic omni-directional microphone (which in fact turned out useless). The two omni-directional lavalier microphones were used in recording interviews and other conversations, especially those involving just two speakers. 33 This practice proved useful since the special cable connecting external microphones to the video camera (female XLR to 3.5mm mini plug) turned out - after several recordings - to be of inconsistent quality during the 2010 trip. 47 Lastly, the head-mounted unidirectional microphone was used for phonetic recordings, as well as in the monologue narration of the Pear Story. The head-mounted type was considered somewhat uncomfortable by speakers, and thus was not used much. 2.4. Data Processing: From Primary to Derived Data This section describes the methods and workflows followed in processing primary (i.e., media) data. 2.4.1. Workflow: Preparing and Processing Media Files The workflow followed in preparing and processing media files is shown in Figure 8. It is an idealized version of the workflow, because in reality, it cannot always be followed as smoothly and consistently. For example, backing up was not always done as systematically, or when doing the analysis we realized that something was off in the transcription or segmentation and had to go back to that. Nevertheless, this workflow illustrates the general steps taken in processing the data for this dissertation. The first step after obtaining media files was to put the files from the SD card (which in my case was the medium on which all media files were recorded) on the laptop and then to label them. The original files (usually) remained on the SD cards so that at that point, there existed two sets of copies. The labeling conventions I followed for audio and video files (and later on annotation files derived from those) was to always include speaker initials, a two or three letter text name acronym, and the date of recording (as a code consisting of year, month, day, where the year is only the last two digits) in this order as seen in Table 7. Adding a sequence number was typically not necessary as in most cases only one media file pertaining to a particular text and one or several particular speakers were recorded on a given day. Table 7. Sample file label File label Speaker name Text name Media file date SH_CSM_090226 Sashikola Hansepi Chomangkan Story Mother February 26, 2009 48 If there is a video file: Figure 8. Data processing workflow After all files were accordingly labeled, some of the audio files were edited to cut the beginning or end before the speaker/singer started or after s/he had ended. This was done using the free software Audacity. In addition, video files also had to first be converted before proceeding further. The video camera used for this project generates AVCHD or .mts files, which cannot be used for processing the data. Therefore, all video .mts files were converted into .avi or .wmv format for working/processing purposes. Furthermore, using the freely available VLC media player software, audio files in .wav Transfer media files to laptop Label files VLC media player: extract audio Back up on external hard drives Create ELAN file ELAN: Segmentation, transcription, (& translation) Create Toolbox file Toolbox: Analysis Audacity: edit audio files Back up on external hard drives Back up on external hard drives 49 format were extracted from the video files. The reason for this is that ELAN (currently) only provides a waveform (which is helpful for segmenting and transcribing) if an actual audio file is uploaded. Therefore, audio files were extracted and uploaded into ELAN together with their video files in order to obtain a representation of the waveform. Next, an ELAN file was created for segmentation and transcription purposes (see §2.4.2.1 and §2.4.2.2 below). The ELAN file was then exported into Toolbox to proceed with the analysis. In order to supply Toolbox with the fields necessary to do the analysis, i.e., at least the "/mb" field for the parsed Karbi text, the "/ge" field for the English gloss, the "/ps" field for part of speech labels, and the "/ft" field for the free translation, I added these fields into new tiers in ELAN and left them blank in ELAN. After export into Toolbox, these fields were exported as well and were ready to be used in Toolbox for the analysis (§2.4.2.3), the free translation (§2.4.2.4), and the ethnographic and linguistic notes (§2.4.2.5). 2.4.2. Annotation In the subsections to follow, I discuss the various annotation components, both the more basic components of segmentation, transcription, and translation, as well as the types of annotation that both represent and are based on the analysis of Karbi grammar. This notion of 'annotation' including all of transcription, translation, and analysis follows the terminology of Bird and Liberman (2001) and Schultze-Berndt (2006). The discussion is roughly ordered according to the typical workflow: what needs to be done first is the segmentation of the audio or video file into intonation units (§2.4.2.1), then followed the transcription (§2.4.2.2) (sometimes but rarely along with the translation), and then followed the analysis including parsing, glossing (§2.4.2.3), typically the translation (§2.4.2.4), and adding ethnographic and grammatical notes (§2.4.2.5). 2.4.2.1. Segmentation Segmentation of audio files of spoken texts was carried out based on auditory impressions, such that each segment represents an intonation unit. Typically, I myself did 50 the segmentation, mostly due to the fact that this was something I could do relatively quickly compared to research assistants who did not use computers on a regular basis.34 2.4.2.2. Transcription The transcription of texts was carried out by native Karbi speaking research assistants Amphu Rongpipi, Klirdap Langne Teronpi, Serdihun Beypi, and Larshika Tissopi. All of them read and write English and Karbi. All texts were transcribed using a Karbi orthography that follows Grüßner’s (1978) work (§1.8); phonetic transcriptions were not prepared. Within the orthographical transcription, however, certain very basic non-linguistic and paralinguistic aspects were transcribed as suggested by Schultze-Berndt (2006:229): whispering, laughing, the existence of short pauses, and hesitation markers are indicated. Furthermore, false starts were transcribed, as also advised by Himmelmann (2006b:269), as they "may prove crucial for various interpretative and analytical tasks." An issue was the accurate transcription of minor dialect differences such as using a different vowel. For example, one dialect has richo for 'king', whereas the standard dialect has recho (see §1.4.4). Research assistants transcribing texts would understandably often slip into transcribing how they would say a word instead of how the recorded speaker said it. Overall, text transcription was very close to the text. False starts and other types of misspoken words were indicated by angular brackets < >. 2.4.2.3. Parsing and Glosses The way Toolbox works, every project typically involves a text database and a lexical database. Because of that, morphological parsing and glossing becomes semi- automated with a growing lexical database. In choosing glosses for grammatical morphemes, the conventions of the February 2008 version of the Leipzig Glossing Rules were followed (see also §2.4.3). 34 This was generally possible due to the considerable overlap in the phonological marking of intonation units cross-linguistically (Himmelmann 2006). There still remained a few segmentation issues in some cases that had to be changed at a later point. 51 2.4.2.4. Free Translation Free translations from Karbi into English were typically added while analyzing a text, intonation unit by intonation unit, although a few texts were translated in the process of being transcribed. The type of free translation provided for most texts was rather close to the original Karbi structure, so in fact more literal than free. This decision was based on the wish to highlight Karbi idiomatic expressions or constructions. Where the actual meaning became obscure, a brief explanation was added in the free translation or in the ethnographic notes. As advised by Schultze-Berndt (2006:236), anything that had to be added in the translation in order to render the particular English clause grammatical, most typically noun phrases or pronouns, was put in brackets to indicate that the corresponding form was absent in the Karbi original text. 2.4.2.5. Ethnographic and Linguistic Notes Ethnographic notes were added, for example, for customs that were perhaps referred or alluded to in a particular clause in a text. Linguistic notes were added if, for example, a) a language consultant told me that the use of a particular morpheme was unacceptable in her/his dialect or odd; or b) if there was something peculiar about a phonological issue, such as a much lengthened vowel; or c) when doing minor text-based elicitation, such as asking whether a particular information structure marker could be replaced by a different one with roughly the same meaning. 2.4.3. Representation of Text Examples in this Dissertation Following the annotation principles outlined in §2.4.2.1 through §2.4.2.4 above, text examples in this dissertation include four lines, as illustrated in (1), (a) through (d). (1) Representation of text examples in this dissertation (a) […] alamthe neli lapu'ansi non ephonglokke (b) [a-lamth n -l lap n si n n e-ph ng-l k ke] (c) POSS-matter 1EXCL-HON like.this=that.much=FOC:RL now one-CLF:time-only=TOP 52 (a) atomo kethan kangton’iklo; kardom'iklo ho (b) [a-tom ke-th n ke-ingt n- k-l ] kard m- k-l ho] (c) POSS-story NMLZ-tell NMLZ-conclude-FRML-RL GREETING-FRML-RL EMPH:INTERACT (d) ‘[…] this matter I'm telling, just this one thing (i.e., doesn't want to tell any other stories), I'm finished telling the story, thank you’ [SeT, MTN 052] In (a), the word line, tone is not marked (see §3.5.9), except in some cases where prosodic extra high pitch occurs, typically serving as non-final marking, as in (2) below (see §11.2.1.2). The spelling conventions for Karbi that are used in the word line (and elsewhere) are outlined in §1.8. Square brackets with three dots […] are included whenever either the beginning or the end of an intonation unit, or both, are left out (because they are irrelevant to the point being made). In order to indicate words or parts of words that the speaker did not intend to say (where s/he misspoke), are used. If these are full words, then they are also listed in the morpheme and gloss lines (and translated in the free translation line). In the morpheme and gloss lines, (b) and (c), there are three symbols that may indicate a morpheme boundary: the dash (‘-‘) as the default, which includes the morpheme boundary between affixes, and between roots in compounds; furthermore, the equal sign (‘ ’) for clitics; and finally, the tilde (‘~’) for reduplication. Moreover, in the morpheme line (b), tone is marked following the conventions discussed in §3.5.9. This line may also include square brackets that indicate constituency. In the gloss line (c), abbreviations follow the Leipzig Glossing Rules (§2.4.2.3) where possible. Borrowings are indicated where known, e.g., t ‘person(, , , or may be described as rhymes with a diphthong nucleus or as rhymes with a monophthong nucleus and a glide coda. In §3.2 and §3.3, I present the diphthong analysis, but §3.4 discusses both alternative analyses, as they work equally well for the available evidence. Moving on to suprasegmental elements of Karbi phonology, §3.5 discusses the tone system, which is peculiar due to its low functional load, and §3.6 offers a few remarks on stress. In §3.7, several characteristics of hypoarticulated speech are presented, and §3.8 offers a brief overview over the characteristic phonological shapes of different morpheme types including a discussion of the exceptional phonological features of interjections (§3.8.5) and patterns of reduplication (§3.8.6). Finally, §3.9 discusses morphophonemics. Morphophonological tone changes are discussed (§3.9.1), as well as the allomorphy of and/or resulting from the prefixes ke- ‘nominalizer’, pV- ‘causative’, che- ‘reflexive/reciprocal’, and cho- ‘auto- benefactive/malefactive’ (§3.9.2). For a thorough discussion of phonological strategies involved in the nativization of especially older (rather than more recent) borrowed lexical items, see Grüßner (1978: 28-33). Grüßner points out what happens with onset voiced aspirated stops from Indic, onset clusters such as /sm/, /skh/, and /sy/ from Khasi, and documents vowel changes and tone assignment. 3.1. Consonants There are a total of 18 consonant phonemes in Karbi that contrast with each other in minimal sets. All but one of the 18 phonemes, which is the velar nasal /ŋ/, occur at the 55 beginning of syllables (see §3.1.1 and Table 8), whereas the syllable coda position is limited to a much more restricted set of consonants (see §3.1.2 and Table 16). 3.1.1. Consonant Onsets In the class of syllable onset consonants (see Table 8), stops are the only manner of articulation that exists at all places of articulation except for the glottal stop. Phonetically, there is a glottal stop in the language, which, however, only surfaces as part of the mid tone and occurs in conjunction with glottalization across the whole syllable (see §3.5), as well as with syllable-initial vowels (§3.3). Note that Table 8 shows one phoneme in two different cells: the palatal /ɟ~j/ has allophonic variation in its manner of articulation, and is therefore given as both a stop and a glide. Details will be discussed below. Table 8. Syllable-initial consonants35 Bilabial Alveolar Palatal Velar Glottal Stops b p ph~ɸ d t th ɟ~j c k kh Fricatives β~w s h Nasals m n Lateral l Rhotic r~ɾ Glide ɟ~j The bilabial voiceless aspirated stop /ph/ is in free variation with a bilabial voiceless fricative /ɸ/. It seems as though the younger generation, and particularly speakers of the Christian sociolect, tend to use /ɸ/ more. It should also be noted that the name of the capital Diphu as a specific lexical item is most commonly pronounced with 35 Representation in indicate the orthographic representation of the respective phoneme followed in this grammar. 56 /ɸ/. Grüßner (1978: 12) also noted the use of the fricative /ɸ/ in the then younger generation and ascribes it to contact with the dominant language Assamese, where the fricative production is the standard realization of orthographic, or perhaps ‘original’, according to him. Scott DeLancey (p.c.) notes that this allophonic alternation between /ph~ɸ/ also occurs in Boro (Boro-Garo, Tibeto-Burman; Assam, Northeast India), and may be an areal feature. Indeed, the alternation between /ph~ɸ/ geographically extends into Northeastern Bhutan, where it is found in at least Kurtöp (but presumably other languages as well) (Hyslop 2011: 106). The alveolar stop series /d/, /t/, /th/ is complete, while the palatal and velar series each lack one member: the palatal series /ɟ/, /c/ () lacks the voiceless aspirated stop, while the velar series /k/, /kh/ lacks the voiced stop. Lacking specifically the velar voiced stop is common across phonological systems of languages of the world for a phonetic reason: it is more difficult to produce a negative voice onset time (VOT) for the velar place of articulation because there is less room in the vocal tract for voicing to build up (Ohala 2010: 667). The palatal voiced stop [ɟ] is in free variation with the palatal glide [j]. The choice of which allophone should be considered primary largely depends on whether one wants to focus more on synchrony or more on diachrony. The stop articulation [ɟ] is more common in the dialects now considered standard. Perhaps related to the orthographic representation as , there is a prescriptive tendency in favor of the stop [ɟ], while rejecting the glide pronunciation. However, especially in syllable onset but word-medial position, most native speakers at least sometimes produce a glide instead of the stop. The glide [j] pronunciation appears quite frequent in the more conservative varieties in West Karbi Anglong, and perhaps also more so among older people. It also seems that sometimes an intermediate, fricative-like version is produced such that it almost seems to be more of an allophonic continuum of manner of articulation that spans from a more stop-like across a more fricative-like to a more glide-like production. 57 Grüßner (1978: 12) also reports a voiced “fricative” production of /ɟ~j/,36 which he says he especially noticed among older people and particularly in the context of singing and reciting traditional texts. He also cites data from Robinson (1849), which show transcriptions of this phoneme sometimes as and sometimes as . Grüßner (1978: 12) suspects that there was and is an ongoing sound change from the “fricative” to the stop citing Shafer (1966) for the claim that “*/y/” is historically earlier. More recent research by Matisoff (2003) suggests that the Karbi /ɟ~j/ phoneme does indeed reconstruct to Proto-Tibeto-Burman as the glide */j/.37 To summarize, then, the stop pronunciation [ɟ] is primary synchronically in the now considered standard dialects in that it is most frequent. The glide pronunciation [j], however, is primary diachronically, because it appears to be reconstructible and is quite frequent in the more conservative dialects and especially among older speakers. The fricative series is restricted to /s/ and /h/ as well as a bilabial voiced fricative /β/ (rather than a bilabial glide [w] as reported by Grüßner (1978: 12) or a labiodental voiced fricative [v] as suggested by the spelling). By describing this as a bilabial voiced fricative /β/, we can explain both salient facts, which are, on the one hand, observing speakers produce this consonant more like a bilabial rather than a labiodental, and, on the other hand, especially preceding unrounded vowels, it sounds a lot more like a fricative (and, indeed, closer to [v]) than a glide. The exact production of this phoneme also seems to be variable between a more fricative-like and a more glide-like articulation when comparing different dialects. While the subdialects of Hills Karbi tend more towards a fricative-like articulation, a more glide-like articulation is found in the Ri-Bhoi variety spoken in the border area between Assam and Meghalaya. 36 Grüßner (1978: 12) writes that it is a fricative using [j] as a phonetic symbol for it; it appears that he has the glide in mind instead. 37 Evidence includes the following forms: ‘to stand’ from Proto-Tibeto-Burman *r(y)ap; hijap ‘fan’ from *ya:p; ‘rat’ from *b-yəw; ‘to point’ from *y ŋ ‘f ’; ‘night’ from *ya; ‘to sell’ from *ywar; t ‘deer’ from *d-yuk; and ‘to be lightweight’ from *r-y :ŋ. 58 In onset position, nasals are limited to bilabial /m/ and alveolar /n/. Other sonorants include the lateral /l/ and rhotic /r~ɾ/, the latter of which is usually produced as the flap /ɾ/ in onset position rather than the trill /r/.38 The onset position allows clusters of two consonants. These are exclusively combinations of stops with the lateral or the rhotic. Permissible onset clusters are discussed in §3.3. 3.1.1.1. Stop Onset Minimal Sets A minimal triplet for the bilabial stop series (voiced, voiceless, aspirated) in onset position with an open, mid tone rhyme is presented in Table 9. Table 9. Minimal set for bilabial stop onsets b__ ‘to be small’ p__ ‘to give’ ph__ ‘to roast’ Table 10 offers a minimal triplet for the alveolar stop series (voiced, voiceless, aspirated) in onset position with an open, low tone rhyme. Table 10. Minimal set for alveolar stop onsets d__ ‘tongue’ t__ t ‘older sister’, ‘to spread out in sun’ th__ t ‘to be big’ Table 11 gives a minimal pair for the two palatal stops: voiced /ɟ~j/ () (also listed in a minimal set with liquid onsets in Table 15) and voiceless unaspirated /c/ (), with a low tone, velar nasal coda rhyme. Table 11. Minimal set for palatal stop onsets j__ ‘to spin (thread) ch__ ‘to begin’ 38 The rhotic occurs in an onset cluster with the voiceless aspirated alveolar stop in two lexical items, t ‘six’ and t ‘seven’. In this case, the rhotic is produced like the approximant /ɹ/ (see §3.3 and Table 25), which is a production also found in coda position (see §3.1.2). 59 Table 12 offers a minimal pair for the aspirate-nonaspirate contrast among voiceless velar stops. The voiced velar stop is not a native phoneme of Karbi (but see §3.1.1.4 for the voiced velar onset in borrowings). Table 12. Minimal set for velar stop onsets k__ n ‘to dance’ kh__ n ‘to be in a hurry’ 3.1.1.2. Fricative Onset Minimal Set In Table 13, monosyllabic roots with the same, stopped low tone rhyme but different fricative onsets, voiced /β~w/ (), voiceless /s/, and voiceless /h/, are contrasted. Table 13. Minimal set for fricative onsets v__ ‘to swim; to steer’ s__ ‘to put, to attach’ h__ ‘to open up’ 3.1.1.3. Sonorant Onset Minimal Sets Table 14 and Table 15 give minimal pairs for the two nasal onset phonemes /m/ and /n/, and for the liquids /l/ and /r/ and the palatal glide (/stop) /ɟ~j/, respectively. Table 14. Minimal set for nasal onsets m__ ‘strip of field’ n__ ‘ear’ Table 15. Minimal set for liquid and glide onsets l__ l ‘to send’ r__ r ‘to praise’ j__ ‘night’ 60 3.1.1.4. Marginal Onset Consonants and Consonant Clusters Through prolonged contact and (more modern) multilingualism with Indic languages, many Karbi speakers39 produce voiced aspirated onsets in (modern) borrowed lexical items that have them. Some lexical items are pronounced either with the voiced aspirate or without depending on the speaker. A typical strategy to avoid the voiced aspirate is to break it up with a vowel and getting the sequence voiced stop - vowel - /h/. For example, two different speakers in two different texts of the present corpus used the word /bhari/ ‘big () t˺ () k˺ () Fricatives Nasals m n ŋ () Lateral Rhotic r~ɾ~ɹ 39 In particular, those with some fluency in Assamese, Bengali, and/or Hindi. 61 In syllable-final position, there is only one member each of stops and nasals at the bilabial, alveolar, and velar positions, as well as the rhotic. Stops are unreleased. The velar nasal is the only syllable-final consonant that does not also occur as a syllable onset. The rhotic /r~ɾ/ varies between a more flap-like production and a more trill-like production, as in onset position. Word-finally, it often is a trill. Word-medially before a syllable starting in an alveolar consonant, the rhotic is often produced like an approximant in alveolar position, [ɹ], or in retroflex position, [ɻ]. In fact, it appears that speakers of the younger generation in general tend to an approximant production of rhotic codas. Grüßner (1978: 15) also notes that some speakers produce what he calls a retroflex (and uses the symbol of the retroflex flap [ɽ] for) for the rhotic, in free variation with [r]. Note that Plains Karbi has preserved coda /l/ in words such as phirul ‘snake’, mol ‘back’, or ingkol ‘twenty’, which in Hills Karbi has turned into diphthongs or glide coda, depending on the analysis: phi ‘snake’, ‘back’, and ‘twenty’ (see §3.4). 3.1.2.1. Stop Coda Minimal Set Table 17 shows two sets of three monosyllabic verb roots that are minimally contrasted by their coda stops. Table 17. Minimal sets for stop codas __p t ‘to put inside’ ‘to help’ __t t t ‘to slaughter, to kill’ t ‘public ( for a-t ‘POSS-PL’, for ‘custom, or for ‘water’. However, the proposal does not include marking the mid tone on open or stopped syllables, and does not at all include marking the low or the high tone (see also the discussion in §1.8). Thus, despite these different signs of native speaker awareness of tones, it is perhaps still not clear how truly systematic or phonological this awareness is. A last type of evidence for the phonological basis of tone comes from morphophonological patterns that change the tonal category of a root or a suffix depending on the morphological environment (see §3.9.1). Since there are a number of different such patterns where the tone category affiliation of a syllable changes to another tone category, this logically then is evidence that there are, in fact, tone categories. 3.5.4. Low Functional Load The idea that different phonemic contrasts may have different degrees of functional load in the overall phonemic system goes back to the Prague School (inter alia Mathesius 1929; Jakobson 1931). There have also been approaches to quantify the functional load of phonemic contrasts (e.g. Hockett 1967; Surendran and Niyogi 2006). The goal of this section is, however, to argue in a qualitative way for why tones in Karbi only carry a low functional load. 77 I present six different types of evidence that the Karbi tone system does indeed carry a low functional load within Karbi phonology. While each piece of evidence by itself would not be conclusive, the various types of evidence together form the argument for the low functional load of tones in Karbi. The first type of evidence comes from native speakers’ difficulty in identifying tone categories. The next two types of evidence come from what we can refer to as the paradigmatic and syntagmatic dimensions of the functional load of tone. The paradigmatic dimension consists in the contrastiveness of the tone system or the existence of tone minimal sets. The syntagmatic dimension consists in the context of a tonal morpheme, both within the same word and at the phrasal or clausal level, which may greatly contribute to the identification of that morpheme. The fourth type of evidence presented here is the occurrence of categorical tone changes and cases of indeterminability of the tones of certain morphemes due to over-layering prosody. The fifth type of evidence comes from a phonetic study that looked at both acoustic measurements of tones and at the performance of native speakers as they tried to identify lexical items in a perception study (Konnerth and Teo in press) Lastly, evidence for the low functional load of the tone system also comes from the fact that only roots and suffixes bear tone (see §3.5.6). 3.5.4.1. Native Speakers’ Difficulty to Identify Tone Categories My Karbi language consultants experience a lot of difficulty in identifying the tone category of a morpheme, especially when there is no tone minimal counterpart. The method of humming or whistling the tone as a way to get rid of the disturbance introduced by the segmental structure, a method often used in fieldwork to identify the tone of a syllable, was not successful. Instead, what we would do to determine the tone of a morpheme was try and find a near minimal counterpart that would have the same rhyme or at least close to the same rhyme, and/or follow the strategies outlined in §3.5.8. Even those native speakers heavily invested in the project, i.e., members of the Karbi Lammet Amei (see §1.1.4), who also work on a dictionary that is supposed to indicate tone, have a hard time trying to learn to determine the tone category of a root or 78 a suffix, which, I believe, is already suggestive of the low functional load of this tone system. 3.5.4.2. Low Contrastiveness By ‘low contrastiveness’ I refer to the overall small number of tone minimal triplets (see §3.5.1 and §3.5.2), and to the virtual absence of tone minimal triplets, where all three members belong to the same basic morphosyntactic word class (the only example I have come across is the all-verbal triplet t vs. t vs. t in Table 30). Since roots generally do pattern quite differently in discourse depending on whether they are nominal (being able to take the a- ‘POSS’ prefix) or verbal (being able to take the ke- ‘NMLZ’ prefix) (see §4.1.1), a minimal triplet, where one member is verbal while the other two are nominal, or vice versa, practically only counts as minimal pair at the discourse level. Of course, minimal pairs also matter, and there still are a lot of minimal pairs, where both members belong to the same word class. Furthermore, it appears that minimal sets only exist within monosyllabic roots and perhaps a handful of monosyllabic suffixes, as well as within disyllabic roots. Also, the kind of disyllabic roots that occur in minimal sets are mostly those that have the common first syllable ing or ar (see §3.5.2). Other than those, there are only very few minimal sets of disyllabic roots. 3.5.4.3. Large Amount of Contextuality If the morphological (or phrasal/clausal) context of a tonal morpheme frequently helps identify its meaning or function, then that reduces the functional load of that tonal morpheme. In Karbi, there is a large class of predicate derivation suffixes, some of which combine more productively with different kinds of roots, but some of which also have very specific semantics and only combine with a very limited number of verbs, sometimes even just one (§6.5.1.1.3). This latter type of predicate derivation suffixes with narrow semantics is of interest here, because it provides a morphological context that helps identify stems that are part of tone minimal sets. Furthermore, even if a particular predicate derivation suffix may occur with a small number of different stems, there are certain stem-suffix collocations that seem 79 remarkably frequent, such that they seem a) semantically close to the prototypical meaning of the stem without the suffix, and b) to some degree lexicalized as a unit of their own. As a result of that, native speakers have quite frequently used predicate derivations to differentiate between members of minimal sets in the course of research on tone for this project. Examples are t - ‘be.short-small’ and t - ‘snatch-quickly’ (§6.5.1.1.3). Thus the existence of predicate derivations with narrow semantics and especially the cases of frequently collocating stem-suffix combinations are another factor that reduces the functional load of tone in Karbi. Another, quite curious piece of evidence that suggests that the context of a root matters is that for recordings made for the phonetic analysis of tone, where stems were recorded once in isolation followed by three times in a carrier phrase (“Neli ___ pusi kepu.”), one particular speaker merged mid and high tone items produced in isolation to the low tone such that the phonetic recordings of the items t ‘be short’ and t ‘snatch’ would be (and sound to other native speaker) as follows: “ . Neli t pusi kepu. Neli t pusi kepu. Neli t pusi kepu.” (for t ‘be short’) “ . Neli t pusi kepu. Neli t pusi kepu. Neli t pusi kepu.” (for t ‘snatch’) Note that other native speakers thought this speaker was first saying the verb ‘die’ and then switched to ‘be short’ or ‘snatch’, respectively. It is perhaps not clear whether this should count as evidence that the context matters so much that an item without a context, i.e. if produced in isolation, does not receive tonal specification by this speaker. However, it does represent more proof for the low functional load of tone. 3.5.4.4. Speaker Differences in Realization of Mid versus High Tones An acoustic study of Karbi tone has shown that there are differences between speakers in whether they realize the mid versus high tone distinction in pitch (Konnerth and Teo in press). This study examines two native Karbi speakers, one female and one male, in their respective realizations of the three tones in the following three contexts: 1) monosyllabic bare stems, 2) monosyllabic stems with the suffix - ‘IRR2’, and 3) monosyllabic stems with the suffix - ‘IRR1’. Although both speakers originally come from different areas of Karbi Anglong, they have both lived in Diphu for a long time. 80 Averaged F0 values of the three tones show that the male speaker consistently differentiated the mid and the high tone through F0 in all three contexts, while the female speaker merged the mid and the high tone. For both speakers, the low tone was consistently lower than the mid or the high tone in a statistically significant way. It is not quite clear what the reason behind this difference between the two speakers in the realization of the mid versus the high tone is, but to evaluate the phonological basis of the mid versus high tone distinction produced by the male speaker, a follow-up perception study was conducted, discussed in the next section §3.5.4.5. 3.5.4.5. Production-Perception Mismatch A perception study to investigate the phonological basis of the differential realizations of the mid versus high tones of two native Karbi speakers (§3.5.4.4) is described in Konnerth and Teo (in press). It turns out that the statistically significant F0 differentiation between the mid and the high tone produced by the male speaker did not help listeners correctly identify the target member of tone minimal sets. Both the female and the male speaker’s stimuli of mid and high tone members of tone minimal sets elicited error rates of 50% or higher in the case of stems either with the suffix - ‘IRR2’ or with the suffix - ‘IRR1’.53 Since listeners essentially guessed the target stem at chance level, there is an interesting mismatch between production and perception in the case of the male speaker: Although he produced a statistically significant F0 difference between the mid and the high tone in these two contexts, listeners were not able to pick up on it. Strikingly, the male speaker himself participated in the perception study and listening to his own stimuli, he still had an error rate of 20% for stems with the suffix - ‘IRR2’ and an error rate of 50% for stems with the suffix - ‘IRR1’. These results of the acoustic and follow-up perception study underscore the low functional load of tone in Karbi. 53 Listeners could listen to the stimuli as much as they wanted. The stimuli were the target item once in isolation and three times in the carrier phrase Neli ___ pusi kepu. ‘I said ___’. 81 3.5.4.6. Prosodic Tone Changes and Indeterminability There are at least two types of instances in the corpus of recorded texts where a morpheme that we know to have a particular tone in a pragmatically unmarked context occurs with a different tone in a particular pragmatic or prosodic context. This is different from morphophonemic tone changes, discussed in §3.9.1, which are explained purely by the morphological environment of a tonal morpheme without reference to prosody. In (4), ‘how’ in kopuloma is originally low tone, as indicated in the morpheme line. However, in the emphatic context in this example (i.e., with a sense of ‘how only’, as the speaker is desperate) is actually produced with a high tone, as indicated in the word line.54 This prosodic tone change is even more striking considering that with the high tone exists separately and means ‘where’.55 (4) Prosodic tone category change ‘how’ mh bojarta loma chetongji? mh boj r t o =lo=ma chet ng-j INTERJ market( nangthemuchot nke e-j n nang t t-phl t nang=th -m ch t and.then one-CLF:animal CIS=exit-suddenly.big.A/O CIS=be.big-COMPAR ‘and then, one (tiger) came out (of the jungle or some area in the Rongker ground) and he was bigger (than expected and than the previous one)’ [HK, TR 172] (23) Superlative - on t ‘be big’ akethenei akehoineilo tangh {‘sh!..} vanglo a-ke-th -n i akeh i-n i-l t ngh {‘sh} v ng-l POSS-NMLZ-be.big-SPLT powerful.person-SPLT-RL REP wow! come-RL ‘he was the biggest and the most powerful one (so they say) {wow!}... he came’ [HK, TR 033] Compare this to (24), where the same comparative and superlative suffixes attach to the underived, propotypical (i.e., non-PCT) verbal stems ‘eat’ and ‘dance’. 123 (24) - t ‘eat-COMPAR’ - t ‘dance-COMPAR’ - ‘eat-SPLT’ - ‘dance-SPLT’ [SiT 130827, elicitation] The resulting meaning is ‘eat more’, ‘eat the most’, and ‘dance more’ and ‘dance the most’, i.e., quantification of the action or event (‘dancing more’), or, in a sense, quantification of the object in transitive events (‘eating more’). The comparative and superlative constructions are fully productive among roots that may take ke- ‘nominalizer’, i.e., both PCT roots and prototypical verb roots (see also §6.5.5.1). Grüßner (1978: 107) even provides the example shown in (25), where the superlative - attaches to a classifier marked diminutive by - , in order to get a reading of ‘the smallest [of the given cylindrical items]’. (25) - - - POSS-CLF:cylindrical-DIM-SPLT ‘the smallest (loaf of bread)’ (Grüßner 1978: 107) I was able to confirm the construction in (25) as a productive pattern, but only with classifiers. In order to use this construction with a common noun, a noun phrase as in (26) needs to be formed so the superlative still occurs on a diminutive marked classifier. Using a noun root in this construction such as * - - ‘house-DIM-SPLT’ is unacceptable. (26) - - - house POSS-CLF:container-DIM-SPLT ‘the smallest house’ Lastly, also note that there is another superlative construction, which consists of the suffix - attaching to nominal PCTs, as in (27) (see §5.4.5). (27) - - - 1EXCL:POSS-older.brother POSS-old.one-SPLT ‘my oldest brother’ 124 It turns out then that gradability is not a useful criterion for differentiating a word class of property-concept terms (PCTs) in Karbi. Comparative and especially superlative constructions by no means exclusively take PCT roots. Another construction semantically related to gradability that can be considered in the search for constructions that distinguish between PCT roots and prototypical verb roots is the “V=t V-suffixes” copy verb construction (see §12.2.3.2). It has an intensifying function, which may be more prototypically related to property-concept terms rather than actions or events. However, (28) and (29) show that not only PCT roots like ‘be good’, but also prototypical verb roots like ‘reach’ participate in this construction. (28) “V=t V-suffixes” construction with PCT root ‘be.good’ “ ang vangchitlo! meta melo” pu tangho (both laughing) [n ng v ng-ch t-l ] [m t m -l ] pu t ngh you come-just.right-RL be.good=ADD be.good-RL QUOT REP ‘”you came just right, it's very good” (he) said (both laughing)’ [HK, TR 082] (29) “V t V-suffixes” construction with verb root ‘reach’ lasi laso adakke tovarta mesen apot las las a-d k ke tov r t m -s n ap t therefore this POSS-road.inbetween=TOP road=ADD be.good-INTENS because leta ledappranglo Bokolia'an l t l -d r ng-l Bokoli - n reach=ADD reach-early-RL PN-till ‘so for this stretch, the road was good, and so we reached Bokolia early’ [SH, CSM 012] Lastly, the most promising candidate among morphosyntactic constructions with the potential to uniquely identify PCT roots as a distinct word class is a derivational adverb construction. It consists of the main verb stem followed by a modifying root that carries the causative prefix pe- (§8.3.2). An example is (30), where t k ‘pound’ is modified by pe- ‘CAUS-be.good’ to mean ‘pound well’. (30) Derivational adverb construction lapente menthuta ekdom langpong tok peme lap nte menth t kd m langp ng [t k e-m after.this dried.fish=ADD EXCM(' [SiT, HF 034] (37) Pre-head PCT-based modifier ‘be poor’ halata kidukthektik amonitlo h la t [ke-d -the t a-mon t-l ] that=ADD:also NMLZ-be.poor-as.much.V.as.it.can.be POSS-man-RL ‘that one also is an unimaginably poor man’ [HK, TR 128] (38) Possibly post-head relative clause nangso kithike enutnat, nesoke [[nang-os ke-th ke] e-n t-n t] [ne-os ke 2:POSS-child NMLZ-die=TOP one-CLF:HUM:SG-only 1EXCL:POSS-child=TOP bangthrok phosi kithi. [b ng-thr k ph si] ke-th ] CLF:HUM:PL-six five=FOC NMLZ-die ‘only one child of yours has died, but of mine, so many (lit. five, six) have died' [RBT, ChM 043] 4.2.5. Summary: Basic Property-Concept Terms (PCTs) To summarize the discussion above, consider Table 58, which is based on Table 55 above, but has added columns that show the participation of prototypical verb roots and PCT roots in each construction. Table 58. Possible mor hosyntactic criteria for ‘adjectives’ Possible adjective class criteria Prototypical Verbs PCTs May take - - t ‘comparative’ YES YES May take - i ‘superlative’ YES YES “V t V-inflection” intensifier construction YES YES “V a-V” adverb construction NO SOME Possible verbhood criteria May take aspectual and modal suffixes (May function as the predicate of a clause) YES YES May take an imperative / hortative suffix YES Mostly NO Noun modification May modify nouns (ke- ‘NMLZ’ required) YES, pre-head or post-/internal-head YES, post-head or pre-head 129 Printed in bold in this table are those three constructions that do show a difference between prototypical verb roots and PCT roots, whereas all the other constructions do not. Out of the three constructions, there is not a single one that shows the kind of clear evidence that one would comfortably use to argue in favor of a really distinct adjective class. I conclude that ‘adjectives’, or basic PCT roots, are a subclass of verbs in Karbi. 4.2.6. Marginal Types of Property-Concept Term (PCT) Constructions The majority of PCTs share the properties laid out in the previous sections and summarized in §4.2.5. But there are a few other, marginal types of PCT constructions that occur in the corpus and should be mentioned. Compared to the properties shared by basic PCTs, these PCT constructions appear not to be productive: there are very small sets of items that can occur in these constructions. They are listed in Table 59, which also references relevant examples given below. Note that most of these PCTs have semantics related to SIZE, which is one of the core semantic categories of ‘adjectives’ according to Dixon (1977). Table 59. Marginal types of property-concept term constructions Form Gloss Pre- or Post-head Example Nominal, non- reduplicated ‘old one’ ‘second-born one’ post-head post-head (39),(41) (40),(41) Nominal, reduplicated achitchit ajerjer ‘tiny’ ‘small’ pre-head post-head (42) (43) PCT.root-p derived t - t - - ‘big-MODIF’72 ‘big-AUGMENT’ ‘long-MODIF’ post-head post-head post-head (44) (45) (46) Borrowed ‘very good’ ‘very big’ post-head pre-head post-head pre-head (47) (48) (49) (45),(46) Other ng ‘a lot’ post-head (50) 72 The ‘modifier’ suffix - appears to derive modifiers from PCT roots, but it is not synchronically productive. 130 (39) as nominal modifier nangong akleng ahemke nangong [nang- ng a-kl ng a-h m ke] [nang- ng 2:POSS-maternal.uncle POSS-old.one POSS-house=TOP 2:POSS-maternal.uncle ahemripo ahemke la'an abang a-h m'r -p a-h m ke] la- n ab ng POSS-oldest.son-male POSS-house=TOP this-that.much NPDL ki'ikrintile putangho ke- k-rint le p -t ngh NMLZ-be.black-equally:PL:S/A=FOC:IRR QUOT-REP 'the family of your older maternal uncle, the family of your uncle who is the eldest son of the family, all of them are so black (so you shouldn't get your wife from them)' [WR, BCS 014] (40) as nominal modifier Ke'et abang aphanlo... nangong adakvam ke- t ab ng a-ph n lo] [nang- ng ada v m NMLZ-be.yellow NPDL POSS-NSUBJ=FOC 2:POSS-maternal.uncle second.born ahemsi kene asopi arje a-h m si] ken [a-oso-p arj POSS-house=LOC HESIT POSS-child-female appearance kemerintihe po nang hadak Bey ke-m -rint he] [p n ng h d k B y NMLZ-be.good-equally:PL:S/A=you.know father you there CLAN Ki'ik ahemsi nang piso hangdamrong ke- k a-h m si n ng p s h ng-d m-r ng] NMLZ-be.black POSS-house=LOC 2 wife call-GO-instead ‘it's to your second-born (maternal uncle), you know, to Bey the Fair (that you should go and ask for a wife), at your second-born maternal uncle's house, his daughters are all equally beautiful, you know, father, you went there to the house of Bey the Black to ask for a wife instead’ [WR, BCS 013] (41) and as nouns Bey atum korte bangkethom do; aklengsi abangke [B y a-t m kort b ng-keth m d ] a- l ng-s ab ng=ke CLAN POSS-PL brother CLF:HUM:PL-three exist POSS-old.one-SPLT NPDL=TOP Bey Ki'ik, adakvam abangke Bey Ke'et, B y ke- k] [adakv m ab ng ke B y ke- t CLAN NMLZ-be.black second.child NPDL=TOP CLAN NMLZ-be.yellow 131 akibi abangke Bey Ronghang [a-ke-b ab ng ke B y Rongh ng] POSS-NMLZ-be.small NPDL=TOP CLAN CLAN 'there were three Bey brothers, the oldest one was Bey the Black, the second one was Bey the Fair, and the small one was Bey Ronghang' [WR, BCS 002] (42) Achitchit preceding its head penke damsi isi aporke Kohima rongsopi lelo... laso p n=ke d m-si is a-p r ke K h m r ngs p l -l las and.then=TOP go-NF:RL one POSS-time=TOP PLACE town reach-RL this adak isi hini achitchit arong kephopon do a-d k is hin ach tch t a-r ng ke-ph -p n d POSS-road.inbetween one two tiny POSS-village NMLZ-reach-in.passing exist ‘and then we went and at one o'clock, we reached Kohim Town..., one the road inbetween / up to there, there were one or two tiny villages that we had crossed [SiT, HF 017] (43) Ajerjer following its head noun atema ajerjer do mati ho [a-tem ajerj r] d mat h POSS-tobacco.container( kevang apot a-ke-hel =pen ke-v ng ap t POSS-NMLZ-be.far=from nang= NMLZ-come because ‘[…] since she has come from far away […]' [SH, CSM 048] 4.4. Noun Subclasses Second after proper nouns, the largest word class that we can consider a subclass of nouns are classifiers, which are discussed in §4.4.1. In turn, classifiers create subclasses of nouns by virtue of being classifiers. Some nouns are not enumerated in a classifier constructions, however, but instead are directly modified by numerals; information on this is found in §4.4.2. Section §4.4.3 briefly discusses how nouns with human/personified referents are treated differently from nouns with non-human/non- personified referents in Karbi grammar. Section §4.4.4 is about relator nouns, i.e., those words that function the same way adpositions do in other languages. In §4.4.5, the subclass of those nouns that need to carry a possessive prefix is investigated, including body part and kinship terms. Note that relator nouns as well as body part and kinship terms all need to be considered bound roots since they require a possessive prefix in order 135 to occur in an utterance. Nevertheless, the completely different clausal function of relator nouns compared to body part and kinship terms advocates fo their discussion in separate sections. Lastly, §4.4.6 offers a brief discussion of frozen nominal prefixes given by Grüßner (1978). 4.4.1. Classifiers Numerals typically require classifiers in order to form a classifier-numeral word that can then be used in noun modification (for an exception to this general principle, see §4.4.2 and §7.7.2.1.4 for the ‘non-classifier’ or ‘direct enumeration’ construction). Classifiers can be categorized into groups depending on which of three different constructions they occur in: a) the typical classifier construction (see §7.7.2.1.1); b) the self-referential classifier construction (see §7.7.2.1.2); and c) the ‘not fully grammaticalized’ construction (see §7.7.2.1.3). In addition, in the case of typical classifiers and not fully grammaticalized classifiers, we can distinguish whether classifiers are ‘true’, i.e., sortal classifiers, or mensural classifiers; this distinction does not occur within the class of self-referential classifiers, as they classify themselves. The five different types of classifiers that emerge from this categorization are shown in Table 60. Table 60. Classifier types SORTAL MENSURAL Typical classifiers Typical classifiers Not fully grammaticalized classifiers Not fully grammaticalized classifiers Self-referential classifiers In the sections that follow, §4.4.1.1 gives an overview of sortal classifiers (including ‘typical’ and ‘not fully grammaticalized’ ones), §4.4.1.2 an overview of mensural classifiers (likewise including ‘typical’ and ‘not fully grammaticalized’ ones), and §4.4.1.3 lists self-referential classifiers. Classifiers represent a subclass of nouns in that they may take the possessive/modified a- prefix (§4.1.1). In (53), the speaker uses the classifier - for round objects to refer to a ‘tube-shaped’ object, here specifically the top tube of a bicycle. 136 In this example, the classifier functions just like a noun, evidenced not only by prefixing a- ‘possessive’, but also by being modified by ‘iron’, and occurring in the relator noun construction with - ‘LOC’. (53) Classifier for round objects - m functioning as a head noun ‘tube’ lapenke hala kangni adim along ingnithekthesi lap n ke [h la ke-ingn a-d m a-l ng] ingn -th k-C -si and.then=TOP that NMLZ-sit POSS-place POSS-LOC sit-see-NEG-NF:RL si ingchin apum along ingnisi... saikel s [[ingch n a- m] a-l ng] ingn -si... saik l therefore iron POSS-CLF:round POSS-LOC sit-NF:RL bicycle( miso-rongpo atum korte banghini mis -rong a-t m] [kort b ng-hin ] ant.sp POSS-PL brother CLF:HUM:PL-two ‘there were two , ant brothers’ [RBT, ChM 008] The lines in (63) and (64) give the context for the use of the animal classifier to refer to a human in (65). In this folk story, tigers celebrate the same ceremony as humans/Karbis, which requires sacrificing chickens and/or goats, as explained in (63) (which represents an utterance not by the primary storyteller but by a native Karbi speaking listener, as indicated by the curly brackets). 145 (63) Context for (65) {la monitsi kenangpo he, halatum aphanke, l mon t si ke-n ng-p he h la-tum aph n ke this man=FOC NMLZ-need-IRR1 AFTERTHOUGHT that-PL NSUBJ=TOP halatum aphanke bi vosi ketheklo} h la-t m aph n ke b v si ke-th k-l that-PL NSUBJ=TOP goat chicken=FOC NMLZ-see-RL ‘{ […] they will need human beings, right? They consider them goats and chickens (i.e. what is sacrificed)}’ [HK, TR 042] The line in (64) immediately precedes (65) and mentions the ‘village head tiger’ (where the use of this terminology further underscores the personification), who collects the humans that are caught by the other tiger as sacrifice for the ceremony. (64) Context for (65) huladak ateke akangbura ahemsi h lad k a-tek a-kangbur a-h m si there POSS-tiger POSS-village.head.man( temporal > causal’ are -i , - , and - , of which at least the latter two have corresponding lexical nouns with locational semantics that undoubtedly represent their origins. What may be the lexical source of the relator noun, or anyway a related lexical/grammatical item is provided where known. Some of the relator nouns given here are recorded with different tones by Grüßner (1978), which is mentioned in footnotes. Table 66. Relator nouns Semantic domain Form Gloss Lexical source or related item Gloss Locational -t ‘on.top’ -i ‘high.up’ -i ‘in.front’ ‘front’ - ‘below’ - ~ - 93 ‘at.side.of’ - - 94 ‘sideways’ - - 95 ‘near’ - ‘at.bottom.of’ -a ‘inside’ - t t 96 ‘towards’ -i 97 ‘towards’ (general direction)98 - ‘amidst’ - ‘road.inbetween’ Locational/ -i ‘in.middle.of’99 93 Grüßner (1978: 77) reports this item with high tone as y. 94 A text example of this suffix is in the verb - - - ‘RR-see-sideways-RL’ meaning ‘looked sideways’ (HK, TR 053). 95 Grüßner (1978: 77) reports this item with high tone as . 96 Grüßner (1978: 77) reports this item with high tone on -t . 97 Grüßner (1978: 77) reports this item with low tone as . 98 Grüßner (1978: 77) reports the meaning ‘opposite from’ for . I have put “general direction” in brackets to indicate that this item has a more general sense than the more specific t t ). 99 The difference in meaning between ‘in.middle.of’ and ‘amidst’ is that locates a person or thing right in the middle or center of something, whereas more generally locates a person or thing within a defined area. 151 Temporal - ‘before’ - ‘front’ - ‘after’ - ‘backside’ Temporal100 - t ‘during’ Causal - t ‘because’ - - Other101 - ‘LOC’ ng ‘classifier:place’ - ‘for; NSUBJ; GOAL’ - t ~ - t ‘with( kosonma angno [[an ng a-n t pen] ke-thekl ng kos n ma] [[angn back POSS-direction=from NMLZ-see Q how=Q in.front anatpen ketheklong kosonma a-n t pen] ke-thekl ng kos n ma] POSS-direction=from NMLZ-see how=Q ‘from the backside, how (the houses) look, from the front, how they look, (we went to see) […]’ [SiT, HF 048] 100 Grüßner (1978: 77) also lists ‘as long as, until’ as a relator noun. Since this marker only occurs as a subordinator in the corpus, I discuss it in §4.4.4.7.1. 101 Grüßner (1978: 77) also records the Assamese loan ab ‘against, opposed to’ as a relator noun. This form does not occur in the present corpus. 152 Finally, a frequent use of relator nouns in discourse is that of discourse connectors at the beginning of an intonation unit. This construction involves an anaphoric use of the proximal or distal demonstrative followed by a relator noun, as in (75) and (76). (75) RN discourse connector construction with - t ‘during’ halaso ahut documentaryta paklangbom nelitum langdamlonglo h las ah t documentary t pa-kl ng-b m ne-li-t m l ng-d m-l ng-l that during doc.=ADD:also CAUS-appear-CONT 1EXCL-HON-PL see-GO-GET-RL ‘they also were showing a documentary at that time, and we got to go and see it [SiT, HF 057] (76) RN discourse connector construction with - ‘after’ laso aphi laso aHingchong musoso hala habit las a h las a-Hingch ng musos h la hab t this after this POSS-CONSTELLATION 2.siblings.of.diff.gender that jungle kethondamti ahut mok ingchirlo ke-th n-d m-t ah t m k ingch r-l NMLZ-drop-go-get.rid.off during breast be.hungry-RL ‘after that, the Hingchong sisters, as they were dropped in that jungle, they were hungry’ [CST, HM 025] 4.4.4.1. General Relator Noun - ‘locative’ The general relator noun - ‘LOC’ is the most frequent relator noun in the corpus, due to its bleached semantic content. It can be used instead of a relator noun with a more specific semantic content. Examples below show the functional range covered by - ‘LOC’. First, (77) shows two instances of - ‘LOC’ in its locative function. (77) Relator noun - with basic locative function richoke ha pharla alongsi [rich ke h harl a-l ng si king=TOP over.there outside.part.Karbi.house POSS-LOC=FOC pohui moidai along doji oh i m id i a-l ng d -j pillow backrest POSS-LOC exist-IRR2 '"[…] the king will be over there in his pharla, on his comfortable bed, […]"' [CST, HM 044] 153 Examples of other locational uses of - are given below. In (78), - has an allative function of ‘motion towards’ a place, or location of a person or entity. In (79), - indicates a relationship where one item is attached to another item. Example (80) shows that - may be used even when there is a more specific relator noun that describes a spatial configuration, in this case , which specifically means ‘in’. (78) Relator noun - with allative function voarbipi along richo atum damlilo v arb a-l ng [rich a-t m] d m-l -l bird.sp POSS-LOC king POSS-PL go-again-RL 'the people of the king again went to the Voarbipi bird' [RBT, ChM 038] (79) Relator noun - marking attachment anke laso athongkup along lujisi nke las a-thong a-l ng luj si and.then this POSS-tobacco.container POSS-LOC mirror=FOC kapabon ke-pa-b n NMLZ-CAUS-be.attached ‘and then, on this tobacco container, there was a mirror attached’ [HK, TR 026] (80) Relator noun - meaning ‘in’ anke hala jamborong alongke.... dak laso aduma nke [h la jambor ng a-l ng e....] d k las a-dum and.then that bag POSS-LOC=TOP here this POSS-tobacco thongkup dolo {dolo} thongk p d -l d -l tobacco.container exist-RL exist-RL ‘and then, in this bag...., here he had this tobacco container’ [HK, TR 073] In (81), the metaphorical use of - is shown, as the context here is ‘working for a particular project’. Furthermore, (82) shows that for certain verbs, such as ‘follow’, - marks the object, i.e., the person being followed. (81) Relator noun - meaning ‘for’ Hydro-Electric-Project alongsi kam klem'ikbom [Hydro-Electric-Project a-l ng si] k m kl m- k-b m NAME POSS-LOC=FOC work do-FRML-CONT ‘I work for the Hydro-Electric Project’ [KaR, SWK 010] 154 (82) Relator noun - marking O argument of ‘follow’ apiso along chidunkri […] a- is a-l ng] chV-d n-kr POSS-wife POSS-LOC RR-follow-follow.closely ‘he followed his wife closely […]’ [KK, BMS 082] Finally, there are instances where - heads clauses and with the frozen a- prefix functions as a subordinator. In (83), - functions as the head noun of the locative relative clause ‘where the birds don’t chirp’. In (84) and (85), a marks subordinate clauses that indicate simultaneity in (84) and perhaps causality in (85) (where the elaborate expression ‘rule, be in charge of’ occurs in a parallelism construction, see §12.1.1). (83) Relator noun - functioning as locative relative clause head noun […] hi'ipi abangke etum aphan ha votek ingrengre [h 'ip ab ng ke] [e-t m aphan] h v t ingr ng- witch NPDL=TOP 1PL.INCL-PL NSUBJ over.there wild.bird call(small.animals)-NEG voso ingrengre along ekethondamti v s ingr ng- a-l ng e=ke-th n-d m-t EE:v t k call(small.animals)-NEG POSS-LOC 1PL.INCL=NMLZ-drop-GO-get.rid.off ‘[…] that witch went and left us over there where the birds don't chirp' [CST, HM 062] (84) Relator noun with subordinating function ingparke bhari arleng dingpo karlu alongke, ingp r ke bhar arl ng d ng- ke-arl al ng e besides=TOP very.big( arlosomar atum arpu ko'an do? rlos -m r a-t m arp ko' n d women-PL POSS-PL woman-PL POSS-PL responsibility how.much exist 'so with running a family and being in charge, how much responsibility do women have?' [KaR, SWK 026] 4.4.4.2. Locational Relator Nouns Examples of locational relator nouns are given below in (86) - (94). They are given in the order of Table 66 as repeated in Table 67 for easier reference. Table 67. Overview of locational relator nouns Form Gloss -t ‘on.top’ -i ‘high.up’ -i ‘in.front’ - ‘below’ - - ‘at.side.of’ - - ‘near’ - ‘at.bottom.of’ -a ‘inside’ - t t ‘towards’ -i ‘towards’ (general direction) - ‘amidst’ - ‘road.inbetween’ (86) Relator noun -t ‘on.top’ ok an hor setame longle athaksi pichomchomlo [ k n h r set m ]] longl a-th si p -ch m~ch m-l ] meat rice liquor nevertheless earth POSS-on.top=FOC give-a.little~DIST.PL-RL ‘[…] they gave him a little bit of meat and rice and liquor each, on the ground' [KK, BMS 055] (87) Relator noun -i ‘high.up’ ha thengpi angsongsi dolo banghinita {mm} h theng a-ings ng si d -l b ng-hin t mm over.there tree/wood POSS-high.up=FOC exist-RL CLF:HUM:PL-two=ADD:EXH AFF ‘high up there in the tree they are, both of them’ [HK, TR 152] 156 (88) Relator noun -i ‘in.front’ korte banghini angno nangklolo ort b ng-hin thesere kelik amonit adung'an nanglelo [las theser ke-l k a-mon t] a-d ng- n nang=l -l this this fruits NMLZ-pluck POSS-man POSS-near-up.to CIS=reach-RL ‘near to this fruit picking man he reached’ [SiT, PS 010] (93) Relator noun - ‘at.bottom.of’ ha Hajong aling abojar pulo tangho [h [[ aj ng a-l ng] a-boj r] p -l t ngh ] over.there(] pathite h [[n mp n md r] a-j <=pen>] pa-th -t over.there( CAUS-die-if pathikhangjanganang pu amat [pa-th -khangj ng-lon ng pu am t] CAUS-die-do.irreversibly-HORT:EMPH QUOT and.then ‘”[…] in the middle of the jungle, if this causes them to die, then let it happen”’ [CST, RO 049] (97) - ‘road.inbetween’ bonseta Dobokapen Hojai adak b nset [[[ obo en oj i] a-d ] but PN=from PN PN POSS-road.inbetween abangke tovar henopik ab ng ke] tov r hen -p k NPDL=TOP road bad-very ‘but between Doboka and Hojai the road is very bad’ [SH, CSM 017] Note that there is no example of ‘towards’. 102 Note that when a- ‘possessive, modified’ attaches to disyllabic roots that start in ar-, one of the two /a/ vowels that end up occurring in a row is often deleted, especially in grammaticalized constructions such as the relator noun construction (see §3.9.2.1). 158 4.4.4.3. Locational/Temporal Relator Nouns Relator nouns that encode both locational and temporal concepts most likely originate in locational lexical nouns. As part of a typical shift from locational to temporal concepts, they end up encoding temporal relations as well. Table 68 lists three locational/temporal relator nouns. Below examples are given that show the locational use of ‘amidst’ in (98) and its temporal use in (99). Table 68. Locational/temporal relator nouns Form Gloss -i ‘in.middle.of’ - ng ‘before’ - ‘after’ (98) Locational use of -i ‘amidst’ amatsi etum aphanke dak habit angbongsi am tsi e-t m aph n ke d k [hab t a-ingb ng si] and.then 1PL:INCL-PL NSUBJ=TOP here jungle POSS-in.middle.of=FOC nangkethonti nang=ke-th n-t CIS=NMLZ-drop-get.rid.off 'and then, she took us here in the middle of the jungle and abandoned us [CST, HM 052]' (99) Temporal use of -i ‘amidst’ lasi dak hopta isi hini angbong dolo […] [las d k ho t is hin a-ingb ng d -l ] therefore here week( kosonma angno [[a-n ng a-n t pen] ke-thekl ng kos n ma] [[a-ngn POSS-back POSS-direction=from NMLZ-see Q how=Q POSS-in.front anatpen ketheklong kosonma a-n t pen] ke-thekl ng kos n ma] POSS-direction=from NMLZ-see how=Q ‘from the backside, how (the houses) look, from the front, how they look, (we went to see) […]’ [SiT, HF 048] 4.4.4.4. Temporal Relator Nouns So far only one relator noun is attested that is used to express a temporal relationship without also expressing location: - t ‘during’. An example is given below. Note that other temporal relator nouns have further grammaticalized to subordinators (see §4.4.4.7.1 and §9.5.2). (103) Relator noun - t ‘during’ hako adin ahut so'arlosomar [hak a-d n a-h t] [s 'arlos -m r POSS-first that.time POSS-day( la inglong arlok apot l [[ingl ng arl ] a- t] stone this hill foot.of.hill POSS-because ‘and then, as we go we have to suffer a lot because of all the up and down’ [SH, CSM 023] (105) Relator noun - ‘reason’ laso akenemphru ajoinesi han [las a-ke-nempr a-join si h n this POSS-NMLZ-have.sweet.smell POSS-reason=FOC:RL prepared.vegetables akechome […] a-ke-ch -m ] POSS-NMLZ-eat-GOOD ‘this fragrant smell is the reason why the curry is tasty […]’ [SiH, KH 015] 161 4.4.4.6. Relator Nouns with Other Functions Relator nouns that express functions other than locational, temporal, and causal notions are given in Table 69. Table 69. Relator nouns with other functions Form Gloss - ‘LOC’ - ‘for; NSUBJ; PURP’ - t - t ‘along.with( longle [las ke-th p aphr ng aphr ng] [longl this NMLZ-put.inside before before this earth keklo alongpen humsi, laso aketer ke-kl al ng pen] h m-si] [las a-ke-t r NMLZ-fall LOC=from pick.up-NF:RL this POSS-NMLZ-be.dirty athesere longle kero'anke halaso apepensi venlo a-theser longl ke-r - n=ke h las a-p pen si v n-l POSS-fruits this earth NMLZ-hit-all=TOP that POSS-cloth=with=FOC wipe-RL 'just before putting (them) into (the basket), he picks them up from having fallen onto the ground, and these dirty fruits, all the ones that were dirty with (had hit the) earth, with this cloth, he wiped them’ [SiT, PS 008] (112) Subordinator t ‘while’ (grammaticalized from relator noun) elitum hako pirthe kangduk ahut inglong kedo [e-li-t m [[hak pirth ke-ingd k] ah t [[ingl ng ke-d ] 1PL.INCL-HON-PL that.time world NMLZ-immature during hill NMLZ-stay ahutke sabun tangho kopine tangho la konane ah t e [sab n t ngh kop -n t ngh l kon t-n during=TOP soap( pe akelokpen keroi isi ajamborong [[p a-ke-l k pen ke-r i is a-jambor ng cloth POSS-NMLZ-be.white=with NMLZ-sew one POSS-bag arlosi lahai kethap lapen arum kevan arl si] [lah i] ke-th p]] lap n [ar m ke-v n]] inside=FOC these NMLZ-put.inside and down NMLZ-bring 'he's placed himself a ladder... and then, the man, into one bag sown from white cloth he puts these (fruits), and then brings them down [SiT, PS 003] 165 4.4.5. Bound Noun Roots Body part and kinship terms, and inalienably possessed nouns have in common that they are bound noun roots, i.e., they do not (typically) occur without a possessive prefix (but see below for an exception). This may be either the general possessive/modified prefix a- (§5.3.1) or one of the personal possessive prefixes (§4.5.1). 4.4.5.1. Body Part Terms A lot of body part terms are monosyllabic and have clear Tibeto-Burman origins, e.g., - ‘eye’, - ‘ear’, - ‘tongue’, - ‘tooth’, - ‘hand, arm’, - ‘foot’. Some, however, are disyllabic, such as - ‘face’ and -nokan ‘nose’. A subset is disyllabic and has the ing- prefix (see §4.7.1), for example, -i ’ ‘cheek’, -i ‘mouth’, - ‘lungs’, and -i ‘beard’. 4.4.5.2. Kinship Terms Comprehensive lists of kinship terminology are provided by Grüßner (1978: 73 ff.), who reports a total of 70 different forms including forms of reference and forms of address (some of which are, however, formed via productive suffixes such as - ‘female’ and - ‘masculine’), as well as by Phangcho (2012), who reports 34 different forms. Besides the fact that kinship terms are bound roots (or stems) that generally require a possessive prefix (but see below), one other morphological characteristic is that certain kinship terms may take the suffix - - i for more formal address and reference (§12.4.3). Note that kinship terms actually do not always have to carry a possessive prefix. Evidence is provided in (116), where ‘wife’ occurs in a non-referential, idiomatic construction: ’ ‘to get married (lit. take a wife)’, where a- is not used. (116) ‘wife’ without possessive prefix anke latum thelo dinglo piso some enlo tangho nke [la-t m th -l d ng-l ] [[ s s m ] n-l ] t ngh and.then this-PL be.big-RL be.long-RL wife EE:p s take-RL REP 'and then, they grew up and they got married, so they say' [WR, BCS 003] 166 4.4.5.3. Other Inalienably Possessed Items In addition to relator nouns, and body part and kinship terms, a few other nouns obligatorily have a possessive prefix. Among these are ‘border, mark’, ‘circumference’, p ‘foam’, t ‘unbroken rice’, t ‘hole (inhabited by an animal such as a rat)’, ‘sombody’s turn (in a particular procedural order)’, ‘number’, ‘a little bit’. This presumably has to do with these nouns only ever being used in a relational sense, i.e., as they relate to another concept. 4.4.6. Other Possible Noun Classes with Frozen Prefixes (Grüßner 1978: 44-6) Grüßner (1978: 44-6) has sorted disyllabic lexical roots by shared first syllables. The two by far most frequent ones, ing- and ar-, are discussed below (§4.7). In addition to those two, Grüßner also offers lists of only disyllabic nouns (i.e., no verbs) that share the first syllable kar- (seven roots in total), those that share ke- as their first syllable (seven roots in total), those that share che- as their first syllable (fifteen roots in total), and those that share me- or ma- as their first syllable (five roots in total). Grüßner suggests that the respective first syllables are frozen prefixes, whose meaning, however, is no longer recoverable. In addition to these ‘frozen prefixes’ that according to Grüßner only occur with nouns, there are other ones that occur with both nominal and verbal disyllabic roots (see §4.7.3). 4.4.7. Collective Noun Roots There are collective noun roots that indicate reference to a general group of people, such as ’ ‘the women’ (compare ‘woman, girl’) and ‘the men’ (compare to ‘married man’). 4.5. Pro-Forms The pro-forms listed below have the same distribution as noun phrases. In addition, demonstratives and interrogative pronouns have limited distributional properties of nouns as well (note that nouns may function as noun phrases), but this is not the case for personal pronouns. Evidence for this difference comes from the possessive/ 167 modification construction, in which both demonstratives and interrogative pronouns may function as pre-head modifiers with the head marked a- ‘possessive’ (and therefore behave like other nouns), while personal pronouns have their own possessive prefixes, thus functioning differently from nouns. 4.5.1. Personal Pronouns and Personal Possessive Prefixes Table 70 shows the forms of personal pronouns. Karbi distinguishes between first person exclusive and inclusive. The inclusive form requires pluralization via t (see below) for use as an independent pronoun, but not for use as a possessive prefix. The exclusive form is the same as the first person singular form, suggesting a shared origin.103 For honorific forms (see §12.4.1) - is added. Possessive forms are prefixes, which do not have a tonal specification. Honorific possessive prefixes have the same - , but are probably best analyzed as disyllabic prefixes rather than a sequence of two prefixes, which would require us to posit the existence of both a suffix - and a prefix li- in the Karbi lexicon, when it is clearly the same affix. Table 70. Personal pronouns and personal possessive prefixes Personal pronoun (honorific) Gloss Possessive prefixes (honorific) n ‘1EXCL’ ne(li)- e(li)-t (only plural) ‘1INCL’ e(li)- ‘2’ nang(li)- ‘3’ [alang(li)- ; a-] Note that the third person possessive has alang(li)- and a- both in square brackets. This is meant to indicate that there is not actually a dedicated productive third person possessive prefix in Karbi. Sometimes, alang(li)- is used as a third person possessive prefix, for example Alanglimen Basapi. ‘Her name is Basapi.’ (with ‘name’). However, it is not generally used, and instead the a- ‘possessive / modified’ prefix is used, which receives a third person possessive interpretation from context (and is, in fact reconstructible to a Proto-Tibeto-Burman third person possessive *a- prefix, see §5.3.1). For example, consider the possessive clause construction in (117). The possessive clause 103 In the texts of this corpus, and ne- are always glossed as ‘1EXCL’ even if the context makes it clear that there is a singular rather than a plural reference. 168 construction requires a possessor, a possessed item, and the existential copula (see §4.6.2.1.1). In (117), only the general possessive prefix a- is acceptable to index the third person possessor ’ on the possessed item osomar ‘children’. (117) Possessive clause construction showing third person possessive marked by a- [n - k ] - - - t 1EXCL:POSS-older.brother old.one POSS-child-PL CLF:HUM:PL-three exist ‘my older older brother has three children’ [elicited SiT 090220] Plural forms of personal pronouns involve the (bound) plural noun -t (see §7.6).104 Table 71 gives the example of the first person exclusive independent pronoun and its possessive prefix counterpart ne- in honorific, plural, and other possessive constructions. Table 71. Morphological structure of independent pronouns and pronominal possessive prefixes [Pron. (HON) (PL / N)] [a-N] Gloss Translation ‘1.EXCL’ ‘I’ - ‘1.EXCL-HON’ ‘I’ (honorific) ne-li- t ‘1.EXCL-HON-PL’ ‘we’ (honorific, exclusive) [ne-li- t ] [ - ] [‘1.EXCL-HON-PL’] [POSS-house] ‘our house’ (honorific, exclusive) ne- ‘1.EXCL-house’ ‘my house’ ne-li- ‘1.EXCL-HON-house’ ‘my house (honorific)’ What is true about (possessive) pronouns directly attaching to the plural noun -t is also true about other grammatical categories marked by nouns in possessive constructions, such as the ‘differential primary object’ marker -p (§10.6.2) and the locative -l (§10.6.3). Here, third person pronoun forms involve either - or the demonstratives, onto which the grammatical markers attach directly, as in -t , alangli-ph , or -t and - for the proximate and distal . 104 It is impossible to tease apart whether the plural pronoun forms should be phonologically analyzed as a prefixal or compound construction since all of the pronouns are low tone. Thus, both the phonological compound interpretation leads to a low-mid tone pattern, e.g., on -t , as does the prefix interpretation where the toneless prefix ne- would be realized with a low tone before a mid tone syllable (see §3.5.6). 169 4.5.2. Reflexive/Reciprocal Pronouns Reflexive pronouns are formed by adding personal possessive prefixes to the reflexive nouns - t or, less commonly, -m ‘self’. Commonly, in clauses that have a reflexive pronoun, the verb is marked reflexive/reciprocal by che- (§6.4.3). Co-reference between the subject and the (reflexive) possessor of another (oblique) clause participant is illustrated in (118) and (119). (118) Co-reference between subject and possessor of clause participant […] nut chotiki chonghoi amonit amethang [[e-n t cho-tik cho-ingh i] a-mon t i a-meth ng i one-CLF:HUM:SG AUTO.BEN-cultivate AUTO.BEN-do POSS-man POSS-self abiri arlopen eson thesere] kelik a-bir ] arl pen] e-s n theser ke-l k POSS-garden inside=from one-CLF:thing POSS-fruit fruits IPFV-pluck ‘[…] [one farmer]i from (inside) hisi (own) garden is picking a kind of fruit’ [SiT, PS 002] (119) Co-reference between subject and possessor of clause participant latum bangkethomke amethang atovar chedamlo, l -t m b ng- eth m e i [[a-meth ng]i [a-tov r]] che-d m-l ] this-PL CLF:HUM:PL -three=TOP POSS-self POSS-road RR-go-RL lapenke saikel ingdoiponbomsi, [lap n ke saik l ingd i-p n-b m-si and.then=TOP bicycle( n o =lo ke-v -p l -ho 1EXCL what=FOC NMLZ-do-IRR1 this-EMPH:INTERACT 'what should I do?' [CST, HM 013] (131) Place interrogative t “konatlo?” pu, “ha longku arlo” on t=lo? pu h longk arl where=FOC QUOT over.there cave inside ‘ “where are they?”, “over there inside the cave” ‘ [CST, HM 111] 176 (132) Reason interrogative […] “Kopisi nang nesopi aphan kipithima?“ o si n ng [ne-oso-p aph n] ke-pV-th ma] why 2 1EXCL:POSS-child-female NSUBJ NMLZ-CAUS-die=Q ‘[…] "for what possible reason did you kill my daughter?", […]' [RBT, ChM 028] (133) Time interrogative t komantupo aRongkerjike {mm} omant -p a-R ngk r-j ke mm when-IRR1 POSS-FESTIVAL-IRR2=TOP AFF ‘when will it be, the Rongker?’ [HK, TR 103] (134) Manner interrogative nesomar pule kosonsi thengpi abeng ne-oso-m r pu=le os n=si thengp a-b ng 1EXCL:POSS-child-PL QUOT=FOC:IRR how=FOC tree/wood POSS-piece nangketetroiroidetlo nang=ke-t t-r i~r i-d t-l CIS=NMLZ-exit-PL.solid.obj~DIST.PL-PFV-RL ‘if they are my children, how did they come out as pieces of wood?’ [CST, HM 023] (135) Amount interrogative ’ si la hemtun isi kaboche along kachari along s l h mt n is [ke-boch al ng] [ke-char al ng] therefore this good.family one NMLZ-create LOC NMLZ-rule LOC arlosomar atum arpu ko'an do? rlos -m r a-t m arp o n d women-PL POSS-PL woman-PL POSS-PL responsibility how.much exist 'so with running a family and being in charge, how much responsibility do women have?' [KaR, SWK 026] Interrogative pronouns and adverbs easily function as noun modifiers, see §7.5.3.1. Further discussion of content questions in the context of other interrogative constructions is presented in §11.1.1.2. 4.5.4.1. Positive Indefinite Construction with - ‘indefinite’ In positive clauses, interrogative pronouns and adverbs occur with - ‘indefinite (INDEF)’ as indefinite pronouns and adverbs: t- ‘somebody, anybody’, - 177 ‘something, anything’, t- ‘somewhere, anywhere’, etc. An example of t- ‘somebody, anybody’ in a positive clause is (136). (136) t- ‘somebody, anybody’ komatneke... la ser kapali'et asonsi [ om t-n e l s r ke-pa-l - t as n si] who-INDEF=TOP this gold NMLZ-CAUS-flow-RES:yellow like=FOC acharpen ketheklong langmepik [[a-ch r=pen ke-thekl ng] [l ng-m -p k]] POSS-far.away=from NMLZ-see see-be.good-very ‘as if somebody had colored it with gold to make it look yellow and shiny, from far away it's very nice to see […]’ [SiT, HF 021] Indefinite - also occurs on clauses as it marks complement clauses that represent indirect questions, see §6.10.4 and §11.2.2.2. Based on that construction, - also marks main clauses in an insubordination construction (§11.4.3). The negative indefinite construction makes use of a different set of pronominal and adverbial forms, see §4.5.6. 4.5.4.2. Interrogative Pronouns in Indirect Questions In complement clauses functioning as indirect questions (§6.10.4 and §11.2.2.2), interrogative pronouns are often marked by -t ‘indirect interrogative pronoun (INDIR.ITROG)’, as in (137). (137) Interrogative pronoun marked with -t ‘INDIR.ITRG’ [ t- - - ] ch - who-INDIR.ITROG NMLZ-come-INDEF 1EXCL know-NEG 'I don't know who came' [SiT 090224] 4.5.4.3. Co-Relative Construction A co-relative construction consists of two clauses with corresponding elements, which in Karbi are an interrogative and a demonstrative pronoun, respectively. Interrogative pronouns carry the question clitic =ma (see §11.1.1.4.1) to participate in the 178 co-relative construction (§9.7.3.1.4), as shown in (138), (139), and (140). In (138), the =ma marked interrogative pronouns functions as a simple relative pronoun, whereas in (139) and (140), it functions as an indefinite or universal relative pronoun, ‘whoever’ and ‘whatever’, respectively. (138) Relative pronoun construction with ko t ‘where’ + =ma la kedambom ahut Patkai-College konatma kedo l ke-d m-b m ah t P tk i-College on t m ke-d this NMLZ-go-CONT during PN where=Q NMLZ-stay lata nangpaklanglo l t nang pa-kl ng-l this=ADD:also 1/2:NSUBJ=CAUS-appear-RL ‘while we were going, they also showed us where Patkai College is [SiT, HF 011] (139) Indefinite relative pronoun construction with ko t ‘who’ + =ma lasi laso ahonjeng komatma keteroiun las las a-honj ng om t ma ke-ter i- n therefore this POSS-thread who=Q NMLZ-walk.cautiously-be.able labangke ahoklo lab ng ke a-h k lo this=TOP POSS-truth-RL ‘therefore, whoever can walk over this thread, that one is true’ [CST, HM 096] (140) Indefinite relative pronoun construction with reduplicated ‘what’ + =ma kopipima ladak kelongdun ahormu hortar'an o ma l d k ke-l ng-d n] a-horm hort r- n] what~DISTR.PL=Q here NMLZ-GET-JOIN POSS-thing EE:horm -all kirim kibi isi ahem do laso langdamlonglo ke-r m ke-b ] is a-h m] d las l ng-d m-l ng-l NMLZ-put.in.one.place NMLZ-keep one POSS-house exist this see-GO-GET-RL ‘[…] whatever they got here [as part of the war between the British and Japan], this we got to go and see’ [SiT, HF 056] 4.5.5. Parallelism between Demonstrative and Interrogative Adverbs Table 75 gives an overview of words with corresponding demonstrative ( ) and interrogative (ko) roots (see also Grüßner (1978: 87)). 179 Table 75. Corresponding demonstratives and interrogatives Function Demonstrative Interrogative Other morpheme Manner la la ko ko ‘like’, ? ‘say / quotative” Place la ko k ‘here’ tt tt 108 ko t natthu ‘direction, towards’ Amount la’ ko’ ‘this much; all’ 4.5.6. Pronouns and Pro-Adverbs of Universal Quantification The pronouns and adverbs of universal quantification, which are used in the negative indefinite construction (‘nobody’, ‘nothing’, etc.), are listed in Table 76 (for information on the positive indefinite construction, see §4.5.4.1). Some forms may also occur in positive clauses (i.e., as ‘all’, ‘everything’, etc.) as indicated in the table. Table 76. Pronouns of universal quantification Semantic field Form of pronoun Gloss Origin Positive / negative polarity PERSON =t ‘anybody’ negative only =t =t ‘somebody’ + ?pak =t ‘everybody’ - - ‘NMLZ-exist NMLZ- not.exist’ positive/negative THING t=t ‘anything’ t ‘type(Tomorrow penapdap, moning adap penap (a)ningve(thu) >2 days after today penapdik penapdik adap penapdik (a)ningve(thu) >3 days after today penapdik isi adap penapdik isi (a)ningve(thu) Note that unique expressions for ‘whole day’ terms are limited to today, tomorrow, and yesterday. For two days into the future or past, the suffix -dik is added, while further days into the future or past just add the independent numerals that count how many more days are added ( for ‘one’). The ‘morning’ terms all have the word ‘morning’ in them: as compounds in terms for ‘tomorrow’ and ‘yesterday’, in a syntactic possessive construction for further days into the future or past, and only the 190 word for ‘this morning’ has just a prefix along with ‘morning. The ‘evening/night’ terms pattern the same as the ‘morning’ terms except for ‘last night’, which also has a simple disyllabic stem that consists of a prefix along with the second syllable of ‘evening/night’ (in fact, this form is even more reduced then the form for ‘tonight’). In order to compare the prefixes, consider Table 78, which also includes terms for year ordinals. Table 78. Year and day ordinals Year Day Morning Evening/Night <1 before chu-ning (pa-)tu- ti-mi-dap to- , tu-mi (a)ningve(thu) Present pe-ning pi- pa- to-dap pe-ningve, mo-ningve >1 after mo-ning pe- pe-nap-dap, mo-ning adap penap (a)ningve(thu) What is quite striking is that although we get three basic prefixes: pV-, tV-, and mo- (ignoring chu-, which only occurs in the form for ‘last year’), they do not align the way we might have expected. pV- occurs in all ‘present’ forms, but it additionally occurs in the elongated expression patumi ‘yesterday’ as well as in ‘tomorrow’. tV- occurs in all ‘1 before’ forms (except for ‘last year’), but additionally also in todap ‘this morning’. Finally, mo- occurs in ‘1 after’ forms as well as in mo- ‘tonight’. A reasonable hypothesis to explain two of the unexpected forms, todap ‘this morning’ and - ‘tonight’, is that they are typically used around midday, when ‘this morning’ is in the past and ‘tonight’ in the future, which would explain the tV- and the mo- prefix if we assume they originally mark past and future, respectively. Now, this turns out to be not correct. For ‘this morning’, either to-dap or pa-dap may be used interchangeably, no matter whether it is 4:00AM and somebody talks about plans to do at 7:00AM, or if it is already 4:00PM, and they talk about something that happened at 7:00AM. The same turns out to be true for pe- and mo- for ‘tonight’, which are used irrespectively of whether the reference is to the past or the future. Nevertheless, it seems likely that this is how the forms originated. The other unexpected forms are the forms for ‘today’, ‘tomorrow’, and ‘yesterday’, in that all three of them contain pV-. Here, it seems likely that pV- was 191 reinterpreted as an element that means ‘day’ rather than indicating present, past, or future, and that that is the reason why it got extended to the words ‘tomorrow’ and ‘yesterday’. 4.8.1.1.2. Other Underived Temporal Adverbs In addition to day and year ordinals, there are a few other temporal adverbs, such as ‘now’, t ‘right then’, or relator nouns that are used as adverbs like ‘before, earlier’ or ‘later, afterwards’ (see §4.4.4.7.2). Deictic, interrogative, and universal quantifier temporal adverbs are listed in §4.5.3, §4.5.4, and §4.5.6, respectively. 4.8.1.1.3. Temporal Adverbs with - ‘every’ There is a subclass of adverbial temporal nouns that take the suffix - ‘every’: e.g., - ‘each year’ and - ‘each day’. It is likely that this - suffix is related to the verb ‘come’, considering functionally similar expressions in, for example, English such as ‘in the coming years’ to mean ‘in future years’. Also note the possibly related verb suffix - ‘plural:S/A’ (§6.5.5.1). 4.8.1.1.4. Intensifier Reduplication Construction (156) shows that the deictic temporal adverb ‘(at) that time’ may be reduplicated as for the purpose of intensification. (156) Reduplication hakokota so'arlo atumke hem [[h k ~k t s 'arl a-t m ke h m 1EXCL that that.time~INTENS=ADD:EXH women:COLL POSS-PL=TOP house akam kachoklem ajoine esomarpen, laso alamlo a-k m ke-cho-kl m a-join ] [e-oso-m r-pen]] [las a-l m-l ] POSS- work NMLZ-AUTO.BEN/MAL- do POSS- reason 1PL.INCL-child-PL- from this POSS-matter- RL ‘in the old, old days, because the women had to do the house work, with the children (= afterthought), this is the matter’ [KK, CC 009] 192 4.8.1.2. Locative Adverbs Locative adverbs include ‘here’ (used with interrogative ko- and demonstratives (ha)la-, see §4.5.5), ‘left’ and ’ ‘right’, ‘this side’ (also used with interrogative ko-), ‘this side’. Locative relator nouns such as ‘down’ or ‘high up’ also function as locative adverbs (see §4.4.4.7.2). 4.8.1.3. Other Adverbs Other adverbs, i.e., those with neither temporal nor locative meaning, include t ‘anyway’ (with the components a- ‘POSS’, t ‘type( pe akelokpen keroi isi ajamborong [[p a-ke-l k pen ke-r i is a-jambor ng cloth POSS-NMLZ-be.white=with NMLZ-sew one POSS-bag arlosi lahai kethap lapen arum kevan arl si] [lah i] ke-th p]] la n [ar m ke-v n]] inside=FOC these NMLZ-put.inside and down NMLZ-bring 'he's placed himself a ladder... and then, the man, into one bag sown from white cloth he puts these (fruits), and then brings them down [SiT, PS 003] (160) ‘or( turthap a-ingn r t ke-ingr ng aj t t r-th p POSS-elephant=ADD:DM NMLZ-roar GENEX kick-mindlessly turphrulo... harlong turpur t r-phr -l harl ng t r-p r kick-EE:-th p-RL stone kick-RES:move.over 'this elephant was roaring and everything and kicked around mindlessly, and kicked over a rock' [RBT, ChM 025] Another set of occurrences of a- is represented by akibisi ‘the youngest one’ in (169). I follow Grüßner (1978:52) in hypothesizing that a- is used here in order to mark this deverbal form more clearly as a referent (i.e., noun), rather than a modifier (which is also marked by the nominalizer ke-, see §4.3). In Grüßner’s terms, “due to the generally referring function [of a-], this prefix is used to form abstract nouns from gerunds [i.e., nominalizations via ke-].” (169) a- in akibisi to perhaps indicate referentiality latumke akibisi atumlo, latumta [la-t m ke a-ke-b -s a-t m-l ] la-t m t this-PL=TOP POSS-NMLZ-be.small-SPLT POSS-PL-RL this-PL=ADD:DM piso some enlo potsi ahem arit dolo p s s m n-l ] [p t si a-h m a-r t d -l ] wife EE:p s take-RL reason=FOC POSS-house POSS-field exist-RL ‘they were (the children/descendants of) the youngest, they also had gotten married and so they had their house and property’ [WR, BCS 027] Possibly the same type of occurrence of a- on property-concept terms (PCTs) is also frequently found when the PCT acts as a preposed modifier, as in (170) (for a 203 discussion of preposed PCT modifiers, see §7.7.1.2). The reason why this may be the same type of occurrence of a- is because in this case of preposed PCT modification, the underlying construction may be a possessive construction (§7.5.2), in which the preposed PCT modifier is nominalized in order to act as the (nominal) possessor or modifier. (170) Pre-head PCT-based modifier ‘be new’, marked with a-ke- ‘POSS-NMLZ-‘ lasonthotsi Lindata ketheklongpen aning kerong, [las n-th t si L nd t ke-thekl ng-p n] [a-n ng ke-ar ng]] that.way-exactly=FOC PN=also NMLZ-see-NF POSS-mind NMLZ-be.happy akimi ahormulo, amonit atum aphanta theklonglo [a-ke-m a-horm -l a-mon t a-t m aph n t thekl ng-l k-l POSS-NMLZ-be.new POSS-thing-RL POSS-man POSS-PL NSUBJ=ADD see-happen.to-RL ‘seeing exactly this, Linda was happy, it was a new thing, she also got to see the people’ [SH, CSM 035] 5.3.2. Personal Possessive Prefixes Personal possessive prefixes are discussed along with the independent pronouns they derive from in §4.5.1; Table 84 repeats the forms (with the optional honorific marker - in parentheses). Note that first person exclusive ne(li)- is also used for first person singular reference. Table 84. Personal possessive prefixes Possessive prefixes (honorific) Gloss ne(li)- ‘1EXCL’ e(li)- ‘1INCL’ nang(li)- ‘2’ [alang(li)- ; a-] ‘3’ 5.3.3. Verbalizer pe- ~ pa- The verbalizer pe- ~ pa- (for the allomorphy, see §3.9.2.1) is related to (or arguably the same morpheme as) the causative pe- ~ pa- prefix (§6.4.2). Since nouns can function as predicates without additional marking (§4.3), the use of pe- ~ pa- typically has a causative, or perhaps change-of-state, implication ‘make X (be) [N]’. In (171), for example, the literal meaning is ‘make the backside (be) the front’, i.e., ‘turn around’. 204 (171) Verbalizer pe- ~ pa- on noun root ‘front’ […] aphi anatsi chepangnophit a-ph a-n t si che-pa-ingn -ph t POSS-backside POSS-direction=FOC RR-VBLZ-front-right.away ‘[…] (he) turned pointing back again right away’ [HI, BPh 006] Grüßner (1978:93) provides similar examples, such as ‘pair, couple’ and - ‘marry off’, or ‘dust’ (recorded as low tone by Grüßner) and - ‘pulverize’. In addition, Grüßner offers examples of the prefix on a classifier-numeral word ( - i- ‘VBLZ-CLF:group-two > divide into two groups’, and on onomatopoeia ( - ’ ‘to make the sound ok-ok, to grunt (of pigs)’. However, there are also examples of pe- ~ pa- on nouns such as in (172), where the opposite of a ‘change of state’ is indicated in nangpa'okorjangdunlonglang ‘still getting to remain / still be (and participate in society as) a girl’ and the equivalent nangparisomardunlonglang. It appears that in this example, pa- only functions as a verbalizer, and not a causative. We may hypothesize that some speakers prefer to use pe- ~ pa- as an overt verbalizer in longer, more complex predicates. (172) Verbalizer pe- ~ pa- on noun roots ‘unmarried.girl’ and ‘unmarried.boy’ la'an akemesen atovar kedamtheksi [la- n a-ke-m s n a-tov r ke-d m-th k-si] this-that.much POSS-NMLZ-be.good POSS-road NMLZ-go-know.how-NF:RL hako amonit atumke nonpu'anta [[hak a-mon t a-t m ke] n n-pu- n t that.time POSS-man POSS-PL=TOP now-QUOT-all=ADD:EXH ilitum a'ansose nangpa'okorjangdunlonglang e-li-t m a- n-sos nang=pa-okorj ng-d n-l ng-l ng 1PL.INCL-HON-PL POSS-that.much-more CIS=VBLZ-unmarried.girl-JOIN-GET-yet nangparisomardunlonglang nang=pa-ris -m r-d n-l ng-l ng] CIS=VBLZ-unmarried.boy-PL-JOIN-GET-yet ‘they know how to go on a good road up to a high degree (metaphorically referring to knowing how to do things properly, how to keep everything clean, etc.), and, because they know how to keep everything clean and nice, those people back then up until today, get to stay even more like girls and boys (i.e., young) than we do’ [SiH, CW 017] 205 In (173), pa- occurs on t ‘fruit’ to mean ‘to bear fruit’, and Grüßner also records -t ‘VBLZ-egg > to lay eggs’. These examples suggest that pe- ~ pa- may also function to express ‘cause [N] to exist’. Further research will need to investigate the factors that determine the function of pe- ~ pa- on a particular noun stem (which may turn out to be largely pragmatic in nature). (173) Verbalizer pe- ~ pa- on noun root t ‘fruit’ […] pholo epen, pathepo, ingdakpo [phol -pen] [pa-th -p ] [ingd k-p ] cotton plant-NF VBLZ-fruit-IRR1 burst.open-IRR1 ‘[…] after having planted the cotton, (the cotton tree) carries fruit, then (the seeds) will burst open’ [KST, PSu 003] 5.4. Nominal Suffixes The discussion of nominal suffixes starts with the gender suffixes - and - , which have further functions as augmentative and modifier-deriving markers (§5.4.1). In §5.4.2, information on the diminutive - is offered, and §5.4.3 discusses the occurrence of the diminutive and the two gender and augmentative/modifier-deriving suffixes in the names of animal/plant subspecies. In §5.4.4, the plural suffix - , which occurs on nouns with human referents, is shown, and §5.4.5 offers an account of the nominal superlative suffix - . 5.4.1. Gender Suffixes -p and -p Karbi has two gender suffixes, - ‘female’ and - ‘male’. There are a number of nouns with human referents that may be specified for gender via one of the two suffixes, for example - ‘daughter’ and - ‘son’, - ‘female friend’ and - ‘male friend’, or - ‘married woman’ and - ‘married man’.117 ‘Female’ - also occurs productively with animal referents, whereas ‘male’ - is often replaced by - (which is 117 Note that - is often replaced by the word - in colloquial speech, where the second part is a borrowing from Assamese. There is no directly analogous female form, but instead a form with both suffixes, i.e., - - , is used in addition to - . The male form - is still used in ceremonial speech. 206 commonly used as a noun rather than a suffix, e.g., in - ‘chicken POSS-male > rooster’). Below I discuss each suffix separately. 5.4.1.1. Female and Augmentative - The ‘female’ suffix - occurs in several places, where - is not or not typically used for the male counterpart. One example is clan names. Children carry the clan name of their father, for example or . But while the clan names of sons (or men) do not require the ‘male’ suffix, the clan names of the daughters (or women) do, so the daughter would be called or , but the son would be or , just like his father. ‘Female’ - is also used on nouns with animal referents, for example - ‘chicken-female > hen’. The lexical noun - still exists, so it is also possible to say - ‘chicken POSS-female > hen’ or - ‘goat POSS-female > female goat’. The noun - ‘female (person/animal)’ is likely related to ‘mother’. While a form - for male referents, or grammaticalized as a nominalizer, exists all across Tibeto-Burman, ‘female’ - is not very common. Interestingly, however, Meithei also has a ‘female’ -pi suffix as in nu-pi ‘female human’ or hənu-bi ‘old woman’ (Chelliah 1997: 244). The corresponding ‘male’ suffix in Meithei is -pa. The shared -pi suffix may be part of a set of items that occur in both Karbi and Meithei due to language contact (§1.3). Polysemically related to the ‘female’ marking function, - also has an augmentative function. Although it may be cross-linguistically more common to polysemically relate the male gender with augmentative marking, the ‘female- augmentative’ link has a parallel in Galo (Tani, Tibeto-Burman), where the ‘female’ suffix -nə also means ‘big’ (for example dog-nə ‘large stone bead at ornament base’ or lə- nə ‘big toe’ (Post 2007: 873)). Examples of Karbi ‘female’ - as an augmentative are t - ‘vast plains’, - ‘large mountain’, or the name of a river, (lit. ‘water-AUGMENT’). The ‘female, augmentative’ - occurs on PCT roots, arguably in its augmentative function; this is discussed below in §5.4.1.3. 207 5.4.1.2. Male (and Non-Productive Modifier-Deriving) - The male suffix - is related to the lexical noun - ‘father’, a common root in Tibeto-Burman with the same semantics of ‘male’ or ‘father’. Examples are - ‘wise old man (borrowed from Indic Brahmin)’ (which also has a female counterpart, - ), or - , a character in folk stories whose stupidity results in entertaining, funny stories. ‘Male’ - alternates with ‘female’ - as augmentatives in the noun stem ‘thumb’, which may be either - or - . This appears to be an exception, however; generally, only - is used as an augmentative suffix on noun stems. There are several occurrences that suggest that - has historically derived modifiers from PCT roots in a synchronically no longer productive way. This is interesting considering that -pa/-po nominalizers are found in a large number of Tibeto- Burman languages from different branches of the family (LaPolla 2008: 52). Examples are (174) and (175), which come from folk stories. (174) shows that the elephant in the story is characterized as t - ‘deaf’, where t is a compound of - ‘ear’ and t ‘deaf’. (174) - in modifier t - ‘deaf’ ingnar nothongpo ano lutchok arkevaret [[ingn r noth ng- ] a-n ] l t-ch k ark -var t elephant deaf-MODIF POSS-ear enter-disappearing scratch-INTENS '(the bird) got into the ears of a deaf elephant, and scratched around' [RBT, ChM 024] It is not clear what word class affiliation t has. There is a productive compounding process that derives noun stems from a combination of a noun root and a verb root (§5.2.1), so t could be a noun stem, but since it doesn’t occur by itself, it is impossible to know for sure. With - , however, it clearly acts as a modifier, and - does not indicate that this is a male elephant. Additional examples are [ - ] [ t - ] ‘big black bird’ in (175). Here, - occurs on straightforward PCT roots and derives modifiers of the head noun ‘bird’. 208 (175) - in modifiers - ‘black’ and t - ‘big’ vo ikpo vo thepo do [v k- ] [v th - ] d bird be.black-MODIF bird be.big-MODIF exist ‘[…] there is a big black bird’ [SeT, MTN 018] Further discussion of - with the (historical) function of deriving modifiers and a comparison with - is offered in the next section. 5.4.1.3. Augmentative and Modifier-Deriving - and - Examples (176) and (177) demonstrate the equivalent uses of - and - , as they occur on the PCT root t ‘be big’ to form a modifier of the preceding head noun (see also §4.2.6). (176) t - ‘big (< t ‘be big’ and - ‘big’)’ anke ha langso asiluka thepota pulelo nke h [langs a-s luk th - t ] p -l -l and.then over.there this POSS-sp.tree( ingsir'etlo tangte nsi [l ng d ng-p ] nke [las ings r- t-l t ngt then water pour-IRR1 and.then then <...> filter-PRF-RL if pacharmatpo; chenangchitpen, phu'iksopen pacharm t-p ] [chen ng-ch t-p n phu' k-s =pen test.if.taste.is.good-IRR1 match-finally-NF earthen.pot-DIM=with ilitum han tun'ikpo e-li-t m h n t n- k-p ] 1PL.INCL-HON-PL vegetables cook-FRML-IRR1 ‘and then, we pour water and then when (the funnel) has filtered (the ashes), we test the taste, and after finding it matching, we cook the curry in a small phu-ik pot’ [SiH, KH 007] Grüßner (1978: 55) also records other occurrences of the diminutive, such as - ‘little leaf’ or - ‘small pond’. Another example is (179), where - occurs on a classifier. It appears that - is used productively to derive diminutive stems of nominal elements (i.e., nouns and classifiers). (179) - - - POSS-CLF:cylindrical-DIM-SPLT ‘the smallest (loaf of bread)’ (Grüßner 1978: 107) 5.4.3. Gender/Augmentative and Diminutive Suffixes in Names of Animal(/Plant) Subspecies A number of proper nouns that refer to animal (and some plant) subspecies end in the gender/augmentative suffixes - or - , or the diminutive suffix - . Table 85 offers a list of examples attested in the corpus (and Grüßner provides more examples in his dictionary manuscript). 210 Table 85. Proper nouns with - , - , or - suffix Proper nouns with - Proper nouns with - Proper nouns with - - ‘pig.sp’ - ‘ant.sp’ - ‘frog.sp’ - ‘bird.sp’ t - ‘dog.sp’ - ‘squirrel.sp’ - ‘plant.sp’ The - and - suffixes here probably do not mark gender. Instead, - is probably the augmentative counterpart to - ‘diminutive’ to indicate that a particular subspecies is relatively large or small. The - suffix then is likely to be a purely structural element that derives the modifier that characterizes the particular subspecies. 5.4.4. Human Plural - r The plural suffix - only occurs on nouns with human referents, e.g., - ‘unmarried boys’, - ‘children’, - ‘married women’, - ‘married men’. The more general plural marking strategy is a possessive construction involving the ‘plural noun’ -t (§7.6). As seen in (180), nouns that already carry - in addition often occur in the -t plural construction. (180) Pleonastic plural marking via - and t anke laso a'osomar atum nangke'otkrei atheseresi nke [las a-os -m r a-t m] nang=ke- t-kr i a-theser si and.then this POSS-child-PL POSS-PL CIS=NMLZ-touch-DISTR.PL POSS-fruits=FOC langdunveretlo... l ng-d n-ver t-l ... see-JOIN-INTENS-RL ‘and then, he (the old man) keeps watching the fruits that these children are each holding, […]’ [SiT, PS 045] Interestingly, (181) suggests that - functions as a derivational (rather than an inflectional) suffix, as it forms an extended noun stem - , which then is verbalized with pa-. 211 (181) Plural - […] nangparisomardunlonglang nang=pa-ris -m r-d n-l ng-l ng] CIS=VBLZ-unmarried.boy-PL-JOIN-GET-yet ‘[…] (they) get to stay even more like [girls and] boys (i.e., young) than we do’ [SiH, CW 017] Note that the honorific suffix - occurs on - pluralized nouns. Honorific - otherwise only occurs on pronouns (and personal possessive prefixes), see §4.5.1 on pronoun forms, and §12.4.1 on honorific - . 5.4.5. Superlative - The suffix - occurs on nominal stems with property-concept semantics to indicate a superlative degree. In (182), the suffix attaches to - - ‘POSS-NMLZ-be.small > young one’. While - may ultimately bear a relationship with the realis focus marker =si (§10.7.3), they are synchronically different elements: superlative - is a suffix that occurs on the noun stem as seen in (182), whereas focus=si is a clitic that attaches to an entire phrase. (182) Superlative - on nominalized latumke akibisi atumlo, latumta [la-t m ke a-ke-b -s a-t m lo] la-t m t this-PL=TOP POSS-NMLZ-be.small-SPLT POSS-PL-RL this-PL=ADD:DM piso some enlo potsi ahem arit dolo p s s m n-l ] [p t si a-h m a-r t d -l ] wife EE:p s take-RL reason=FOC POSS-house POSS-field exist-RL ‘they were (the children/descendants of) the youngest, they also had gotten married and so they had their house and property’ [WR, BCS 027] (183) shows that - may also occur on adverbs - here, an adverb derived from a relator noun.118 118 It might be worth double-checking that here cannot instead be interpreted as a noun with the meaning ‘the later/last one’. 212 (183) Superlative - on ‘after, last’ […] si aphi abangke aphisi vanglo, mh s a-ph ab ng ke aph -s v ng-l mh and.then POSS-grandmother NPDL=TOP afterwards-SPLT come-RL DSM ‘[…] and then, the grandmother was the last one who came’ [KK, BMS 074] 5.5. Reduplication Reduplication occurs more frequently and has more different functions on verb stems (§6.6) than on noun stems. Nevertheless, there are some cases where reduplication of noun stems occurs. So far dual and (distributive) plural functions of reduplicated noun stems have been attested. Note that reduplication of noun and verb stems consists of the reduplication of the last syllable of the stem, with scope typically over the whole stem, but see §6.5.1.1.1 with scope differences in verbs. 5.5.1. Dual Reduplication of the last syllable of a noun stem may indicate duality, as shown in (184), where refers to ‘two friends’. A plural interpretation (with a different context) is not acceptable. (184) Reduplication with dual marking function anke damlo adapprang halatum damlo tangho, jirpopo {mm} nke d m-l a-dappr ng h la-t m d m-l t ngh j r-p ~p mm and.then go-RL POSS-dawn that-PL go-RL REP friend-male~DUAL AFF ‘and then, they went, early in the morning they went, the two friends’ [HK, TR 146] Also note (185) from an on-line narration of the pear story (i.e., the speaker is describing what is going on as he is watching the video clip). Here, the reduplicative dual form arlososo from the noun arloso ‘woman/girl’ does not mean that there are two girls, but instead refers to the duality of the boy on the bike colliding with the girl on the bike, i.e., the duality of the girl and the boy. (185) Reduplication with dual marking function: associative dual arlososo abangpen [ rlos s ab ng pen] this bicycle( ‘mother and father’, - ‘child-female~DL’ > ‘daughter and son’, - ‘father-child~DL’ > ‘father and son’ (Grüßner 1978:57). 5.5.2. (Distributive) Plural As discussed in §6.6.2, one of the functions of reduplication of verb stems is to indicate the (sometimes distributive) plurality of an argument, typically the S or the O argument. Similarly, the inanimate plural demonstrative or has a reduplicated form (la) i (or (la) , or (la) ), which indicates not only plurality (which is already part of the meaning of ), but a ‘plurality of types’ or distributive plurality in the sense of ‘these different ones’. This is the intended meaning in (186), for example, where laheihui anaphorically refers to two types of plants used as soap in traditional times. (186) Reduplication with distributive plural marking function lapente ephu kechingthike vo'arkokpo tangho, [lap nte e-ph ke-chingth ke] [v 'ark kp t ngh ] and.then 1PL.INCL-head NMLZ-clean.thoroughly=TOP sp.plant REP lapente plimplam abo tangho, laheihui helo [lap nte plimpl m a-b t ngh ] lah i h i-hel and.then sp.sour.fruit POSS-fruit.inside REP these~DIST.PL-RL:EMPH ‘and then, to wash our head, the things (we use) are Voarkokpo, and then the inside of the plimplam fruit, it is those different ones’ [SiH, CW 008] In (187), heihai with its sense of ‘different ones’ occurs in a general extender construction (see §12.2.1). 214 (187) heihai in general extender construction Europe lapen kaprek kaprek adet Europe lap n ke-pr k ke-pr k a-d t Europe( angparke pirthe kV-cho-pe-th -pen anp r ke] [pirth NMLZ-AUTO.BEN/MAL-CAUS-be.big-NF:with POSS-beyond( angtanke, kachoklemdunji avarsai chinidunde a-ingt n ke] kV-cho-kl m-d n-j a-vars i chin -d n-C POSS-outside=TOP NMLZ-AUTO.BEN/MAL-do-JOIN-IRR2 POSS-way know-JOIN-NEG ‘in the old days, beyond doing household works and raising children, ways of working in the outside world, they don't understand how to get’ [KaR, SWK 063] The order of the causative preceding the auto-benefactive/malefactive does not appear to occur synchronically. There are examples such as nangkapachobeima in (195), which look like they contain pa-cho-, but here really has to be treated as a lexicalized root with the meaning ‘lie (not telling the truth)’, as without cho- means ‘console’. (195) Verb form with causative preceding auto-benefactive/malefactive […] nephan nangpakolikma {oi} nangkapachobeima ne-ph n nang pakol k ma i nang=ke-pa-cho(-)b i ma 1EXCL-NSUBJ 1/2:NSUBJ=lie=Q yes 1/2:NSUBJ=NMLZ-CAUS-(AUTO.BEN/MAL-)lie=Q ‘[…] “are you lying to me? are you telling me a lie?” (said the tiger)’ [HK, TR 087] 6.2.3. Post-Root Slots The structure of post-root slots is more complex than that of pre-root slots. This is already obvious from the fact that there is a hugely greater number of suffixes than prefixes. There are co-occurrence restrictions between slots 8 and 10 that cannot be represented in a position class diagram such as Figure 14 (repeated here with the post- roots slots only, as Figure 15). They are discussed in §6.2.3.1. Further complications exist with respect to - in slot 9 (§6.2.3.2), as well as within slot 10, as - and - appear to co-occur. This is discussed in §6.2.3.3. 221 5 6 7 8 9 10 ROOT DERIV* RDPL - - t - - -l -si - - … 5: root (/stem) 8: negation 6: predicate derivations, 9: aspect including modals 10: mood, aspect, subordinate, 7: reduplication non-declarative speech act marking Figure 15. Post-root slots of the Karbi verb Moreover, another problematic slot is 7 ‘reduplication’. This is because reduplication does not frequently occur with other suffixes in the corpus. Examples (196) and (197) show, however, that reduplication (whose functions are discussed in §6.6) may occur before the quasi/onset-reduplicative negative suffix, which is why the position class diagram presented above has the two slots ordered that way. (196) Reduplication suffix indicating (distributive) plural occurring before negative suffix “t pinepinanedetjima, te m p -n in - -d t-j ma and.then/therefore future what-INDEF~DIST.PL-NEG-PFV-IRR2=Q ” { } ko j rp pu mm buddy:VOC friend QUOT AFF ‘”and there won't be anything (any difficulties, problems, dangers), my friend?”’ [HK, TR 140] (197) Reduplication suffix occurring before negative suffix -rai - jump-RES:break~DIST.PL-NEG ‘(s/he) didn’t repeatedly jump and break (something)’ or ‘(s/he) repeatedly jumped on things without breaking them’ [KT 111208] 222 6.2.3.1. Cooccurrence Restriction between Negative - and Irrealis -j and - (Slots 8 and 10) The negative suffix - may only co-occur with the irrealis suffixes - and - if perfective - t intervenes. Therefore, t- - t- = ‘enter-NEG-PFV-IRR2=Q’ (RBT, ChM 042) and - - t- ‘be.fine-NEG-PFV-IRR1’ (SH, CSM 049) are perfectly acceptable. However, * - - ‘*go-NEG-IRR2’ and * - - ‘*go-NEG-IRR1’ are unacceptable. 6.2.3.2. Slot 9 - ‘experiential’ The experiential suffix - only occurs with - ‘realis’ of slot 10, but no other slot 10 suffixes. It also has mostly been found to occur in conjunction with negative - in the sense of ‘have never V-ed’. For more details, see §6.8.2. 6.2.3.3. Slot 10 - ‘still’ and - - ‘IRR2-still’ A problem for a position-class analysis is posed by - ‘still’. It appears to be able to co-occur with one and only one suffix from the same slot 10: the suffix - ‘irrealis2’. Specifically, it is acceptable to say - - ng ‘eat-IRR2-still’ meaning ‘(s/he) is still eating (and will continue eating for awhile)’. However, * - - or * - - are both unacceptable. These acceptability data can be analyzed in two ways. One can either pose a slot 11 for - (and only - ), or can argue that - should go in slot 10. I argue for the latter analysis. Specifically, I argue that - - is undergoing grammaticalization/lexicalization, or mono-morphemization. There are phonological, morphological, and semantic reasons in favor of this analysis. On a phonological level, note that low tone - turns into mid tone in - - , and note that in hypo-articulated speech, a contraction to - occurs (§3.7.3). That is, there is phonological evidence of - - forming a close unit. On a morphological level, note that it is possible to add - - to a negated stem. It is acceptable to say - - - ‘be.ripe-NEG-IRR2-still’ meaning ‘(the fruit) won’t be ripe yet’, which ‘violates’ the principle that the irrealis suffixes cannot immediately follow the negative suffix without - t ‘perfective’ intervening (see above §6.2.3.1). The fact that - - can immediately follow the negative suffix when - and - cannot 223 represents morphological evidence of - - being more than just a sequence of - ‘irrealis2’ and - ‘still’. On a semantic level, there is no obvious reason why - - ng is acceptable but not *- - (or *- - ). The two irrealis suffixes - and - overlap in their semantic range to a large degree (§6.9.2.1). Again, this semantic fact only makes sense if - - ng somehow already is a unit. Now, - - semantically still appears compositional: it means both ‘future irrealis’ and ‘still’. Furthermore, in a language in which most morphemes are monosyllabic (with the only quantitatively relevant exceptions being disyllables in ing- and ar-, §4.7), one may be less inclined to analyze a form with two very transparent parts as one morpheme. So the best analysis of course is that - - is neither one morpheme nor two morphemes, but that it is caught in-between, as a result of grammatical change. 6.3. Proclitic Slot: Non-Subject Speech Act Participant Cross-Referencing and Cislocative Marking The proclitic slot on the verb consists of nang= indexing speech act participants in non-subject roles (as well as, in some dialects, ne= < ‘1EXCL’ and e= < e- ‘1INCL’), and cislocative nang= (defined as a marker of motion towards a reference point). Based on the different functions, we may synchronically consider the person cross-referencing nang= a different morpheme from the cislocative marking nang=. Historically, however, all the evidence suggests that there is just one nang= proclitic, which likely goes back to the second person pronoun . This is further discussed in the summary §6.3.3. 6.3.1. Non-Subject Speech Act Participant Marking This section discusses the function of nang= (and ne= and e=) to cross-reference non-subject speech act participants (SAPs). In §6.3.1.2, an overview is provided of the frequent cross-referencing of SAPs that function as primary objects, and §6.3.1.3 offers examples of instances where SAPs in other, non-core, roles are cross-referenced; §6.3.1.4 summarizes this section. 224 6.3.1.1. Introduction The proclitic nang= is used to index or cross-reference speech-act participants that are not subjects in the clause, independent of the person of the subject, as shown in Table 86. Table 86. Cross-referencing ‘ aradigm’ of nang= ‘non-A’ A 1 2 3 1 -- + -- 2 + -- -- 3 + + -- While I interchangeably use the terms ‘indexing’ or ‘cross-referencing’, what we find is non-obligatory but very common marking of speech-act participants that are not subjects in the clause. An independent pronoun referring to the same participant may or may not be present. All of these properties of nang= are illustrated with examples in the following subsections. 6.3.1.2. Cross-Referencing SAP Primary Objects In (198) and (199), nang= occurs on verbs that mark events in which a first person A argument acts on a second person O argument, which may be both singular as in (198), or plural as in (199). The second person O argument may occur as an independent pronoun in addition to the preverbal clitic, as in nangphanke in (198), or only in the form of the preverbal clitic (i.e., with the independent pronoun being a zero anaphor in the clause), as in (199). (198) First person acting on second person (1>2) […] nangphanke nangkeponpo nang-ph n ke nang=ke-p n-p you-NSUBJ=TOP 1/2:NSUBJ=NMLZ-take.away-IRR1 ‘[…] (I) will carry you away’ [HK, TR 059] 225 (199) First person acting on second person (1>2) […] nangkecharjulo, peipen po nang=ke-che-arj -l p i pen p 1/2:NSUBJ=NMLZ-RR-ask-RL mother=with father ‘[…] we are asking you, mother and father’ [CST, HM 117] (200) shows that nang= also occurs when there is a third person acting on a second person. The second part of this example also shows, however, that this cross- referencing via nang= is not obligatory. Although the two clauses ([[nangphan nangkelang] inut] donangji ‘there needs to be somebody to look after you’ and [[kevan kepon] inut] donangji ‘there needs to be somebody to bring you and to take you’) are parallel in their structure and in their reference to the second person, nang= is only used on the verb in the first clause and not the second. (200) Third person acting on second person (3>2) athema nangphan nangkelang inut donangji ath ma [n ng-ph n nang=ke-l ng e-n t d -n ng-j ] because you-NSUBJ 1/2:NSUBJ=NMLZ-see one-CLF:HUM:SG exist-need-IRR2 kevan kepon inut donangji […] [ke-v n ke-p n e-n t d -n ng-j ] NMLZ-bring NMLZ-take.away one-CLF:HUM:SG exist-need-IRR2 ‘because there needs to be somebody to look after you, there needs to be somebody to bring you and to take you, […]’ [SH, CSM 066] In addition to second person arguments, nang= also cross-references first person arguments, i.e., SAPs generally, in non-subject roles. This is shown in (201) and (202), which have a third person and a second person acting on a first person, respectively. In both examples, the first person primary object is indicated by the independent pronoun marked as primary object in the form - , and is cross-referenced by nang=. (201) Third person acting on first person (3>1) t “ t am t Bokol -p ab ng r lad k ne- h n m t si and.then NAME-male NPDL SURPRISE(1) nephan nangpakolikma {oi} nangkapachobeima {oi} ne- h n nang=pakol k ma i nang=ke-pa-chob i ma i 1EXCL-NSUBJ 1/2:NSUBJ=lie=Q yes 1/2:NSUBJ=NMLZ-CAUS-lie=Q yes ‘[…] “are you lying to me? are you telling me a lie?” (said the tiger)’ [HK, TR 087] (203) shows that nang= also cross-references the standard of comparison in the comparative construction, which is also indicated by the - ‘non-subject’ marked independent first person exclusive pronoun, - . (203) Cross-referencing the standard of comparison in comparative construction opeija nephanta halasi nangsarlang (both laughing) opeija ne- h n t h la si nang=s r-l ng my.goodness! 1EXCL-NSUBJ=ADD:even that=FOC 1/2:NSUBJ=be.old-still ‘oh my goodness! this one is still older than me! (both laughing)’ [HK, TR 098] Although nang= may be used to cross-reference speech act participants in general, some speakers use the forms of the first person inclusive and exclusive pronouns as proclitics to specifically cross-reference non-subject inclusive and exclusive first person arguments, as in (204) and (205). (204) First person inclusive primary object (3>1INCL) marked with e= ‘1INCL:NSUBJ’ […] itum aphanke ha nampi namdur alongsi e-t m aph n ke h n mp n md r al ng si 1INCL-PL NSUBJ=TOP over.there big.forest EE:namp LOC=FOC ekethondamlo e=ke-th n-d m-l 1INCL:NSUBJ =NMLZ-drop-GO-RL ‘[…] (the witch) abandoned us over there in the deep forest’ [CST, HM 076] 227 (205) First person exclusive primary object (2>1EXCL) marked with ne= ‘1EXCL:NSUBJ’ mh nephan nechiriphetnoi mh ne- h n ne=che-r p-h t-n i DSM 1EXCL-NSUBJ 1EXCL:NSUBJ=RR-hold.firmly-firmly-INFRML.COND.IMP ‘”hold (yourself) firmly onto me”’ [KK, BMS 046] Although it may be dialectal variation that underlies the preference to use ne= or e= to cross-reference first person non-subjects instead of nang=, there is an even more interesting sociolinguistic dimension to this, as even the same speaker, in the same text, and even in the same utterance, may switch between using e= or nang= for a first person inclusive O argument. This is shown in (206), where the beginning of the utterance, ethapkangdetpen aphi, is part of a tail-head linking construction (§12.1.2), which repeats the verb from the previous utterance, which in fact was t […] t glo, i.e., marked with e= to cross-reference the argument also indicated by the primary object marked first person inclusive pronoun itum aphanke. After this beginning in (206), even though the O argument remains constant (while the A argument changes), the speaker switches to t ’ , using nang= to cross-reference the first person inclusive argument. (206) First person inclusive primary object (3>1INCL) marked with e= ‘1INCL:NSUBJ’ and nang= ‘1/2:NSUBJ’ in the same utterance ethapkangdetpen aphi, hi'ipi abangke [e=th p-k ng-d t-p n aph ] h 'ip ab ng ke 1INCL:NSUBJ=put.inside-leaving-PFV-from after witch NPDL=TOP itum aphan nangkelangun'e epei e-t m aphan nang=ke-l ng- n-C e-p i 1PL.INCL-PL NSUBJ 1/2:NSUBJ=NMLZ-see-be.able-NEG 1PL.INCL-mother aphan kelangun'e aph n ke-l ng- n-C NSUBJ NMLZ-see-be.able-NEG 'after (our mother) put us in the cradle, the witch could not tolerate (< see) us, she also couldn't tolerate our mother' [CST, HM 051] My hypothesis is that the invariable use of nang= to cross-reference both second and first person arguments is original, and using ne= and e= is an innovation based on a ‘logical insight’ that ne= and e= better correspond to nephan and itum aphan. There are 228 both Karbi-internal and comparative-TB reasons to believe this is actually the case. As for the Karbi-internal reasons, there is a prescriptive movement claiming that ne= and e= are more correct than nang=. Also, I was told that the invariable use of nang= is typical in the more remote villages (which will need to actually be investigated). On comparative grounds, the invariable use of nang= fully conforms with the SAP/cislocative syncretism in Kuki-Chin languages (see summary in §6.3.3). 6.3.1.3. Cross-Referencing SAP in Non-Core Roles Proclitic nang= may also cross-reference SAPs in non-core roles. In (207) and (208), first and second person possessors are cross-referenced by nang=. (207) Cross-referencing the possessor (1>2) […] nangjat nangkhong nang ’ t Sala!", Therdamlo. nang-j t nang-kh ng nang=pa-v r- t-j sala th r-d m-l 2-type 2-tribe 1/2:NSUBJ=CAUS-lose-all:S/O-IRR2 damn.you! threaten-GO-RL ‘ “[…] I will destroy your tribe and your species, damn you!", he threatened (the plantain)' [RBT, ChM 046] (208) Cross-referencing the possessor (2>1) "Ai richo, nepran nangenri nemui i rich ne-pr n nang= n-r ne-m i how.bad! king 1EXCL-life 1/2:NSUBJ=take-NEG.IMP 1EXCL-EE:pr n(2) {nang kedo adim ne nangchinike} {[[n ng ke-d ]REL a-d m] n nang=chin ke you NMLZ-stay POSS-place 1EXCL 1/2:NSUBJ=know=TOP ‘{I know the place where you are staying}’ [HK, TR 105] 6.3.1.4. Summary Procliticized nang= (and, via dialectal variation, also ne= and e=) cross- references SAP in non-subject roles depending on pragmatic as well as syntactic factors. If this was a strictly syntactic construction, we would expect that we could define, and predict, which syntactic role gets cross-referenced in this way, and that that particular syntactic role gets cross-referenced every time it occurs in a clause. Example (200) above, however, shows that nang=, (perhaps) just like independent pronouns, may be left out as a zero anaphor. And (209) above shows that it is not just a particular syntactic role that is cross-referenced, but that it instead appears to be a non-agentive, affected SAP that is pragmatically cross-referenced via nang=. Table 87 gives an overview of the person interactions that allow (but not automatically trigger) cross-referencing via nang= (or ne=/e=). Instead of the typical A>O format of such tables, I used the notation A>’non-A’ to highlight that it is not just first and second person O arguments that are cross-referenced in this construction. Table 87. Proclitic cross-referencing ‘paradigm’ ‘non-A’ A 1 2 3 1 ---- [nang=] ---- 2 [nang=] ~ [ne= / e=] ---- ---- 3 [nang=] ~ [ne= / e=] [nang=] ---- 6.3.2. Cislocative Marking This section gives examples of the different cislocative-related functions of nang=, i.e., functions related to the marking of motion towards a reference point. This includes purely directional marking (§6.3.2.1); associated motion in the sense of ‘come 230 and V’ (§6.3.2.2); and metaphorical extensions of the cislocative function (§6.3.2.3). A summary is offered in §6.3.2.4. 6.3.2.1. Directional The directional cislocative function occurs on motion verbs and indicates that this motion is directed towards a reference point or deictic center. An example of a manner motion verb is in (210), where ‘ride, straddle’ occurs with nang= to express ‘ride (a bicycle) towards (the reference point)’. This is further (i.e., redundantly) indicated here through the construction that nangardon occurs in. This verb is marked non-final via -si, and the sentence ends with the lexical cislocative verb ng ‘come’. (210) ‘Standard’ cislocative indicating motion towards reference point laso ahut amat inut akaprek amonit las a-h t am t e-n t a-ke-pr k a-mon t this POSS-during and.then one-CLF:HUM:SG POSS-NMLZ-be.different POSS-man abangke saikel nangardonsi vanglo... […] ab ng ke saik l nang=ard n-si v ng-l ... NPDL=TOP bicycle( come (to reference point) and keep/put (there)’ hala ejon ateketa vangpo laso angchin h la e-j n a-tek t v ng-p las a-ingch n that one-CLF:animal POSS-tiger=ADD:also come-IRR1 this POSS-iron a'umsi nangingomnaipo anke nangbikok... a- m si nang=ing' m-n i-p nke nang=b -k k POSS-cage=FOC CIS=carry.in.mouth-big.solid:O-IRR1 and.then CIS=keep-firmly ‘this one tiger will also come, this iron cage he will keep in his mouth and he will put it in a fixed place’ [HK, TR 167] (217) nang= ‘CIS=drink > come (to reference point) and drink (there)’ […] alanglike latum ahemsi nangvursi sa al ng-l ke l -t m a-h m si nang=v r-si s 3-HON=TOP this-PL POSS-house=FOC CIS=drop.in-NF:RL tea( come (to reference point) and see (there)’ det arlo angbongpen laso nangkelangdunta d t arl angb ng pen las nang=ke-l ng-d n t country inside middle=from this CIS=NMLZ-see-along=ADD:also ‘from within the country they came to watch this (i.e., there were domestic tourists)’ [SiT, HF 039] 233 (219) nang= ‘CIS=stay > come (to reference point) and stay (there)’ amatsi apenan abang pulo, “ai sarpi! [am tsi a-pen n ab ng p -l ] ai sarp and.then POSS-husband NPDL say-RL how.strange! old.woman etumta dak ritlo nangkedo jailo nangkedo ” e-t m t d k r tl nang=ke-d j il nang=ke-d 1PL.INCL-PL=ADD here inhabited.field CIS=NMLZ-stay EE:r tl CIS=NMLZ-stay ‘and then, the husband said, “how bad, woman. We (have come here and) are staying here in the field (but should be staying in the village)”' [SeT, MTN 006] 6.3.2.3. Semantic Extensions In a number of occurrences in the corpus, nang= ‘cislocative’ has to be interpreted as having undergone semantic change. This includes a type of semantic narrowing such that instead of ‘motion towards a reference point’, nang= merely indicates ‘orientation towards a reference point’. In the elicited example (220) (asking for a translation from English) and the corpus example (221), the orientation of a fan hanging down from the ceiling as well as long hair worn down are both expressed with cislocative nang= on the respective verbs, even though no motion is involved. They both represent the default reference point for vertical orientation towards the ground (or perhaps the default direction downwards, following gravity). (220) Cislocative nang= marking orientation only, without movement involved = = nang= - up.high=from=FOC fan( arlong terekpiphitlo... penke padamlo arl ng ter k-p -ph t-l ... p n ke pa-d m-l stone move-BEN/MAL-away-RL and.then=TOP CAUS-go-RL ‘[…] and then one child, the one who was in front, he moved the stone away for him, and then they (the children) let him (the bicycle boy) go away (i.e., the cleared the way for him)’ [SiT, PS 033] Note that Grüßner (1978: 93-4) reports the acceptability of a double causative, as in - - ‘CAUS-CAUS-be.good > make somebody improve something’, - -t ‘CAUS-CAUS-die > make somebody kill somebody’. Matisoff (2003: 132) suggests that in Karbi (and in other Northeast Indian languages with similar forms, such as Dimasa (Bodo-Garo), Angami Naga, as well as Kuki-Chin languages such as Khumi and Maraa (Lakher)), causative pe- ~ pa- has 239 grammaticalized from the verb ‘give’ . While this could be the case, it would have to be a fairly old instance of grammaticalization, because more recent grammaticalizations seem to end up in suffix slots on the verb, such as the (arguably) more recent grammaticalization of ‘give’ to - ‘benefactive’ (§6.5.5.2.1). 6.4.3. Reflexive/Reciprocal che- Besides marking the reflexive (in a broader than typologically expected way) and the reciprocal, che- also occupies part of the functional territory of a middle as defined by Kemmer (1993), and to some degree overlaps with cho- ‘auto-benefactive/malefactive’ (§6.4.4). For the morphophonological properties of this prefix, see §3.9.1.1 and §3.9.2. First, for the reflexive function, see (228), where che- indicates the ‘standard’ reflexive that has the A and O argument of a transitive verb referring to the same participant, here -t ‘RR-put.inside’ > ‘put oneself inside (a hole in the tree)’. Note that while there are reflexive/reciprocal pronouns (§4.5.2), their presence is not obligatory, and che- may be the only indicator of reflexivity/reciprocity. (228) (Typical) reflexive marking function of che- (A=O) amat la apenan abangke the'angtanglo tangte ha [am t [l a-pen n ab ng=ke] [the' ng t ng-l t ngt ] h and.then this POSS-husband NPDL=TOP be.bright start-RL if over.there chethapdamlutpo anke anbor pu ha che-th p-d m-l t-p ] nke [ n-b r p h RR-put.inside-GO-enter-IRR1 and.then rice-wrapped.bundle like.this over.there t t pe-kl -b p-p ] b ng ke ch -t ng-l j n-t ng-l CAUS-fall-sd.of.falling.down-IRR1 CLF:HUM:PL=TOP eat-finish-RL drink-finish-RL ‘and then, the husband, when it had gotten bright, he would put himself there in (the hole in the tree trunk), and then she dropped the rice bundle there (into the hole), and he ate and drank (everything)' [SeT, MTN 023] A clause with a che- marked verb may, however, also have an O argument that is a different participant but is possessed by the A argument. This reflexive-marked coreferentiality between the A and the possessor of the O can be considered a form of possessor raising. Nevertheless, since an O argument may be present, reflexive che- does 240 not change the valence of a verb (but see Chapter X and specifically §10.1.2 and §10.6 on why valence as a strictly syntactic concept is generally problematic in Karbi). In (229), the same reflexive-marked verb as above, -t ‘RR-put.inside’, has to be interpreted as ‘put one’s (own; here: tobacco container) inside (here: a bag)’ (229) Reflexive che-: A = possessor of O anke.... duma alangpong chethapponthotlo nke dum a-langp ng che-th p-p n-th t-l and.then tobacco POSS-small.bamboo.container RR-put.inside-away-into.opening-RL ‘and then... he put the tobacco container inside (the bag) to carry it along’ [HK, TR 021] In (230), (231), and (232), reflexive che- is used with human O arguments that are possessed by the A argument. The relationships are either kinship (children or wife in the examples) or friendship. (230) Reflexive che-: possessive relationship = kinship asomar aphan chititekangroklo [a-oso-m r a h n] che-t -tek ng-r k-l POSS-child-PL NSUBJ RR-get.rid.off-leave-completed-RL chevarkangchorlo che-v r-k ng-ch r-l RR-throw.away-just-RES:away-RL 'he got rid of his children' [CST, RO 050] (231) Reflexive che-: possessive relationship = kinship apiso along chidunkri […] [a-pis al ng] che-d n-kr POSS-wife LOC RR-follow-follow.closely ‘he followed his wife closely […]’ [KK, BMS 082] (232) Reflexive che-: possessive relationship = friendship ajirpo chehanglo tangho {mm} a-jirp che-h ng-l t ngh mm POSS-friend RR-call-RL REP AFF ‘he called his friend’ [HK, TR 126] In the ditransitive clause in (233), che- indicates the friendship between the referents of the R argument and the A argument. 241 (233) Reflexive che-: possessive relationship = friendship an laso a'oso abang thesere pumni hala n [las a-os ab ng] [theser p m-n ] [h la and.then this POSS-child NPDL fruits CLF:round-two that ajirpo banghini aphan chepaklangdamlo a-jirp b ng-hin a-ph n] che-pa-kl ng-d m-l POSS-friend CLF:HUM:PL-two POSS-NSUBJ RR-CAUS-appear-GO-RL ‘and then, this child went to show the two fruits to those two friends of his’ [SiT, PS 040] As illustrated in (234), che- can also occur on motion verbs, here ‘go’. In this example, the reflexive marking on the verb cross-references amethang atovar ‘their own road’. Similarly, - ‘RR-go’ also occurs in clauses that contain ‘house, home’ as the goal of the motion, as in (235). (234) Reflexive che- on motion verb, cross-referencing path latum bangkethomke amethang atovar chedamlo, [[l -t m b ng-keth m ke] a-meth ng a-tov r che-d m-l ] this-PL CLF:HUM:PL-three=TOP POSS-self POSS-road RR-go-RL lapenke saikel ingdoiponbomsi, [lap n ke saik l ingd i-p n-b m-si and.then=TOP bicycle( nangthemuchot nke e-j n nang t t-phl t nang th -m ch t and.then one-CLF:animal CIS=exit-suddenly.big.A/O CIS=be.big-COMPAR ‘and then, one (tiger) came out (of the jungle or some area in the Rongker ground) and he was bigger (than expected and than the previous one)’ [HK, TR 172] (255) Superlative - - akethenei akehoineilo tangho […] a-ke-th -n i akeho -n i-l t ngh POSS-NMLZ-be.big-SPLT powerful.person-SPLT-RL REP ‘he was the biggest and the most powerful one (so they say) […]’ [HK, TR 033] 6.5.3. Result Table 98 offers some sample result derivations along with verb roots the suffixes may occur with. A corpus example with - ‘RES:little.wound’ is provided in (256). Table 98. Sample result derivations Form Gloss Sample host verbs - ‘RES:death’ ap ‘shoot’, t ‘beat’, ‘fear’ - ‘RES:little.wound’ ‘scratch’, r ‘bite’, - ‘RES:split’ ‘split’ - t ‘RES:burst’ ‘sit’, ‘step’ (256) Result derivations […] "o bang voarbipi akam kechomathale neno [o b ng v arb p a-k m ke-chomath le VOC CLF:HUM:PL bird.sp POSS-work NMLZ-think.with.bad.intentions=FOC:IRR nanglutchok nangarkerakrakdetkema?" ne-n nang l t-ch k nang ark -r ~r k-d t ke ma] my-ear CIS=enter-disappearing CIS=scratch-RES:little.wound~DISTR.PL-PFV=TOP=Q ' “O Voarbipi, what were you thinking, coming into my ears and scratching and wounding me?!"’ [RBT, ChM 034] 255 6.5.4. Direction, (Associated) Motion, Path Table 99 lists direction, motion, and path derivations. Table 99. Direction, motion, and path derivations Form Gloss Sample host verbs - n - ‘JOIN’ [productive] - n~-p ‘on.the.way’ [productive] - - ‘GO’ [productive] -t - ‘leave.behind’ [productive] -t t ‘into.opening ‘fall’ - t ‘enter’ ‘bite’ - ‘away:S’ ‘go’, ‘follow’, - ‘disappearing’ var ‘throw’, ingbo ‘’; t ‘enter’, * ‘go’ - ‘away’ var ‘throw’, tur ‘kick’, ingjar ‘fly’, An example of - ‘away’ is (257). (257) Predicate derivation - ‘away’ […] misorongpoke a'ik mis rongp ke a- k a-t m a-tep a-t m ant.sp=TOP POSS-older.brother POSS-PL POSS-elder.brother's.wife POSS-PL atum atipi atum adappen rit damjuilo a-d p pen r t d m-j i-l POSS-morning=from field go-away-RL ‘[…] the ant's older brother and his wife had gone to the jhum field in the morning’ [RBT, ChM 009] The two suffixes - n - ‘on.the.way’ and - n - ‘JOIN’ to some degree function in a complementary, or converse, way. First, consider - n - ‘JOIN’. This suffix is used in situations where an event occurs against the background of something that is in motion (see also §6.5.7.1). For example, if runners are racing each other, people watching and giving the runners water can be said to - ‘water give-JOIN’ > ‘give water (to the runners as they are moving along)’. If we switch perspective from the bystanders to the runners, we can say about the runners that they - ‘water take- on.the.way’ > ‘take water (as they are moving along)’, here using - indicating that the event occurs while the subject is in motion. 256 Let us consider other examples of - n - ‘JOIN’ and - n - ‘on.the.way’. Another example of - n - ‘JOIN’ is (258), where the suffix indicates that the food items are being wrapped in order to be taken to the field. (Note that - n - ‘JOIN’ also occurs in contexts that do not involve motion events, see §6.5.7.1.) (258) Acting in the context of expected motion: - n - ‘JOIN’ […] ok paka paka han paka paka lopen [ k pak pak h n pak pak l pen meat very.good very.good curry very.good very.good banana.leaf=with thuidun pame pamepo th i-d n pa-m pa-m -p ] wrap-JOIN CAUS-be.good CAUS-be.good-IRR1 ‘[…] she wrapped very good meat and very good curry very nicely for him to take along (to the field)’ [CST, RO 014] Two more examples of - n - ‘on.the.way’ are offered in (259) and (260). First, (259) is parallel to the example of the runners: in this personal narrative, the speaker says that they stopped in a town on the way and bought some snacks and water for the trip. (259) Acting while moving: - n - ‘on.the.way’ anke thesere haihuita namponlo tovar nke theser haih i t n m-p n-l tov r and.then fruits different.kinds=also buy-on.the.way-RL NMLZ-eat road kecho aphan lang haihui namponlo ke-ch a-ph n l ng haih i n m-p n-l NMLZ-eat POSS-PURP water some buy-on.the.way -RL ‘and then, we also bought some fruit (to carry along), to eat on the road, and we bought some water (to carry along)’ [SH, CSM 014] The next example (260) features the suffix twice. As - n - occurs on ‘fall’, the idea again is that the falling is happening during ongoing motion away from the deictic center. In the first occurrence of - n - on the manner motion verb ‘steer’, however, the suffix simply highlights the translocative or andative, i.e., motion away from a point of reference. 257 (260) Motion away or occurring during ongoing motion away: - n - ‘on.the.way’ saikel vekponbom dambomlo [saik l v k-p n-b m d m-b m-l ] bicycle( inglong aritsi h r t cho-tik cho-ingh i-d m] [ingl ng a-r t si over.there field AUTO.BEN-cultivate AUTO.BEN-do-GO field hill POSS-field=FOC kenongdam kisimdam sai chotikidamlo ke-n ng-d m ke-s m-d m] [s i cho-tik -d m-l NMLZ-loosen.soil-GO NMLZ-hold-GO labor AUTO.BEN-cultivate-GO-RL ‘therefore, that bamonpo and bamonpi went there to the jhum field to cultivate it, to the hill field they went to loosen the soil and to work, to work they went’ [KK, BMS 009] 123 Associated motion categories indicate that the event denoted by the verb occurs against the background of a motion event (Guillaume 2013). 258 Finally, -t - ‘leave behind’ indicates another associated motion category, which signals in a sense the opposite of - n - ‘JOIN’. While, as pointed out above (as well as below in §6.5.7.1), - n - ‘JOIN’ is about the involvement in another event, -tek - ‘leave behind’ is about the lack of involvement in another event. The difference, however, lies in where motion comes in. In verbs marked by - n - ‘JOIN’, the motion is associated with the ‘other’ event and not with the subject’s event (i.e., in the example above, giving water to the runners, the runners are in motion but not the giver). In verbs marked by -t - ‘leave behind’, it is the subject that moves and leaves the location of the event, thus signaling the lack of involvement (i.e., due to moving on). An example is (263). (263) Associated motion derivation -t - ‘leave behind’ anke komat aphansi kepitekangpo, nke kom t a-ph n si ke-p -tek ng-p , and.then who POSS-NSUBJ=FOC:RL NMLZ-give-leave.behind-IRR1 inutvetpo e-n t-v t-p one-CLF:HUM:SG -only-IRR1 ‘and then, who would we have given her to, she would have been alone’ [SH, CSM 063] 6.5.5. Argument and Argument Structure Related Functions 6.5.5.1. Argument Quantification Argument quantification derivations indicate the quantity of one of the arguments. In most cases, the suffixes indicate universal quantification, i.e., ‘all’, ‘everything’, ‘everybody’. Table 100 lists all quantification derivations attested in the corpus and gives examples for the low frequency ones. Table 100. Argument quantification derivations Form Gloss Examples - ‘much’ - ‘(too.)much’ - ‘a.lot’ - t ‘all:S/O’ 259 - p ‘each:S/A’ dorep ‘exist-each:s/a’ (SH, CSM 064) -t -t i ‘all’ ’ t ‘have taken all (from me)’ (KTa, TCS 082) - p ‘all:S’ damlaplo ‘everybody went’ (KK, BMS 074) klolaplo ‘everything fell out’ (SiT, PS 030) - …- p124 ‘all.neg’ rikcho rikhaplo ‘everything is scattered’ (KK, BMS 093) - ng ‘PL:S/A’ langphronglo ‘everybody saw him’ (HK, TR 190) - i ‘many:S’ thuruilo ‘many have rotten’ (WR, BCS 016) - ‘PL:S/A’ chethekvangve ‘they don’t know’ (SiT, HF 041) Note that it appears generally possible to determine which syntactic role a given predicate derivation quantifies over, although further study is required to confirm that this is indeed syntactically fixed and not pragmatically flexible. Examples of both -t -t i ‘all’ and - i ‘many:S’ occur in (264). Note that -t in this example occurs after a separate construction to indicate universal quantification, which is the use of ‘all’ in t ’ t (§7.8.2). (264) Instances of -t -t i ‘all’ and - i ‘many:S’ aphi alam apot kroilo, anke hala Bey Ki'ik [a-ph a-l m ap t kr i-l ] nke [h la B y ke- k POSS-grandmother POSS-word because agree-RL and.then that CLAN NMLZ-be.black ahemke piso hangdam'et jat'et, lo han sik'et jat'et a-h m ke p s h ng-d m- t j t- t] [l h n s k- t j t- t] POSS-house=TOP wife call-GO-PFT type-PFT banana.leaf curry prepare-PFT type-PFT kachepangri pangdon nangji aphan kesiktang'anta [[[ke-che-pangr pangd n n ng-j aph n] ke-s k-t ng- n t ] NMLZ-RR-reconcile even.out need-IRR2 NSUBJ NMLZ-prepare-finish-all=ADD:EXH siktheilo,an hadak abangke lo han thuruilo […] s k-th i-l ] [ n h d k ab ng ke l h n th -r i-l ] prepare-all:S/O-RL and.then there NPDL=TOP banana.leaf curry rot-many:S-RL ‘because it was his grandmother's advice, he agreed, and so he went to Bey the Black's house to ask for a wife and do all the formalities, and prepare the banana leaves and the curry (for the wedding) and everything, they prepared all of the necessary things for the wedding, and then there all the food got rotten, […]' [WR, BCS 016] 124 See §6.5.1.1.2. 260 In (265), an instance of - ‘plural:S/A’ is shown. This suffix is interesting because it is a negative polarity item, which only occurs in combination with negative - . (265) Instance of negated - ‘plural:S/A’ (negative polarity) pisi kithurvangvedetma {mm} p si ke-th r-v ng-C -d t ma mm why NMLZ-get.up-PL:S/A-NEG-PFV=Q AFF 'why didn't you get up?' [HK, TR 154] Note also the the likely relationship of - ‘plural:S/A’ with - , which occurs on temporal adverbs and means ‘each, every’, as in - ‘each day’ (§4.8.1.1.3), as well as the homophony and possible relationship with ‘come’. 6.5.5.2. Argument Structure Highlighting The two suffixes - ‘benefactive/malefactive’ and - ‘instrumental/comitative’ are referred to as ‘argument structure highlighting’ rather than ‘argument structure changing’ or ‘applicatives’, because there is no evidence that they actually change the argument structure. 6.5.5.2.1. Benefactive/Malefactive - Benefactive/malefactive - highlights that the event is conceptualized as having a benefactee or a malefactee. This affected argument is marked by the non-subject marker - , such as asitin akhei aphanta in (266). (266) Benefactive/malefactive - laso aphike asitin akhei aphanta las aph ke [a-is -t n a-kh i a-ph n t ] this after=TOP POSS-one-each POSS-community POSS-NSUBJ=ADD:EXH isisi ahem kikimpi do hadak governmentpen is ~s a-h m ke-k m-p d h d k government=pen one~DIST.PL POSS-house NMLZ-build-BEN exist there government=with ‘and then, there was one house for every tribe, built by the government’ [SiT, HF 045] 261 Although - acts as a differential O marker (§10.2.1.2), which could be taken as evidence that - is an applicative that ‘promotes’ an oblique benefactee to argument status, there is evidence presented in §10.2.3.2 which suggests that this ‘promotion’ is not marked by - but only ‘highlighted’ by - : The evidence consists in a sentence with a benefactee participant marked by - , without - occurring on the verb. 6.5.5.2.2. Instrumental, Comitative - Unlike benefactee and malefactee participants, which can be marked by - ‘non-subject’ (see section above as well as §10.2.3.2, §10.6.2.6), there is no way to mark an instrumental or comitative participant with - ‘non-subject’. Instrumental and comitative participants are only ever marked by =pen ‘with’ (§7.8.1). Nevertheless, the predicate derivation - may be used on the verb to ‘highlight’ that an instrumental or comitative participant is included in the conceptualization of the event. Consider (267) and (268). (267) Instrumental - motorsaikel=pen=si t - m- 1EXCL motorcycle=with=FOC market( ‘be tasty; edible’ (cf. Post (2007:491) for a discussion of the same phenomenon in Galo, which he also refers to as adjectivalization). In the case of - ‘nothing.to’, detransitivization also happens, but with the former A argument turning into an S argument of a verb meaning ‘have nothing to V’, e.g., ‘have nothing to eat or drink’ in (270). (270) Predicate derivation - ‘nothing.to’ chomove junmove {mm} ch -mov j n-mov mm eat-nothing.to drink-nothing.to AFF ‘(he) had nothing to eat, nothing to drink’ [HK, TR 009] Finally, - ‘inducing’ turns a hypothetical causer into an S argument, e.g., -me ‘laugh-inducing’ > ‘laughable, ridiculous’. 6.5.6. Aspect/Aktionsart and Time 6.5.6.1. Overview Table 102 gives an overview of aspect/aktionsart and time derivations. I understand the label ‘aktionsart’ to refer to lexicalized aspect and hence the aktionsart/aspect continuum to correspond to a lexical-grammatical continuum. Thus, there are certain PDs that are more productive and grammatical (specifically, - t ‘perfect’, - - ‘continuative’, and -t ‘perfective2’125), and hence more like ‘aspect’. On the other hand, - ‘completive’ and - t ‘perfective3’ are less productive and collocate only with certain verb roots, and are hence more like ‘aktionsart’. 125 The aspect derivations -t and - t are labeled ‘perfective2’ and ‘perfective3’, leaving the simple label ‘perfective’ for the much more frequent - t, which goes in a verb position class following the negative suffix (see §6.8.1). 264 Table 102. Aspect/aktionsart and time derivations Type Form Gloss Productivity Aspect / aktionsart - t ‘perfect (PRF)’ [productive] - - ‘continuative (CONT)’ [productive] -t ‘perfective2 (PFV2)’126 [productive] - ‘completive (COMPL)’ [limited] - t ‘perfective3 (PFV3)’ [limited] - ‘durative (DUR)’ [limited] Temporal - ‘for.first.time’ [productive] -t ‘again’ [productive] - - ‘again’ [productive] Examples of the aspect/aktionsart suffixes listed in Table 102 are given in the following subsections. 6.5.6.2. Perfect - t The perfect - t is very frequently used. For example, it occurs in the common Karbi greeting question shown in (271). (271) - t- = rice/food eat-PRF-RL=Q ‘have you eaten?’ 6.5.6.3. Continuative - - The continuative - - is quite frequent. An example is (272), where the continuative aspect is additionally iconically indicated by three repetitions of the verb stem. (272) Continuative - - lasonsi juibom juibom juibomlo las n si j i-b m j i-b m j i-b m-l that.way=FOC:RL play-CONT play-CONT play-CONT-RL 'this way, they played and played and played' [CST, HM 058] 126 What could be glossed as ‘perfective1’ is - t (§6.8.1), which is, however, glossed as simply ‘perfective’ because it is very frequent as well as in a different slot in the verbal position-class. 265 Continuative - - is likely a reflex of a form reconstructed to Proto- Tibeto-Burman as *bam~*pam by Benedict (1972: 125), based on, among similar forms in other languages, Meithei pham ‘sit’ and Lepcha bam ‘remain’. In Lepcha, bam has futher grammaticalized as a progressive marker (Plaisier 2007:119). 6.5.6.4. Perfective2 -t Perfective2 -t is productively used with any verb root, but it is not as frequent as - t ‘perfective’ (§6.8.1). An example of -t is (273), where it is used on a nominalized verb, of which there are, in fact, a number of other instances. (On the other hand, it appears that - t ‘perfective’ only occurs on predicates, which makes sense considering that -t can be analyzed as being derivational and - t as inflectional (§6.2.1).) (273) Perfective2 -t ante kolo nangkeneptang, nangpaklangtha lason nte ko=lo nang=ke-n p-t ng, nang pe-kl ng-th OK.then ITROG=FOC CIS=NMLZ-catch-finish 1/2:NSUBJ=CAUS-appear-CON.IMP 'if so, which one have you already caught? You have to show me!, […]’ [HK, TR 090] Note that perfective2 -t may, however, co-occur with - t ‘perfective’ as on the predicate in (274). (274) Perfective2 -t in combination with - t ‘perfective’ anta tunlonglelo an arni kethetangdetle!" n t t n-l ng-C -l n arn ke-th -t ng-d t l rice=ADD cook-GET-NEG-RL that.much sun NMLZ-be.big-PFV2-PFV=EXCLAM ‘[…] (and) this much the sun has become so big already"’ [KK, CC 026] The perfective2 suffix -t apparently originates in an independent verb root t ‘finish’ that may function as a complement-taking verb, as in (275). (275) Complement-taking t ‘finish’ […] amat lang kachinglu ketangpen kevang amat richo [am t l ng ke-chingl ke-t ng-pen ke-v ng am t rich 266 and.then water NMLZ-take.bath NMLZ-finish-NF:with NMLZ-come and.then king asopi aphan baplam a-oso-p a-ph n b p-l m] POSS-child-female POSS-NSUBJ press.down-RES:paste-like ‘[…] and then after having finished taking her bath, she was coming (home), and then (the rock) rolled over the king's daughter’ [RBT, ChM 026] 6.5.6.5. Completive - Completive - occurs just nine times in the corpus. There are six occurrences with ‘reach’ and three occurrences with t ‘get rid off’. One of the occurrences with t ‘get rid of’ is offered in (276). (276) Completive - Rengsopen Onso aphanke tidamroklo chevanvedetlo R ngs pen ns a-ph n ke t -d m-r -l che-v n-C -d t-l NAME=with NAME POSS-NSUBJ=TOP get.rid.off-GO-COMPL-RL RR-bring-NEG-PFV-RL '"I don't know at all (what to do). Go, in the future, you also become gods (praying to god)", he had gotten rid of Rengso and Onso' [CST, RO 054] One of the occurrences with ‘reach’ is shown in (277), where in addition to - , the perfective2 suffix -t is used. This is probably because the context is about reaching Chom arong, which is the mythological place of the dead for the Karbis, so reaching there is definite, with no possibility of returning.127 (277) Perfective2 -t in combination with completive - […] bangke Chom Rongme Chom Rongso letangrok […] [b ng ke Ch m r ng-m Ch m r ng-s l -t ng-r ] CLF:HUM:PL=TOP PLACE village-be.good PLACE village-small reach-PFV2-COMPL ‘[…] and she had already reached Chom arong, […]’ [KK, BMS 115] 127 This particular story that (277) is taken from is actually about the impossibility of returning from the place of the dead. Somewhat resembling the Greek story of Orpheus and Eurydice, the wife dies and the husband (the bamonpo) in the story travels to Chom arong to try and get his wife to come back to the world of the living with him. But even though the bamonpo does not make a particular mistake like Orpheus, his wife still ends up having to go back to Chom arong. 267 6.5.6.6. Perfective3 - t Perfective3 - t only occurs once in the corpus, with t ‘finish’, as shown in (278). (278) Perfective - t amat jutletlo am t j t-l t-l and.then finish-PFV3-RL ‘and then, it (the story) is finished’ [SiT, PS 047] 6.5.6.7. Durative - Like perfective3 - t, durative - also only occurs once in the corpus, see (279). (279) Durative - [… ] mendu chikimra hadak doklungnang […] [mend che-k m-ra h d k d -kl ng-n ng] field.hut RR-build-NF:IRR paddy you weed there stay-DUR-HORT '"[…] let's build us a field hut, and stay there for a long time […]' [KTa, TCS 007] 6.5.7. Other Functions 6.5.7.1. Involvement - ~- ‘JOIN’ The involvement derivation - ~- ‘JOIN’ (grammaticalized from the lexical verb ‘join, follow’) is mentioned as an associated motion suffix in §6.5.4, due to examples such as (280), where - ~- ‘JOIN’ indicates that the event is conceptualized against the background of a motion event. Here, in an example from a folk story, a frog tells an ant to pass through between his legs (as the frog is sitting in a way such that the road is blocked). As the ant is passing through, however, which is the backgrounded motion event, the frog sits down, on the ant. (280) Involvement - ~- ‘JOIN’: acting on an object in motion […] akengdak arum kilut ahut amat… [a-k ng-d k ar m ke-l t ah t am t 268 POSS-foot-road.inbetween down NMLZ-enter during and.then anborpenpen chongho abang ingnidunpret n-b r p n~p n chongh ab ng ingn -d n-pr t rice-wrapped.bundle=with~DISTR.PL frog NPDL sit-JOIN-acting.on.inflated.object ‘[…] and as (the ant) was passing through between the frog’s legs, with all its rice bundles, the frog sat down (pressing down the rice bundles)’ [RBT, ChM 016] The next two examples (281) and (282) show, however, that - ~- ‘JOIN’ can also be used in contexts that do not necessarily involve motion. The larger and more abstract function of - ~- ‘JOIN’ thus has to do with indicating that the event is conceptualized as occurring in the context of (or intervening in) an already established event, which may be a motion event, but does not have to be one. In (281), a procedural text about traditional Karbi cooking with alkaline foods by using ashes, the speaker explains that after the fire has burned down the field, it is necessary to pick up the ashes quickly. The idea is that picking up the ashes quickly intervenes in a process, which is culturally known to occur otherwise, which is that the ashes that need to be collected will become wet in the morning dew or will be blown away by the wind, or will in some other way become unavailable. (281) Involvement - ~- ‘JOIN’: acting against the background of an ongoing (natural) process ansi laso anglong arit kepan alongsi me nsi las a-ingl ng a-r t ke-p n al ng si m after.that this POSS-hill POSS-field NMLZ-clear.vegetation LOC=FOC:RL fire kaipo lasi laso arjang aphelosi k i-p las las arj ng a-phel si set.fire-IRR1 therefore this immature.bamboo POSS-alkaline=FOC:RL elitum humdunji e-li-t m h m-d n-j 1PL.INCL-HON-PL pick.up-JOIN-IRR2 ‘after that, on the hill fields where we have cleared the vegetation, we have to set a fire and then these ashes from the immature bamboo we have to pick up together’ [SiH, KH 003] 269 In (282), the context of a war between England and Japan is already established. The use of - ~- ‘JOIN’ on verbs such as t ‘die’ or ‘fight’ indicates that these events are supposed to be understood in the already established context of this war.128 (282) Involvement - ~- ‘JOIN’: event seen in context of another event halaso ahut kithidun Britainpen ke'ongdung [h las ah t ke-th -d n Britain=pen ke- ng-d ng that during NMLZ-die-JOIN Britain=from NMLZ-exist.much-INTENS t t a-regiment d - ] [las a-regiment k l ~l POSS-regiment exist-much this POSS-regiment which~DIST.PL amonitpenloma, koloso aregimentpensi, ladak a-mon t=pen-l ma] [k l -s a-regiment=pen=si] lad k POSS-man=with-RL=Q which-DEM POSS-regiment=with=FOC:RL here kachedandunra kithidunma] ke-che-d n-d n-r ke-th -d n=ma NMLZ-RR-fight-JOIN-NF:IRR NMLZ-die-NF:with NMLZ-die-JOIN=Q ‘at the time, too many from the British died, many regiments died, from which different regiments are the people (that have died), from which regiment they are, did they fight together here, and did they die together (their names have been written here on the epitaphs)’ [SiT, HF 028] Finally, (283) shows that the involvement suffix - ~- ‘JOIN’ can also be used with an additive function, in which case it corresponds to the occurrence of the additive particle on a noun phrase in the clause. (283) Involvement - ~- ‘JOIN’ with additive function laso ahormu abangke kadokave akheita [[las a-horm ab ng ke kad kav a-kh i t this POSS-thing NPDL=TOP all POSS-community=ADD:EXH kacharlidunke mesen pusi neli matha ke-charl -d n=ke m -s n] pusi] n -l math NMLZ-study-JOIN=TOP be.good-INTENS QUOT.COMP 1EXCL-HON think ‘I think for this thing, it would be good for everybody from every tribe (i.e. everybody in 128 Note that although - ~- ‘JOIN’ can have an additive function as in (283), the suffix here does not have an additive function in the sense of ‘Japanese soldiers died and British soldiers died, too’. It would be perfectly grammatical to say ‘in this war, not a single British soldier died’ and use t - - ‘die-JOIN-NEG’ as the verb. 270 the world) to (also) learn it’ [SiT, HF 044] More evidence for this analysis of - n~- n comes from its idiomatic use with certain verbs such as thàk 'answer', 'listen', and dèng 'accept'. The semantics of these verbs inherently imply that there is a context in which these actions are performed: answering requires prior asking, listening requires prior talking or any other existence of sound, and accepting requires prior giving. 6.5.7.2. Formal - The suffix - is used as a marker of a formal register or style (§12.4.2). As seen in (284) and (285), - is placed closest to the root, even breaking up near-lexicalized root-suffix sequences such as - ‘be.good-INTENS’ and - ‘listen-GET’. (Note that - is on the far lexical end of the lexical-grammatical continuum of predicate derivations; to my knowledge, it does not occur with any root other than ‘be good’.) This very salient placement of - may be reflective of its social importance. (284) Formal - si aphrangsi nanglimen chethan asonte s a-phr ng-s nang-li-m n che-th n as n-t therefore POSS-first-SPLT 2POSS-HON-name RR-tell like-COND me'iksenji m - k-s n-j be.good-FRML-INTENS-IRR2 ‘so first, if you could tell us your name, that would be wonderful’ [KaR, SWK 004] (285) Formal - nangli aphrangphrang, hakoko alam sitame n ng-l aphr ng~phr ng hak ~k a-l m sit m you-HON first~DIST.PL that.time~DIST.PL POSS-matter although arju'iklong tahailo arj - k-l ng tah i-l listen-FRML-GET DUBIT-RL 'you most probably have heard the different matters about the old days' [KaR, SWK 059] 271 6.6. Reduplication Full reduplication of the last syllable of the verb stem (either with or without vowel change, see §3.8.6.1 and §3.8.6.2) indicates a habitual reading, plurality of an argument or the iterative, or intensification, as shown in the respective sections below. 6.6.1. Habitual In (286), reduplication of the last syllable of the verb stem - ‘eat-JOIN’, i.e., - ‘eat-JOIN~HAB’ indicates the habitual. (286) Reduplication of last syllable of verb stem indicating habitual [netumta nangtum nangpipo longle thak [ne-t m t nang-t m nang p -p longl ath k 1EXCL-PL=ADD:also 2-PL 1/2:NSUBJ=give-IRR1 earth on.top nangbokchom titisi] neta nang b k-ch m tit -si n t 1/2:NSUBJ=serve.small.items-a.little habitually-NF:RL 1EXCL=ADD:also nangkechodundun nang=ke-ch -d n d n CIS=NMLZ-eat-JOIN~HAB ‘to us you would also give us, on the ground always you would serve us (food), I also used to eat like that’ [KK, BMS 060] 6.6.2. Argument Plurality and Iterative In (287), the reduplication of t - ‘be.big-much’ indicates the plurality of the S argument. (287) Reduplication indicating plural of S argument latum phelangpenta kali tinpenta [l -t m [[phel ng pen t kal ] [t n pen t this-PL thatch=with=ADD:also:PRL NEG.EQU.COP tin( ingnekmeme alam asonlo […] las a-b ng arj -l ng~l ng hed ingn k-m m a-l m as n-l this POSS-CLF:HUM:PL hear-GET~ITER okay? laugh-inducing POSS-matter like-RL ‘[…] this I got to hear from different sources, it's like a laughable (funny) matter […]’ [KaR, SWK 070] In (289), the reduplication of - t indicates a repeated, iterative event of beating. (289) Reduplication indicating iterative chongho aphan jamir abupen sapphratphratdet chongh aph n [jam r a-b pen] s p-phr t~phr t-d t frog NSUBJ grain.sp POSS-bundle=with beat.w/sth.flexible-sd.beating~ITER-PFV amat abang pevangphrok am t [a-b ng pe-v ng-phr k] and.then POSS-CLF:HUM:PL CAUS-come-bulging.out ‘and with a bundle of jamir they kept beating the frog so his skin got swollen’ [RBT, ChM 079] 6.6.3. Intensification Finally, reduplication of verb stems, in particular those including a predicate derivation, may also indicate intensification, as in (290), where - can be translated as ‘very quietly or secretly’. 273 (290) Reduplication indicating intensification anungpen damjoijoisi berdamphlutlo tangho an ng-p n d m-j i j i-si b r-d m-phl t-l t ngh back-from go-quietly~INTENS-NF:RL press.down-GO-miss/fail-RL REP {mm} berdamphlut {mm} b r-d m-phl t AFF press.down-GO-miss/fail ‘from behind he was very secretly approaching and tried to jump on him, but failed’ [HK, TR 052] 6.7. Negative - (Onset Reduplication) The onset reduplicative negative suffix represents the main verbal negation construction (for nominal negation, the negative equational copula is used, see §4.6.2.2 and §8.1.1). For (morpho-)phonological details, see §3.8.6.3. Morphosyntactically, the negative suffix forms the ‘right edge’ of the derivational verbal complex or verb stem (§6.2.1). An example of the negative suffix in a complex verb is (291). (291) Onset reduplicative negative suffix - […] adappen hadakpen nangchesikmek'et'edetlo a-d p pen h d k pen nang che-s k-m k- t- -d t-l POSS-morning=from there=from CIS=RR-prepare-in.advance-all:S/O-NEG-PFV-RL ‘[…] from the morning from there we hadn't prepared it (well)’ [SH, CSM 062] 6.8. Post-Stem Aspect: Exhaustive Perfective - t and Experiential - 6.8.1. Exhaustive Perfective - t Perfective - t occurs with high frequency in the corpus (at a total of 134 occurrences). There are three semantic components to it: perfectivity, exhaustiveness, and, though much less prominently and less consistently, a stance component of a negative evaluation of the event by the speaker (in the sense of ‘did X but should not have’). 274 The perfective component is the most consistent semantic component of - t. It is particularly clear in examples such as (292), where a negated past event is expressed, i.e., something that did not happen.129 Keep in mind that - ‘realis’ (which on non-negated stems typically has past implications) results in a future reading if directly attached to a negated stem (e.g., - - ‘go-NEG-RL’ > ‘won’t go’, see §6.9.1.2). Therefore, in order to express a negated past event, perfective - t is required, following which - ‘realis’ again has past implications even on negated stems. (292) Exhaustive perfective - t between negative - and realis - […] adappen hadakpen nangchesikmek'et'edetlo a-d p pen h d k=pen nang che-s k-m k- t- -d t-l POSS-morning=from there=from CIS=RR-prepare-in.advance-all:S/O-NEG-PFV-RL ‘[…] from the morning from there we hadn't prepared it (well)’ [SH, CSM 062] Perhaps ultimately related to this perfective function, the presence of - t also allows the irrealis suffixes - and - to occur in conjunction with a negated stem, as in (293), which is otherwise not possible (§6.2.3.1). (293) Exhaustive perfective - t between negative - and irrealis suffix “ ” nephan arjulo amatsi neta ch k-j ma pu ne-ph n arj -l am tsi n t be.fine-IRR2=Q QUOT 1EXCL-NSUBJ ask-RL and.then 1EXCL=ADD:CONV “ ; t M p -l ch k p si ch k-C -d t-p m -s n-l ke say-RL be.fine why be.fine-NEG-PFV-IRR1 be.good-INTENS-RL=TOP ” n-n i pu take-INFRML.COND.IMP QUOT '”is it fine?”, they asked me, and I replied, “it's fine, why would it not be fine?, it's okay, take (the interviews)”' [SH, CSM 049] The exhaustive semantic component of - t surfaces in examples such as - t ‘ate up’. In fact, this particular verb form was used frequently by six different Karbi 129 Another morphosyntactic type of occurrence of - t that especially highlights its perfectivity is in subordinate clauses with subordinator ‘after’. An example is - t ‘after watching’ (SH, CSM 060). 275 native speakers that participated in a pilot study using the Fish Film experimental protocol (Tomlin 1995), in which speakers repeatedly describe events of fish swallowing up entire other fish. Finally, there also appears to be a stance component associated with - t that at times surfaced in elicitation (although it remained difficult to pin down), such that the use of - t suggested that the speaker evaluated the occurrence of the - t marked event in a negative way, implying that it would have been better for the event not to actually have occurred. 6.8.2. Experiential - In the corpus and in most elicitation data, - only occurs on negated verb stems and thus appears to be a negative polarity experiental marker ‘never’. An example is keningjejepinpi in (294), which occurs inside a relative clause that marks exclamative force here. (294) - ‘never’ mh “an akai adin ne nangkapangreng mh [ n a-k i a-d n n nang=ke-pangr ng DSM that.much POSS-time( Hojai adak abangke b nset [Dobok =pen Hoj i a-d k ab ng ke] but PN=with PN PN POSS-road.inbetween NPDL=TOP tovar henopik tov r hen -p k road bad-very ‘but between Doboka and Hojai the road is very bad’ [SH, CSM 017] 281 anke tovar longle adukta dopiklo nke tov r [l ngl a-d k t ] d -p k-l and.then road road earth POSS-dust=ADD exist-very-RL ‘and then, there is also a lot of dust’ [SH, CSM 018] In (300), - does not occur on the first predicate, because 'being bad' is a general statement about the road. But the second predicate 'being very dusty' has to occur with - , because of the logical connection between both statements: Because the road is bad (meaning that it has many potholes), the road gets dusty (as dust accumulates in the potholes). Note that the second statement in isolation would not be marked with - . Just remarking that the road was very dusty, the most natural thing to say would be tovar longle aduk dopik. If one were to say it with - in isolation (outside the context of this story), i.e., tovar longle aduk dopiklo, it would actually translate more as 'the road was dustier now' implying a comparison with an earlier condition of the road (which might have been more or less dusty, but in any case different from the present condition). This implication is not present in (300). Instead of marking a change of state, maybe one could say that - here marks a conditioned state, or a conditioned quality as opposed to an intrinsic quality. Another example of - marking a conditioned state is (301), where the cause of ening arongpiklo '(we) were very happy' is mentioned just before (i.e., reaching just in time to see the own clan perform a certain ritual). (301) Realis - marking a conditioned state Amri asorsi rong-ketonglo anke Amr a-s r si r ng-ket ng-l nke PN POSS-people PN POSS-people=FOC:RL CEREMONY-RL and.then netumta Amri asorbo anke chephodunloklo ne-t m t Amr a-s r-b nke che-ph -d n-l k-l 1EXCL-PL=ADD:also PN POSS-people-also and.then RR-reach-JOIN-right.then-RL ening arongpiklo e-n ng ar ng-p k-l 1PL.INCL-mind be.happy-very-RL ‘it was the Amri people doing the Rongketong, and then we are also from Amri, and so 282 we happened to reach just in time for it, and (so) we were very happy’ [SH, CSM 030] 6.9.1.5. Correcting a Wrong Assumption Another context where - is used is in correcting a wrong assumption. Let us first consider (302), in which the storyteller mentions that the orphan had a shovel and a basket with him, as he went out to search for edible roots.134 (302) chingjor epak {chingjor epak?!} hak isi do chingj r e-p k chingj r e-p k h k is d shovel one-CLF.flat shovel one-CLF.flat finely.woven.bamboo.basket one exist 'one shovel, ...' {'one shovel?!'} one basket he had’ [HK, TR 016] The storyteller also mentions that the orphan had a small tobacco container with him, which will be of importance for the story at a later point, (303). (303) atema ajerjer do mati ho a-tem ajerj r d mat h POSS-tobacco.container( “dolo ” {mm} d -l t p -b m-l t ngh l ke d -l mm exist-RL EMPH say-CONT-RL REP this=TOP exist-RL AFF '”definitely, it's there!” this one (i.e., the orphan) kept saying, “it's there!”' [HK, TR 088] 135 In this story, of course only the possession of a knife (and not the other items) is a clarifying or correcting statement - however, it seems reasonable that in this context the storyteller just clarifies overall what all things the orphan is carrying along. 284 6.9.1.6. Summary Karbi - combines elements of perfective aspect as well as elements of a more abstract pragmatic category of contextuality. On the one hand, it resembles perfective aspect in occurring on event sequences in narratives, and on negated action verbs to yield a future sense (§6.9.1.2), as well as in occurring on adjectival and stative verbs to indicate a change of state (§6.9.1.3). On the other hand, there are a number of contexts, in which - occurs, which are not covered by the notion of perfectivity. Specifically, - occurs robustly in situations of indicating a logical relationship (§6.9.1.4), or when correcting or clarifying wrong assumptions (§6.9.1.5). 6.9.1.7. Realis - on Nominal Predicates and Focus =lo While not as frequent as on verbal predicates, - ‘realis’ also occurs on nominal predicates. The function of adding - to nominal predicates appears to only ever be one of emphasis or (active) assertion: On nominal predicates, - only resembles verbal - where it indicates a situation of ‘correcting or clarifying a wrong assumption’ (§6.9.1.5). The other functions of - on stative verbs detailed in the preceding sections, i.e., change of state (§6.9.1.3), and indicating a logical relationship (§6.9.1.4), are not attested once for ‘nominal’ - . An example of -l on a nominal predicate is (306). This folk story is about why two subclans, the Dili and the Rongchecho, split up, which goes back to two brothers of the same names that have a falling out. In this intonation unit, this falling out is declared by one of them with the words ‘you are Dili, I am Rongchecho’, marking the ‘you are Dili’ assertion with - . (306) Realis - on nominal predicate “ D > R t ” chepulo tangho n ng ke Dil -l n ke Rongchetch las n che-p -l t ngh you=TOP PN-RL you=TOP 1EXCL=TOP PN that.way RR-say-RL REP '"[…] you are Dili, , I am Rongchecho”, like this they said to each other' [KTa, TCS 089] 285 The fact that verbal - and nominal - overlap to some degree but not entirely in their functional range could be taken to consider them two different morphemes. However, consider that irrealis - and - also occur on nominal predicates in examples like (307), as do other verbal affixes more generally, which is shown in §4.1.2. (307) Irrealis - on numeral plus classifier - t functioning as a nominal stem anke komat aphansi kipitekangpo, [ nke [kom t a-ph n si] ke-p -tek ng-p ] and.then who POSS-NSUBJ=FOC NMLZ-give-leave.behind-IRR1 inutvetpo e-n t-v t- one-CLF:HUM:SG-only-IRR1 ‘but who will (we) give (her) to, (she) will be alone’ [SH, CSM 063] In light of the larger word class agnosticism underlying the fact that elements from any of the larger word classes can function as predicates in Karbi (§4.3), it makes most sense to propose only one morpheme - ‘realis’, which occurs in both verbal and nominal predicates. (I do recognize there to be another lo morpheme, which does not occur on predicates, which is =lo ‘focus’, discussed below.) A number of language consultants have suggested that there also exists a form , which may be related to - . An example of this form is offered in (308). However, occurs in a restricted number of contexts, almost all of which contain the demonstrative . This form appears to be a more formal or otherwise special variant of the simple realis. It is glossed here as ‘realis:emphatic’ (‘RL:EMPH’). A compatible account of is offered by Grüßner (1978: 132), who parses into he and - , with he analyzed as a pragmatic sentence-final type particle (see §12.3.9 on =he). (308) bai pei nangingjinso'un'e nangtum aphan, b i p i nang ingj ns - n-C nang-t m a-ph n how.mean! mother 1/2:NSUBJ=have.pity-be.able-NEG you-PL POSS-NSUBJ o lahelo lason chungkreng kedo marjeng la-hel las n chungkr ng ke-d marj ng 286 EXCLAM this-RL:EMPH that.way be.thin NMLZ-exist be.thin kedo lok'hu kedo lokphlep kedo ke-d l kh ke-d l kphl p ke-d NMLZ-exist be.pale NMLZ-exist be.pale NMLZ-exist 'how mean!, I can't tell you how much pity I feel for you, oh that's why you're so thin and so pale' [CST, RO 040] Finally, in addition to - on predicates, there also are a few occurrences of a lo marker that occurs on other elements in the clause. While not being frequent, the distribution resembles the one of realis focus =si, which is why this lo is treated as a focus marker =lo. Specifically, =lo ‘focus’ occurs on interrogative pronouns (309), on an NP, here the O argument (with the verb formally nominalized) (310), and on the discourse connector t ‘and then’ (311). This is parallel to =si ‘focus:realis’, which also occurs on interrogative pronouns and specifically on focused elements in a construction that involves a (diachronically) nominalized verb (§9.7.3.1), and on discourse connectors (§10.7.3). (309) Focus =lo on interrogative pronoun ne kopilo kevipo laho n kop lo ke-v -p l -ho 1EXCL what=FOC NMLZ-do-IRR1 this-EMPH:INTERACT 'what should I do?' [CST, HM 013] (310) Focus =lo on NP (O argument) nangphanlo nangkeponpo {mm} n ng-ph n lo nang=ke-p n-p mm you-NSUBJ=FOC 1/2:NSUBJ=NMLZ-take.away-IRR1 AFF ‘it is you who we have to take’ [HK, TR 063] (311) Focus =lo on discourse connector t ‘and then’ amatlo la kroikrelo am t lo l kr i-C -l and.then=FOC this agree-NEG-RL ‘and then, she disagreed’ [SeT, MTN 009] Also note (312), where a sentence involving focus realis =si produced by one speaker (not the main storyteller here, as indicated by the curly brackets) is repeated as a 287 way of confirming it by the main storyteller. Crucially, however, in repeating it, the storyteller uses =lo instead of =si, which demonstrates that the two clitics have equivalent focus-marking functions here. (312) Focus =lo used to substitute focus realis =si {akejoisi longdunlokpo, eli} a-ke-j i=si l ng-d n-l k-p -l POSS-NMLZ-be.for.free/in.vain=FOC:RL get-JOIN-definitely-IRR1 1PL:INCL-HON akejoilo ili longdunpo a-ke-j i=lo -li l ng-d n-p POSS-NMLZ-be.for.free/in.vain=FOC 1PL:INCL-HON get-JOIN-IRR1 ‘{we will get it without any effort}-we will get it without any effort’ [HK, TR 137] 6.9.2. Irrealis Marking: - and - There are two irrealis markers, - ‘irrealis1’ and - ‘irrealis2’, which both cover cross-linguistically typical irrealis categories associated with futurity. While - is used in the context of a more immediate, definite future/irrealis situation, - is used in more general, intentional, or indefinite future/irrealis contexts. For example, if one says ‘I will come over tomorrow’, they will be more likely to use - as compared to a statement such as ‘I will come over tomorrow at 2pm’, in which case the use of - is more likely. That said, the suffix - ‘definitely’ can be used in conjunction with - as well as with - , and it has proven difficult for my language consultants to imagine contexts in which only one of the two suffixes is truly acceptable and the other not acceptable. An illustrative example from the corpus is (313), where a question using the more indefinite or general - ‘irrealis2’ is replied to using the more definite - . (313) Irrealis2 - in question and irrealis1 - in reply “ahokma, methan- t “ a-h k ma meth n-sib ngp , ne p n-th k-j m POSS-truth=Q dog.sp 1EXCL:NSUBJ=take.away-know.how-IRR2=Q “ nangponthekpo ti, phu! n nang p n-th k- ti ph 288 EXCM 1EXCL 1/2:NSUBJ=take.away-know.how-IRR1 EMPH grandfather:VOC nangdunle nangdunnoi ho pulo tangho nang d n l nang d n-n i h p -l t ngh CIS=join=FOC:IRR CIS=join-INFRML.COND.IMP EMPH say-RL REP '"is it true, dog, you know how to take me?"' '"I certainly know how to take you there, grandfather. Just make sure to join me", he said' [KK, BMS 034-5] A similar example with - ‘irrealis2’ in the question, however the bare stem in the reply is (314). (314) Question with - ‘irrealis2’ (reply with bare stem) “ ” t t ch k-j =ma pu ne-ph n arj -l am tsi n t be.fine-IRR2=Q QUOT 1EXCL-NSUBJ ask-RL and.then 1EXCL=ADD:CONV “ ; t M […]” p -l ch p si ch k-C -d t-p m -s n-l ke say-RL be.fine why be.fine-NEG-PFV-IRR1 be.good-INTENS-RL=TOP '”is it fine?”, they asked me, and I replied, “it's fine, why would it not be fine?, it's okay, […]”' [SH, CSM 049] The following discussion offers examples of the various future irrealis functions of - and - . In §6.9.2.2, examples of past habitual marking, which apparently only occurs with - , are offered. 6.9.2.1. Functions Common to - and - Future irrealis contexts in which both - and - are used include simple future (§6.9.2.1.1); habitual marking in procedural texts (§6.9.2.1.2); hypotheticals and counterfactuals (§6.9.2.1.3); epistemic contexts of expressing uncertainty (§6.9.2.1.4); deontic contexts of expressing necessity and obligation (§6.9.2.1.5); desideratives (§6.9.2.1.6); and, finally, purpose clauses (§6.9.2.1.7). 6.9.2.1.1. Future Marking Examples (315) and (316) are from the same text and refer to the same situation, talking about the future as indicated by the time adverb ‘tomorrow’. Perhaps somewhat unexpectedly, the first instance in (315) is marked by - ‘irrealis1’, which 289 generally is the more definite, immediate future irrealis marker, and the following instances in (316) are marked by - ‘irrealis2’, the generally more indefinite marker, including, in the last of three repetitions, - in conjunction with - ‘definitely’. Perhaps the use of - here emphasizes the intention of the speaker. (315) Future marking function of - penap Rongker alongsi vangpo {mm} […] pen p R ngk r al ng si v ng- mm tomorrow FESTIVAL LOC=FOC come-IRR1 AFF ‘tomorrow we will come to the place of the Rongker, […]’ [HK, TR 107] (316) Future marking function of - anke.... halake hangdunbomlo {mm} “penap vangji, ank h la ke h ng-d n-b m-l mm pen p v ng-j and.then that=TOP call-JOIN-CONT-RL AFF tomorrow come-IRR2 penapthuke vangji, vangvekji” pu tangho […] pen p-th ke v ng-j v ng-v k-j pu t ngh tomorrow-again=TOP come-IRR2 come-definitely-IRR2 QUOT REP ‘and then, he keeps shouting, “tomorrow I will come, when it's a new day again tomorrow, I will come, definitely I will come” he said […]’ [HK, TR 115] 6.9.2.1.2. Habitual Marking in Procedural Texts In the excerpt (317), three subsequent intonation units from a procedural text are offered, all of which have the final verb marked with - , as is typical. (317) Habitual marking function of - in procedural text ansi pholo ingdaklote hekpo nsi phol ingd k-l -t h k- after.that cotton disperse-RL-COND remove.cover-IRR1 ‘then, when the cotton gets dispersed, we open up (the seeds)’ [KST, PSu 004] t las takir pen j ng- therefore spindle( arm t j r-h r-j =ma} mm j r-h r-l tail=ADD:also be.standing.up-high.up-IRR2=Q AFF be.standing.up-high.up-RL ‘{and (the tiger’s) tail might have been lifted up (as he was running off)?}-(yes, his) tail was lifted up ()’ [HK, TR 117] Preliminary elicitation suggests that - is also used to express uncertainty or for making guesses, although there are no instances in the corpus. 6.9.2.1.5. Expressing Necessity/Obligation The deontic verb ‘must, need’ almost always occurs with - ‘irrealis2’, as in (325), and there are a few instances in the corpus where it occurs with - ‘irrealis2’, such as (326). Realis - cannot be directly attached to , i.e., * - is unacceptable, but in conjunction with the intensifier - , which also occurs in (325), it 293 yields an acceptable verb form, i.e., - - (although there are only three occurrences of this form in the corpus). (325) - on ‘must’ {lang nangkokjike} l ng n ng-k k-j =ke} see must-INTENS-IRR2=TOP ‘{we must see! (if there is a tiger there) ’ [HK, TR 086] (326) - on ‘must’ […] nangpo […] [pin pen ke n n ng pen n ke che-k k n ng-p ] today=from=TOP 1EXCL you=from 1EXCL=TOP RR-part must-IRR1 ‘[…] “from today I will need to part from you” […]’ [SeT, MTN 039] 6.9.2.1.6. Expressing Desiderative Building on the conditional -te (§6.10.3), a desiderative construction can be formed by using one of the irrealis suffixes. This is shown in (327) and (328). (327) Desiderative function of - […] jo... to chirijite, chirinon j t che-r -j -t che-r -n n see OK RR-search-IRR2-COND RR-search-SUGG.IMP1 ‘[…] “see!, okay, if you feel like finding yourself a wife, then find yourself one”' [CST, RO 009] (328) Desiderative function of -j ako ingti tharmit ba birik jokjite, jokpo ak ingt tharm t b b r k j k-j -t , j k-p then salt turmeric or( pharla dam, e [ nke a-p i t pharl d m] DSM and.then POSS-mother=ADD:DM HESIT outside.part.Karbi.house go theng akhangra , hem damsi, [th ng a-khangr -k k-si] [h m d m-si] firewood POSS-basket.for.firewood leave-in.a.fixed.place-NF:RL house go-NF:RL hongkup , mok chepachusi, [hongk p ingn -l n-si] [m k che-pa-ch -si] entrance.area.Karbi.house sit-big:AO-NF:RL breast RR-CAUS-suck-NF:RL "dojoinoi, po!" [d -j i-n i p ] stay-quietly-INFRML.COND.IMP father ‘and then, the mother went and unloaded the firewood in the Pharla (Veranda), then went inside the house, sat down in the Hongkup, gave the child the milk, (and said) '”be quiet, daddy”' [KK, CC 015] (332) Clause chain with irrealis non-final -ra marked clauses mo n t [m nang-h m chV-d m a-hom i ke] [lap che-v ng-th -ra] future your-house RR-go POSS-time( nang=ke-r nang=ke-th i t 1/2:NSUBJ=NMLZ-serve 1/2:NSUBJ=NMLZ-serve=ADD kechepameso kali la'an a'arleng ke-che-pe-m -s kal l n a-arl ng NMLZ-RR-CAUS-be.good-INTENS NEG.EQU.COP this that.much POSS-person keong angbong ke- ng angb ng NMLZ-be.much middle and then, that way we were joining them and reaching there, the people of the house served as really really well, amongst so many people [SH, CSM 039] (335) Non-final -pen on non-nominalized verb lasi longku arlo chepondetpen latum ok las longk arl che-p n-d t-pen l -t m k therefore cave inside RR-take.away-PFV-NF:with this-PL meat han akeme keme vanpilo h n a-ke-m ke-m v n-p -l prepared.vegetables POSS-NMLZ-be.good NMLZ-be.good bring-BEN-RL jatlo sonsi orabomlo j t-l las n si or -b m-l type(' [SiT, HF 034] 308 (352) NP structure: DEM - [NP]POSR - HN 138 amat la apiso abangke la jangthu abong am t l a-pis ab ng ke l j ngth a-b ng and.then this POSS-wife NPDL=TOP this oil POSS-bottle cheenlo amat khalun anung vekponlok che- n-l am t khal n an ng v k-p n-l k RR-take-RL and.then kd.big.basket back hang-take.away-not.main.action and then, the wife took herself the bottle of oil and hung it on the back of the khalun to carry it [SeT, MTN 044] (353) NP structure: DEM - HN - NUM hala arleng ebeng'an t […] h la arl ng e-b ng- n am tsi a-khal n ingp -v k-l that slope one-CLF:half-this.much and.then POSS-kd.big.basket open-RES:open-RL ‘she (had climbed) half of the slope and then she opened her khalun basket […]’ [SeT, MTN 050] (354) NP structure: NUM - PCT - HN laso ahut amat inut akaprek amonit las a-h t am t [e-n t a-ke- r a-mon t this POSS-during and.then one-CLF:HUM:SG POSS-NMLZ-be.different POSS-man abangke saikel nangardonsi vanglo... […] ab ng ke] saik l nang ard n-si v ng-l ... NPDL=TOP bicycle( thesere] kelik [[[a-meth ng] a-bir ] arl pen] e-s n theser ke-l k POSS-self POSS-garden inside=from one-CLF:thing POSS-fruit fruits IPFV-pluck ‘[…] one farmer from (inside) his (own) garden is picking a kind of fruit’ [SiT, PS 002] (356) NP structure: RC - NUM - HN […] kopipima ladak kelongdun ahormu hortar'an o ma l d ke-l ng-d n a-horm hort r n what~DIST.PL=Q here NMLZ-get-JOIN POSS-thing EE:horm all 138 For a discussion of preposed modifier embedding, and differential analyses of these kinds of examples as [DEM - [NP]POSR - HN] or [[DEM - NP]POSR - HN], see §7.4. 309 kirim kibi isi ahem do laso ke-r m ke-b RC [is ]NUM a-h m HN d las NMLZ-put.in.one.place NMLZ-keep one POSS-house exist this langdamlonglo l ng-d m-l ng-l see-GO-GET-RL ‘[…] there is one house where they put everything they got from the time of when the British were fighting against Japan, this we got to go and see’ [SiT, HF 056] (357) NP structure: NUM - [NP]POSR - HN aphrang ahut... inut arong agaonbura a-phr ng ah t e-n t a-r ng a-g onbur POSS-front during one-CLF:HUM:SG POSS-village POSS-village.headman( thesere] kelik [[[a-meth ng]i a-bir ] arl pen] e-s n theser ke-l k POSS-self POSS-garden inside=from one-CLF:thing POSS-fruit fruit IPFV-pluck ‘[…] [one farmer]i from (inside) hisi (own) garden is picking a kind of fruit’ [SiT, PS 002] 318 7.5.3. Other Preposed Modifiers 7.5.3.1. Interrogative Pronouns and Derived Indefinites Both interrogative pronouns and indefinites derived from interrogative pronouns with - may function as nominal modifiers. In (376) from a folk story, a squirrel is mad at a frog for destroying the ladder to its nest. Being sarcastic, it yells at the frog asking who it was who is so smart and strong and jumped and destroyed its ladder. Structurally, there are four coordinated noun phrases, all consisting of the interrogative pronoun t ‘who’ modifying deverbal nominals marked by a- ‘possessive’. A closer translation into English would be ‘which knowledgeable person’ and ‘which strong person’, but where English only has one general interrogative nominal modifier ‘which’, any interrogative pronoun or adverb regularly and systematically functions as a modifier in Karbi. (376) t ‘who’ functioning as nominal modifier amat karlesibongpota... aning thilo… “mat akethek, am t karl sib ngp t ... a-n ng th -l [m t a-ke-th ] and.then squirrel.sp =ADD POSS-mind be.short-RL who POSS-NMLZ-know.how mat akere, mat akangtang, [m t a-ke-r ] [m t a-ke-ingt ng] [m t who POSS-NMLZ-be.smart who POSS-NMLZ-be.strong who mat akangsaksi nedondon chonraima ” a-ke-ings si ne-dond n ch n-r i ma POSS-NMLZ-EE:ingt ng=FOC:RL 1EXCL:POSS-ladder jump-RES:solid.obj.breaking=Q pu, lata pu l t QUOT this=ADD:DM 'and then, the squirrel... got mad, “who is the wise one, who is the smart one, who is the strong and mighty one, who jumped on my ladder so it broke?” it (the squirrel) (said)' [RBT, ChM 019] Similarly, in (377), which was spontaneously uttered in the context of seeing a truck crowded with people going to a market, the interrogative adverb k ‘where’ modifies ‘market’. 319 (377) ‘where’ functioning as nominal modifier [ - = ] today where POSS-market(' [SiT, HF 034] Thus in these examples, both PCT and prototypical verb roots need to carry ke- ‘nominalizer’, but PCT-based modifiers follow their head noun, whereas prototypical verb-based modifiers precede them. In addition, however, a preceding relative clause requires its head noun to occur with a- ‘possessive’, whereas a following PCT-based modifier has an unmarked head noun. This follows the general pattern that head nouns with preceding modifiers are marked possessive (or modified) by a-, but head nouns with following modifiers remain unmarked (§7.4). 7.7.1.2. Pre-Head PCT-Based Modifiers (and Post-Head Relative Clauses) There also are a number of instances in the corpus in which a PCT modifier precedes its head noun. Examples (390), (391), and (392) show pre-head PCT modifiers that themselves are marked with the a- ‘possessive’ in addition to ke- ‘nominalizer’. (390) Pre-head PCT-based modifiers ‘be red’ and ‘be black’, marked with a- ke- ‘POSS-NMLZ-‘ akeer pusetame akiik pusetame a-ke- r set m a-ke- set m POSS-NMLZ-be.red likewise POSS-NMLZ-be.black likewise akala a- al r p -p POSS-color( ejo joni dolo nke ch -l j n-l e-j j -n d -l and.then eat-RL drink-RL one-night night-two stay-RL 'and then they ate and drank... they stayed a few nights' [KTa, TCS 039] 7.7.2.1.3. Not Fully Grammaticalized Classifier Construction In the ‘not fully grammaticalized’ classifier construction ([head noun] + [CLF- indep.NUM]), there is both a head noun and a classifier-numeral word. However, unlike the typical classifier construction, the classifier in this construction occurs with independent (rather than bound) numerals, which is why this is called ‘not fully grammaticalized’. An example is korte banghini in (401). (For a list of sortal and mensural classifiers that occur in this construction, see §4.4.1.1.2 and §4.4.1.2.2.) (401) Not fully grammaticalized classifier construction t te banghini ke la-t m b ng-hin ab ng ke [[ ort b ng-hin ] and.then this-PL CLF:HUM:PL-two NPDL=TOP brother CLF:HUM:PL-two 331 abangke aseme dokoklohe ab ng ke] a-sem d -k k-l he NPDL=TOP POSS-oath exist-firmly-RL=DM ‘and then, (between) the two brothers, the oath remains, you know’ [WR, BCS 023] 7.7.2.1.4. Non-Classifier (Direct Enumeration) Construction On the other end of the spectrum, the least grammaticalized or integrated construction is the ‘non-classifier’ or ‘direct enumeration’ construction ([head noun] [indep.NUM]). It looks just like a simple Western Indo-European-type enumeration construction, perhaps except for the differences in ordering possibilities, as numerals may precede or follow their head noun (§7.7.2.2). (For a list of nouns that so far are attested to occur in this enumeration construction, see §4.4.2). There is nothing classifier-like in this construction, and there is no evidence that this construction contains anything other than a numeral and a head noun that is modified by the numeral. Consider (402), which shows that the numerals need not be directly following or preceding their head noun. (402) Numerals , modifying achitchit arong in ‘non-classifier construction’ […] laso adak isi hini achitchit arong las a-d k is hin ach tch t a-r ng this POSS-road.inbetween one two tiny POSS-village kephopon do ke-ph -p n d NMLZ-reach-in.passing exist ‘[…] one the road inbetween / up to there, there were one or two tiny villages that we had driven past’ [SiT, HF 017] Another example from elicitation in (403) shows that in this construction, the indepedendent numeral may be removed from its head noun. In this example, the head noun is topicalized and left-dislocated, with the numeral in the main clause functioning anaphorically. 332 (403) Numeral functioning anaphorically in ‘non-classifier construction’ [ ] [ t hoton=si ] b.basket=TOP one exist but b.basket=FOC not.exist ‘as for hak bamboo baskets, there is one, but there is no hoton bamboo basket’ [Elicitation SiT 130905] 7.7.2.2. Pre- vs. Post-Head Order The enumerator (i.e., numeral or classifier-numeral word) is placed following the head noun when the emphasis is on the counting, i.e., typically in those cases, where the referent is already known (rather than newly introduced). Conversely, pre-head placement occurs in situations when a new participant is being introduced. In (404), the classifier-numeral word ejon occurs after the head noun methan- sibongpo because the context is one of counting: ‘one dog, his grandmother and his grandfather, all three’. At this point in the folk story, the dog is already known as one of the protagonists and not newly introduced. (404) Postposed enumerator: counting (/adding up) people “dah ” pu'ansi, methan-sibongpo ejon, d h pu- nsi [meth n-sib ngp e-j n] go! QUOT-after.that dog.sp one-CLF:animal aphipen aphu, mh bangkethom [a-ph pen a-ph ] mh b ng- eth m POSS-grandmother=with POSS-grandfather DSM CLF:HUM:PL-three vangchomchomchomchomchom v ng-ch m~ch m~ch m~ch m~ch m come-a.little~ITER~ITER~ITER~ITER '”let's go!”, and then one dog, his grandmother and his grandfather, all three, went step by step by step’ [KK, BMS 099] In (405), bangkethom occurs postposed to the head noun korte ‘brother(s)’, because here again, the emphasis is on the exact number, while the general referent ‘Bey brothers’ is already mentioned before. 333 (405) Postposed enumerator: specifying number after story character is introduced hako ahut hedi Bey atum korte bangkethom do tangho hak ah t hed [B y a-t m] [ ort b ng- eth m] d t ngh that.time during DM TITLE POSS-PL brother CLF:HUM:PL-three exist REP 'in the old days, you know, right?, there were three Bey brothers, they say' [WR, BCS 001] Finally, the pre-head placement of the enumerator inut in (406) is explained by the fact that a character is being newly introduced here. In fact, the use of a preposed ‘one’ enumerator is best understood as an indefinite article construction (§7.7.2.6.1). (406) Preposed enumerator: newly introducing story character laso ahut amat inut akaprek amonit las a-ah t am t e-n t a-ke-pr k a-mon t this POSS-during and.then one-CLF:HUM:SG POSS-NMLZ-be.different POSS-man abangke saikel nangardonsi vanglo... laso a-b ng ke saik l nang ard n-si v ng-lo... las NPDL=TOP bicycle( nangthemuchot nke [e-j n] nang t t-phl t nang th -m ch t and.then one-CLF:animal CIS=exit-suddenly.big.A/O COMP=be.big-COMPAR ‘and then, one (tiger) came out (of the jungle or some area in the Rongker ground) and he was bigger’ [HK, TR 172] 334 hala ejon nangtetphlut nangthemuchot {mm} [h la e-j n] nang t t-phl t nang th -m chot mm that one-CLF:animal CIS=exit-suddenly.big.A/O CIS=be.big-COMPAR AFF ‘that one came out and it was much bigger (than the previous one)’ [HK, TR 173] 7.7.2.4. Juxtaposition of Two Numerals or Classifier-Numeral Words to Indicate Indefiniteness or Vagueness Juxtaposition of two numerals or classifier-numeral words is used to indicate an indefinite (or vague) amount or number. In (408), inut banghini is vague about the exact number of people: ‘one or two (people)’. (408) Two juxtaposed classifier-numeral words: inut banghini ‘one or two (people)’ […] Boithalangso along neli inut banghini amonit Boithalangs a-l ng n -l [[e-n t b ng-hin ] a-mon t TOWN POSS-LOC 1EXCL-HON one-CLF:HUM:SG CLF-two POSS-man atumpen chetongji si aphrangsi nelitum a-t m en] che-t ng-j s a-phr ng-s ne-li-t m POSS-PL=with RR-meet-IRR2 therefore POSS-first-SPLT 1EXCL:POSS-HON=PL inut <'e> abangphipen chetongiklo e-n t a-b ngph pen che-t ng- k-l ] one-CLF:HUM:SG POSS-lady=with RR-meet-FRML-RL ‘[…] in Boithalangso I will meet with a few people... So first we are meeting with this lady’ [KaR, SWK 003] In (409) and (410), the pairing of numerals or classifier-numeral words meaning ‘two’ and ‘three’ as well as ‘five’ and ‘six’ represent idiomatic constructions with similar senses to English ‘a few’ and ‘many’. (409) Two juxtaposed classifier-numeral words: humni humthom ‘a few (houses)’ laso ahem langmepik; humni humthom lason do l so a-h m l ng-m -p k h m-n h m-th m las n d this POSS-house see-be.good-very CLF:house-two CLF:house-three that.way exist ‘those houses look very nice, there are a few (lit. two, three) of that kind’ [SiT, HF 049] 335 (410) Two juxtaposed classifier-numeral words: bangpho bangthrok ‘many (people)’ o nelimena amatta lapu'an bangpho o [ne-li-men am t t lap - n [b ng- h AFF 1EXCL:POSS-HON-self self=also like.this-up.to CLF:HUM:PL-five bangthrok osomar don rap a'osomar hem isi b ng-thr os -m r] d n r p a-oso-m r h m is CLF:HUM:PL-six child-PL relative EE:d n POSS-child-PL house whole pacho'et pajun'et mane hem pa-ch - t pa-j n- t] mane [h m CAUS-eat-PRF CAUS-drink-PRF I.mean( mam t [bam n-p aph n p n h la r ng is and.then wise.person( atumta Rongker pu do tangho hak arn ke [tek a-t m t ] [R ngk r pu] d t ngh that.time day=TOP tiger QUOT POSS-PL=ADD FESTIVAL QUOT exist REP ‘at that time (in the old days), tigers also (like humans) celebrated the Rongker [HK, TR 035] 7.8.3.1.3. Bisyndetic Coordination Additive =t also functions as a bisyndetic coordinator, as it occurs on each coordinated element (hence, bisyndetic). In (434), the three NPs y ’ , y ’ t, and akibi abang are coordinated by repeating the same clause three times, only replacing the coordinated NPs, marked by =t (§11.5.1.3). (434) Bisyndetic coordination piso some enlo anke Bey Ki'ik abangta p s s m n-l ] nke [B y ke- k ab ng t wife EE:p s take-RL and.then CLAN NMLZ-be.black NPDL=ADD ahem arit dolo Bey Ke'et abangta a-h m a-r t d -l ] [B y ke- t ab ng t POSS-house POSS-field exist-RL CLAN NMLZ-be.yellow NPDL=ADD ahem arit dolo Bey Ronghang abang, a-h m a-r t d -l ] [B y Rongh ng ab ng POSS-house POSS-field exist-RL CLAN CLAN NPDL akibi abangta ahem arit dolo a-ke-b ab ng t a-h m a-r t d -l ] POSS-NMLZ-be.small NPDL=ADD POSS-house POSS-field exist-RL 'they got married, and then Bey the Black had his (own) house and property, Bey the Fair likewise had his (own) house and property, and Bey Ronghang, the young one, also had his (own) house and property' [WR, BCS 004] The same parallelism construction (§12.1.1) can be used to coordinate clauses as in (435) (see §11.5.1.2). (435) Clause coordination via additive-marked NPs […] langta junlong anta cholon […] [l ng t j n-l ng n t ch -l ng water=ADD drink-GET rice=ADD eat-GET ‘[…] they got to drink water and they got to eat rice, […]’ [KK, BMS 056] 345 7.8.3.1.4. Scalar Additive ‘Even’ In addition to the non-scalar additive function of ‘also’, =t also indicates the scalar additive function of ‘even’, as in (436). (436) Scalar additive ‘even’ la abangke emekpen non'anta kethekdunlong […] l ab ng ke e-m k pen n n n t ke-th k-d n-l ng this NPDL=TOP 1PL.INCL-eye=with now=up.to=ADD NMLZ-see-JOIN-GET ‘I have seen this myself, even nowadays (they still do this) […]’ [KaR, SWK 080] Note that =t also appears to be part of the etymology of the concessive conjunction t t (§11.2.3.3). 7.8.3.1.5. Universal Quantification Additive =t also occurs in contexts in which it indicates universal quantification or exhaustiveness of a set. One such context are negative indefinite constructions, in which the indefinite pronoun is marked by =t , while the verb is negated, as in (437) (see also §4.5.6). (437) Negative indefinite construction with =t ‘additive’ […] laso atangka atibuk halake ajatta van'un'elo […] las a-t ngk a-tib k h la ke a-j t t v n- n- -l this POSS-money POSS-earthen.pot that=TOP POSS-type=ADD bring-be.able-NEG-RL ‘[…] all the earthen pots, that friend didn't manage to carry anything, […]’ [HK, TR 196] A related element that appears to have =t as a (diachronic) component is =t which is glossed as ‘any’ in (438) (here occurring in the general extender construction, §12.2.1). (438) =t ‘any’ ansi elitum pakrengdunpo, anke horpentame nsi e-li-t m pa-kr ng-d n-p nke h r pen t m then 1PL.INCL-HON-PL CAUS-be.dry-JOIN-IRR1 and.then liquor=with=any 346 jattame ingti patippo tokklingpo j t t m ingt pat p-p tokkl ng-p GENEX=any salt mix-IRR1 pound.until.tight-IRR1 ‘and then, we need to dry it, and then either with liquor or something else we need to mix it with salt and pound until it's tight/crushed to a paste’ [SiH, KH 013] 7.8.3.1.6. Intensifier Verb Construction Like several other clitics, =t also occurs in a copy verb construction (§12.2.3.2), in which a preposed verb copy is marked with the clitic, as in (439). With =t , the copy verb construction functions as an intensifier construction in declarative clauses. (439) Intensifier copy verb construction, main verb with - ‘much’ anke.... paprapta paprap'olo nke.... e- r t e- r - -l and.then CAUS-be.quick=ADD:INTENS CAUS-be.quick-much-RL ‘and then, (the tigers) did everything very quickly[…]’ [HK, TR 160] 7.8.3.1.7. Discourse (Information Structure) Function The topic-switch function of additive =t is discussed in §10.7.2. 7.8.3.2. Topic and Focus Clitics Besides additive =t , information structure clitics include =ke ‘topic’ (§10.7.1), =si ‘realis focus’ (§10.7.3), and =le ‘irrealis focus’ (§10.7.4). 347 CHAPTER VIII 8. MONOCLAUSAL PREDICATE CONSTRUCTIONS This chapter discusses predicate constructions beyond the simple verbal predicate. It offers an overview of monoclausal, single-event predicate constructions. Clause- combining constructions are discussed in Chapter XI. 8.1. Overview Most commonly, the predicate consists of at least one verb root, including both prototypical verb roots and property-concept term roots (§4.2). This chapter gives an overview of complex predicate constructions that (appear to) involve more than one word. Specifically, §8.2 offers a discussion of markers at the monoclausal endpoint of the complementation scale in Karbi, which may or may not be grouped with the heterogeneous category of predicate derivations (§6.5). In §8.3, adverbial constructions, including non-final marked constructions, are discussed. Two periphrastic constructions based on copulas are the topic of §8.4. In §8.5, a complex motion construction is mentioned, which requires further study. Finally, §8.6 outlines the various predicate constructions that involve noun-verb pairs. The remainder of this section is dedicated to a brief note on non-verbal predicate constructions and on verbal and nominal predicate negation. 8.1.1. Non-Verbal Predicate Constructions and Verbal vs. Nominal Negation Constructions As discussed in §4.1.2, §4.1.3, and §4.3, items from a large range of different syntactic categories can function, just as they are, as the predicate of a clause. As shown in those above sections, this includes nominal stems, adverbs, interrogative pronouns and adverbs, and interjections, and it is not clear that any particular element could not function as a predicate in Karbi. An example of a noun phrase functioning as the predicate is (440); for further examples, see the respective sections in Chapter IV. 348 (440) Noun phrase functioning as predicate halata kidukthektik amonitlo […] [h la t ]NP [ke-d k-thekt k a-mon t-l ]PRED( saikel along'an [saik l al ng- n] POSS-kd.basket LOC-up.to bicycle(, to the bicycle he brings the basket, the basket he is trying to put on the cycle [SiT, PS 021] One step closer to clause union, (449) offers an example of the complement- taking verb ‘start’. The complement clause verb ‘go’ directly precedes the main verb, but is marked dependent via nominalization with ke-. (449) Nominalized complement clause of ‘start’ chepaklangdampen... latum ke t che-pe-kl ng-d m-pen... l -t m [ke-d m-th ]CC pangch ng-l RR-CAUS-appear-go-NF:with this-PL NMLZ-go-again start-RL ‘after going to show them, they again started walking’ [SiT, PS 041] Finally, at the mono-clausal end of the continuum, we have the markers of interest in this section. They occur under the same intonation contour as the preceding main verb stem, for example - t ‘know how’ in (450). Compared to predicate derivations such as - - ‘JOIN’, however, which occurs both in (450) as well as in (451) below, the modal markers show some signs of morphosyntactic independence. This is discussed in the next section. (450) Monoclausal end of complementation scale: - t ‘know how’ bonsita hala ahemphu abangke chipudunthekthe b nset h la a-h mph ab ng ke che-p -d n-th -C but that POSS-house.owner.male.hon NPDL=TOP RR-say-JOIN-know.how-NEG ‘but that old man couldn't realize’ [SiT, PS 026] (451) Involvement - ~- ‘JOIN’: acting on an object in motion […] akengdak arum kilut ahut amat… [a-k ng-d k ar m ke-l t ah t am t POSS-foot-road.inbetween down NMLZ-enter during and.then 353 anborpenpen chongho abang ingnidunpret n-b r p n~p n chongh ab ng ingn -d n-pr t rice-wrapped.bundle=with~DISTR.PL frog NPDL sit-JOIN-acting.on.inflated.object ‘[…] and as (the ant) was passing through between the frog’s legs, with all its rice bundles, the frog sat down (pressing down the rice bundles)’ [RBT, ChM 016] 8.2.3. Morphosyntactic Tests for Structural Properties of Modals There are three morphosyntactic tests we can use to better describe the structural properties of the modals. While the first test shows the relative degree of morphological boundedness of these markers, the other two tests provide evidence for their morphological independence. 8.2.3.1. Under Scope of Nominalization along with Main Verb Root? First, markers such as - t ‘know how’ are under the scope of negation of the main verb, which is evidence for their morphological boundedness. In (452), the adverbial construction kemesenpen kechothek (see §8.3.4.1) is embedded into a nominalized adverbial clause headed by - ‘POSS-reason’ and therefore nominalized. (452) - t -)t ‘know how’ under scope of nominalization along with main verb root kemesenpen kechothek ajoine apotsi [ke-m s n-pen ke-ch -th a-join a-p t si NMLZ-be.good-NF:with NMLZ-eat-know.how POSS-reason POSS-because=FOC:RL ‘it's the reason why they know how to eat nicely’ [SiH, CW 022] On the other hand, truly independent complement-taking verbs like ‘begin’ are nominalized separately, as in (453). (453) c ‘begin’ separately nominalized t t gar pen v ng-d t aph si ne-t m d k pen Hongkr m car( ‘see’ and - ‘listen-GET’ > ‘hear’, where it resembles similar markers in other Asian languages (see discussions by Enfield (2003) and Jenny (2012), as well as, within Northeast India, Post (2007:491) for a discussion of the 'attainment' marker in Galo). In addition to these near-lexicalized occurrences, - ‘GET’ occurs in situations where the subject has a lack of control over an action or event. In contexts of desirable actions or events, a translation with English ‘get to V’ works. However, - ‘GET’ is also used in contexts of non-desirable actions or events, as long as there is a lack of control on part of the subject. In (465) and (466), - ‘GET’ occurs in contexts of desirable actions: first, where the action could be carried out, and second, where it could not, which is frequently the case such that - ‘GET’ often occurs in combination with negative - . 359 (465) Non-control - ‘GET’ in context of desirable action methan atum'anke abangke ha kasu keme harlung [[meth n a-t m- n ke] ab ng ke] h [kas ke-m harl ng dog POSS-PL-all=TOP NPDL=TOP over.there plate NMLZ-be.good bowl kemepen langta ke-m pen] [l ng t j n-l ng n t ch -l ng,] NMLZ-be.good=with water=ADD:COORD drink-GET rice=ADD:COORD eat-GET junlong anta cholong, pirtheta bangke mh [pirth t b ng ke] mh world=ADD:EXH NPDL=TOP DSM ‘all the dogs, there, they ate from brass plates and brass bowls, they got to drink water and they got to eat rice, everything’ [KK, BMS 056] (466) Negated non-control - ‘GET’ in context of desirable action tangke hala apei abang tunlongle

t ngke [[h la a-p i ab ng t n-l ng-C d ng-l ng-C -l ] thing and.then that POSS-mother NPDL cook-GET-NEG put.on.stove-GET-NEG-RL danglonglelo, aso kachiru ajoine, si "bai! han [a-os ke-chir a-join ] [las b i h n POSS-child NMLZ-cry POSS-reason( thengpi angsongpen nangkeklosi a-jirp ab ng ke thengp angs ng pen nang=ke-kl -si POSS-friend NPDL=TOP tree/wood high.up=from CIS=NMLZ-fall-NF:RL {mm} thinilo {mm} bonseta nangdunbor'ibor'alo mm th n -l mm b nset nang d n-bor -bor -l AFF be.almost.dead-RL AFF but CIS=join-w.great.effort-EE:bor -RL ‘[…] that friend had fallen down from the tree and hurt himself badly, but by trying very hard came home’ [HK, TR 196] 365 Finally, a verb with modal semantics as well but with a higher degree of morphosyntactic independence is t ‘desire’, which may be individually nominalized as shown in (486). (486) t ‘wish’ individually nominalized tumi nelitum Kohima kedam alamsi jerso [tum ne-li-t m K h m ke-d m a-l m si] j rs yesterday 1EXCL-HON-PL TOWN NMLZ-go POSS-matter=FOC:RL a.little than kangtung th n ke-ingt ng tell NMLZ-desire 'I want to tell just a little bit about when we went to Kohima yesterday' [SiT, HF 001] 8.3. Adverbial Constructions 8.3.1. Overview There are two proper adverbial constructions (ADVCs) in Karbi, as well as two non-final adverbial constructions (NF-ADVCs) that may function and be structured similarly to the proper adverbial constructions, and are therefore discussed here, too. All four constructions consist of a main verb and a derived adverbial element. In the two proper ADVCs, the adverbial element consists of a property-concept term (PCT; see §4.2) verbal stem; it always follows the main verb, as seen in Table 107. Table 107. Proper adverbial constructions (ADVCs) Schematic representation Involved affixes Causative ADVC [ [V] main verb [pa-V] adverbial ] pa- ‘CAUS’ Nominalization ADVC [ [ke-V] main verb [V] adverbial ] ke- ‘NMLZ’ In the ‘Causative ADVC’, the main verb is unmarked, while the adverbial element consists of a causative pa- marked PCT stem. In the ‘Nominalization ADVC’, the main verb is nominalized with ke-, while the adverbial element consists of a bare stem PCT. There is no apparent functional difference between these two proper ADVCs. Both occur in elicitation when the task is to translate from English into Karbi. 366 In addition to these two proper ADVCs, there are also two non-final adverbial constructions (NF-ADVCs), which resemble proper ADVCs functionally and structurally. As seen in Table 108, in NF-ADVCs, there also is an adverbial element that occurs juxtaposed to the main verb and modifies it like an adverbial. However, since in NF- ADVCs, the adverbial element is a non-final marked verb, it has to precede the main verb. Table 108. Non-final adverbial constructions (NF-ADVCs) Schematic representation Involved affixes Non-final -pen ADVC [ [ke-V-pen] adverbial [V] main verb ] ke- ‘NMLZ’ -pen ‘NF:with’ Non-final -si ADVC [ [ke-V-si] adverbial [V] main verb ] ke- ‘NMLZ’ -si ‘NF:RL’ While the NF-ADVC with -pen appears to be used with both PCT and prototypical (non-PCT) roots in the adverbial element, the NF-ADVC with -si ‘non-final:realis’ is so far only attested to occur with prototypical verb roots in the adverbial element. NF-ADVCs thus resemble the proper ADVCs, but they of course also resemble clause chaining constructions (§11.2.1.1). 8.3.2. Causative Adverbial Construction [V] main verb [pa-V] adverbial In the ‘Causative ADVC’, the main verb is unmarked, while the following adverbial element consists of a causative pa- marked PCT root and may take any inflectional suffixes. This is shown in (487), where the main verb ‘eat’ is followed by the causativized PCT root ‘be good’, which further has the realis suffix - attached. (487) Causative adverbial construction an han cho pamelo […] n h n ch a-m -l rice prepared.vegetables eat CAUS-be.good-RL ‘we ate well […]’ [SH, CSM 055] In (488), the causative adverbial construction occurs inside an elaborate expression (EE) construction, in which the verb ‘cook’ is expressed by the two stems t ‘cook’ and ‘put on stove’. The two stems both suffixing - ‘benefactive’ occur in a parallel fashion each followed by the adverbial element - ‘CAUS-be.good’, while 367 only the second EE element takes the inflectional imperative suffix - (see §12.2.2.2 for syntactic properties of EEs). (488) Causative adverbial construction in elaborate expression construction […] apot padap abangke, tunpi peme [ap t pad p ab ng ke [[t n- e-m ] because this.morning NPDL=TOP cook-BEN CAUS-be.good dangpi pemenoi! […] [d ng- e-m -n i ] put.on.stove-BEN CAUS-be.good-INFRML.COND.IMP ‘[…] “so this morning, cook and prepare them nicely for me […]”’' [SeT, MTN 029] Finally, there are a small number of instances in the corpus in which it looks like a causativized PCT root occurs in a causative adverbial construction with an ellipsed, contextually retrievable main verb, as in (489). Here it is plausible to interpret the causativized ‘be late’ as the adverbial element of the ellipsed main verb ‘come’ mentioned in the previous clause. (489) Causativized PCT root without main verb? penap vangalang… netum abang paderchotpo {mm} [pen p v ng-j -l ng] [[ne-t m ab ng] a-d r-ch t- mm tomorrow come-IRR2-still 1EXCL-PL NPDL CAUS-be.late-a.bit-IRR1 AFF 'tomorrow we are coming, but we will be a little bit late' [HK, TR 106] 8.3.3. Nominalization Adverbial Construction [ke-V] main verb [V] adverbial The nominalization adverbial construction is illustrated in (490). This construction consists of a ke- nominalized main verb, here klem ‘do’, followed by a PCT stem, mesen ‘be good, be nice’. (490) Nominalization adverbial construction Nagalen government laso kachari atum keklem mesen [[N g l n government] [las ke-char a-t m]] [ke- l m m -s n PLACE government this NMLZ-rule POSS-PL NMLZ-do be.good-INTENS ‘the government of Nagaland, the ruling people do a good job’ [SiT, HF 024] 368 Another example is (491), where the nominalization adverbial construction occurs inside a nominalized adverbial clause headed by - ‘POSS-reason’ (as well as an elaborate expression construction ‘live’ < ‘take’ and ‘eat’). The fact that the PCT stem t r is nominalized as well (as opposed to being under the scope of nominalization of the ke- on the preceding main verb) represents evidence that we are dealing with two separate grammatical verbs. (491) Nominalization adverbial construction inside nominalized (adverbial) clause ke'en kangthir ajoine kecho kangthir ajoine [ke- n ke-ingth r a-join ] [ke-ch ke-ingth r a-join ] NMLZ-take NMLZ-be.clean POSS-reason NMLZ-eat NMLZ-be.clean POSS-reason ‘because they live in a way of keeping everything clean’ [SiH, CW 018] 8.3.4. Non-Final Preposed Adverbial Constructions Non-final -pen and -si may occur on a nominalized verb in order to function as an adverbial element preceding the main verb. 8.3.4.1. Non-Final -pen Construction [ke-V-pen] adverbial [V] main verb In this non-final adverbial construction, the adverbial element takes -pen ‘non- final:with’. In (492), the adverbial element is furthermore nominalized with ke- (while the main verb -t ‘know how to eat’ is also nominalized due to being in a nominalized adverbial clause construction headed by - ‘POSS-reason’). (492) Non-final -pen construction kemesenpen kechothek ajoine apotsi [ke-m s n-pen ke-ch -th a-join a-p t si NMLZ-be.good-NF:with NMLZ-eat-know.how POSS-reason POSS-because=FOC:RL ‘it's the reason why they know how to eat nicely’ [SiH, CW 022] Grüßner (1978:60-61;89) also documents this adverbial construction, although in his data, the adverbial element is not nominalized. Note that Grüßner further reports that the adverbial element in this construction can be causativized, as in the causative adverbial construction (§8.3.2). As an example, consider (493), where data from Grüßner 369 are quoted: In (a), this construction with the preposed adverbial element marked with pe- ‘causative’ and -pen ‘non-final:with’ is illustrated. In (b), a semantically equivalent version, the causative adverbial construction is employed (§8.3.2). (493) Preposed adverbial construction with pe- ‘causative’ and -pen ‘non-final:with’ (a) - - -pen t - CAUS-be.clear CAUS-be.good-NF:with tell-RL ‘(s/he) told clearly and well’ (b) t - - - tell CAUS-be.clear CAUS-be.good-RL ‘id.’ (Grüßner (1978:89) Finally, consider (494), in which nominalized, non-final -pen marked verbs do not constitute a single clause with the final verb damlo because of the lack of a single intonation contour as well as the intervening adverb lason ‘this way’. Also, note that the non-final verbs here are all prototypical verbs rather than PCTs. This example also demonstrates the gradient nature of constructional categories. (494) Clause chaining construction with non-final verbs marked with ke- ‘NMLZ’ and -pen ‘non-final:with’ […] amatsi netum chepenangpen kangnekpen am tsi ne-t m che-pen ng-pen ke-ingn k-pen and.then 1EXCL-PL RR-make.fun-NF:with NMLZ-laugh-NF:with kachingnipen, lasonsi damlo ke-che-ingn -pen, l s n s d m-l NMLZ-RR-EE:ingn k-NF:with that.way=FOC:RL go-RL ‘we get to join and watch the Chomangkan, and so we are happy and everything, and then teasing each other and laughing each other, that's how we go’ [SH, CSM 021] 8.3.4.2. Non-PCT Root Construction [ke-V-si] adverbial [V] main verb Lastly, prototypical verbs (i.e., non-PCT roots) can be marked non-final with -si ‘non-final:realis’ and (typically) nominalized with ke- in order to express a simultaneous, and sometimes specifically manner indicating, event. In (495), ‘choose’ occurs 370 with nominalizer ke- and non-final -si indicating the manner in which the main event ‘eat’ occurred. (495) Non-PCT root non-final adverbial construction amat "mai pei! kaita nangtum lasonloma?" "o am t m i p i k i t nang-t m las n-l =ma and.then how.bad! mother always=ADD:EXH you-PL that.way-RL=Q vocative po! lasonlo netum khali p las n-l ne-t m khal father that.way-RL 1EXCL-PL always( thesere kelik a-bir arl pen] [e-s n theser ] ke-l k POSS-garden inside=from one-CLF:thing POSS-fruit fruits IPFV-pluck ‘there's a chicken crowing (in the background)... one cultivator (/farmer) from (inside) his own garden is picking one kind of fruit’ [SiT, PS 002] Note that the Tamangic language Thakali has an identical construction, structurally and seemingly also functionally, which, to make the match perfect, has the same form -si for the non-final marker (Georg 1996: 120).147 8.4.2. Copula Argument Quantification Construction There are nominal constructions to express argument quantification, such as the quantifying noun phrase clitic = ‘this much; all’ (§7.8.2), or using universally 146 In addition to the aspectual component, there may also be a pragmatic component of a presentational or sentence focus that is part of the function of this construction. More research on a larger number of examples is needed. 147 A non-final form -si occurs in a number of Himalayan Tibeto-Burman languages (§6.10.1). 373 quantifying pronouns such as ‘all, everbody’ (§4.5.6) as a modifier. But there also are verbal constructions that indirectly express argument quantification. These verbal constructions are based on argument quantification predicate derivations (PDs; §6.5.5.1). While these suffixes can attach to the main verb, there also is a nominalization-based construction: specifically, this involves an event or a participant nominalization of the main verb on the one hand, and, on the other hand, the existential copula with quantifying PDs attached to it. (In the case of an event nominalization, this then is an instance of the nominalization plus copula construction, see §9.7.1.) An example is (500), which actually was produced by my language consultant when asked for a translation of the English sentence ‘many people came’, which suggests that this construction is pragmatically neutral.148 (500) Copula argument quantification construction t - - person NMLZ-come exist-much:S/O ‘many people came’ [SiT 090302] A corpus example is (501), where the - quantification suffix on the copula has scope over the subject of the nominalized clause, ’ atum ‘the women’.149 (501) Corpus example of copula argument quantification construction […] angtan akam kachongdatdunji [[a-ingt n a-k m] ke-cho-ingd t-d n-j POSS-outside POSS-work NMLZ-AUTO.BEN/MAL-make.a.living-JOIN-IRR2 aphanta so'arlo atum kabor'i do'olo a-ph n t ] [s 'arl a-t m] ke-bor' d - -lo POSS-PURP=also women:COLL POSS-PL NMLZ-try exist-much:S/O-RL ‘[…] many women also try to get outside work’ [KaR, SWK 064] 148 While it is the simpler analysis to consider monit kevang an event nominalization, it is technically also possible to consider it an internally headed relative clause, with monit as the head noun. 149 Despite being structurally different from English due to the use of argument quantification predicate derivations, there may be a similar pragmatic function of this kind of construction in both Karbi and English, such that the nominalization construction with the existential copula serves a presentational function (i.e., the difference between ‘many women try to get a job’ and ‘there are many women trying to get a job’). 374 Similarly, in (502), the parsing of nangkelelesi suggests an interpretation of this word as a participant nominalization and therefore the =si as the focus marker. Another possibility is to interpret this as a non-final construction such that there is no focus marker =si but the realis non-final marker -si. (502) Copula argument quantification construction ha nangkelelesi ke'onglang {mm} h nang=ke-l -C si ke- ng-l ng mm over.there CIS=NMLZ-reach-NEG=FOC:RL NMLZ-exist.much-yet AFF ‘there still many of them haven't reached’ [HK, TR 183] 8.5. Complex Motion Constructions There are complex motion constructions that require further research. An example is vekponbom dambomlo in (503). The fact that - ‘continuative’ occurs twice suggests that this is a sequence of two independent verbs, but the fact that inflectional - ‘realis’ only occurs once at the end suggests that we are dealing with a juxtaposition of two stems.150 (503) Complex translocative motion construction with verbs in juxtaposition saikel vekponbom dambomlo, atheta [saik l v - n-b m d m-b m-l ] [a-th t bicycle( be born’. 377 still too much semantics associated with ‘rice, food’ that he adds the non-final marker -si and specifies: mok kangchir ‘be hungry (for breast milk)’. (506) Noun incorporation construction: ‘be hungry’ […] banghini hangjolo… an kangchirsi mok b ng-hin h ng-j -l ] n ke-ingch r-si m k CLF:HUM:PL-two call-many.continuously:S-RL rice NMLZ-be.hungry-NF:RL breast kangchir ke-ingch r NMLZ-be.hungry ‘[…] the two of them (i.e., babies), were crying loudly, they were hungry, they were hungry for milk' [CST, HM 027] 8.6.2. Psycho-Collocations and Possessed Noun Incorporation Southeast and East Asian languages commonly have a construction termed ‘psycho-collocation’ by Matisoff (1986:4): “a polymorphemic expression referring as a whole to a mental process, quality, or state, one of whose constituents is a psychonoun, i.e. a noun with explicit psychological reference (translatable by English words like HEART, MIND, SPIRIT, SOUL, TEMPER, NATURE, DISPOSITION, MOOD).”153 Karbi also has such psycho-collocations, with the obligatorily possessed - ‘mind, heart’ as the ‘psychonoun’,154 and various PCT and non-PCT verb roots as the other constituent. A few sample psycho-collocations are offered in Table 110. The right- hand column in the table offers glosses for those verbs that also occur outside the psycho- collocation. Note that several verb roots only occur in the psycho-collocation construction with - and not otherwise: ‘be happy’, ‘be sad’, and ‘want’. 153 In a way, this type of construction can be seen as the converse to possessor-raising constructions: instead of generalizing to an affected possessor, the psycho-collocation (and other possessed noun incorporation with incorporated body part terms, as discussed further below in this section) specifies the ‘possessed’ locus of the impact of an event, which in psycho-collocations is - ‘heart, mind’, but may be other body part terms. 154 Karbi - goes back to Proto-Tibeto-Burman * ŋ ‘heart’ (Matisoff 2003). Apparent cognates in Meithei are -niŋ ‘wish to V’ and a homophonous root with the meaning ‘head/mind’ (Chelliah 1997:215;333;512). 378 Table 110. Sample psycho-collocations Form Meaning Meaning without - - ‘be happy’ n/a ‘be sad’ n/a t ‘be mad’ <‘be short’ ‘be glad, be grateful’ <‘be cold’ ‘be calm, well-tempered’ <‘be good’ ‘be troubled’ < ‘be difficult’ t ‘hope’ <‘be big’ ‘want’ n/a ‘throw up’ <‘come’ As can be seen in Table 110, psycho-collocations include emotions and inner states, as well as bodily functions such as - ‘throw up’. While Karbi native speakers agree that in careful speech - is obligatorily possessed, there are a number of counter-examples in the corpus. In elicitation, - ng ‘(1EXCL) 1EXCL:POSS-mind be.happy’ is typically used to translate ‘I’m happy’ into Karbi. In discourse, however, examples such as (507), where just without a possessive prefix are used, are not uncommon. (507) Psycho-collocation with no overt possessive prefix on - anke lapu thoi asorpen hapu Rongkhang anatthu nke lap th i a-s r=pen h p Rongkh ng a-n tth and.then this.side plains POSS-people=from that.side AREA POSS-direction aChomangkanke neta ketheklongchenglo aronta a-Chomangkan=ke n t ke-thekl ng-ch ng-l a-r n t POSS-PN=TOP 1EXCL=also NMLZ-see-for.first.time-RL POSS-custom=also chinidun'o'e setame ning arongpiklo chin -d n- -C set m n ng ar ng- -l know-JOIN-much-NEG nevertheless mind be.happy-very-RL ‘and then, the Chomangkan of people from this side, from the plains, and from that side, the Ronghang side, I also see for the first time’ [SH, CSM 044] While psycho-collocations generally express inner states or emotions, or at least generally only intransitive predicates, the expression - ‘be happy’ is used 379 transitively as ‘be grateful to (somebody)’ in (508). Also, in (509), the reciprocal prefix che- is used with - ‘be sad’ to express ‘be upset with one another’. (508) Psycho-collocation used transitively […] laphan aning ingsamsi thesere pumni tekanglo [l -ph n a-n ng ings m-si] [theser p m-n tek ng-l ] this-NSUBJ POSS-mind be.cold-NF:RL fruits CLF:round-two leave.for-RL ‘[…] he (the bicycle boy) was grateful to him (the boy who had picked up his hat for him) and gave him two pieces of fruit’ [SiT, PS 039] (509) Psycho-collocation used with reciprocal che- […] anke ha aphike la Bey Ke'etpen nke h aph ke [l B y ke- t pen and.then over.there after=TOP this CLAN NMLZ-be.yellow/fair=with Bey Ki'ik abangke aning che'oitanglo B y ke- k ab ng ke] a-n ng che- i-t ng-l CLAN NMLZ-be.black NPDL=TOP POSS-mind RR-be.sad-finish-RL ‘[…], and then quite some time later, Bey the Fair and Bey the Black got upset with each other’ [WR, BCS 017] In addition to psycho-collocations, there are a few other noun incorporation expressions which also occur with an ‘obligatorily possessed’ noun (ignoring reduction in colloquial speech). Three such expressions are attested so far, which are listed in Table 111. Note that in all three expressions, the incorporated noun refers to a body part that is saliently involved in the event.155 Table 111. Possessed noun incorporation expressions (non-psycho-collocations) Noun incorporation expression Incorporated noun - ‘wake up’ - k ‘eye’ - t ‘be born’ - ‘face’ - ‘be hungry’ - ‘stomach’ Two of the possessed noun incorporation expressions are illustrated in (510) and (511). 155 Beyond a notion of ‘salient involvement’, it is not possible to characterize the role of the referent with respect to a particular semantic role (which is generally possible with nouns in non-possessed noun incorporation expressions (§8.6.1)). 380 (510) Noun incorporation construction: - ‘wake up’ d n-j i-l nke a-d p a-m nang r ng-l join-away-RL and.then POSS-morning POSS-eye CIS=wake.up-RL she had joined him and gone away with him, and then, in the morning, they (anybody in the village;; or Bamonpo) woke up [KK, BMS 119] (511) Noun incorporation construction: t ‘be born’ hem arlo osomar amahang theklo […] [h m arl ] [os -m r] [a-mah ng th -l ] house inside child-PL POSS-face see-RL ‘inside the house, the children were born, […]’ [CST, HM 009] An analogous construction is a ‘measuring’ construction, which includes overt reference to the dimension along which the measuring takes place. In (512), the description of a person as being short includes the noun - ‘height’. (512) Incorporated noun as reference dimension in measuring expressions amat amonitta ajon thihek am t a-mon t t a-j n th -h k and.then POSS-man=also POSS-height be.short-small ‘and then, the person is short’ [SiT, PS 022] Finally, an interesting example illustrating the same basic possessed noun incorporation construction is (513). Here the property of ‘be fat/healthy’ is highlighted as a physical property by including the possessed noun - ‘body’. (513) Reference noun construction t gbang nke [d k che-v ng-p ] [p a-p t si] n ng nang-b ng and.then here RR-come-IRR1 what POSS-reason=FOC:RL you 2:POSS-body lengvaretmati, sarbura" pu l ng-var t mati s rbur pu be.fat.HUM-INTENS=CG old.man QUOT ‘and then he would return, "why are you so fat/healthy, man? (That's very strange!)"’ [SeT, MTN 025] 381 8.6.3. Light Verb Construction In light verb constructions, the semantics of a predicate is provided by a noun, while the verb only offers structural ‘verbiness’. In (514) and (515), the verbs ‘give’ and ‘make, do’ act as light verbs with the nouns ‘fight’ and ‘do, make’. (514) Light verb construction - - ‘fight NMLZ-RR-give’ misorongpopen chongho ron kachipi atomo […] [mis rongp pen chongh r n ke-che- a-tom ] sp.ant=with frog fight NMLZ-RR-give POSS-story ‘[…] the story of when the ant fought with the frog, […]’ [RBT, ChM 007] (515) Light verb construction ‘do work’ Hydro-Electric-Project alongsi kam klem'ikbom Hydro-Electric-Project a-l ng si m l m- -b m NAME POSS-LOC=FOC work do-FRML-CONT ‘I work for the Hydro-Electric Project’ [KaR, SWK 010] In (516), the light verb t , which does not occur by itself, is used with the noun ‘vow’. (516) Light verb construction: t ‘take a vow’ anke latumta hedi seme tangdetlo nke la-t m t he-d sem t ng-d t-l and.then this-PL=ADD:also you.know-Q.tag vow( pe akelokpen keroi isi ajamborong [[p a-ke-l k pen ke-r i is a-jambor ng cloth POSS-NMLZ-be.white=with NMLZ-sew one POSS-bag arlosi lahai kethap lapen arum kevan arl si] [lah i] ke-th p]] lap n [ar m ke-v n]] inside=FOC:RL these NMLZ-put.inside and down NMLZ-bring 'he's placed himself a ladder... and then, the man, into one bag sown from white cloth he puts these (fruits), and then brings them down [SiT, PS 003] 8.6.5. Other Constructions The case of t (519) is a hybrid between a non-possessed incorporation construction and a cognate object construction. While not actually being from the same etymological root and therefore not qualifying as a cognate object construction, the noun and the verb t have the same reference. The noun i is furthermore non-possessed and cannot be modified. (Note that the demonstrative preceding modifies the whole nominalized adverbial clause here, not specifically.) (519) Hybrid construction t ‘cultivate’ te la'an abangke la sai katiki te l n ab ng ke l s i ke-ti and.then/therefore this=up.to NPDL=TOP this labor NMLZ-cultivate alonglo chotiki chonong alonglo […] al ng-l cho-tik cho-n ng al ng-l LOC-RL AUTO.BEN/MAL-cultivate AUTO.BEN/MAL-loosen.soil LOC-RL ‘and then, this much, for cultivating and loosening the soil […]’ [KaR, SWK 095] 8.7. Other Complex Predicate Constructions Discussed Elsewhere In addition to the complex predicate constructions discussed in this chapter, there are several other constructions which serve rhetorical purposes and are therefore 383 discussed in Chapter XII: the general extender construction (§12.2.1); complex predicates based on elaborate expressions (§12.2.2); and copy verb constructions (§12.2.3). 384 CHAPTER IX 9. NOMINALIZATION Nominalization is at the core of clausal grammar in Karbi as in other Tibeto- Burman languages (see Matisoff (1972); Noonan (1997); Bickel (1999); Genetti et al. (2008); DeLancey (2011); other contributions in Yap, Grunow-Hårsta, and Wrona (2011); among others). In addition to being the underlying construction of subordinate clause types, nominalization is also the diachronic source construction for main clause types, including focus and imperfective constructions. This chapter lays out the various synchronic and diachronic functions of nominalization in Karbi. In Karbi, there is only one nominalizer, which is ke- (with allomorphs ki-~ka-; see §3.9.2.1). This nominalizing velar prefix has many apparent cognates across several branches of Tibeto-Burman both inside and outside Northeast India, which suggests that it is reconstructible to Proto-Tibeto-Burman (Konnerth 2009, 2012). This chapter begins with a discussion of ke- deriving nouns from verbs (§9.1). Nominal modifiers derived from PCT roots are briefly discussed in §9.2, although the main discussion of this construction is in §7.7.1. The next three sections are dedicated to the three major nominalized subordinate clause types: relative clauses in §9.3; complement clauses in §9.4; and adverbial clauses in §9.5. A summary of irrealis - marked subordinate clauses from all three types is offered in §9.6. In §9.7, nominalized main clause types are discussed, which includes both synchronic and diachronic nominalization constructions. Finally, §9.8 addresses the issue of the inconsistent occurrence of ke- on structurally nominalized verbs or clauses. 9.1. Derivational Nominalization In its perhaps most basic function, ke- derives nouns from verbs. In (520), ‘crow’ undergoes event nominalization via ke-, and then functions as a noun and furthermore as a noun phrase, as it takes on the role of the S argument in the clause akiku ’ ‘his crowing is very nice to hear’. In addition to ke-, the a- ‘possessive’ prefix is attached. This prefix occurs in a wide range of grammatical contexts (§5.3.1; §7.3; 385 §7.4). Here, it appears to mark the third person possessive, referring to the rooster as the ‘possessor’. (520) ke- deriving an event nominalization (with a- ‘possessive’) “[…] hala alo abangta thatnangnelang, [h la a-l ab ng t th t-n ng-C -l ng] that POSS-male.animal NPDL=ADD:DM slaughter-need-NEG-still CAUS-crow akiku jume’ong” pusi pukok pu [a-ke-k arj -m - ng] pusi p -k k pu POSS-NMLZ-crow hear-be.good-be.much QUOT.COMP say-firmly QUOT ‘“[…] let's not kill that rooster. (let it cr..,) his crowing is very nice to hear”' [SeT, MTN 010] In (521), ke- functions as a participant nominalizer on the PCT root ‘be small’. Here again, a- occurs in addition to ke-, but with a different function that in (520). Here, a- appears to be contributing to the noun-hood or referentiality of akibisi ‘the youngest one’ (see §5.3.1). (521) ke- deriving a participant nominalization (with a- ‘possessive’) latumke akibisi atumlo, latumta [la-t m ke a-ke-b -s a-t m-l ] la-t m t this-PL=TOP POSS-NMLZ-be.small-SPLT POSS-PL-RL this-PL=ADD:DM piso some enlo potsi ahem arit dolo p s s m n-l ] [p t si a-h m a-r t d -l ] wife EE:p s take-RL reason=FOC POSS-house POSS-field exist-RL ‘they were (the children/descendants of) the youngest, they also had gotten married and so they had their house and property’ [WR, BCS 027] Example (522) shows that ke- may also occur without a- ‘possessive’ as the sole element deriving the noun kakirla ‘change’ from the verb ‘turn over’. (522) ke- deriving a participant nominalization (without a- ‘possessive’) bonta non adin abang asapso kakirla b nt [n n a-d n ab ng] as p-s ke-kirl but now POSS-day(TOP) mane angp p d -p k-l ] [sir -sab n NPDL=TOP I.mean( kapathu abol lapenke bet [[[tennis ke-path ] a-b l lap n ke b t] tennis( t-d ng e-n t os ab ng ke]... [lap n ke touch-attached one-CLF:HUM:SG child NPDL =TOP and.then=TOP this kachingkoidup amonit aphan [ke-ching o -d [a-mon t] a-ph n] NMLZ-fall.down.HUM-falling.sound.from.high.solid.obj POSS-man POSS-NSUBJ this fruits POSS-kd.basket these.types.of fruits LOC aphatang along thesere thapdunlo rapdunlo laphan a-phat ng al ng theser th p-d n-l r p-d n-l l -ph n POSS-kd.basket LOC fruits put.inside-JOIN-RL help-along-RL this-NSUBJ ‘a tennis ball and then a bat he's holding, one child, and then for the person who had fallen down, they put with him the fruit in the basket, they helped him’ [SiT, PS 032] Relativization of A arguments that occur in conjunction with O arguments (specifically, the O-high argument nelitum ‘we’ and the O-low argument t ‘fruit’, see §10.2.1.2) is illustrated in (529) and (530), respectively. 390 (529) A relativization (with O-high) Lily, la nelitum aphan nangkejapon aosopi, Lil l [ne-li-t m a h n nang=ke-j - n]RC a-oso ]]HN NAME this 1EXCL-HON-PL NSUBJ 1/2:NSUBJ=NMLZ-lead-take.away POSS-lady elong adim dosi computer akam klemlo e-l ng a-d m d -si computer a-k m kl m-l ] one-CLF:place POSS-place exist-NF:RL computer(' [SiT, HF 034] (530) A relativization (with O-low) […] nangchithurkrikrisi laso thesere kelik amonit nang=chith r-kr ~kr -si] las l theser ke-l RC a-mon t HN CIS=drag-follow.closely~ITER-NF:RL this this fruits NMLZ-pluck POSS-man adungan nanglelo ad ng= n] nang l -l near=up.to CIS=reach-RL ‘[…] dragging along a female goat, close up to this fruit picking man he reached’ [SiT, PS 010] Two examples of O relativization are offered in (531) and (532) (specifically, O- low relativization on t ‘fruit’ and ‘bag’). (531) O-low relativization alang kepon athesere do'anta klolaplo [[al ng ke- n]RC a-theser ]HN d - n t kl -l p-l 3 NMLZ-take.away POSS-fruits exist-all=EXH fall-completely-RL all of the fruit that he was taking away fell out [SiT, PS 030] (532) O-low relativization dondon chedonsi... anke amonit abang [dond n che-d n-si...] [ nke [a-mon t ab ng] ladder RR-place.ladder/bridge-NF:RL and.then POSS-man NPDL pe akelokpen keroi isi ajamborong a-ke-l en ke-r i RC is a-jambor ng HN cloth POSS-NMLZ-be.white=with NMLZ-sew one POSS-bag 391 arlosi lahai kethap lapen arum kevan arl si] [lah i] ke-th p]] lap n [ar m ke-v n]] inside=FOC these NMLZ-put.inside and down NMLZ-bring 'he's placed himself a ladder... and then, the man, into one bag sown from white cloth he puts these (fruits), and then brings them down [SiT, PS 003] There are only a few ditransitive constructions in the corpus and none involving relativization. Therefore the above shown S, A, and O relativization constructions represent all attested instances of the relativization of particular syntactic roles. However, it is also possible to relativize on other types of (oblique) clause participants. For example, (533) and (534) show that it is possible to relativize on locative NPs. In (533), [[hala] [ka-ngni] a-dim]] is ‘that place where on sits’. (533) Locative relativization lapenke hala kangni adim along lap n=ke [[h la] [ke-ingn ]RC a-d m]]HN al ng and.then=TOP that NMLZ-sit POSS-place LOC ingnithekthesi si ingchin apum along ingn -th k-C -si s ingch n a-p m al ng sit-see-NEG-NF:RL therefore iron POSS-CLF:round LOC ingnisi... saikel kevekponlo ingn -si... saik l ke-v k-p n-l sit-NF:RL bicycle( kosonma angno an ng a-n t pen ke-thekl ng kos n ma angn back POSS-direction=from NMLZ-see Q how=Q in.front anatpen ketheklong kosonma lapenke arlong a-n t pen ke-thekl ng kos n ma lap n ke arl ng POSS-direction=from NMLZ-see how=Q and=TOP stone 393 achetpen sarnung kidip ahemta a-ch t en sarn ng ke-d RC a-h m t HN POSS-small.piece=with roof NMLZ-cover POSS-house=ADD:also nelitum thekdamlong ne-li-t m th k-d m-l ng 1EXCL-HON-PL see-GO-GET ‘from the backside, how (the houses) look, from the front, how they look, and then, we also went to see the houses, whose roofs (they) cover with slabs of stone’ [SiT, HF 048] 9.3.1.2. Irrealis-Marked Relative Clauses While the relative clause verb typically remains unmarked for aspectual or modal categories, it is possible to add - ‘irrealis2’ for a future or irrealis reference (see also the general discussion of irrealis-marked nominalized subordinate clauses in §9.6). For example, in (538), the speaker refers to the matter she is going to talk about as ne kethanji alamthe. (538) Future relative clause ne kethanji alamtheke jo dak rong'aje along [[n ke-th n-j ] a-lamth ke] [j d k r ng'aj al ng 1EXCL NMLZ-tell-IRR2 POSS-matter=TOP see here festival LOC nangkachetongdunsi nang=ke-chet ng-d n-si] CIS=NMLZ-meet-JOIN-NF:RL ‘the matter that I will talk about... after meeting here at the festival’ [KK, CC 002] Only a few sentences later in (539), however, she refers to that same matter she is about to narrate as ne kethan atomo, without using - . This shows that the simple relative clause verb (not marked with - ) has a wide range of default interpretations, including irrealis contexts, and that using - is an optional way of specifically highlighting a future or irrealis reference. (539) Non-purpose relative clause ta ne kethan atomo abangke t [[n ke-th n] a-tom ab ng ke] but 1EXCL NMLZ-tell POSS-story NPDL=TOP 394 pachekengdamthekthedet tahai meneta [pe-che-k ng-d m-th k-C -d t tah i] [men t CAUS-RR-be.straight-go-know.how-NEG-PFV DUBIT maybe=ADD:even nangthanpo nang th n-p ] 1/2:NSUBJ=tell-IRR1 ‘the story I'm telling now, maybe I can't tell it perfectly (straight), but maybe I will still tell’ [KK, CC 008] 9.3.1.3. Head Noun Occurring with Personal Possessive Prefix The noun ‘habit’ occurs in a construction in which it takes a relative clause but, surprisingly, is additionally marked by a personal possessive prefix rather than just the general a- possessive prefix. An example is (540). (540) Head noun ‘habit’ occurring with personal possessive prefix o mota nangtum kachekoi nangbe doji o m t nang-t m ke-che- i nang-b d -j DSM you future=ADD you-PL NMLZ-RR-accuse 2POSS-habit exist-IRR2 '"o, you will (continue to) have a habit of accusing each other in the future "' [RBT, ChM 077] Two analyses are possible based on interpreting the existential copula as being more intransitive-like (‘X exists’) or more transitive-like (‘X has Y’). In the intransitive analysis, the example needs to be bracketed as follows: [[[nangtum kachekoi] nangbe]S doji] ‘lit., your habit of you accusing each other will exist’. In the transitive analysis, it would instead be: [[nangtum]A [[kachekoi] nangbe]O doji] ‘lit., you will have your/a habit of accusing each other’. The second analysis as a more transitive-like possessive construction may be considered preferable because it follows the basic possessive construction that requires the ‘O argument’ to be marked possessive (§10.2.2.3.2). 395 9.3.2. Internally-Headed (or Post-Head) Relativization In addition to the standard relativization construction discussed above, there is another relativization construction that involves the relative clause verb following the head noun. Almost all examples of this construction only consist of the head noun and the relative clause verb, in which case this construction is structurally ambiguous: it could represent either an internally-headed relative clause or a relative clause that follows its head noun rather than preceding it (see also §7.7.1.2). The only example that appears to offer clarification is (541), where the relative clause A argument precedes the head noun, suggesting that head noun is truly embedded in the relative clause. (541) Internally-headed RC? jumepik, phu, nang tomo kethan; arj -m -p k ph n ng [tom ]HN ke-th n RC hear-be.good-very grandfather:VOC you story NMLZ-tell penapta nangthantha dei [oi to] mm pen p t nang th n-th d i [ i t mm tomorrow=ADD:also 1/2:NSUBJ=tell-CON.IMP right? yes OK AFF ‘(this) was very nice to hear, grandfather, the story you’ve told (or: you telling a story); tomorrow also you'll need to tell us a story, ok [HK, TR 200]? However, (541) may also simply be treated as a nominalized clause functioning as the S argument of the verb jumepik ‘be very nice to hear’, which is why the analysis of this relativization construction as either internally-headed or post-head remains inconclusive. This relativization construction is much less frequent than the standard relativization construction. While determining its pragmatic function requires a larger corpus with more instances, the occurrences discussed here suggest that this marked construction may be used in emphatic or dramatic discourse contexts. There are a few examples of S argument relativization, such as (542) and (543). In (542), the relative clause verb kithike ‘(who) have died’ occurs after the head noun nangso ‘your children’. As we can see in the context of this intonation unit, the sentence with the relative clause is in contrast with the next sentence, as the speaker is comparing the death of the addressee’s child to the death of many of her own children. In this quasi- 396 parallelism between the two sentences, the relativized noun nangso kithike occurs in the same subject position as the topic =ke marked NP consisting of the simple possessed noun neso ‘my children’ in the following clause. (542) Internally-headed or post-head RC: relativizing on S argument Neso tangte avelo, nesu tangte avelo. [ne-os t ngt av -l ne-s t ngt av -l ] 1EXCL:POSS-child TOP not.exist-RL 1EXCL:POSS-grandchild TOP not.exist-RL Nangso kithike enutnat, nesoke [[[nang-os ]HN ke-th e]RC e-n t-n t] [ne-os ke 2:POSS-child NMLZ-die=TOP one-CLF:HUM:SG-only 1EXCL:POSS-child=TOP bangthrok phosi kithi. b ng-thr k ph si ke-th ] CLF:HUM:PL-six five=FOC:RL NMLZ-die 'on the other hand, I don't have any children anymore, no grandchildren anymore, only one child of yours has died, but of mine, so many have died' [RBT, ChM 043] In (543), the construction again only consists of the head noun, i.e, the S argument that is being relativized on, and the RC verb. The S argument is nangpiso, Karbipi asomar, aso, where there are two appositional constructions: first, nangpiso, Karbipi ‘your wife, the Karbi woman’, and second, asomar, aso ‘(her) children, (her) child’.157 (543) Internally-headed or post-head RC: relativizing on S argument “nangpiso, Karbipi asomar aso kehacheke nang- is arb - a-oso-m r a-os ]HN ke-hach e]RC 2:POSS-wife PN-fem POSS-child-PL POSS-child NMLZ-be.born=TOP thengpi abeng angse! jaho! Hini “... pu anke hala thengp a-b ng angs jaho hin pu nke h la tree/wood POSS-piece only look.there! two QUOT and.then that richo abangta chelangdamlo, “bai ” rich ab ng t che-l ng-d m-l b i king NPDL=ADD RR-see-go-RL how.mean! ‘”your wife, the Karbipi’s children that were born, they are only two pieces of wood (rather than real humans), look there at the two!”, and then, that king also went himself to look, "my goodness!”' [CST, HM 022] 157 Switching from plural asomar to singular aso may be because the fact that this is about two children is not well captured by either the plural form (which may be implying more than two) or the unmarked form (which may be implying one). Perhaps that is why further on, the speaker adds ‘two’ in a grammatically odd way as it is disconnected from any NP and also without the human classifier ng. 397 Finally, (541) above, repeated here as (544), may be analyzed as an instance of an internally-headed RC relativizing on the O argument t ‘story’ (keeping in mind the caveat mentioned above). (544) Possibly internally-headed RC relativizing on O-low argument jumepik, phu, nang tomo kethan; arj -m -p k ph [n ng tom ke-th n] hear-be.good-very grandfather:VOC you story NMLZ-tell penapta nangthantha dei [oi to] mm pen p t nang th n-th d i [ i t mm tomorrow=ADD:also 1/2:NSUBJ=tell-CON.IMP right? yes OK AFF ‘(this) was very nice to hear, grandfather, the story you’ve told (or: you telling a story); tomorrow also you'll need to tell us a story, ok [HK, TR 200]? 9.4. Complementation 9.4.1. Standard Complementation Complement clauses (CCs) are typically nominalized, although there also are (formally) non-nominalized CC constructions, as discussed in §11.2.2. Also see §8.2 for a discussion of modal and other markers at the monoclausal endpoint of the complementation scale. Examples (545) through (549) illustrate complement clauses functioning as O arguments of complement-taking verbs and , both meaning ‘start’; t, t , and t , all meaning ‘finish’ or ‘conclude’; and - ‘see-JOIN’ > ‘watch’. (545) Nominalized complement clause of ‘start’ chepaklangdampen... latum kedamthu che-pe-kl ng d m-pen... l -t m [ke-d m-th ]CC (>O) 158 pangch ng-l RR-CAUS-appear go-NF this-PL NMLZ-go-again start-RL ‘after going to show them, they again start walking’ [SiT, PS 041] 158 This notation indicates that this is a complement clause (CC) functioning as the O argument of the matrix verb. 398 (546) Nominalized complement clause of ‘start’ t t gar pen v ng-d t aph si ne-t m d en ong r m car( ‘watch’ ansi la sa jun'et ajat'et aphisi netum nsi l s j n- t aj t- t aph si ne-t m after.that this tea(O) l ng-d n-l this drum NMLZ-beat.drum-RL drum NMLZ-beat.drum see-JOIN-RL ‘after we drank tea and everything they were beating drums, we… (they) were drumming… (we) watched the drum beating’ [SH, CSM 041] 399 The dividing line between complement clauses and derivational event nominalization is blurred in many cases, especially when the complement clause only consists of the verb. This is because both CC and event nominalization constructions are formally marked the same way, with nominalizer ke-, but also because of the typical absence of overt NPs referring to recoverable participants (i.e., zero anaphora, §10.4.3). Therefore, in (549) and perhaps even more so in (550), cheng kethip langdunlo and kekan kilun langdunlo could be translated both as complement clauses (i.e., ‘watched them beat the drums’ and ‘watched them sing and dance’) as well as event nominalizations (i.e., ‘watched the drum beating’ and ‘watched the singing and dancing’). (550) Nominalized complement clause of - ‘see-JOIN’ > ‘watch’ amat Kavonpen nelitum kekan kilun langdunlo am t Kav n pen ne-li-t m [ke- n ke-l n l ng-d n-l and.then NAME=with 1EXCL-HON-PL NMLZ-dance NMLZ-sing see-JOIN-RL ‘and then, with Kavon we watched the dancing and singing […]’ [SiT, HF 035] Besides representing the O argument of a complement-taking verb, CCs also function as S arguments, illustrated in (551) and (552). In both of these examples, the complement clause S arguments are followed by nominal predicates. (551) Complement clause functioning as S argument inutvet kedunke pine dinghakjak amatsi [[e-n t-v t ke-d n e]CC (>S) [p -n d nghakj k]PRED] am tsi one-CLF:HUM:SG-only NMLZ-join=TOP what-INDEF odd and.then la elitum ajirpo alangli Yu'espensi l e-li-t m a-jirp al ng-l Yu' s pen si this 1PL:INCL-HON-PL POSS-friend 3-HON COUNTRY=from=FOC kevang Kavon Kavon aphanta cheponlo ke-v ng Kav n Kav n aph n t che-p n-l NMLZ-come NAME NAME NSUBJ=ADD:also RR-take.away-RL ‘going alone along with (Lily) is a strange thing, and so, this friend of ours, he who has come from the US, Kavon, Kavon we also took along with us’ [SiT, HF 008] 400 (552) Complement clause functioning as S argument neli kachoklemke Habepi ahabekongiklo [n -l ke-cho- l m e] CC (>S) [Habep a-habek ng- k-l ] PRED 1EXCL-HON NMLZ-AUTO.BEN/MAL-do=TOP DISTRICT POSS-main.headman-HON-RL 'what I work as is Habekong of the Habepi district (of Rongkhang)' [SeT, MTN 003] Finally, in (553), the complement clause laso ahormu abangke kadokave akheita kacharlidun is marked as a topic with =ke and functions pragmatically as a conditional (i.e., ‘it would be good if everybody learned this’) (see Haiman (1978) for a discussion of the functional similarity between conditionals and topics). (553) Topic =ke marked nominalized clause functioning as a conditional laso ahormu abangke kadokave akheita las a-horm ab ng e O [ ad av a- h i t ] A this POSS-thing NPDL=TOP all POSS-community=ADD:EXH kacharlidunke mesen pusi neli matha ke-charl -d n e CC [m -s n] PRED] pusi n -l math NMLZ-study-JOIN=TOP be.good-INTENS QUOT.COMP 1EXCL-HON think ‘I think for this thing, it would be good for everybody from every tribe (i.e. everybody in the world) to learn it’ [SiT, HF 044] 9.4.2. Irrealis-Marked Complement Clauses Complement clauses may also be marked irrealis by - and followed by one of two nominal elements: either , glossed below as ‘PURP’ but (historically) the same morpheme as the non-subject marker - (§10.6.2); or the (semantically bleached) noun phrase delimiter (§10.5). The addition of irrealis - as well as or is structural evidence of a lesser degree of clausal integration exhibited by this irrealis complementation construction. Following (Givón 2001a), this lesser degree of clausal integration is expected to have a functional equivalent of a lesser degree of event integration (see also §8.2.2). For a general discussion of irrealis-marked nominalized subordinate clauses, see §9.6. 401 9.4.2.1. Irrealis-Marked Complement Clauses with Purpose/Non-Subject Marker - The irrealis complementation construction with is illustrated in (554) and (555). In (554), the complement clause functions as the O argument of the complement- taking verb ’ ‘try (with great effort)’, which occurs in this construction in several instances in the corpus. (554) Nominalized complement clause with irrealis - and ‘PURP’ ( ’ ‘struggle’) saikel along'an [saik l a-l ng= n] POSS-kd.basket POSS-LOC=up.to bicycle(, to the bicycle he brings the basket, the basket he is trying to put on the bicycle’ [SiT, PS 021] In (555), the complement clause [[pirthe along ka-cheklangdunji] aphan] functions as the S argument of sungkrung ‘be difficult’. (555) Nominalized complement clause with irrealis - and ‘PURP’ ( ‘be difficult’) […] isi akhai mane pirthe along [is a-kh i mane [pirth a-l ng one POSS-community I.mean(, (the bamonpo) said, as they say' [KK, BMS 097] In addition to , the general locative form can be used to indicate simultaneity overlap as well, in a common metaphorical extension from place to time. An example is (564). (564) Simultaneity overlap adverbial clause with ‘locative’ ingparke bhari arleng dingpo karlu alongke, ingp r ke bhar arl ng d ng- ke-arl al ng e SIOVER besides=TOP very.big(… hako ahut abang [n -l ke-arj -l ng] [[[ha a-h t a-b ng 1EXCL-HON NMLZ-hear-GET AFF that.time POSS-during POSS-CLF:HUM:PL rit ke'en rit kepan, chonong r t ke- n r t ke- n cho-n ng field NMLZ-take field NMLZ-clear.vegetation AUTO.BEN/MAL-loosen.soil chosim alongle pusitame pinsomar cho-s m al ng le] TOP u-setam ] pins -m r AUTO.BEN/MAL-EE:n ng LOC=FOC:IRR QUOT-nevertheless married.man-PL atum mute arlosomar atumsi akele klempik pu […] a-t m mut rlos -m r a-t m si akel kl m-p k pu POSS-PL compared.to woman-PL POSS-PL=FOC more do-very QUOT 'I have heard this: (I could learn this:), in the old days, while cultivating the jhum field, while working on loosening the soil and doing these kinds of works or whatever, compared to the men, it was the women who did much more, […]’ [KaR, SWK 070] Similarly, in (572), there is an adverbial clause marked by the noun phrase delimiter . Here also, the function is that of a topical element: ‘with respect to (the plan/intention of) making you meet my grandmother’, where the idea of a plan or intentionality lies in the irrealis marking with - .164 164 Compare this construction to complementation with the noun phrase delimiter discussed in §9.4.2.2, as well as irrealis-marked nominalized subordinate clauses discussed more generally in §9.6. 411 (572) Topical adverbial clause with ‘NPDL’ “t t t las t t ngt ne- h a- h n therefore OK if 1EXCL:POSS-grandmother POSS-NSUBJ t t ” nang=ke- a-chet ng-j ab ng e pa-the' ng-sin ng 1/2:NSUBJ=NMLZ-CAUS-meet-IRR2 NPDL=TOP CAUS-be.bright-si.HORT 'and then, "okay then, in order to make you meet my grandmother, let's wait a little while until it's bright (lit., make it bright)"' [KK, BMS 062] 9.5.3. Adverbial Subordination Constructions with Additional Marking As discussed in the previous section, several semantic types of adverbial subordination are marked by constructions that have another morphosyntactic element in addition to clausal nominalization followed by a subordinator. Specifically, temporal posteriority with ‘before’ requires verbal negation (without the nominalizer ke-); causal subordinator induces non-final marking with -pen ‘NF:with’ for some native speakers; and, the adverbial clause is marked irrealis with -j when evoking a comparison (‘as if’) with , or when indicating a plan or an intention, in an adverbial clause marked with the noun phrase delimiter . 9.6. Irrealis-Marked Nominalized Subordinate Clauses The verbs inside nominalized subordinate clauses typically only consist only of the stem with nominalizer ke-. The one exception is that subordinate clauses of all three types (relative, complement, and adverbial clauses) may be marked with - ‘irrealis2’. If marked irrealis, the meanings expectedly change to intentional futures, purposives, or other types of hypotheticals. Relative clauses marked by - may indicate an intentional future event pertaining to the head noun, as in (573), where ne kethanji alamthe refers to ‘the matter that I will talk about’ or ‘want to talk about’. Note that this marking is not obligatory in the case of future reference; as discussed in §9.3.1, a few intonation units later, another relative clause is produced by the same speaker about the same topic (i.e., with the same future reference), but without - . 412 (573) Irrealis-marked relative clause indicating intentional future ne kethanji alamtheke jo dak rong'aje along [n ke-th n-j a-lamth ke] [j d k r ng'aj al ng 1EXCL NMLZ-tell-IRR2 POSS-matter=TOP see here festival LOC nangkachetongdunsi nang=ke-chet ng-d n-si] CIS=NMLZ-meet-JOIN-NF:RL ‘the matter that I will talk about... after meeting here at the festival…’ [KK, CC 002] Another situation where - may be used on a relative clause verb is in a noun complement purpose construction. In (574), [[asaikel kapasangkokra parjaplun ki-bi-ji] a-son] refers to ‘a device to keep the bicycle parked and standing up’. (574) Irrealis-marked relative (/nominal complement) clause indicating a purpose asaikel kapasangkokra [[a-saik l ke-pe-s ng-k k-r take.rest-firmly POSS-bicycle( n kop =lo ke-v -p l -ho 1EXCL what=FOC NMLZ-do-IRR1 this-EMPH:INTERACT 'what should I do?' [CST, HM 013] 9.7.3.1.4. Co-Relative Focus Construction The co-relative construction might have also developed as a focus construction, although the evidence is less clear, partly because this is a rare construction in the corpus. 422 This construction is based on corresponding interrogative pronouns or adverbs (§4.5.3) and demonstrative/deictic pronouns and adverbs (§4.5.4) across two nominalized clauses (see also §4.5.5). In this construction, the interrogative pronouns or adverbs are marked with the question particle =ma in order to function as indefinite or universal relative pronouns ‘whoever’, ‘whatever’, etc. In (590), the first clause contains the derived universal relative pronoun ’ ‘how(ever) much’, while the second clause contains the =lo focus-marked demonstrative counterpart ’ ‘that much’. Both clauses are nominalized, meaning that this co- relative construction has the same structural properties as the two other focus construction subtypes discussed above. (590) Co-relative construction ha thepai thereng longku longdang pirthe methan ko'anma h thep i ther ng longk longd ng pirth meth n o‘ n ma over.there cliff EE:thep i cave crevice world dog how.much=Q kedam bamonpota la'anlo kidun ke-d m bam n-p t la’ n lo ke-d n NMLZ-go wise.person( pe akelokpen keroi isi ajamborong [[p a-ke-l k pen ke-r i is a-jambor ng cloth POSS-NMLZ-be.white=with NMLZ-sew one POSS-bag arlosi lahai kethap lapen arum kevan arl si] [lah i] ke-th p]] lap n [ar m ke-v n]] inside=FOC these IPFV-put.inside and down IPFV-bring 'he's placed himself a ladder... and then, the man is putting these (pieces of fruit) into one bag sown from white cloth and is bringing them down’ [SiT, PS 003] 427 A typologically well-supported way to model the historical development of the imperfective construction from a nominalization construction is to assume a locational construction as the source construction. As sketched out in Figure 20, the locational construction at Stage 1 would include an S argument, a locational NP that structurally consists of a nominalized clause, and the locational copula, which is the same as the existential copula in Karbi, . This hypothesized source construction for the Karbi imperfective is structurally analogous to the source construction of the English progressive (i.e., ‘S be on/at V-ing’), except that in English, a preposition ‘on’ or ‘at’ was required, where in Karbi nothing but the locational copula is required. Stage 1: ([NP]S) [[...] ke-V]LOC [ ] be.at  loss of locational copula 'be at' Stage 2: ([NP]S/A) [...] ke-V Figure 20. Possible grammaticalization pathway for the imperfective construction In the absence of closely related languages, it is not clear what kind of comparative evidence could help put this reconstruction on a stronger footing. It appears that there is no possible evidence that could substantially contribute to strengthen or weaken this hypothesis, but the fact that this is a cross-linguistically well-attested development suggests that this is a plausible reconstruction. 9.7.3.3. Ambiguity between Focus and Imperfective Interpretation In some instances, such as (598), there is an ambiguity as to what triggers the ke- prefix on the main clause verb, as this is an imperfective context but there is also a focused element = ‘mirror FOC:RL’ in the clause. (598) Ambiguity between focus and imperfective interpretation anke laso athongkup along lujisi nke [las a-thongk p a-l ng] luj =si and.then this POSS-tobacco.container POSS-LOC mirror=FOC:RL 428 kapabon ke-pa-b n NMLZ-CAUS-be.attached ‘and then, on this tobacco container, there was a mirror attached’ [HK, TR 026] Similarly, in (599), which is from the on-line narrated pear story (see (596) and (597) in the preceding section §9.7.3.2), the ke- can be interpreted as being the fossilized nominalizer from the focus construction evoked by =si ‘focus:realis’, but it can also be interpreted as marking imperfective aspect, as the speaker is commenting on the event as it is occurring in the video clip. (599) Ambiguity between focus and imperfective interpretation lake phatang alongsi kethap l ke phat ng al ng=si ke-th p this=TOP B.BASKET LOC=FOC:RL NMLZ-put.inside ‘he is putting them in a phatang bamboo basket’ [SiT, PS 004] Note that in examples like these, ke- is glossed as ‘nominalizer’ because it is the more neutral label and better reflects the ambiguity between the two possible interpretations. 9.8. Inconsistent Occurrence of ke- ‘nominalizer’ in Nominalization Constructions This section aims to draw attention to the inconsistency with which ke- ‘nominalizer’ occurs in synchronically nominalized constructions, across all types of synchronically nominalized constructions (though less so in nominalized complementation constructions, as discussed further below). In (600) and (601), ke- is absent from PCT modifiers, both preposed and postposed. Note that (600) is an elicited sentence (produced when asked for a translation of the English sentence), which strongly suggests that the absence of ke- cannot be accounted for as being due to fast colloquial or hypo-articulated speech. (600) Lack of ke- ‘NMLZ’ on preposed PCT modifier = - - - ] this=TOP look-GOOD-INTENS POSS-flower NEG.EQU.COP ‘this is not a pretty flower’ [Elicitation SiT 090220] 429 (601) Lack of ke- ‘NMLZ’ on postposed PCT modifier ba ko jirpo {mm} pinike ne ba ko j rp mm pin ke n SURPRISE( a'ik aphan... an kethondam [NP]A [NP ]R [NP]T e mis rongp ke a- k aph n n ke-th n-d m DSM ant.sp=TOP POSS-older.brother NSUBJ rice NMLZ-drop-GO ‘the ant was on the way to drop off rice for his older brother’ [RBT, ChM 010] 10.2.1.3.2. T-Centered Trivalent Constructions The T-centered trivalent constructions have the T argument either unmarked or marked by - . The R argument may be unmarked or else marked by either the general locative relator noun - (see §10.6.3 and §4.4.4.1) or a relator noun with more specific semantics. In these constructions, the R argument may only have a human referent if the T argument has a human referent as well. Otherwise, the R argument is a non-human location and the T argument is human or non-human. This construction never has the 440 combination of a non-human T argument and a human R argument, because this constellation occurs in the R-centered trivalent construction (§10.2.1.3.1). A recurring verb in these constructions is t , which is glossed as ‘drop’, but more exactly translates as ‘take T to R’ or ‘leave T with/at R’, where both T and R may or may not have human referents (although it may be a requirement that at least one of the two have a human referent). Note that this verb also occurs in the R-centered trivalent construction. Another verb that occurs in this construction is t ‘put inside’, where R is the location or item in which T is put. Let us look at the data. (616) and (617) are from the same story, talking about the same event of a witch abandoning children in the forest. Therefore, in both clauses, the T argument has a human referent, while the R argument is a non-human location. The T argument is marked by - in both instances. The R argument is marked by the general locative marker - in (616), but it is marked by the more semantically specific relator noun - ‘in the middle of’ in (617). (616) Trivalent predicate with - marked +human T argument and - marked locative non-human R argument […] itum aphanke ha nampi namdur alongsi [NP ]T [NP a ]R e-t m aph n ke h n mp n md r al ng si 1PL.INCL-PL NSUBJ=TOP over.there big.forest EE:namp LOC=FOC ekethondamlo e=ke-th n-d m-l 1INCL:NSUBJ =NMLZ-drop-GO-RL ‘[…] (the witch) abandoned us over there in the deep forest’ [CST, HM 076] (617) Trivalent predicate with - -marked +human T argument and - - marked locative non-human R argument amatsi itum aphanke dak habit angbongsi [NP ]T [NP ]R am tsi e-t m aph n ke d k hab t angb ng si because 1INCL-PL NSUBJ=TOP here jungle in.middle.of=FOC nangkethonti nang=ke-th n-t 1/2:NSUBJ=NMLZ-drop-get.rid.off 'and then, she took us here in the middle of the jungle and abandoned us’ [CST, HM 052]' 441 (618) is from the same story as the previous two examples, but is from earlier in the story where the T argument is a third person instead of the first person. Interestingly, the storyteller first uses the non-subject marker - on the T argument, then mentions the locative R argument, which is rather complex and lengthy, and then again mentions the T argument, this time without - . The reason for this change in marking could be that the storyteller corrected himself and wanted to leave the T argument unmarked, perhaps because he decided to use - to indicate the mother of the children as the malefactee and hence primary non-subject argument. However, I think another explanation is that the storyteller simply wants to remind the listeners of the identity of the T referent, and leaves it unmarked for predicate role, following the pragmatic principle of ‘if the role of an argument is obvious, leave it unmarked’ (see §10.1.2, §10.6). (618) Trivalent predicate with unmarked(?) T argument and - -marked locative non-human R argument pu amat la Karbipi langhe kedam aphi [pu am t l Karb -p l ngh ke-d m aph QUOT and.then this PN-FEM washing.place NMLZ-go after laso aosomar, Hingchong musoso atum aphan [NP a ]T [las a-oso-m r Hingch ng mus s a-t m aph n] this POSS-child-PL CONSTELLATION 2.siblings.of.diff.gender POSS-PL PAT ha same sadu akrong alat votek [NP a ]R h sam sad a-kr ng a-lat v t k over.there path EE:sam POSS-CLF:road POSS-EE:kr ng wild.bird ingrengre voso ingrengre along ingr ng-C v s ingr ng-C al ng call(small.animals)-NEG EE:v t k call(small.animals)-NEG LOC osomar ponpidam'et thondam'et [NP]T os -m r p n-p -d m- t th n-d m- t child-PL take.away-BEN/MAL-GO-PRF drop-go-PRF 'and then, after the Karbi woman has gone to the water place, these Hingchong sisters, over there, she went to carry the children to a place where the roads cross, where the birds don't sing, and left them there’ [CST, HM 014]' 442 In (619), the verb is again t ‘drop; take T to R’, and the T argument again has a human referent while the R argument again has a non-human referent. This example demonstrates, however, that the R argument may remain unmarked, as does here. (619) Trivalent predicate with -marked human T argument and unmarked non-human R argument […] apai abangsi mane kechengpenke [NP]A a-p i ab ng si mane ke-ch ng pen=ke POSS-mother NPDL=FOC I.mean( pe akelokpen keroi isi [NP]A [NP a ]R [ nke [a-mon t ab ng] [[p a-ke-l k pen ke-r i is and.then POSS-man NPDL cloth POSS-NMLZ-be.white=with NMLZ-sew one 443 ajamborong arlosi lahai kethap lapen arum kevan [NP]T a-jambor ng arl si] [lah i] ke-th p]] lap n [ar m ke-v n]] POSS-bag inside=FOC these NMLZ-put.inside and down NMLZ-bring ‘[…] and then, the man, into a bag sown from white cloth he puts these (fruits), and then brings them down [SiT, PS 003] Lastly, (622) is the only example in the corpus of recorded texts, in which both T and R have human referents. Although T is only overtly expressed in a preceding non- final clause, we at least can note that in this scenario, the R argument is marked by the general locative marker - . (622) Trivalent predicate with - -marked locative human R argument lasi anke tharunvirsi, aoso ha padok ([NP]T) las nke thar n-v r-si a-os h pa-d k therefore and.then rock-gently-NF:RL POSS-child then.much.later CAUS-be.sweet padoksi, aphi along thondamkoklo [NP ]R pa-d k-si a-ph al ng th n-d m-k k-l CAUS-be.sweet-NF:RL POSS-grandmother LOC drop-GO-in.a.fixed.place-RL ‘and then, gently she was rocking the child and then consoling it, and she left (the child) with the grandmother’ [KK, CC 032] Note that one possibility is to consider T-centered constructions with non-human R arguments, which act as locations, ‘transitive’ motion constructions where ‘R’ is actually the goal argument, and ‘T’ is actually ‘O’. Doing that would at first seem like an improvement in making the facts about Karbi look more systematic: the differential marking of T (with or without - ) is really just the differential marking of O (with or without - ); and motion constructions, which exist for ‘intransitives’ (which then have an S plus a goal argument), also exist for ‘transitives’ (which then have an A plus an O plus a goal argument). The problem, however, is that the same verb t ‘take T to R’ participates in the R-centered construction if T has a non-human referent and R has a human referent, and it participates in a T-centered construction if both T and R have human referents or if T has a human referent and R has a non-human referent. It therefore does not appear to improve the description if we specified the ‘true’ trivalent construction 444 as the R-centered construction and ‘reduced’ the T-centered construction to a bivalent or transitive construction with an additional goal argument. If we did this, the verb t n would be problematic, because it occurs in both constructions. In the end, it seems impossible to describe Karbi with just one true trivalent construction, because with a +human R argument, both constructions occur. It is just not the case that a human R argument makes for a true trivalent construction while a non-human locative or goal argument is simply a bivalent or transitive motion construction with A, O, and a goal argument. 10.2.1.4. Alignment in Typical Declarative Clauses Cross-linguistically, there are two types of alignment. First, alignment is about whether S aligns with A or with O, or neither in mono- and bivalent constructions. Second, it is about whether O aligns with R or with T, or neither in bi- and trivalent constructions. By comparing the typical monovalent and bivalent declarative clause constructions, we can see that S and A are both unmarked, while there is a split in O marking such that O-low is unmarked and O-high is marked by - . Therefore, the O- high construction has O marked different from S and A, suggesting nominative alignment for S and A. However, in the O-low construction, O is equally unmarked, just like S and A, suggesting a neutral alignment system. For the other type of alignment across bi- and trivalent constructions, the situation is even more complex, because there is not only O-high and O-low, but there are also two typical trivalent constructions. In the R-centered construction, R is marked the same as O-high via - ‘non-subject’, and T is unmarked like O-low. In the T-centered construction, T is marked the same as O-high via - ‘non-subject’, while R is either unmarked like O-low or marked locative via - or a semantically more specific relator noun. These issues that arise in the attempt to identify alignment in Karbi serve as evidence for the largely non-syntactic basis of participant marking in Karbi. 445 10.2.2. Declarative Clause Constructions with Non-Typical Role Marking of Arguments The following subsections discuss declarative clause constructions that deviate from the typical role-marking shown above, most of them in favor of more semantically- based role marking. 10.2.2.1. Motion Constructions with Unmarked and - Marked Goals Motion verbs such as ‘follow; join’, ‘go’, ‘reach’, or ‘drop in; stop by’, often occur with overtly expressed goal participants. However, it depends on the particular verb, how overt goal participants are marked, or whether we may even consider them goal arguments (i.e., conceptually required participants). And overt goal participant marking also depends on the referent, particularly whether it is human or non-human. Finally, pragmatic factors also appear to play a role. First, let’s consider ‘follow; join’. (623) has a non-human referent goal, which remains unmarked, while (624) has a human referent goal, which in both clauses is marked by the general locative - . (623) d ‘join’ with unmarked non-human goal ansi ha hithi dunlo […] nsi h hith GOAL/?O d n-l after.that over.there market( tovar longle adukta dopiklo nke [tov r]LOC [l ngl a-d k t ] d -p k-l and.then road road earth POSS-dust=ADD:DM exist-very-RL ‘and then, there is also a lot of dust on the road’ [SH, CSM 018] Since the verb used in the simple locative construction is the existential copula, it perhaps comes as no surprise that the existential construction may be structurally identical, if a locative participant is added (although we should then conceptualize the locative participant as an oblique, i.e., as not required by the predicate). (636) and (637) show that existential clauses with added locatives are parallel to simple locatives in that the locative may also be either unmarked or marked by a locative relator noun. (636) Existential with locative (without relator noun) hako arni tangho {mm} enut arecho h k arn t ngh {mm} [[e-n t a-rech ] that.time day REP AFF one-CLF:HUM:SG POSS-king arong {mm} jangreso.... do tangho {mm} a-r ng]LOC {mm} j ngr s .... d t ngh {mm} POSS-village AFF single.parent.child exist REP AFF ‘in the old days (once upon a time), in a king's village, there was an orphan’ [HK, TR 002] (637) Existential with locative (with relator noun) […] aphong arong along vo ikpo a- h ng a-r ng al ng LOC v k-p POSS-wild.jackfruit POSS-plant LOC bird be.black-MODIF 450 vo thepo do v th -p d ] bird be.big-MODIF exist ‘[…] by the wild jackfruit tree, there is a huge black bird’ [SeT, MTN 018] 10.2.2.3.2. Predicational Possession Construction with Unmarked A/Possessor and Possessive-Marked O/Possessed In one of the two predicational possession constructions, the possessor (or arguably, A argument) is unmarked, while the possessed (or arguably, O argument) is also unmarked with respect to role marking, but carries the appropriate possessive prefix. (638) through (641) offer examples of this construction. Note that (638) through (640) suggest that this construction may function to indicate inalienable possession. However, (641) apparently presents counterevidence, as houses do not generally count as inalienable possession. Elicitation furthermore showed that the same construction is used in translating the sentence ‘I don’t have shoes’, where ‘shoes’ likewise would not appear to be inalienably possessed items. Nevertheless, this construction may still be associated with expressing (a culture-specific notion of) inalienable possession, or else more long- term possession, compared to the more temporary seeming possession construction discussed below in §10.2.2.3.3. (638) Possession construction with unmarked A, 2nd person possessive-marked O “ ” t t [nang-d n n ng-C pu t ] [kr i-C -d t-l ] CIS-join need-NEG QUOT=ADD:although agree-NEG-PFV-RL “nangke nangdin ” n ng e]A/POSR [nang-d n]O/POSD d -l ng] 2=TOP 2POSS-day(] [nepiso aphan ne kos n lo ma n las ne- is a- h n n how=FOC=Q 1EXCL this 1EXCL-wife POSS-NSUBJ 1EXCL 453 apran endet amui endetta bang a-p an n-d t a-m i n-d t-t b ng POSS-life take-PFV POSS-EE:pr n() [HK, TR 098] Interestingly, the -te in aphante in (647) may be the same element as the second syllable in t ‘compared to’ in (649), which marks the standard of comparison here. The first syllable could be related to - ‘comparative’. (649) Comparative construction with t ‘compared.to’, ‘more’, - ‘very’ […] pinsomar atum mute arlosomar atumsi akele klempik […] pins -m r a-t m mut rlos -m r a-t m si akel kl m-p k married.man-PL POSS-PL compared.to woman-PL POSS-PL=FOC more do-very 455 pu pu QUOT ‘[…] compared to the men, it was the women who did much more, (I heard) […]’ [KaR, SWK 070] 10.2.3. Predicates with Derivationally Changed Argument Structure Causative pe-~pa- and benefactive/malefactive (affective) - have an effect on argument structure as demonstrated by the examples and discussion below. These changes in argument structure that the two affixes cause make them different from instrumental/comitative - , which leaves the instrumental/comitative participant marked with =pen (§6.5.5.2.2). 10.2.3.1. Causative pe-~pa- If the causative pe-~pa- occurs on monovalent verb such as t ‘die’ in (650), the original S argument becomes the new causee, which in Karbi appears to be treated like an O argument. In (650), the causee r is marked non-subject via - . (650) Former S becomes -marked O osomar aphan pathietnangta, kopu manalangma [NP ]CAUSEE / O ( a'ik aphan... an e mis rong =ke <...> a- k aph n n DSM ant.sp=TOP <…> POSS-older.brother NSUBJ rice kethondam ke-th n-d m NMLZ-drop-GO ‘the ant was on the way to drop off rice for his older brother’ [RBT, ChM 010] amat ø horbong anbor... inghorpontanlo am t ø h r-b ng n-b r and.then ZERO.ANAPHORA liquor-gourd rice-wrapped.bundle chonghokalosoke tovar dakkrang ingh r-p n-t n-l chongh al s e tov r d k-kr ng carrying.load-take.away-S/O:big-RL frog.sp=TOP road spread.out-VSE 'and then, the ant was carrying heavily on the liquor gourd and the rice bundle, and the frog was spread out in the road, blocking the way' [RBT, ChM 011] Another example is (667). Here, ‘stone, rock’ is a lexical NP in the first two clauses of the intonation unit (where its role changes from being an O argument to being an S argument). Then, the topic switches to the daughter of the king and the third and fourth clause of this intonation unit are only about her. Then, in the last clause, the rock again becomes the A argument but remains unexpressed via zero anaphora, although the topic had in the meantime switched to the daughter of the king. Context unambiguously identifies the A argument as the rock, making zero anaphora possible here. (667) Full NP ‘stone, rock’ changing to zero anaphora harlong turpurlo aharlong ingplonglo richo [harl ng t r-p r-l ], [a-harl ng ingpl ng-l ], [rich stone kick-move.over-RL POSS-stone run.away.animal-RL king 466 asopi abang ha langhe lang kachinglu... a-oso-p ab ng h l ngh l ng ke-chingl ] POSS-child-female NPDL over.there washing.place water IPFV-take.bath amat lang kachinglu ketangpen kevang amat [am t l ng ke-chingl ke-t ng-pen ke-v ng am t and.then water NMLZ-take.bath NMLZ-finish-NF NMLZ-come and.then ø richo asopi aphan baplam ø rich a-oso-p a-ph n b p-l m] ZERO.ANAPHORA king POSS-child-female POSS-NSUBJ press.down-RES:paste-like it kicked the stone, the stone rolled away, the daughter of the king was taking a bath there at the washing place, and then after having finished taking her bath, she was coming (home), and then it pressed down the king's daughter [RBT, ChM 026] 10.5. Noun Phrase Delimiter The ‘noun phrase delimiter’ (NPDL) occurs very frequently in the corpus of recorded texts. There are approximately 300 instances, depending on whether some occurrences are counted as - ‘POSS-CLF(:HUM:PL)’ instead (§10.5.2), which likely is the source form of the grammaticalized . It marks noun phrases and relator noun phrases in any clausal role and with any information status, although it most frequently occurs on noun phrases unmarked for clausal role and either unmarked for information structure status or marked with topic =ke; it thus appears to correlate with subject and topic to a large degree. Its function has to do with marking contrast between clausal or discourse participants. The position of the noun phrase delimiter is the right edge of an NP, either preceding or following any role markers, and always before any information structure clitics. Examples of are given in (668), where both an extraclausal possessor NP and the clausal S argument are marked by . (668) Noun phrase delimiter on extraclausal possessor NP and on possessed S argument an Bey Ke'et pu atum abangke n [B y ke- t pu a-t m ab ng e] and.then CLAN NMLZ-be.yellow QUOT POSS-PL NPDL=TOP 467 asomar abang etpik tangho [a-oso-m r ab ng] t-p k t ngh POSS-child-PL NPDL be.yellow-very REP 'and then, with respect to the so-called Bey the Fair and his family, his children were very fair' [WR, BCS 010] In the story that (668) is taken from, is used particularly frequently. The story is about three brothers from the Bey Clan in mythological times, and gives an account of why each brother started a subclan and how the relationships between the subclans came about, which is a common genre in Karbi oral literature (§1.6.1). What appears to trigger the frequent use of then is that there are three protagonists, which are constantly contrasted. A further example that highlights this is (669). (669) Parallelism based on coordination indicated by additive =t (folk story) […] y abangta ahem arit dolo nke [[B y ke- k ab ng t a-h m a-r t d -l ] and.then CLAN NMLZ-be.black NPDL=ADD:also:PRL POSS-house POSS-field exist-RL Bey Ke'et abangta ahem arit dolo [[B y ke- t ab ng t a-h m a-r t d -l ] CLAN NMLZ-be.yellow NPDL=ADD:also:PRL POSS-house POSS-field exist-RL Bey Ronghang abang, akibi abangta, [[[B y Rongh ng ab ng [a-ke-b ab ng t CLAN CLAN NPDL POSS-NMLZ-be.small NPDL=ADD:also:PRL ahem arit dolo a-h m a-r t d -l ] POSS-house POSS-field exist-RL ‘[…] Bey the Black had his (own) house and property, Bey the Fair likewise had his (own) house and property, and Bey Ronghang, the young one, also had his (own) house and property' [WR, BCS 004] 10.5.1. Distribution of Noun Phrase Delimiter The distribution of the noun phrase delimiter is very unrestricted as it occurs in a wide variety of semantic and pragmatic contexts, as further discussed in §10.5.3 and §10.5.4. In the corpus of recorded texts, it occurs with NPs that have singular referents as well as with NPs that have plural referents. It occurs with lexical NPs but 468 also with pronouns, such as ‘he’, t ‘we (exclusive)’, and t ‘we (inclusive; formal)’. It also occurs with uniquely referential proper names, e.g., Linda abangke. The ‘noun phrase delimiter’ most typically occurs on noun phrases, but there are some instances where occurs on adverbs (or on (nominalized) subordinate clauses, see §10.5.2). Its occurrence on adverbs generally leads to a (nominal-like) interpretation of adverbs as referring to bounded entities, which can then be contrasted with other bounded entities. For example, (670) is about a character in the story, who takes his grandmother’s advice and changes his mind about which of his two uncles’ daughters he wants to marry. As a consequence, (670) states that at the house of the uncle that had been his original choice for marriage, referred to as hadak abangke ‘there’, all the food that had already been prepared for the wedding got rotten, because the wedding never took place. The expression of interest, hadak abangke ‘there’, clearly contrasts the original house/family with the newly chosen house/family to marry into. It appears that adding results in the vague adverb ‘there’ receiving a more specific interpretation of referring to the original house/family (i.e., literally, ‘at the there one (i.e., house)’). (670) Noun phrase delimiter on ‘there’ […] an hadak abangke lo han thuruilo, hala [ n [h d ab ng e] l h n th -r i-l ] [h la and.then there NPDL=TOP banana.leaf curry rot-many-RL that aphi alam karju an Bey Ke'et a-ph a-l m ke-arj n] [B y ke- t POSS-grandmother POSS-word NMLZ-hear because CLAN NMLZ-be.yellow ahem hedi hadak asopi la Bey Ke'et a-h m hed ] [h d k a-oso-p ] [l B y ke- t POSS-house NP.EMPH there POSS-child-female this CLAN NMLZ-be.yellow asopi aphansi hedi piso hangdamrong hadaksi a-oso-p aph n si hed ] [p s h ng-d m-r ng] [h d k si POSS-child-female NSUBJ=FOC NP.EMPH wife call-GO-instead there=FOC pangri pangdonrong tangho pangr pangd n-r ng t ngh ] reconcile even.out-instead REP ‘[…] and then there all the food got rotten, and then he followed his grandmother's advice 469 and to Bey the Fair's house, you know, right?, there (that man's) daughter, to the daughter of Bey the Fair, you know, right? he went to ask for her as a wife instead, there he went to get married instead' [WR, BCS 016] A similar use of with an adverb is shown in (671). Here, ‘now’ is used with again to restrict the vague adverb ‘now’ to a specific reading of ‘this time’. (671) Noun phrase delimiter on ‘now’ laso kematha amatsi “o do nangnelo, non abangke” las ke-math am tsi o d n ng-C -l [n n ab ng e] this NMLZ-think and.then INTERJ stay need-NEG-RL now NPDL=TOP ‘we were thinking this, and “o, no need to stay this time”’ [SH, CSM 065] Finally, (672) offers an example of with demonstratives for an added sense of referentiality (see also §4.5.3). (672) Noun phrase delimiter on demonstratives lasi laso ahonjeng komatma keteroiun las las a-honj ng kom t ma ke-ter i- n therefore this POSS-thread who=Q NMLZ-walk.cautiously-be.able labangke ahoklo l -ab ng e a-h k-l this-NPDL=TOP POSS-truth-RL ‘therefore, whoever can walk over this thread, that one is true’ [CST, HM 096] 10.5.2. Analysis as Noun Phrase Delimiter vs. Syntactic Head Noun In a number of occurrences of ng, it is synchronically unclear whether it should be analyzed as the noun phrase delimiter or as an abstract head noun - ‘possessive-classifier’, where is not necessarily the human plural classifier (anymore) (§4.4.1.1.2) but may be a further grammaticalized “general” classifier, or semantically entirely bleached head noun. An example is (673), where abang appears to head a relative clause with an indefinite reading: [[hem/rit kehon] abang] ‘somebody to look after the house and property’. Here, we could analyze - as ‘possessive-classifier:human.plural’, or even 470 as ‘possessive-somebody’, because is also used as an indefinite pronoun ‘somebody’ (see also bang-pak in §4.5.6). (673) Abang heading a non-referential relative clause […] hem kehon abangta ave h m ke-h n a-b ng t av house NMLZ-look.after POSS-somebody=ADD not.exist rit kehon abangta ave […] r t ke-h n a-b ng t av field NMLZ-look.after POSS-somebody=ADD not.exist ‘[…] there is nobody to look after my house and property […]’ [CST, RO 007] (674) shows that abang can also head a referential relative clause. In this case, it is parsed and glossed as ‘possessive-classifier:human’. (674) Abang heading a referential relative clause […] la saikel kevek abang puthot chevekponthulo […] [l saik l ke-v k a-b ng] puth t che-v k-p n-th -l this bicycle( hi'ipi abangsi laso kethondamtilo l -t m h 'ip ab ng si las ke-th n-d m-t -l this-PL this witch NPDL=FOC this NMLZ-drop-GO-get.rid.off-RL ‘nobody else than the witch abandoned them’ [CST, HM 083] (682) Noun phrase delimiter with =le ‘focus:irrealis’ hala alo abangle chothatnang […] [h la a-l ab ng le] cho-th t-n ng that POSS-male.animal NPDL=FOC:IRR AUTO.BEN/MAL-slaughter-HORT “let's kill that rooster!” […]' [SeT, MTN 010] 474 10.6. Role Marking I use the term ‘role marking’ to refer to a type of marking or non-marking that relates a participant to the verb. This term intentionally blurs the line between syntactic and semantic roles, as well as between core and oblique participants. Figure 22 shows the four basic possibilities in role marking on a continuum of the parameter of ‘syntacticity’ and/or, in fact, ‘pragmaticity’ (least semantic information and most likely to be ‘core argument’) and ‘semanticity’ (most semantic information and most likely to be ‘oblique’). These four possibilities are: 1) leave the NP unmarked; 2) the ‘non-subject’ marker - ; 3) the ‘locative’ marker - ; and 4) one of a set of (semantically specific) relator nouns (§4.4.4) or the comitative/instrumental/ablative =pen. Unmarked - - Other RNs; =pen Least information / Most information / most likely to be ‘core argument’ most likely to be ‘oblique’ Figure 22. Role marking possibilities Figure 22 represents these four possibilities on a continuum based on evidence that an unmarked NP can fill any semantic role (§10.6.1); while an NP marked with - ‘non-subject’ is somewhat more restricted in its role interpretation (§10.6.2); an NP marked with - ‘locative’ is even more restricted in its role interpretation (§10.6.3); and finally, an NP marked with one of the other relator nouns or with =pen very specifically marks particular roles (§10.6.4). Note, however, that there is variation as to how semantically specific a member of the category on the semantic end of the continuum is. For example, =pen is in fact not as semantically specific because it covers comitative, instrumental, and ablative roles. While the left end of the continuum in Figure 22 could be considered the syntactic pole, I believe there is a very strong sense that it is more of a pragmatic pole. That is, at this pole, pragmatic factors enable the language comprehender to determine the particular 475 role an NP has. In particular, instead of offering concrete semantic information, the use of an unmarked NP means that the speaker relies on the addressee to be able to unambiguously figure out the role of the NP. The two middle points on the continuum, - and - may be analyzed as having some syntactic basis, because - generally never marks S/A (except for, arguably, in the semantic marking of arguments of ‘need’, §10.6.2.4), and - generally never marks S/A (except for, again arguably, in the semantic marking of possessor, §10.6.3.4), and never O or T, pending the analysis of motion/goal constructions (§10.2.2.1, §10.6.3.2, §10.6.3.3). 10.6.1. Unmarked Noun Phrases Unmarked noun phrases in a clause may fill any ‘syntactic’ or ‘semantic role’, i.e., they may fill in for ‘required’ core arguments as well as any type of additional ‘oblique’ participant. It therefore makes sense to think of them as truly unmarked, rather than ‘zero-marked’, i.e., leaving them without a marker is not to be understood in opposition or in a paradigm with the actual markers, but as not specified for a syntactic or semantic role. Instead, then, unmarked is best understood as a pragmatic default, which represents the assumption on part of the speaker that the addressee is able to identify the syntactic or semantic role the unmarked noun phrase takes in the clause (see also §10.1.2 and §10.6). ‘Unmarked’ then instructs the listener to interpret the noun phrase as the most obvious or expected syntactic or semantic role. In addition, ‘unmarked’ NPs predominate where the semantic role is non-salient or most typical. For example, a locative NP that could receive the general locative marker - is more likely to remain unmarked than a locative NP whose locational properties are unexpected or salient, such as - ‘high up’ (§10.6.1.7). Examples that demonstrate the occurrence of unmarked noun phrases in all types of syntactic and semantic roles follow. 10.6.1.1. S Argument (683) and (684) show that NPs unmarked for role can function as S arguments both of predicates consisting of PCT roots and those consisting of active verbs. 476 (683) Unmarked S argument (PCT root) jangrengso abangta repik tangho {mm} jangr ngs ab ng t r -p k t ngh mm orphan NPDL=ADD:DM be.smart-very REP AFF ‘[but] the orphan is very smart’ [HK, TR 064] (684) Unmarked S argument lasi ha nangpai vanglo jaho damnoi mok las h nang- i v ng-l j ho d m-n i m k therefore over.there 2-mother come-RL look.there! go-INFRML.COND.IMP breast chudamnoi dah pulo ch -d m-n i d h p -l suck-GO-INFRML.COND.IMP go! say-RL ‘and then, "from there your mom has come, look there!, go and drink milk, go!" said (the grandmother)’ [KK, CC 014] 10.6.1.2. A Argument A arguments are always unmarked, here in a transitive clause with an O-low argument ‘yam’ in (685). (685) Unmarked A argument laso ajangrengsoke phurui kituk kituk kituk kituk... las a-jangr ngs e phur i ke-t k ke-t k ke-t k ke-t k this POSS-orphan=TOP yam NMLZ-dig NMLZ-dig NMLZ-dig NMLZ-dig chelangledetlohe {mm} che-l ng-C -d t-l =he RR-see-NEG-PFV-RL=AFTERTHOUGHT ‘this orphan, as he was digging and digging and digging... he didn't look around’ [HK, TR 051] 10.6.1.3. O-Low Argument (686) and (687) show that O arguments both with non-human and human referents may remain unmarked. Unmarked O arguments are defined as O-low arguments 477 (§10.2.1.2), so per definition, only O-low arguments are unmarked, while O-high arguments are marked by - ‘non-subject’.172 (686) Unmarked O-low argument with non-human referent nepo kecho ahormu vanpo ne-p [ke-ch a-horm v n-p 1EXCL-father NMLZ-eat POSS-thing bring-IRR1 ‘our father will/might have brought something to eat’ [HI, BPh 016] (687) Unmarked O-low argument with human referent ne nahokpen setame... e ne nechor n nah k pen set m e n ne-ch r 1EXCL anywhere=from nevertheless DSM 1EXCL 1EXCL:POSS-spouse chirithupo pu […] che-r -th -p pu RR-search-again-IRR1 QUOT ' (he thought by himself), […]' [CST, RO 009] 10.6.1.4. T Argument T arguments in ditransitive constructions (both R-centered and T-centered constructions; see §10.2.1.3) often remain unmarked, as in (688). (688) Unmarked T argument in R-centered trivalent construction lapenke aphutup pidetlo laphan [NP]T [NP ]R lap n ke a- hut p -d t-l l -ph n and.then=TOP POSS-hat give-PFT-RL this-NSUBJ ‘and then, he gave him his hat’ [SiT, PS 038] 10.6.1.5. R Argument (T-Centered Trivalent Constructions) In the T-centered trivalent constructions, the R argument may be unmarked, as in (689), where the verb t means ‘take T to R’. 172 Note that in (687), the reason why the O argument nechor is unmarked is not because the verb is marked reflexive by che-; O arguments of reflexive-marked verbs can still be O-high (see §6.4.3). 478 (689) Unmarked R argument in T-centered trivalent construction […] apai abangsi mane kechengpenke [NP]A a-p i ab ng si mane ke-ch ng pen ke POSS-mother NPDL=FOC I.mean( pharla dam, e [ nke a-p i t harl d m] DSM and.then POSS-mother=ADD:DM HESIT outside.part.Karbi.house go t hem damsi, [th ng a-khangr -k k-si] h m d m-si] firewood POSS-basket.for.firewood leave-in.a.fixed.place-NF:RL house go-NF:RL hongkup hong ingn -l n-si] [m k che-pa-ch -si] entrance.area.Karbi.house sit-big:AO-NF:RL breast RR-CAUS-suck-NF:RL "dojoinoi, po!" [d -j i-n i p ] stay-quietly-INFRML.COND.IMP father ‘and then, the mother went and unloaded the firewood in the Pharla (Veranda), then went inside the house, sat down in the Hongkup, gave the child the milk, “be quiet, father”’ [KK, CC 015] 479 10.6.1.7. ‘Oblique’ or Semantic Role As shown in §10.6.1.6, both goals of motion goal verbs, which should therefore be considered arguments, i.e., required roles, and locatives of motion manner verbs are often unmarked. Another example of a different motion manner verb, ‘jump’, with an unmarked goal participant is offered in (691). (691) Unmarked goal participant with manner motion verb ‘jump’ amat chonghota chonthap chonphrulo am t chongh t ch n-th p ch n-phr -l and.then frog=ADD:DM jump-here.and.there.1/2 jump-here.and.there.2/2-RL kesolo... karlesibongpo adon chonrai ke-s -l [ arl sib ng- a-d n] ch n-r i NMLZ-hurt-RL squirrel.sp-male POSS-bridge jump-solid.obj.breaking and then, the frog was jumping everywhere because he was hurt, and he jumped on the ladder of the squirrel and it broke [RBT, ChM 018] Locatives may also be unmarked with predicates that we do not conceptualize as projecting a locative as a core role. This is the case in (692), where the locative ‘(in) the field hut’ is an oblique participant of ‘eat’. In the same sentence, however, the previous conditional clause has a different oblique locative, hemtap angsong ‘up in the tree house’, here marked with the relator noun - ‘high.up’. (692) Unmarked (non-salient) locative NP with ‘eat’, but marked salient locative NP ( ‘high up’) […] nangpole hemtap angsong chote, nangtumke mandule [[nang-p le h mt a-ngs ng ch -t ] nang-t m ke [mand =le] 2-father=FOC:IRR tree.house POSS-high.up eat-if 2-PL=TOP field.hut=FOC:IRR cho ch ] eat ‘[…] if your father takes his meal in the hemtap, you eat in the mandu>' [CST, RO 017] The fact that in the same sentence, the locative NP ‘(in) the field hut’ is unmarked, but the other locative NP hemtap angsong ‘high up in the treehouse’, provides further evidence that ‘unmarked’ really does mean ‘unmarked’ in the sense that a role does not need to be marked if it is unambiguously and expectedly defined by context (as 480 judged, of course, by the speaker). Here, the unusual and salient location ‘up in the tree house’ is marked by the specifically semantic relator noun - g, while the ordinary and default location on the ground ‘(in) the field hut’ remains unmarked. Finally, (693) and (694) demonstrate that NPs in unusual and typically oblique roles such as ‘instrument’ and ‘path’ may be unmarked if the speaker judges the context to satisfactorily disambiguate their roles. (693) Unmarked instrumental NP [...] laphanke ha sirkut ingdeng krehini arlo l -ph n ke h sirk t ingd ng kr -hin arl this-NSUBJ=TOP over.there HESIT room level ten.and-two inside bengdamcheklo sabi maricheklo b ng-d m-ch k-l [sab ]INSTR mar -ch k-l lock-GO-firmly-RL HESIT key( halaphansi apei apo chitinloklo h la- h n si a-p i a-p che-t n-l k-l that-NSUBJ=FOC POSS-mother POSS-father RR-mistake-happen.to-RL ‘they mistakenly considered them (the tigers) mother and father’ [CST, HM 109] However, there are three instances of O-arguments with non-human referents, all with the same referent in the same recording: a procedural text which is mostly about how traditional clothes are made. One of these instances is in (696). The O-high argument in three different sentences is pindeng sumpot a collective elaborate expression that refers to ‘dress and ornaments’, which is the topic of the larger discourse or text, and perhaps because of that is treated as an O-high argument. (696) - marking inanimate O argument asumpot halabangso ahut elitum Karbi a-sump t] [h la-b ng-s ah t e-li-t m Karb POSS-EE:pind ng that-NPDL-DEM during 1PL.INCL-HON-PL PN akhei atum pindeng sumpot aphan a-kh i a-t m [ ind ng sum t a h n] POSS-community POSS-PL dress.and.ornaments EE: ind ng NSUBJ kosonsonsi keklemma kos n~s n si ke-kl m ma how~DIST.PL=FOC NMLZ-do=Q 'in the old days, the people of the Karbi tribe, the clothing and ornaments, during the old days, what are the (different) ways in which we the Karbi tribe would make/produce dresses and ornaments?, (that's what I will talk about)' [KST, PSu 002] Finally, in another instance of O-high arguments, the apparently typically intransitive predicate ‘be glad’ takes an O-high argument and is then interpreted as ‘be grateful to sb’ in (697). 482 (697) - marked participant of predicate ‘be glad; be grateful’ lapenke la phutup kipidunthu apot lap n ke [l phut p ke-p -d n-th ap t] and.then=TOP this hat NMLZ-give-JOIN-again because laphan aning ingsamsi, thesere pumni tekanglo [l - h n a-n ng ings m-si] [theser p m-n tek ng-l ] this-NSUBJ POSS-mind be.cold-NF:RL fruits CLF:round-two leave.for-RL ‘and then, because he returned the hat, he (the bicycle boy) was grateful to him (the hat picking boy) and gave him two pieces of fruit’ [SiT, PS 039] 10.6.2.2. R Argument (R-Centered Trivalent Construction) R arguments are marked by - , as in (698). Note that in this example, the speaker firsts uses the plural form asomarke (i.e., with - ‘plural’) for the T argument, and then corrects herself and uses the singular form asoke. This construction is then defined as the R-centered trivalent construction (§10.2.1.3.1). (698) - marked R argument asomarke asoke aphi aphan [ø]A [NP]T [NP]T [NP ]R ø a-so-m r ke a-os ke [a-ph aph n] ø POSS-child-PL=TOP POSS-child=TOP POSS-grandmother NSUBJ tekangbuplo tek ng-b p-l leave.for-RES:gone-RL ‘she left her child with the grandmother’ [KK, CC 011] 10.6.2.3. T Argument (T-Centered Trivalent Constructions) In the T-centered trivalent constructions (§10.2.1.3.2), T may be marked with - , as in (699). 483 (699) - -marked human T argument and a -marked locative R/goal argument […] itum aphanke ha nampi namdur alongsi [NP ]T [NP a ]R e-t m aph n ke h n mp n md r al ng si 1PL.INCL-PL NSUBJ=TOP over.there big.forest EE:namp LOC=FOC ekethondamlo e=ke-th n-d m-l 1INCL:NSUBJ =NMLZ-drop-GO-RL ‘[…] (the witch) abandoned us over there in the deep forest’ [CST, HM 076] 10.6.2.4. Semantic Marking with ‘need’ As discussed in §10.2.2.2, the verb ‘need’ projects an A-like argument that is optionally marked by - . 10.6.2.5. Marking the Standard of Comparison (700) shows that - often marks the standard of comparison in comparative constructions (§10.2.2.5). (700) - marked standard of comparison opeija nephanta halasi nangsarlang (both laughing) opeija ne- h n t h la si nang s r-l ng my.goodness! 1EXCL-NSUBJ=ADD:even that=FOC 1/2:NSUBJ=be.old-still ‘oh my goodness! this one is still older than me! (both laughing)’ [HK, TR 098] 10.6.2.6. Oblique Participant The ‘non-subject’ marker - also marks oblique participants in a number of instances in the corpus of recorded texts. In (701), (702), and (703), it occurs in a PCT intransitive, an equational clause, and in an existential construction, respectively, marking a topical participant to whom the stated proposition applies. (701) - marking an oblique participant of ‘be good’ neliphanke me'ongchotlo ne-li- h n e m - ng-ch t-l 1EXCL-HON-NSUBJ=TOP be.good-be.much-very-RL ‘this is very good (i.e. a very good opportunity) for me’ [SiT, HF 003] 484 (702) - marking an oblique participant in an equational clause isi great inspiration neliphan, laso hormu neli atumi is great inspiration ne-li- h n las horm n -l tum one great inspiration 1EXCL-HON-NSUBJ this thing 1EXCL-HON yesterday thekdamlonglokpenke ning ingsam'olo th k-d m-l ng-l k-p n ke n ng ings m- -l see-GO-GET-happen.to-NF=TOP mind be.cold-much-RL ‘it was one great inspiration for me, that I got to see this thing yesterday I was very glad’ [SiT, HF 032] (703) - marking an oblique participant of ‘not exist’ mh nephanke aker apar nangkethanke mh ne- h n e a-k r ap r nang=ke-th n ke pause 1EXCL-NSUBJ=TOP POSS-bad.omen besides 1/2:NSUBJ=NMLZ-tell=TOP avelo av -l not.exist-RL ‘to me, this is nothing but a bad omen’ [KK, BMS 021] In (704), - marks an added benefactee, which, however, is not projected as a core role by the predicate due to the lack of the benefactive suffix - in the verb stem (see also §10.2.3.2). (704) Benefactee marked with - ‘non-subject’ without benefactive - on verb tangka atibuksi ronji la arnam aphan, [[t ngk a-t b k si] r n-j [[l arn m a h n] money POSS-earthen.pot=FOC distribute-IRR2 this god NSUBJ latum a'arnam aphan {avan along} avan [l -t m a-arn m a h n]]BEN {[a-v n al ng]} [a-v n this-PL POSS-god PAT POSS-share LOC POSS-share along tangka atibuk nunrenpo lasi al ng] [t ngk a-t b k] n n-r n- las LOC money POSS-earthen.pot place.container-in.a.row-IRR1 therefore ‘they (i.e. the tigers) distribute/offer the money pots for the god, for their gods, {on their plates (of offerings)}, and they will put the earthen pots in one long row’ [HK, TR 111] Finally, it should be noted that a has grammaticalized to function as a subordinator marking nominalized adverbial clauses as in (705). 485 (705) a as subordinator with adverbial clause saikel along'an [saik l al ng- n POSS-kd.basket LOC-up.to bicycle(, to the bicycle he brings the basket, the basket he is trying to put on the cycle [SiT, PS 021] Evidence for considering the subordinator not (yet) a (strongly) separate morpheme from the non-subject role marker is offered by (706).173 Here we can see that two - phrases are coordinated: one an NP, the other a purpose subordinate clause, which indicates that they are treated as having the same syntactic status. The subordinator is further discussed in §9.5. (706) Coordination of two - marked constituents: NP and purpose clause tun dangpikang'etsi [t n d ng-p -k ng- t-si] cook put.on.stove-BEN/MAL-leaving-PRF-NF:RL chinghorponkingsi rit kedo atum [che-ingh r-p n-k ng-si] [ r t ke-d a-t m RR-carry.load-on.the.way-some.weight:O-NF:RL field NMLZ-stay POSS-PL aphanta ba hadak keklemdamji aphan a- h n t b h d ke- l m-d m-j a- h n POSS-NSUBJ=ADD or( pe akelokpen keroi isi [NP]A [NP ]R [ nke [a-mon t ab ng] a-ke-l en ke-r i is and.then POSS-man NPDL cloth POSS-NMLZ-be.white=with NMLZ-sew one ajamborong arlosi lahai kethap lapen arum kevan [NP]T a-jambor ng arl si] [lah i] ke-th p]] lap n [ar m ke-v n]] POSS-bag inside=FOC these NMLZ-put.inside and down NMLZ-bring ‘[…] and then, the man, into a bag sown from white cloth he puts these (fruits), and then brings them down [SiT, PS 003] (720) Trivalent predicate with - marked T argument and - marked locative non-human R argument amatsi itum aphanke dak habit angbongsi [NP ]T [NP ]R am tsi e-t m aph n ke d k hab t angb ng si because 1INCL-PL NSUBJ=TOP here jungle in.middle.of=FOC nangkethonti nang=ke-th n-t 1/2:NSUBJ=NMLZ-drop-get.rid.off 'and then, she took us here in the middle of the jungle and abandoned us’ [CST, HM 052]' 10.6.4.2. Semantically Specific Relator Noun Marking of Obliques Semantically specific relator nouns presumably most often mark obliques, i.e., roles not required or projected by the predicate. Examples of the semantically specific 492 roles marked by the various relator nouns are offered in §4.4.4; a sample instance of - ‘high up’ marking a semantically specific location is provided in (721). In this example, the non-specific or non-salient locative role of ‘(in) the field hut’ remains unmarked (see also §10.6.1.7). (721) ‘Salient’ locative NP marked by - ‘high up’ […] nangpole hemtap angsong chote, nangtumke [[nang-p le h mt a-ngs ng ch -t ] nang-t m ke 2:POSS-father=FOC:IRR tree.house POSS-high.up eat-if 2-PL=TOP mandule cho [mand =le] ch ] field.hut=FOC:IRR eat ‘[…] if your father takes his meal in the hemtap, you eat in the mandu>' [CST, RO 017] 10.6.5. Differential Marking O arguments as well as goal arguments are differentially marked. For O arguments, this means that certain O arguments are marked by - ‘non-subject’ while others remain unmarked (§10.2.1.2). For goal arguments, this means that some are marked by - ‘locative’ while others remain unmarked. Both semantic and pragmatic factors underlie this differential marking, and they do so in a probabilistic way. For example, an important semantic factor is +/-human. A human referent is very likely to be marked by - or - , while a non-human referent is very likely to remain unmarked. Nevertheless, not all O and goal arguments with human referents are marked and not all arguments with non-human referent are unmarked. Comprehensive corpus study of the interplay of semantic and pragmatic factors involved in differential argument marking in Karbi needs to be carried out in future research. Nevertheless, just to offer a glimpse of the pragmatic aspects of differential marking, consider (722) and (723). These examples show that in the same context, within the same story and just four intonation units apart, in the same proposition ‘we still need to ask our mother and father’, the O argument ‘our mother and father’ may be unmarked or marked by - ‘non-subject’. This may have something to do with nepei nepo ‘our mother and father’ just having been mentioned in the preposed subordinate clause in 493 (722). But in any event, it clearly shows that differential O marking may be triggered solely by pragmatic factors, because these two examples are semantically identical. (722) [NP] charjudamlang ‘mh’ “nepei nepo hadak do apot nepei [‘mh’ ne-p i ne-p h d k d ap t] [ ne- i NEG.INTERJ 1EXCL-mother 1EXCL-father there stay because 1EXCL:POSS-mother nepo charjudamlang” pu amatsi halaso ateke along ne- che-arj -d m-l ng pu] [am tsi [h las a-tek al ng] 1EXCL:POSS-father RR-hear-go-yet QUOT because that POSS-tiger LOC ako chedamlo ak che-d m-l ] again( nephipen mo e ne- h en m DSM 1EXCL 2 1EXCL:POSS-grandmother=with future chetongvekpo chet ng-v k-p meet-definitely-IRR1 1EXCL ‘I will definitely meet my grandmother later’ [KK, BMS 028] (726) O argument of t ‘meet’ marked with - ‘non-subject’ damlo anke.... halabangso kiridam ahut d m-l nke h la-b ng-s ke-r -d m ah t go-RL and.then that-NPDL-DEM NMLZ-search-go during jangreso aphan chetonglok [jangr s a h n] che-t ng-l k single.parent.child NSUBJ RR-meet-happen.to ‘he (the tiger) went, and then, that one while looking for more, he happened to run into the orphan (in the text actually jangreso, i.e. single parent child)’ [HK, TR 048] 495 10.6.6.2. - ‘ask-GO’ Another instance of marking variation occurs with - ‘ask-go’, and in this case it appears to be due to this being a complex stem that involves serialization of ‘ask’ and ‘go’ (also see §6.5.4 on the grammaticalized predicate derivation - - ‘GO’). (727) and (728) show that the ‘non-subject’ argument can be marked either by - ‘non-subject’ or - ‘locative’, which suggests that either ‘ask’ projects the argument structure, leading to marking by - , or ‘go’ does, leading to marking by - . (727) [[NP] aph n] arjudamlo matlo ante kechokcheke, o ha ingnar nothongpo aphan arjudamlo noth ng-p le> ingn r noth ng- a h n arj -d m-l ] deaf- MODIF =FOC:IRR elephant deaf- MODIF NSUBJ ask-go-RL '"who then is the guilty one?", o there he went to ask the deaf elephant' [RBT, ChM 032] (728) [[NP] al ng] arjudamlo ha karlesibongpo along arjudamlo... "Te [h arl sib ng- al ng] arj -d m-l t over.there squirrel.sp-male LOC ask-go-RL and.then/therefore karlesibongpo, pisi nang hanthar athe karl sib ngp p si n ng hanth r a-th squirrel.sp why you vegetable.sp POSS-fruit kerotpetle... phakbelengpi amoi ke-r t-p t le ph kbel ngp a-m i NMLZ-cut-sd.of.resulting.event=FOC:IRR pig.sp POSS-back peklodup athema?" pe-kl -d p ath ma CAUS-fall-falling.sound.from.high.solid.obj because 'over there he went and asked the squirrel, "so then, squirrel, why did you gnaw on the Hanthar and thus made it fall down on the back of the pig?"' [RBT, ChM 066] 496 10.7. Information Structure Marking The four sections below discuss each of the four information structure clitics: topic =ke in §10.7.1; additive =t , which acts as a topic-switch marker, in §10.7.2; furthermore, (realis) focus =si in §10.7.3; and irrealis focus =le in §10.7.4. Noun phrases unmarked for any of these information structure statuses are taken to simply be unspecified with regard to the four information statuses. Note, however, that information structure marking is not restricted to these four clitics. §10.7.6 discusses several other information structure constructions including a preliminary account of constituent order (§10.7.6.1). 10.7.1. Topic =ke In calling =ke a topic marker, I follow the traditional notion of ‘topic’ as ‘what the sentence is about’. Since this does not serve as an operationalizable definition, this section instead offers examples to provide an overview of typical occurrences of topic =ke, which coincide with typical topic functions in the linguistic literature. Note that in all instances, =ke indicates an element at the beginning of the clause, only following any discourse connectors (or another element marked by =ke). NPs marked by =ke may be oblique participants that are not projected by the verb, or they may be core arguments that are projected by the verb. NPs marked (or unmarked) for any syntactico-semantic role (§10.6) may be marked with =ke. =ke also occurs on adverbs, as well as on entire clauses. Topic =ke optionally marks the S argument of equational clauses, as it does in (729). (729) Topic =ke on S argument in equational clause kortete apoke richo [ ortet a- e] [rich ] 2.siblings.of.same.gender POSS-father=TOP king 'the father of the sisters was a king' [CST, HM 004] Topic =ke marks framing elements at the beginning of clauses, which indicate the setting of the event expressed in the clause. In (730), a temporal NP is marked with =ke, while in (731), a temporal adverb occurs in the same construction. 497 (730) Topic =ke on framing NP […] laso arni abangke hala osomar atum mandu kecho […] las arn ab ng e [h la os -m r a-t m mand ke-ch ] this day NPDL=TOP that child-PL POSS-PL field.hut NMLZ-eat ‘[…] that day, those children were eating in the mandu, […]' [CST, RO 030] (731) Topic =ke on framing adverb ‘ t t chorappetsinang ‘mh' [ p i a-t m] [[ in e] e-t m n ch -r p-p t-sin ng] NEG vocative mother POSS-PL today=TOP 1INCL-PL rice eat-together-all-CON.HORT ‘no, o mothers, today let's eat together now (and see what's going to happen)’ [CST, RO 027] (732) and (733) show that there may be more than one topic-marked element, in which case both topics occur at the beginning of the clause. In (732), the second person pronoun , which is an oblique or non-core person participant of the nominal predicate ‘(these) are new people’, represents the first topic; the locative adverb ‘here’ represents the second topic. (732) Double topic (person participant and locative adverb) […] “nangke dakke arleng kimi apot la siksakji” pu […] n ng e 1 d e 2 arl ng ke-m ap t] l siks k-j ] pu you=TOP here=TOP person NMLZ-be.new because this be.difficult-IRR2 QUOT ‘[…] for you, here, these are new people, so it will be difficult […]’ [SH, CSM 066] In (733), the temporal postpositional phrase laso arnipenke ‘from this day on’ represents the first topic. The O argument of the verb stem ‘cause to not exist’, hala ’ ‘that witch’, represents the second topic, which is reactivated here after having been an important character in the story before. (733) Double topic (temporal NP and person participant) lasi laso arnipenke hala hi'ipi aphanke pavedetlo, las las arn en e 1 h la h i a h n e 2 pe-av -d t-l therefore this day=from=TOP that witch NSUBJ=TOP CAUS-not.exist-PFV-RL la Karbipipensi alangtum choboche chosonse, aosomarpen l Karb -p pen si al ng-t m choboch chosons a-os -m r pen this PN-female=with=FOC 3-PL settle.down EE:choboch POSS-child-PL=with ‘from that very day on, he killed the witch, with the Karbi woman they settled down, with the children’ [CST, HM 119] 498 In (734) and (735), =ke occurs on each of two contrasting topics in two different clauses. In (734), the two clauses are constructed parallel to one another, which makes it very straightforward to see how =ke marks contrastive topics. (734) Topic =ke in contrastive topic construction inutke hi'ipi, inutke arlengpi, Karbipi e-n t e h 'ip ] e-n t e [arl ng-p Karb -p ]] one-CLF:HUM:SG=TOP witch one-CLF:HUM:SG=TOP person-FEM PN-FEM ‘one is a witch, one/the other is a woman, a Karbi woman’ [CST, HM 006] In another example of the contrastive topic construction in (735), the clauses are not structured exactly parallel to one another, but the contrast is still very clear: ‘you have already reached’, and ‘we don’t know how to get there’. (735) Topic =ke in contrastive topic construction e nanghem nangritlo, nangke nangcheleroklo [e nang-h m nang-r t-l ] n ng e nang chV-l -r k-l ] DSM 2POSS-house 2POSS-field-RL you=TOP CIS=RR-reach-completed-RL t t t ne-t m e d m-th k-C -l nang-ph pen 1EXCL-PL=TOP go-know.how-NEG-RL 2POSS-grandmother=with nang-ph ke] 2POSS-grandfather=TOP ‘it's your house and property, you've already reached, (but) we don't know how to go, your grandmother and your grandfather’ [KK, BMS 096] The next example is part of a story, in which a dog takes his owner to Chom Arong ‘Chom’s Village’, the place in Karbi mythology where the dead people reside. In (736), the dog and its owner have reached a huge body of water on their journey. In this sentence, the dog is speaking, and =ke occurs on the first person pronoun subject. It appears that the function of =ke here is to indicate the despair of the dog over the difficulty of the task; =ke may thus serve to evoke a set of candidates more likely to succeed in the challenge. 499 (736) Topic =ke evoking a set of more likely candidates? kopusi neke nangkepaparponpoma kop si n e nang=ke-pa-p r-p n-p ma how=FOC 1EXCL=TOP 1/2:NSUBJ=NMLZ-CAUS-cross(, they asked me, and I replied, ' [SH, CSM 049] (739) =t signaling the perspective-switch from taking to giving (converses) latum interview enlo, alangta interview chepidunlo [la-t m interview n-l ] [al ng t interview che-p -d n-l ] DEM.PROX-PL interview take-RL 3=ADD:DM interview RR-give-JOIN-RL ‘they took interviews (from her), and she also gave them interviews’ [SH, CSM 050] In the other construction type, =t marks a reactivated topic that contrasts with the current topic. This function of =t is argued to indicate discourse continuity, i.e., as telling the listener to understand the utterance as being strongly connected to the previous discourse despite the fact that the topic has changed (cf. also Kaplan's (1984: 514) explanation of obligatory English 'too' as "to emphasize the similarity between contrasting constituents"). This strong connection is typically afforded by a causal, resultative, or reactive relationship to the previous event, as demonstrated with the following examples. In the folk story Chongho-kaloso lapen Miso-rongpo ‘The Frog and the Ant’ (see Appendix D), there are numerous instances of topic-switch =t due to the structure of the story, which is built on the idea of a chain reaction of events: after a fight between an ant and a frog, the ant bites the frog, the frog is mad and jumps around and destroys a squirrel’s ladder, the squirrel gets mad and gnaws a fruit off a tree, which then falls on the back of a pig, and so on. In the end, a rock kills the king’s daughter, and as the king tries to find out who he can hold responsible, he traces the chain reaction back to the frog and the ant and punishes them. This story that is built on this chain reaction of events offers a number of natural topic-switch situations that are marked by =t . For example, in (740), the first clause states that the frog, ellipsed via zero anaphora (§10.4.3), is in rage and jumps on the squirrels ladder, which then breaks. As a consequence, the squirrel, 501 marked by =t , gets angry. It is this topic switch to the squirrel as it reacts to the frog’s action that is marked by =t . (740) Topic-switch: =t marking new topic reacting to action by previous topic karlesibongpo adon chonrai [ - ] - squirrel.sp POSS-bridge jump-RES:solid.obj.breaking amat karlesibongpota aning thilo t [a- t - ] and.then squirrel.sp=ADD:TS POSS-mind be.short-RL '(the frog) jumped on the ladder of the squirrel so it broke, and then the squirrel in turn got angry' [RBT, ChM 018-9] In (741), Bamonpo’s wife passes away, as expressed euphemistically in the first clause with the expression Chom chevoi ‘return to Chom (i.e., the mythological village of the dead)’. As a consequence, Bamonpo, marked by =t , is desperate and full of worries. (741) Topic-switch: =t indicating a consequence “ [s ] [Ch m che-v i-j i-l ] [ nsi m i kop si DEM.PROX PLACE RR-return-away-RL after.that how.bad! how=FOC t t ” ta ningrilo ke-d -th k ap tlo ma] [bam n-p t ningr -l ] NMLZ-stay-know.how should= Q wise.person( CLF/NUM/QUANT Noun Verb - + + t ~ - t - + + - + - - t + - - - - + + - t - + - - t ? - + As for their syntactic distribution, the markers differ in whether they attach to classifiers/numerals/quantifiers, nouns, predicates, or a combination of these, as shown in the Table 114. Note that t - t is the only marker whose form differs depending on what type of head it modifies. Finally, note that is the only element for which a likely historical origin still exists in the language: the verb ‘be naked’. While t looks like a relator noun, there is no homophonous lexical item in modern Karbi that could represent its grammaticalization source element. The - t suffix is homophonous with exhaustive perfective - t (§6.8.1), and the exhaustive semantic component does make a relationship between the two suffixes likely, as does the fact that restrictive focus - t does not occur on verbs. Table 115 shows which restrictive focus marker indicate which particular function, of which four have so far been identified. Table 115. Functions of restrictive focus markers Function > Exclusively Exclusively and constantly Does not meet numeric/measurable expectation Does not meet semantic/pragmatic expectation (‘merely’) Associated with > entity event entity entity / event Marked on > noun noun / verb CLF/NUM/QUANT noun / verb - ? - + - t + + + + - t - - + - - k - + - ? - t + - - ? - t - + + + 176 ‘+’ means that the marker occurs with or on the particular element, ‘-‘ means it does not, and ‘?’ means that there is currently no evidence to tell for sure. 516 The function described by the adverb ‘exclusively’ indicates that the referent of the noun marked as such is asserted to be the exclusive and only referent for which the proposition is correct. An elicited example with - t is (765). Here, if it ended up being the case that somebody besides or along with Kasang was bringing food, the sentence would not be truthful. (765) - t marking ‘exclusively’ function Kasang- =si -t - NAME-only=FOC rice NMLZ-drop-GO ‘only/exclusively Kasang (nobody else and nobody accompanying her) is bringing food’ [Elicitation SiT 111104] An elicited minimal pair of (765) is (766). It illustrates the function of - to indicate the function described in Table 115 as ‘exclusively and constantly’. Specifically this means that if there was anybody besides Kasang who kept bringing food or also if Kasang only brings or brought food once, the sentence would not be truthful. Note that in both (765) and (766), the restrictive focus marked NP is additionally marked by the general focus particle =si (§10.7.3). (766) - marking ‘exclusively and constantly’ function Kasang- =si -t - NAME-only=FOC rice NMLZ-drop-GO ‘only/exclusively Kasang keeps bringing food (nobody else)’ [Elicitation SiT 111104] An example of this ‘exclusively and constantly’ marking function of - from the corpus of recorded texts is (767). Here the context makes it very clear that the action is going on ‘constantly’. (767) - marking ‘exclusively and constantly’ function t t t [th p ke-t k-l k] [j arn t s ng-l ng-C ] cake.for.rice.beer IPFV-pound-only night day=ADD:EXH take.rest-GET-NEG thap ketoklok ketoklok, aso mok [th p ke-t k-l k ke-t k-l k] [[[a-s m k cake.for.rice.beer IPFV-pound-only IPFV-pound-only POSS-child breast 517 kachepechuji apor ave tangho ke-che-pa-ch -j ] a-p r] av t ngh ] NMLZ-RR-CAUS-suck-IRR2 POSS-time not.exist REP ‘they just kept pounding the rice for the rice beer cake, the whole time they didn't get to take rest, they were pounding the rice beer cake, they didn't even have time to breast-feed their children’ [WR, BCS 030] (768) provides a text example that shows - t occurring on classifier-numeral words. The restrictive focus here indicates that there is an expectation in this context that there should be a higher number than the one that the ‘only’ marker has scope over. (768) -v t: numeric/measuring only: no more than X api jonni alo [a-p j n-n ] [a-l POSS-female/mother CLF:animal-two POSS-male.animal jonnivetlo jonphlivetlo j n-n -v t-l ] [j n-phl -v t-l ] CLF:animal-two-only-RL CLF:animal-four-only-RL that way, he kept eating and eating, and from the one hundred hens and one hundred roosters, two hens and two roosters only, only four (were left) [SeT, MTN 028] Lastly, the function ‘not meeting the full expectation’ with respect to a referent or event presupposes a contextually defined semantic and pragmatic scale of referent and events that fulfill a particular expectation more or less. In the folk story example in (769), a witch has previously taken the Karbi woman’s children and abandoned them in the jungle, while putting two pieces of firewood in the cradle, which were meant to imitate the shape of the children. In (769), the witch says to the father, the king, that the Karbi woman had given birth to ‘only’ or ‘merely’ two pieces of firewood. Pieces of firewood clearly do not fulfill the expectation of actual human babies and would be ranked lower in an intuitive scale on what a woman should give birth to. (769) ‘merely’: does not meet full expectation (semantic/pragmatic scale) nangpiso Karbipi asomar aso [[nang-pis Karb -p a-oso-m r a-os 2:POSS-wife PN-fem POSS-child-PL POSS-child 524 (776) Polar interrogative with =ma and with answer “ ” , ch -j m p ne-ph n arj -l ] be.fine-IRR2=Q QUOT 1EXCL-NSUBJ ask-RL t t “ ” [am tsi n t p -l ch and.then 1EXCL=ADD say-RL be.fine '”is it fine?”, they asked me, and I replied, “it's fine”' [SH, CSM 049] (777) shows that this type of interrogative with =ma also allows the verb to be negated. (777) Polar interrogative with =ma and with answer {nopakke ponpema?} nop k ke n- =ma dao=TOP take.away-NEG=Q {he wasn't carrying a dao?} [HK, TR 022] nopakta dolo dak {lahe} mm nop k t d -l d k lah mm dao=ADD:also exist-RL here that.way? AFF 'he did have a dao also there.' {'is it like that?'} 'Mm.' [HK, TR 023] 11.1.1.4.2. Polar Interrogatives with Prosody Only Another polar interrogative construction is formed by using a rising intonation. An example is offered in excerpt (778), which starts out with a storyteller talking about the protagonist of the story and saying that he he had no parents or siblings. As a reaction, another Karbi native speaker listening to the storyteller asks enutvetlo? ‘(so) he was alone?’, to which the answer by the storyteller is agreement through repeating the predicate enutvetlo. (778) Prosodic polar question apei avelo apo avelo.... a-p i av -l a-p av -l .... POSS-mother not.exist-RL POSS-father not.exist-RL 525 a'ik avelo ate avelo a- k av -l a-t av -l POSS-older.brother not.exist-RL POSS-elder.sister not.exist-RL ‘he didn't have a mother anymore, he didnt have a father anymore.... he didn't have any brothers or sisters anymore’ [HK, TR 004] {enutvetlo?} e-n t-v t-l one-CLF:HUM:SG-only-RL ‘{he was alone?}’ [HK, TR 005] enutvetlo {to} e-n t-v t-l t one-CLF:HUM:SG-only-RL OK ‘he was alone {OK}’ [HK, TR 006] 178 Figure 23 offers the spectrogram and waveform of the question enutvetlo? and the answer enutvetlo, with the blue line representing F0 and the yellow line representing intensity (figure made with Praat (Boersma and Weenink 2013)).179 Figure 23. Waveform and spectrogram of interrogative and subsequent declarative enutvetlo ‘he was alone’ ( TR 005-6) 178 The audio file for HK, TR 005-6 is available under the DOI name 10.7264/N3736P5Z, see Appendix B. 179 Note that in both speakers’ productions, both alveolar stops are elided as is common in hypoarticulated speech (§3.7.1). Segmentically, they therefore both produce “ nuvelo.” 526 While the first enutvetlo, which represents the question, shows the expected rise in F0, it is perhaps surprising that the answer closely mirrors the interrogative F0, as more clearly seen in Figure 24, which only displays F0 over time (also produced with Praat). As we can see in Figure 24, F0 goes up to just over 200 Hz in the question and to just below 200 Hz in the answer, and these are both male speakers. Figure 24. F0 contour of interrogative and subsequent declarative enutvetlo ‘he was alone’ ( TR 005-6) 11.1.1.5. Disjunctive Interrogatives There are four different disjunctive interrogative constructions in Karbi, as shown in Table 116. Table 116. Disjunctive interrogative types Type Schematically: 1 A=ma A-NEG 2 A=ma B 3 A=ma B=ma 4 A=ma ma B=ma e n u v e l o e n u v e l o 80 300 100 150 200 250 P i t c h ( H z ) Time (s) 0 1.051 0 527 11.1.1.5.1. Type 1: A=ma A-NEG The type [A=ma A-NEG] is a typical disjunctive question construction in languages of Southeast Asia. Burling (2004:338) refers to the exact same construction in Garo as the ‘balanced question’ construction, whereas Li and Thompson (1981: 532) use the term ‘A-not-A’ for a similar construction in Mandarin Chinese.180 An example of the construction is shown in (779). It appears that only verbal predicates participate in this construction in Karbi. (779) Disjunctive interrogative: A=ma A-NEG - = - take.rest-IRR2=Q take.rest-NEG ‘should we take rest or not?’ [Notebook OH 121010.004] 11.1.1.5.2. Type 2: A=ma B Examples of the second type, ‘A=ma B’, are provided in (780) and (781), which both have nominal predicates. (780) Disjunctive interrogative: A=ma B ‘{was it an orphan with one parent left or no parents at all?}’ [HK, TR 011] jangrengsolo jangr ngs -l orphan-RL ‘it was an orphan with no parents left’ [HK, TR 012] (781) Disjunctive interrogative: A=ma B [ - t = ] Nagaon=ma - […] that POSS-during NPDL=TOP DISTRICT=Q DISTRICT-RL ‘at that time, was it Nagaon or Karbi Anglong? […]’ [KCT, SWK 014: SiT] 180 However, while in Mandarin Chinese, the construction involves simply an affirmative predicate followed by its negated counterpart, both Karbi and Garo require the first affirmative predicate to be additionally marked by the question particle =ma, i.e., ‘A=ma A-NEG’. {jangresoma jangrengsolo?} jangr s =ma jangr ngs -l single.parent.child= Q orphan-RL 528 However, verbal predicates may also occur in this construction, for example - = - ‘eat-GOOD=Q eat-BAD > is it edible or not?’. It is not clear whether verbs can only occur in this construction if they denote opposites (in which case they mirror the ‘A=ma A-NEG’ construction shown above). 11.1.1.5.3. Type 3: A=ma B=ma The third disjunctive interrogative construction consists in a simple juxtaposition of two polar questions, both marked with =ma clause-finally. An example is (782). (782) Disjunctive interrogative: A=ma B=ma? […] a-ron a-tang=pen - - = [rong=si this POSS-custom POSS-EE:ron NMLZ-stay-NEG=TOP village=FOC ], [town - , - ] be.much=Q town POSS-LOC=FOC be.much=Q town POSS-LOC ‘the people that don’t behave well, is it mostly the village people or the town people, from the rongsopi?’ [JB, SWK 174: SiT] 11.1.1.5.4. Type 4: A=ma ma B=ma Finally, Type 4 is characterized by using an apparently further grammaticalized version of =ma ‘question particle’, which has turned into a disjunctive clause coordinator ‘or’ in questions only. In this construction then, both disjunctive interrogative clauses are marked by =ma clause-finally, and they are additionally linked via coordinator ma. An example of this construction is (783), reported by Grüßner (1978). (783) Disjunctive interrogative: A=ma ma B=ma [ - t - t- = ], ma [ - - - - = ?] POSS-basket POSS-strainer ?self-still=Q Q POSS-NMLZ-be.new AUTO.BEN/MAL- get-RL=Q ‘do you still have the same baskets and strainers, or did you get new ones?’ (Grüßner 1978: 129; glosses LK) Another, incomplete instance of the same construction occurs in (784). In this example, the speaker begins with a content question. He then presumably decides that he 529 has more knowledge and asks for the same information more directly, rephrasing it as a disjunctive question. He stops, however, after the coordinating ma, leaving the alternative of the disjunctive question unexpressed. (784) Disjunctive interrogative: A, or? […] a-deng=pen=si - - - which POSS-district=from=FOC NMLZ-come-FRML-RL Kamrup a-deng=pen=ma, … DISTRICT POSS-district=from=Q Q ‘which district are you from? From the Kamrup district, or…?’ [JB, SWK 021: SiT] 11.1.1.6. Interrogative Assumption =bo The ‘interrogative assumption’ clitic =bo marks statements whose proposition the speaker assumes is true while still eliciting a reply that is expected to confirm the truth of the proposition. An example of a =bo marked interrogative assumption is (785), in which the curly brackets indicate a native Karbi speaker different from the main storyteller of this text. In this example, there are two =bo marked interrogative assumptions, both with a third person subject. In both cases, they are confirmed: the first question via the affirmative interjection a, and the second question via affirmatively repeating the predicate. (785) Interrogative assumption =bo {anke inghonghelobo?} a {kekatchon nke ingh ng-C -l =bo} a {ke-k t-ch n and.then wait-NEG-RL=ITROG.ASSUM AFF NMLZ-run.HUM-very.quickly pulobo?} kekatchonlo p -l =bo} ke-k t-ch n-l like.this-RL=ITROG.ASSUM NMLZ-run.HUM-very.quickly-RL ‘{and so, he is not waiting, huh? is he running away} he is running away’ [HK, TR 116] In (786), the subject of the =bo marked clause is second person. Here also, a full reply follows the interrogative assumption. 530 (786) Interrogative assumption =bo ke methan-sibongpoke “hem chirimkangetlobo, k meth n-sib ngp ke] [h m che-r m-k ng- t-l =bo and.then dog.sp=TOP house RR-keep.in.order-leaving-PRF-RL=ITROG.ASSUM phu ” pu “hem chirim'et chibi'etlo” ph ] pu [h m che-r m- t che-b - t-l ] grandfather:VOC QUOT house RR-keep.in.order-PRF RR-keep-PRF-RL 'and then, the dog (said), "I assume you already put everything in its place?", "yes, I've put everything in order"' [KK, BMS 039] 11.1.1.7. Tag Question Tag questions marked by are used to seek confirmation for the truth of a proposition that the speaker strongly believes in. In (787), a tag question marked by is confirmed in a reply with the same adverbial predicate. (787) Tag question with ‘question.tag’ with reply “ba! Lasonloklo, di ”, “o! Lasonloklo, po ” [b las n-l k-l d ] [ las n-l k-l p ] how.bad! that.way-only-RL Q.TAG AFF that.way-only-RL father '”how mean, like that it's always been, right?”, “yes, just like that, father”' [CST, RO 039] 11.1.1.8. Feedback Request with Whereas d ‘question tag’ occurs after realis clauses and elicits confirmation of the truth of a proposition, ‘OK?’ occurs after irrealis clauses and represents a request to the addressee to confirm their ‘having taken notice.’ Irrealis contexts in which is used for feedback request include imperatives (§11.3.2), as in (788), and deontic clauses with ‘need’ (§11.3.4), as in (789). (788) Feedback request with following imperative clause […] ladakle dotha dei? jattha dak lang lad k le d -th d i j t-th d k l ng here=FOC:IRR stay-CON.IMP OK? GENEX-CON.IMP here water 531 chinglunoi juinoi pu amat […] chingl -n i j i-n i pu am t take.bath-INFRML.COND.IMP play-INFRML.COND.IMP QUOT self ‘[…] stay here, okay?, here do everything, and take your bath and play” he said, and then […]’ [CST, RO 049] (789) Feedback request with following deontic clause lasi osomar aphan pulo adapprang thurdap nangji dei? las os -m r aph n p -l a-dappr ng th r-d p n ng-j d i therefore child-PL NSUBJ say-RL POSS-dawn get.up-early need-IRR2 OK? ‘so I said to the children, we need to get up early in the morning, okay?’ [SH, CSM 002] Feedback request ‘OK?’ is also commonly used in a formulaic expression following - ‘go-IRR1’ > ‘I’m leaving’ (i.e., dampo, dei?), which is used as a ‘good- bye’ expression after being done visiting. 11.1.2. Imperatives and Prohibitives The following subsections discuss the various imperative and prohibitive constructions, including the bare stem imperative (§11.1.2.1); the informal suggestive imperative with - (§11.1.2.2); the (non-informal) suggestive imperative with - (§11.1.2.3); the conative imperative -t (§11.1.2.4); and the most command-like imperative with -t (§11.1.2.5). §11.1.2.6 discusses the differences between - , -t , and -t . Prohibitive - is discussed in §11.1.2.7, and the prohibitive construction that combines an imperative with the prohibitive suffix is shown in §11.1.2.8. 11.1.2.1. Bare Stem Imperative The structurally simplest imperative construction is to use the bare stem, as in (790). As a prohibitive counterpart to the bare stem imperative construction, a simple negated verb may be used, e.g., t- ‘touch-NEG’ > ‘don’t touch (it)!’181 181 I have heard this used by somebody who was talking to a four-year old child. 532 (790) Bare stem imperative “ako nangpole mandu cho tangte... ak nang-p -le mand ch t ngt on.the.other.hand(' [CST, RO 017] Note also in (792) that the bare stem imperative (§11.1.2.1) occurs in the last clause of this intonation unit, thus appearing functionally equivalent to - here. 11.1.2.3. Conditioned Imperative - - indicates an imperative that suggests (rather than commands) an action under particular circumstances. It is the more formal counterpart to - (§11.1.2.2). In (793), children whose mother has died are saying to their father that if he wants to look for a new wife, he should go ahead. (793) Conditioned imperative - […] to chirijite, chirinon! t che-r -j -te che-r -n n OK RR-search-IRR2-COND RR-search-COND.IMP ‘[…] “okay, if you feel like looking for (a wife), then do it!” ' [CST, RO 009] 534 11.1.2.4. Conative Imperative -t Conative imperative -t is used when the speaker suggests the addressee try and do something and see what happens. Compared to - i and - n (§11.1.2.2, §11.1.2.3), -t is less direct or immediate, although they may be used in the same context suggesting that their functions are not very different. This can be seen in the example. In this folk story, a father desperately sees no other way to deal with a difficult situation than to abandon his children. In (794), he has taken them to a place in the jungle and tells them to try and stay there, using -t ; and that they should take baths and play there, using - . (794) Conative imperative -t bahari alongtar along ponlo amatsi... “o pei! ladakle bahar a-longt r al ng p n-l am tsi p i lad k le very.big( pharla dam, e [ nke a-p i t pharl d m] DSM and.then POSS-mother=ADD:DM HESIT outside.part.Karbi.house go 543 theng akhangra ksi, hem damsi, [th ng a-khangr -k k-si] [h m d m-si] firewood POSS-basket.for.firewood leave-in.a.fixed.place-NF:RL house go-NF:RL hongkup , mok chepachusi, [hongk p ingn -l n-si] [m k che-pa-ch -si] entrance.area.Karbi.house sit-big:AO-NF:RL breast RR-CAUS-suck-NF:RL "dojoinoi, po!" [d -j i-n i p ] stay-quietly-INF.COND.IMP father ‘and then, the mother went and unloaded the firewood in the Pharla (Veranda), then went inside the house, sat down in the Hongkup, gave the child the milk, (and said) '”be quiet, daddy”' [KK, CC 015] In addition, non-final clauses may bear other semantic relationships to the final clause, besides temporal sequence. In (809), -si occurs on a manner motion verb ‘steer’ (here: ‘ride a bike’), while the final verb ‘come’ indicates the deictic direction towards the reference point. (809) Non-final clause marked with -si: manner adverbial clause kidun a'oso...] halata saikel nangveksi ke-d n a-os h la t saik l nang v k-si NMLZ-join POSS-child that=also bicycle( pharla dam, e [ nke a-p i t pharl d m] DSM and.then POSS-mother=ADD:DM HESIT outside.part.Karbi.house go theng akhangra , hem damsi, [th ng a-khangr -k k-si] [h m d m-si] firewood POSS-basket.for.firewood leave-in.a.fixed.place-NF:RL house go-NF:RL hongkup , mok chepachusi, [hongk p ingn -l n-si] [m k che-pa-ch -si] entrance.area.Karbi.house sit-big:AO-NF:RL breast RR-CAUS-suck-NF:RL "dojoinoi, po!" [d -j i-n i p ] stay-quietly-INF.COND.IMP father ‘and then, the mother went and unloaded the firewood in the Pharla (Veranda), then went inside the house, sat down in the Hongkup, gave the child the milk, (and said) '”be quiet, daddy”' [KK, CC 015]188 (817) Prosodic extra high pitch preceding -pen ‘non-final:with’ la {mm} aharchi chethekloklo mati {mm} […] l che-th k-l k-pen mm a-harch che-th k-l k-l mati {mm} this RR-see-right.then-NF:with AFF POSS-image RR-see-right.then-RL DM AFF ‘as he was looking, he of course saw the image […]’ [HK, TR 101]189 11.2.2. Complement Clauses Complement clauses (CCs) may be nominalizations (§9.4). In addition, there are four complement clause constructions that are not (formally) nominalized: verb juxtaposition (§11.2.2.1), CCs marked with - ‘indefinite’ in the case of indirect questions (§11.2.2.2), CCs marked with =ke ‘topic’ (§11.2.2.3), and CCs followed by quotative pu or quotative complementizer pusi (§11.2.2.4). 188 The audio file for KK, CC 015 is available under the DOI name 10.7264/N3FN14GV, see Appendix B. 189 The audio file for HK, TR 101 is available under the DOI name 10.7264/N3ZK5DXG, see Appendix B. 547 11.2.2.1. Verb Juxtaposition In (818) and (819), the verb t ‘know how’ occurs in the CC juxtaposition construction. In most instances of this construction, it looks like a serialization construction, in which the root of the CC verb and the root of the CC-taking verb appear directly serialized with no other elements intervening. However, (819) shows that a more complex predicate in an adverb construction (§8.3.2) may also be followed by complement-taking t ‘know how’. (818) Complement-taking verb th k ‘know.how’ in juxtaposition construction “ahokma, methan-sibongpo?, nang nepon t “ a-h k ma meth n-sib ngp , ne p n th k-j ma POSS-truth=Q dog.sp 1EXCL:NSUBJ=take.away know.how-IRR2=Q '"is it true, dog, you know how to take me?"' [KK, BMS 034] (819) Complement-taking verb th k ‘know.how’ in juxtaposition construction - ng n [[lún - ] t -t ] this POSS-girl song sing CAUS-be.good know-NEG 'this girl doesn't know how to sing (well)' [SiT elicitation 090301] In (820), the verb t t ‘forget (to do something)’ is linked to its complement clause ‘carry along a bottle of oil’ by simple juxtaposition of complement clause verb and complement-taking verb. (820) Complement-taking verb t t ‘forget’ in juxtaposition construction […] anke amat eson abang, jangthu abong, nke am t [e-s n ab ng] j ngth a-b ng and.then and.then one-CLF:thing NPDL oil POSS-gourd chepon tennedet pu amat laso hem nangkachiri che- n tengn -d t pu am t las h m nang=ke-che-r RR-take.away forget-PFV QUOT and.then this house CIS=NMLZ-RR-search aphi, apenan abang sunjoi […] aph a-pen n ab ng s n-j i after POSS-husband NPDL descend-quietly ‘[…] and then, one thing, a bottle of oil, she forget to carry along, and so after she went back to search for it in the house, then the husband quietly came down […]' [SeT, MTN 042] 548 11.2.2.2. Indirect Questions Complement clauses functioning as indirect questions are marked by - ‘indefinite (INDEF)’ (see also §4.5.4.1). In (821), the complement-taking verb ‘know’ takes the CC ‘how big or small it is’, which is an indirect disjunctive question that occurs with - ‘indefinite’ after its second part. (821) Indirect question marked by - ‘indefinite’ followed by ‘know’ ajatnon Kohima ko'an akethe ko'an [aj tn n K h m [[[ko- n a-ke-th ] [ko- n anyway PLACE WH-that.much POSS-NMLZ-be.big WH-that.much akibilone chinine, neli […] a-ke-b -l -n ]] chin -C ] n -l ] POSS-NMLZ-be.small-RL-INDEF know-NEG 1EXCL-HON ‘anyway, I didn't know how big or small Kohima is, […]’ [SiT, HF 019] In (822), three separate indirect questions are all marked with - ‘indefinite’ and then anaphorically picked up on in the following topic NP laso alam ‘(about) this matter’. (822) Indirect questions marked by - ‘indefinite’ […] “[…] kolosonlone aning rongne rongrene [[kolos n-l -n ] [a-n ng ar ng-n ar ng-C -n ] how-RL-INDEF POSS-mind be.happy-INDEF be.happy-NEG-INDEF kolosontong alang kemunthilone laso alam [kolos n-t ng al ng ke-m nth -l -n ]] [las a-l m how-INDIR.ITROG 3 NMLZ-think.deeply-RL-INDEF this POSS-matter netum intervyu enji, alomso enji” ne-t m intervyu n-j al m-s n-j ] 1EXCL-PL interview( chin -C -d t-si] [[ne-p know-NEG-PFV-NF:RL 1EXCL:POSS-father market( kithidunma? lad k ke-che-d n-d n-ra ke-th -d n ma here NMLZ-RR-fight-JOIN-NF:IRR NMLZ-die-NF:with NMLZ-die-JOIN=Q ‘[…] did they fight here, and did they die?’ [SiT, HF 028] (830) Irrealis non-final -ra; imperative-marked final verb mo nanghem chedam ahomoike lapu [m nang-h m chV-d m a-hom i ke] [lap future 2:POSS-house RR-go POSS-time( Misorongpo arju, "Chonghoisi nang chongho mis rongp arj chongh i si n ng chongh sp.ant ask reason=FOC you frog ami korrakmati?" "Tovar nangdangthipke" a-m k r-r k mati] tov r nang d ng-th e POSS-buttocks bite-RES:little.wound=CG road CIS=block-firmly=TOP 'he asked the ant, "why did you bite the frog in the butt?", "he had come and was blocking the road… and so…"' [RBT, ChM 076] 11.4.2. Main Clauses Marked with pu ‘quotative’: Desiderative Construction Quotative pu used as a sentence-final particle marks a desiderative or intention construction (see also §12.3.1.2). This main clause construction must have developed from the complementizer function of quotative pu occurring with complement clauses (§11.2.2.4) and subordinate purpose clauses (§11.2.3.2). Ellipsis of a following main clause would have then lead to the development of the insubordination construction. Examples of the desiderative construction are given in (843), (844), and (845). Note that in all examples, the verb preceding pu ‘quotative’ is marked irrealis with - ‘irrealis2’ just like in the subordinate purpose clause construction (§6.9.2.1.7), and that in (845), the quotative pu is additionally marked with realis - (see §12.3 for further cases of particles that take inflectional suffixes). (843) Main clause marked with pu ‘quotative’: desiderative construction adapprang netum thurlo Hongkram Chomangkan dunji pu a-dappr ng ne-t m th r-l Hongkr m Chomangk n d n-j pu POSS-dawn 1EXCL:POSS-PL get.up-RL PN PN join-IRR2 QUOT ‘we got up early in the morning, we wanted to join the Chomangkan in Hongkram’ [SH, CSM 001] 559 (844) Main clause marked with pu ‘quotative’: desiderative construction ai tovar nangpektha ti ko jirpo, i tov r nang-p k-th t ko j rp , how.bad! road 1/2:NSUBJ-give.way-IMP:CON definitely buddy:VOC friend ne'ik atum aphan an thonji pu ne- k a-t m a-ph n n th n-j pu 1EXCL:POSS-older.brother POSS-PL POSS-NSUBJ rice drop-IRR2 QUOT '"how bad! Please do give way to me. I'm supposed to drop off rice to my brother (and sister-in-law)"' [RBT, ChM 012] (845) Desiderative construction with pu ‘quotative’ additionally marked realis - lasi juja'e homtekangsi halaso ape ari [las juja' h m-tek ng-si] h las a-p a-r therefore cradle fix.by.tying-leaving-NF:RL that POSS-cloth POSS-EE:p kechechokdamji pulo amatsi laso osomar banghini [ke-che-ch k-d m-j u-l [am tsi [las os -m r b ng-hin NMLZ-RR-wash.clothes-go-IRR2 QUOT-RL and.then this child-PL CLF:HUM:PL-two aphan juja'e homtekangsi thaptekanglo a-ph n] juja' h m-tek ng-si th p-tek ng-l ] POSS-NSUBJ cradle fix.by.tying-leaving-NF:RL put.inside-leaving-RL ‘so (the mother) fixed the cradle, and went to wash clothes, and then, she fixed the cradle for the two children, and put them inside’ [CST, HM 010] 11.4.3. Stand-Alone Indirect Questions Indirect question complement clauses such as ‘[I do not know [whether he leaves or stays]CC]’ are discussed in §11.2.2.2. They are typically based on a disjunctive or polar question ‘X or not X’, or ‘X or Y’. The two clauses X and Y are then marked by - ‘indefinite’. In the following two examples, indirect question complement clauses are used without a main clause, making them instances of insubordination. In (846), the function is to ask a polar question (for Karbi polar and disjunctive question structure, see §11.1.1.4 and §11.1.1.5) in an indirect way, as can be done in English with ‘I wonder if you heard of this’ instead of the direct ‘Have you heard of this?’194 194 Less direct questions are a common politeness (because face-saving) strategy; insubordination constructions cross-linguistically often serve this kind of function (Evans 2007). 560 (846) Using stand-alone indirect question instead of direct polar question si nanglitumta lason arjulongne s nang-li-t m t las n arj -l ng-n therefore 2POSS-HON-PL=ADD that.way hear-GET-INDEF arjulonglene angko lason thakthak atomo arj -l ng-C -n ak las n thakth k a-tom hear-GET-NEG-INDEF on.the.other.hand( pe akelokpen keroi isi ajamborong [[p a-ke-l k pen ke-r i is a-jambor ng cloth POSS-NMLZ-be.white=with NMLZ-sew one POSS-bag arlosi lahai kethap lapen arum kevan arl si] [lah i] ke-th p]] la n [ar m ke-v n]] inside=FOC these PROG-put.inside and down PROG-bring 'he's placed himself a ladder... and then, the man is putting these (pieces of fruit) into one bag sown from white cloth and is bringing them down’ [SiT, PS 003] 11.5.1.2. Additive Particle Clause/VP Coordination Constructions Two other conjunctive coordination constructions, which perhaps rather than actually linking clauses may only be linking verb phrases,195 involve the additive particle =t (§7.8.3.1). In one construction, =t occurs on NPs, as in (849). In this example, we have two different verbs that are linked, ‘drink’ and ‘eat’. Note, however, that the otherwise identical construction can also be used to coordinate NPs only, with the verb remaining the same, as discussed below (§11.5.1.3). 195 This is a matter for future research. That said, it is cross-linguistically often difficult to distinguish between clause and VP coordination, and therefore sometimes useful to group them as ‘verbal conjunction’ (Haspelmath 2004, 2005). 562 (849) Clause coordination via additive-marked NPs […] langta junlong anta cholon […] [l ng t j n-l ng n t ch -l ng water=ADD drink-GET rice=ADD eat-GET ‘[…] they got to drink water and they got to eat rice, […]’ [KK, BMS 056] In the other construction, the additive particle may be used in a copy verb construction, in which a copy of the verb root occurs with =t , followed by the verb root with optional addition of morphology (see also §12.2.3 for other copy verb constructions that have discourse functions). In (850), the two events ‘cook much’ and ‘eat much’ are coordinated via this construction. (850) Clause coordination via additive-marked verb copy k a-h n [t n t t n- ] [ch =t ch - ] meat POSS-curry cook=ADD cook-much eat=ADD eat-much '(s/he) often cooks and often eats' [SiT 100515] Note that conjunctive coordination via a copy verb construction with the additive particle also exists in Hakha Lai (Central Kuki-Chin) (Peterson and VanBik 2004:348). 11.5.1.3. Clausal NP Coordination Clausal NP coordination puts every participant in a separate clause by repeating the verb each time, and connects the participants across clauses with additive =t . The result is a parallelism structure (§12.1.1). A folk story example is (851), in which three clauses are structured in parallel, which are about the three protagonists of this story. (851) Parallelism based on coordination indicated by additive =t (folk story) […] anke Bey Ki'ik abangta ahem arit dolo nke B y ke- ab ng t a-h m a-r t d -l ] and.then CLAN NMLZ-be.black NPDL=ADD:also:PRL POSS-house POSS-field exist-RL Bey Ke'et abangta ahem arit dolo B y ke- t ab ng t a-h m a-r t d -l ] CLAN NMLZ-be.yellow NPDL=ADD:also:PRL POSS-house POSS-field exist-RL Bey Ronghang abang, akibi abangta, B y Rongh ng ab ng [a-ke-b ab ng t CLAN CLAN NPDL POSS-NMLZ-be.small NPDL=ADD:also:PRL 563 ahem arit dolo a-h m a-r t d -l ] POSS-house POSS-field exist-RL ‘[…] Bey the Black had his (own) house and property, Bey the Fair likewise had his (own) house and property, and Bey Ronghang, the young one, also had his (own) house and property' [WR, BCS 004] Examples from personal narratives are (852) and (853). (852) connects S arguments while repeating the verb. (853) is a more complex case involving negation, which requires translation into English as ‘neither… nor…’ (852) Parallelism based on coordination (personal narrative) Samprita dunji Rasinjata dunji Lindata [ m r t d n-j ] [Ras nj t d n-j ] [ nd t PN=ADD:also:PRL join-IRR2 PN= ADD:also:PRL join-IRR2 PN= ADD:also:PRL dunji pulo d n-j ] pu-l join-IRR2 QUOT-RL ‘Sampri, Rasinja, and Linda all were going to join’ [SH, CSM 004] (853) Parallelism based on coordination (personal narrative) latum phelangpenta kali tinpenta [l -t m hel ng en t al t n en t this-PL thatch=with=ADD:also:PRL NEG.EQU.COP tin( kipidunthu apot [ø]A:X [ø]R:Y lap n ke [ø l phut p ø ke-p -d n-th ap t] and.then=TOP this hat NMLZ-give-JOIN-again because laphan aning ingsamsi, thesere pumni tekanglo [ø]A:Y [NP]R:X [ø l -ph n a-n ng ings m-si] [theser p m-n tek ng-l ] this-NSUBJ POSS-mind be.cold-NF:RL fruits CLF:round-two leave.for-RL ‘and then, because he returned the hat, he (the bicycle boy) was grateful to him (the hat picking boy) and gave him two fruits’ [SiT, PS 039] 566 CHAPTER XII 12. DISCOURSE CONSTRUCTIONS This chapter discusses Karbi discourse constructions as encountered in the corpus of recorded texts. Since the major text genre represented in the corpus is narratives, this chapter offers more detailed description of the constructions that occur in this particular genre. The chapter begins with an overview of constructions that pervade the texts in the corpus and serve to structure the discourse, in §12.1. This is followed by a discussion of rhetorical constructions, which serve emphatic or intensifying purposes, in §12.2. An overview of particles is offered in §12.3, and a list of interjections is provided in §12.5. Finally, §12.6 offers text samples that show how hesitation and correction words are used. 12.1. Discourse Structuring Constructions This section discusses discourse structuring constructions including clause parallelism in §12.1.1, tail-head linkage in §12.1.2, discourse connectors that have a function similar to English ‘and then’ in §12.1.3, and, finally, a description of the two discourse structuring markers e and ’ in §12.1.4. 12.1.1. Clause Parallelism Solnit (1995: 127) defines parallelism as “the binary repetition of linguistic features for rhythmic, esthetic or other expressive effect.” There are two constructions that systemtically result in this kind of parallelism in Karbi.196 One is the elaborate expression (EE) construction (§12.2.2); the other is biclausal NP coordination (see §7.8.3.1.3 and §11.5.1.2). EE use is far more prevalent in folk stories and formulaic language like ceremonial chants; in spontaneous, colloquial language, EEs occur much less. Frequency of NP coordination at the clausal level appears to not be influenced by 196 Acoustically, parallel structures are often accompanied by prosodic marking, which is what I understand much of Solnit’s notion of “rhythmic effect” in his definition to refer to. 567 text genre. Below I discuss first EE parallelism and then biclausal NP coordination parallelism. EE constructions may be built on nouns or verbs. In example (857) from a folk story, the EE t ‘birds’ is the basis for the parallelism in the relative clause votek ingrengre voso ingrengre along. A similar example from a personal narrative is (858), where the parallelism is based on the verbal EE ‘prepare’, which occurs in an adverb construction (§8.3.2). (857) Parallelism based on elaborate expression construction (folk story) […] hi'ipi abangke etum aphan ha votek ingrengre [h 'ip ab ng ke] [e-t m aphan] h v t ingr ng- witch NPDL=TOP 1PL.INCL-PL NSUBJ over.there wild.bird call(small.animals)-NEG voso ingrengre along ekethondamti v s ingr ng- al ng e=ke-th n-d m-t EE:v t k call(small.animals)-NEG LOC 1PL.INCL=NMLZ-drop-GO-get.rid.off ‘[…] that witch, she went and dropped us over there where the birds don't chirp' [CST, HM 062] (858) Parallelism based on elaborate expression construction (personal narrative) pu amat alangtum te lang keso kecho pu am t al ng-t m te l ng ke-s ke-ch QUOT and.then 3-PL and.then/therefore water NMLZ-be.hot NMLZ-eat kejun haihui'anta nangsikpi pame ke-j n haih i- n t nang s - a-m NMLZ-drink some-all=EXH 1/2:NSUBJ=prepare-BEN CAUS-be.good nangdangpi pame nang d ng- a-m 1/2:NSUBJ=put.on.stove-BEN CAUS-be.good ‘[…] and so they had nicely prepared and gotten ready (some) tea and food and drink’ [SH, CSM 040] The other construction that results in parallelism is clausal NP coordination. This construction expresses that a particular proposition is true for two or more participants. Instead of coordinating the NPs representing the participants inside a single clause, this construction puts each participant in a separate clause but keeps the verb constant. An 568 example is (859), where the coordinated neri nekeng ‘my hands and feet’ occur in two different clauses, both ending in the negative existential copula . (859) Clausal NP coordination […] amat neta neri ave nekeng ave […] am t n t ne-r av ] ne- ng av ]] and.then 1EXCL=ADD:DM 1EXCL:POSS-hand not.exist 1EXCL:POSS-foot not.exist ‘[…] and then, I don't have hands, I don’t have feet, […]’ [RBT, ChM 030] Another example of parallelism, which is only loosely built on clausal NP coordination, is (860). What contributes to the impression of parallelism here (as in other instances of clausal NP coordination, see §11.5.1.2), is (historically, here) the occurrence of additive =t on both coordinated elements. (860) Further occurrence of parallelism arvi suinangta dannokso ar'e suinangta dannokso [arv s i-nangt dannoks ] [ar' s i-nangt dannoks ] left turn-if.alternatively danger right turn-if.alternatively danger 'if I turn left, it will be dangerous, if I turn right, it will also be dangerous' [RBT, ChM 013] 12.1.2. Tail-Head Linkage Tail-head linkage consists in the sentence-initial repeating of information from the previous sentence. This phenomenon of narrative structure was first described by Longacre (1968), and has since been reported in other Tibeto-Burman languages such as Galo (Tani) (Post 2007) and Dolakha Newar (Genetti 2011), as well as a range of languages from all across the world (see overview in Guillaume (2011) and De Vries (2005)). Despite the fact that tail-head linkage is an extremely common phenomenon cross-linguistically, the actual form it takes varies. In Karbi, the typical pattern is that the last clause is repeated verbatim, including arguments and predicate. An example is (861), in which the final clause piso some enlo ‘(they) got married’ is repated at the beginning of the next intonation unit, where it is followed by ‘and then’ (§12.1.3), leading into the new information. 569 (861) Tail-head linkage: identical repetition anke latum thelo dinglo piso some enlo tangho nke la-t m th -l d ng-l s s m n-l t ngh and.then this-PL be.big-RL be.long-RL wife EE: s take-RL REP 'and then, they grew up and got married, so they say' [WR, BCS 003] piso some enlo anke Bey Ki'ik abangta s s m n-l nke [B y ke- k ab ng t wife EE: s take-RL and.then CLAN NMLZ-be.black NPDL=ADD:also:PRL ahem arit dolo Bey Ke'et abangta a-h m a-r t d -l ] [B y ke- t ab ng t POSS-house POSS-field exist-RL CLAN NMLZ-be.yellow NPDL=ADD:also:PRL ahem arit dolo Bey Ronghang abang a-h m a-r t d -l ] [B y Rongh ng ab ng POSS-house POSS-field exist-RL CLAN CLAN NPDL akibi abangta ahem arit dolo a-ke-b ab ng t a-h m a-r t d -l ] POSS-NMLZ-be.small NPDL=ADD:also:PRL POSS-house POSS-field exist-RL 'they got married, and then Bey the Black had his (own) house and property, Bey the Fair likewise had his (own) house and property, and Bey Ronghang, the young one, also had his (own) house and property' [WR, BCS 004] The excerpt in (862) starts with a sentence that is much longer and more complex. For the tail-head linkage construction, the storyteller only repeats a simplified version of the predicate, i.e., shortening ’ t t ’ t at the “tail” to simply thondamtilo at the “head”, without including any NPs. (862) Tail-head linkage: slightly modified repetition pu amat la Karbipi langhe kedam aphi, laso [pu am t l Karb -p l ngh ke-d m aph ] [las QUOT and.then this PN-fem washing.place NMLZ-go after this aosomar Hingchong musoso atum aphan a-oso-m r Hingch ng mus s a-t m a-ph n] POSS-child-PL CONSTELLATION 2.siblings.of.diff.gender POSS-PL POSS-NSUBJ ha same sadu akrong alat votek h sam sad a-kr ng a-lat v t k over.there path EE:sam POSS-CLF.road POSS-EE:kr ng wild.bird 570 ingrengre voso ingrengre along osomar ingr ng-C v s ingr ng-C al ng os -m r call(small.animals)-NEG EE:v t k call(small.animals)-NEG LOC child-PL ponpidam'et thondam'et n- -d m- t th n-d m- t take.away-BEN/MAL-go-PRF drop-go-PRF 'and then, after the Karbi woman has gone to the water place, these Hingchong sisters, over there, she went to carry the children to a place where the roads cross, where the birds don't sing, and went left them there [CST, HM 014]' thondamtilo anke halaso aKarbipi ahem th n-d m-t -l nke] [[h las a-Karb -p ] a-h m drop-go-get.rid.off-RL and.then that POSS-PN-fem POSS-house nangchevanglo ja'e along nangchelanglo asomar ave nang che-v ng-l ja' al ng nang che-l ng-l [a-oso-m r av ] CIS=RR-come-RL cradle LOC 1/2:NSUBJ=RR-see-RL POSS-child-PL not.exist ‘(the witch) abandoned (the children there), and then the Karbi woman came home, she looked in the cradle, her children were not there’ [CST, HM 015] 12.1.3. Discourse Connectors Discourse connectors are elements that typically occur at the beginning of a new paragraph in narratives, like English ‘and then’. An overview of so far attested forms in Karbi is offered in Table 118. They are sorted by being based on either ‘this much; all’ (§7.8.2) or the demonstrative (§4.5.3). Apparent combining elements are listed in the right-hand column. Glosses are not given; they all carry out equivalent functions translatable into English as ‘and then’. Table 118. Discourse connectors Based on… Form Possibly combined with… ‘this much’ =ke ‘topic’ =si ‘focus’ t -te ‘conditional’ =pen ‘with’, =ke ‘topic’ ‘this’ =si ‘focus’ =pen ‘with’, =ke ‘topic’ t =pen ‘with’, -te ‘conditional’ 571 The placement of discourse connectors in narratives either at the end of a paragraph, the beginning of a new paragraph, or in a neutral position in-between two paragraphs merits further study. It appears that all types of placement occur, but it is currently not clear what functions may be associated with the differences. Another interesting aspect of discourse connector placement also in need of further investigation is that they occur in second position following the subject in several clauses in the corpus. (863) and (864) exemplify this construction. (863) Discourse connector e occurring after subject “t t t ” t t ngt pu OK if QUOT '”okay then” (said the bamonpo)' [KK, BMS 091] methan-sibongpota anke inghongdinglo meth n-sib ngp t n e ingh ng-d ng-l dog.sp=ADD and.then wait-steadily-RL ‘and then the dog waited and waited’ [KK, BMS 092] (864) Discourse connector t occurring after subject “nangpran nang'en'etji” pulo... osomar ante kephere [nang-pr n nang= n- t-j p -l ] [os -m r nte ke-pher ] 2:POSS-life 1/2:NSUBJ=take-all:S/O-IRR2 say-RL child-PL thus NMLZ-fear ‘”I will take your lives”, she said, so the children were scared' [CST, RO 020] The fact that both instances of post-subject occurrence of discourse connectors are immediately following direct speech may be a coincidence. There is, however, a correlation in topic-switch often occurring after the end of direct speech, which is one of the typical instances where topic-switch is marked by additive =t (§10.7.2), as is the case, in fact, in (863) in the subject t - =t . I suspect that discourse connectors are further markers of topic-switch as they occur following a (subject) argument. 12.1.4. Discourse Structuring Markers e and ’ There are two markers that are particularly involved in structuring discourse. I have glossed them both as ‘discourse structuring marker’ or ‘DSM’, but I describe their 572 distributions and functions in more detail below. They both have unusual phonological shapes that ally them with interjections: one is e with a long vowel that typically hosts a salient intonation contour; the other is ’ , which is similar to (but shorter and with a lower voice than) the English backchanneling ‘mm’ - essentially a glottal stop initial, voiced /m/. The e is more frequent than the ’ in the corpus. The e frequently occurs in narratives by different speakers at the beginning of direct speech, as in (865) and (866). (865) Discourse structuring marker e at beginning of direct speech “e pedo'osinang” pusi kipu e pe-d - -sin ng pusi ke-p DSM CAUS-exist-much-CON.HORT QUOT.COMP NMLZ-say '"let them remain in abundance for now", (she) said' [SeT, MTN 008] (866) Discourse structuring marker e at beginning of direct speech “e epo do epoke doke do do setame e [e-p d ] [e-p ke d ke d ] [[d setam ] DSM 1INCL-father exist 1INCL-father=TOP exist=TOP exist exist nevertheless apiso banghini” [a-pis b ng-hin ]] POSS-wife CLF:HUM:PL-two '”we have a father, though we have a father, he has two wives”' [CST, HM 046] (867) shows that e also occurs inside direct speech, not only at the beginning. (867) Discourse structuring marker e inside direct speech “bai! an adin ningke an ajo ningke b i [[ n a-d n n ngke] [ n a-j n ngke] how.mean! that.much POSS-day( tangke hala apei abang tunlongle

t ngke [[h la a-p i ab ng t n-l ng- thing and.then that POSS-mother NPDL cook-GET-NEG danglonglelo […] d ng-l ng- -l [a-os ke-chir a-join ] put.on.stove-GET-NEG-RL POSS-child NMLZ-cry POSS-reason( turthap turphrulo... a-ingn r t ke-ingr ng aj t t r-th p t r-phr -l POSS-elephant=ADD:DM IPFV-roar GENEX kick-mindlessly kick-EE:-th p-RL 577 harlong turpur harl ng t r-p r stone kick-move.over 'this elephant was roaring and everything and kicked around mindlessly, and kicked over a rock' [RBT, ChM 025] The general extender t also occurs with NPs, as in (875). In this instance, it is not clear whether the general extender implies a category of other items that caused people getting sick with a cold besides all the dust on the roads (a common cause for getting sick). The general extender construction may rather serve an intensifying function here. (875) NP general extender: [NP=pen] [ t=pen] anke osomar atumta anuttinta arep nke os -m r a-t m t a-n t-t n t a-r p and.then child-PL POSS-PL=ADD:EXH POSS-CLF:HUM:PL-each=ADD:EXH POSS-waist amoi kesolo singjam longle adukpen a-m i ke-s -l singj m l ngl a-d en POSS-back NMLZ-hurt-RL have.a.cold earth POSS-dust=from ajatpen lapu amanke netum hapupen vanglo aj t en] lap m nke ne-t m h p pen v ng-l GENEX=from like.this and.then 1EXCL-PL that.side=from come-RL ‘and then, the children, each of them, had his waist and back hurt, and a cold, from the dust and everything, and like this we then came from that side’ [SH, CSM 070] Finally, (876) and (877) show that (and its dialectal variants) also functions as an NP general extender. In (876), this invokes a category of snacks for the road, which here likely just replaces a tedious enumeration at an irrelevant level of specificity. In (877), however, saying America heihaipen may be parallel to Overstreet's (1999: 83) notion of general extenders functioning to indicate “a maximum extreme”, i.e., the least likely item or fact from a category. In this interpretation of (877), America is presented as the least likely country to have visitors from, among the category of countries that visiting foreigners may be from. The general extender would then have a scalar additive function translatable with ‘even’. 578 (876) General extender construction with ; function: invoking set of snacks anke thesere haihuita namponlo tovar nke theser h i h i t n m-p n-l tov r and.then fruit these~PL=also buy-take.away-RL NMLZ-eat road kecho aphan lang haihui namponlo ke-ch a-ph n l ng h i h i n m-p n-l NMLZ-eat POSS-PURP water these~PL buy-take.away-RL ‘and then, we also bought some fruit etc. to carry along, to eat on the road, and we bought some water etc. to carry along’ [SH, CSM 014] (877) General extender construction with i; function: scalar additive? Europe lapen kaprek kaprek adet Europe lap n ke-pr k ke-pr k a-d t Europed( turthap turphrulo... a-ingn r t ke-ingr ng aj t t r-th t r- hr -l POSS-elephant=ADD:DM NMLZ-roar GENEX kick-mindlessly kick-EE:-th -RL harlong turpur harl ng t r-p r stone kick-move.over 'this elephant was roaring and everything and kicked around mindlessly, and kicked over a rock' [RBT, ChM 025] 12.2.2.2. Embedding into Parallelism or Compound Construction In texts, elaborate expressions occur embedded in either a parallelism construction or a compound construction. (881) and (882) represent a minimal set on the EE t ‘assembly’. The two examples are from the same story, communicating the same proposition, first as a main clause, then in a repetition as background information. In (881), the EE occurs in a clause-level parallelism construction, [mei kedam], [thei kedam]. In (882), the EE occurs in an NP-level compound construction, [[mei thei] kedam]. (881) Nominal elaborate expression in parallelism construction richolo amat apoke mei kedam thei [rich -l ] am t a-p ke [[m i ke-d m] [th i king-RL and.then POSS-father=TOP assembly NMLZ-go EE:m i 583 kedam, laso arecho abang apiso banghini ke-d m]] [[las a-rech ab ng] [a-pis b ng-hin ]] NMLZ-go this POSS-king NPDL POSS-wife CLF:HUM:PL-two ‘he is a king, so their father (often) goes to meetings, this king had two wives’ [CST, HM 005] (882) Nominal elaborate expression in compound construction hala apenan abang mei thei kedam aphi la h la a-pen n ab ng [ m i th i ke-d m aph ]] [l that POSS-husband NPDL assembly EE:m i NMLZ-go after this Karbipi abangke osomar hachelo ha hem arlo mh Karb -p ab ng ke os -m r hach -l [h h m arl ]] mh PN-female/mother NPDL=TOP child-PL be.born-RL over.there house inside DSM ‘after her husband had gone for meetings, the Karbi woman gave birth to children there inside the house’ [CST, HM 008] The same options are available in forming elaborate expressions off verbs. Consider the following three examples based on the elaborate expression t ‘cook’. While in (883), the elaborate expression occurs in a parallelism construction such that the imperative suffix - is repeated on both roots, the roots form a compound stem in (884). Note that (885) is somewhat of an intermediate type, as the derivational complex occurs on both roots, but the inflectional imperative suffix - only occurs on the second root. (883) Verbal elaborate expression in parallelism construction ne nephi aphan n ne-ph a-ph n nang pV-chet ng-v k-j 1EXCL 1EXCL:POSS-grandmother POSS-NSUBJ 1/2:NSUBJ=CAUS-meet-definitely-IRR2 nangpachetongvekji e tunnoi dangnoi chonang junnang e t n-n i d ng-n i ch -n ng j n-n ng DSM cook-INF.COND.IMP put.on.stove-INF.COND.IMP eat-HORT drink-HORT ‘I will definitely make you meet my grandmother; (now) cook and prepare, let's eat and drink (so we can start our journey)’ [KK, BMS 029] (884) Verbal elaborate expression in compound construction so'arlo atum adapprang ha the'ang'e s 'arl a-t m a-d ppr ng h the' ng-C women:COLL POSS-PL POSS-very.early over.there be.bright-NEG 584 akopen hem kedo atum aphanta ak pen [h m ke-d a-t m a-ph n t ] before=from house NMLZ-stay POSS-PL POSS-NSUBJ=also tun-dangpikang'et nangjilang t n-d ng-p -k ng- t n ng-j -l ng cook-put.on.stove-BEN/MAL-leaving-PRF need-IRR2-still 'early in the morning, over there, the women have to cook and do all the household works from before dawn also for those who stay at home (besides food for themselves)' [KaR, SWK 074] (885) Nominal elaborate expression in intermediate parallelism/compound construction […] apot padap abangke, [ap t pad p ab ng ke [t n-p pe-m ] because this.morning NPDL=TOP cook-BEN CAUS-be.good tunpi peme dangpi pemenoi! […] [d ng-p pe-m -n i]] put.on.stove-BEN CAUS-be.good-INF.COND.IMP ‘[…] this morning, cook and prepare them nicely for me! […]' [SeT, MTN 029] 12.2.2.3. Functions of Elaborate Expressions According to Matisoff's (1973: 82) definition, EEs do not have a semantic function but represent “[the use of] four syllables where two would have conveyed the same information.” This is largely true for Karbi as well, although there are some noun EEs which apparently do have a consistent semantic effect of conveying a collective interpretation (see Table 119 above in §12.2.2.1). Instead of being semantic, EEs are typically considered a stylistic device used by sophisticated speakers. However, Peterson (2010) demonstrates that EEs also frequently function as intensifiers in Khumi (Kuki-Chin), across the border in Bangladesh. In Karbi, EEs also have intensifying functions similar to what Peterson has pointed out for Khumi. For example, the use of EEs in a situation of “heightened emotional intensity” is shown in (886), where the speaking participant of the story threatens to kill the addressee participant. 585 (886) Elaborate expressions: nangpran__nangmui; nangsapji__nangthengji “[…] pinike nangpran damji nangmui damji, pin ke nang- r n d m-j nang-m i d m-j ] today=TOP 2:POSS-life go-IRR2 2:POSS-EE: r n( nd) go-IRR2 nangsapji nang s -j 1/2:NSUBJ=beat.w/sth.flexible-go-IRR2 1/2:NSUBJ=beat.w/sth.flexible-IRR2 nangthengji!” nang th ng-j 1/2:NSUBJ=beat.w/sth.solid-IRR2 '[…] today your life will definitely go, I will beat the hell out of you!” [RBT, ChM 033] A similar level of intensity can also be argued to underlie (887), where two babies abandoned in the jungle by a witch are saved by a tiger couple. In (887), the female tiger says to the male tiger that they should not leave the two crying babies in the jungle, but that they should take them with them and take care of them. The reason why they should do that, according to the tigress, is because the babies are monit monor ‘human beings’. The use of the EE evokes a number of (perhaps, noble) connotations, which is why the tigress can use it as a reason for why they should go through the trouble of taking care of them. (887) Elaborate expression: monit__monor “[…] lake monit monor aso apot itum l ke [[mon t mon r] a-os ] ap t e-t m this=TOP man EE:mon t POSS-child because 1INCL-PL orapondetnang” or -p n-d t-n ng take.care-take.away-PFV-HORT ‘[…] “because they are human beings, let's carry them away and take care of them”' [CST, HM 033] A matter for future research is the relationship between EEs and general extenders. There is a functional overlap between the two in that both may add an intensifying force to the utterance (§12.2.1). Note (888), which demonstrates that a predicate can simultaneously occur in the elaborate expression construction and in the general extender construction, such as nangcharkok nangcharpheklo ajatlo here. 586 (888) Elaborate expression and general extender used in combination t t [ n nsi a-h m a-r t chV-v ng-l ] [[a-h m a-r t that.much after.that POSS-house POSS-field RR-come-RL POSS-house POSS-field chevangsi bang hako ahem hako arit e chV-v ng-si] [b ng hak a-h m hak a-r t e RR-come-NF:RL CLF:HUM:PL that.time POSS-house that.time POSS-field DSM nangcharkok nangcharpheklo ajatlo, ahem arit nang chV-ar nang chV-ar h -l aj t-l [a-h m a-r t CIS=RR-clean CIS=RR-EE:ar -RL GENEX-RL POSS-house POSS-field nangchotun nangchodanglo nang cho-t n nang cho-d ng-l ] RR-come-NF:RL CIS=AUTO.BEN/MAL-cook CIS=AUTO.BEN/MAL-put.on.stove-RL ‘and then they came home to their house and property, they came home, and then they cleaned their house and property and everything, and they came home and cooked there for themselves’ [KK, BMS 113] 12.2.3. Copy Verb Constructions There are a range of copy verb constructions, which consist of a preposed copy of the verb root that is marked with one of the information structure clitics (see §10.7) or the question clitic (see §11.1.1.2.2), followed by the actual main verb, which may carry derivational and inflectional morphology. Their functions have to do with adding force to the predicate, which we can consider iconic given the phonological force created through repetition of the verb.199 In addition to the four copy verb constructions presented in what follows below, there is another copy verb construction that has the function of coordinating clauses, as discussed in §11.5.1.2. 12.2.3.1. Assertive (with =ke ‘topic’) The assertive copy verb construction consists of the root of the main verb marked with =ke ‘topic’, followed by the full main verb with additional suffixes if applicable, schematically ‘V=ke V-suffixes’. The function of this construction is to strongly assert a 199 Interestingly, a similar type of copy verb construction is found in Kurtoep (Tibeto-Burman; East Bodish) (Hyslop 2011: 680-3). 587 proposition. As a result, the construction is often employed to set up a contrast, as in X is indeed the case, but Y, which is evidenced by the fact that this construction is frequently followed by a concessive conjunction.200 An example is (889), where the assertive copy verb construction occurs in the clause epoke doke do ‘we do have a father’, which sets up a contrast to ‘he has two wives’ as marked by the concessive do setame - a contrast presumably in the sense that although there is one father, the maternal side is unusual, because there are two women. (889) Assertive =ke copy verb construction followed by contrast (do setame) e epo do, epoke doke do, do setame, e [e-p d ] [e-p ke d e d [[d setam ] DSM 1INCL-father exist 1INCL-father=TOP exist=TOP exist exist nevertheless apiso banghini [a-pis b ng-hin ]] POSS-wife CLF:HUM:PL-two 'we have a father, though we do have a father, he has two wives' [CST, HM 046] Similarly, in (890), there is a contrast built up by kechetong doke dohe ‘(I) have indeed met (some of them)’, which follows in the next intonation, offered in (891), which unsurprisingly starts with t ‘but’. (890) Assertive =ke copy verb construction followed by contrast in next IU (seta) Naka anglong pu bihek akopenta arjulong N k a-ingl ng pu b -h k ak pen t arj -l ng TRIBE POSS-hill QUOT be.small-small then=from=ADD:even hear-GET Naka akhei puta arjulong lapenke... Naka N k a-kh i pu t arj -l ng lap n ke... N k TRIBE POSS-community QUOT=ADD:although ask-GET and.then=TOP TRIBE akhei amonit so'arlopen pusetame sopinsopen a-kh i a-mon t so' rl pen p set m sop ns pen POSS-community POSS-man women:COLL=with likewise boy:COLL=with 200 While English does not have a dedicated marker for this kind of strong assertion in anticipation of a contrast, German has zwar, which always has to be followed by aber ‘but’. The particle zwar has the telling etymology es ist wahr ‘it is true’. 588 pusetame elong longni lason kechetong doke p set m e-l ng l ng-n las n ke-chet ng d e likewise one-CLF:place CLF:place-two that.way NMLZ-meet exist=TOP dohe d =he exist=AFTERTHOUGHT ‘since my childhood, I got to hear about the Naga hills, the Naga people, from both the women and men, in one or two places, like that, I actually have met (some of them)’ [SiT, HF 004] (891) Intonation unit after (890) seta adunghetpen alanglitum arong alanglitum set ad ng-h t pen alang-li-t m a-r ng alang-li-t m but near-very.near=from 3-HON-PL POSS-village 3-HON-PL ahem alanglitum kedo kethak kosonma a-h m alang-li-t m ke-d ke-th k kos n m POSS-house 3-HON-PL NMLZ-stay NMLZ-EE:d ( bamonpo atum aphan meth n-sib ngp nt bam n-p a-t m aph n sp.dog OK.then today wise.person( juja'e homtekangsi halaso ape ari [las juja' h m-tek ng-si] h las a-p a-r therefore cradle fix.by.tying-leaving-NF:RL that POSS-cloth POSS-EE:p kechechokdamji pulo amatsi laso osomar banghini [ke-che-ch k-d m-j u-l [am tsi [las os -m r b ng-hin NMLZ-RR-wash.clothes-go-IRR2 QUOT-RL and.then this child-PL CLF:HUM:PL-two aphan juja'e homtekangsi thaptekanglo a-ph n] juja' h m-tek ng-si th p-tek ng-l ] POSS-NSUBJ cradle fix.by.tying-leaving-NF:RL put.inside-leaving-RL ‘so (the mother) fixed the cradle, and went to wash clothes, and then, she fixed the cradle for the two children, and put them inside’ [CST, HM 010] 598 12.3.2. Reportative t The reportative particle t typically occurs at the end of a clause. It marks information as being indirectly known, because somebody has told it to the speaker. In the corpus, t is frequently used in folk stories. As orally transmitted texts, folk stories of course fully consist of reported information. In certain parts of the narrative, the storyteller typically adds t ; further research is required to understand where and for what purpose exactly t is used in the narrative structure of folk stories. So far, it appears that one such part of the story that is typically marked by t is the beginning of the story. For example, in (911), this particular text starts out by introducing the three protagonists, followed by a t at the end of the clause. (911) Reportative t at the end of an utterance in a folk story hako ahut hedi Bey atum korte bangkethom do tangho [hak ah t hed ] B y a-t m kort b ng-keth m d t ngh that.time during DM CLAN POSS-PL brother CLF:HUM:PL-three exist REP 'in the old days, you know, there were three Bey brothers, they say' [WR, BCS 001] In ordinary conversations, using t at the end of an utterance marks reported information, which may have been acquired just moments earlier. For example, Speaker A can relay information of Speaker B having already eaten to Speaker C by saying - t- t ‘eat-PRF-RL REP’ > ‘[S/he] said [s/he] has already eaten,’ with arguments non-overt as zero anaphoras (§10.4.3). (912) shows that t may also occur after an NP if the scope is intended to be particularly over that NP. (912) Reportative t after an NP ansi la hepi ason ingmoipo hepipen thijok a'ok [ nsi l hep as n ingm i-p ] [[[he en thij a- ] then this brinjal like cook.with.alkaline-IRR1 brinjal=with deer POSS-meat tangho pine lason kechongmoi t ngh ] p -n las n ke-cho-ingm i] REP what-INDEF that.way NMLZ-AUTO.BEN/MAL-cook.with.alkaline ‘and then, we cook brinjal or something similar with the alkaline, we cook brinjal and deer meat, so they say, or whatever like that with baking soda’ [SiH, KH 008] 599 The disyllabic form of t suggests that diachronically there are two morphemes involved. In fact, there is one instance in the corpus where apparently the first syllable is used independently of the second syllable. In (913), -t is used as a verbal suffix in a predicate that is marked as a question via =ma. Apparently, -t here has the same function of indicating that the requested information is not directly known by the addressee, but is information that the addressee only knows if at all as reported information. (913) Reportative t the'o'otangma atibukta} mm th - ~ -t ng=ma a-tib k t mm be.big-much~DIST.PL-REP=Q POSS-earthen.pot=ADD:DM AFF {are the earthen pots big enough?} [HK, TR 177] It appears that -t , or t , is more generally the interrogative counterpart of t , because attempts to elicit the use of -t in other contexts have only yielded questions, e.g., (914). (914) - - -t = c - =ma? POSS-skin NMLZ-be.white POSS-PL=TOP rice eat-REP=Q ‘are white people said to eat rice?’ In addition to t , quotative pu also functions as a reportative marker (§12.3.1.1). 12.3.3. Dubitatives and t i There are two dubitative particles, and t . There are no instances of in the recorded text corpus, but (915) offers an elicited example. (915) - - t- fall-NEG-PFV-IRR2 DUBIT 'it probably won't rain' [SiT 090221] According to Grüßner's (1978: 130-2) account of , this particle occurs at the end of quoted clauses (but before the quotative marker). In his view, this is the 600 distributional difference between and =bo, which he suggests are functionally equivalent (for information on =bo, see §11.1.1.6); =bo only occurs as a sentence-final particle. Further research is required to offer a semantic analysis of the differences between t , , and =bo. Note that may be the first element in t ‘but’ (with the additive =t as a second element; see §11.5.3). The other dubitative particle is t . In (916), t occurs after a negated verb (‘may not be able to tell it well’). The next sentence starts with the corresponding dubitative adverb ‘maybe’. (916) Dubitative t , followed in next clause by ‘maybe’ ta ne kethan atomo abangke t [n ke-th n a-tem ab ng ke] but 1EXCL NMLZ-tell POSS-story NPDL=TOP pachekengdamthekthedet tahai meneta [pe-che-k ng-d m-th k-C -d t tah i [men t CAUS-RR-be.straight-go-know.how-NEG-PFV DUBIT maybe=ADD:even nangthanpo nang th n-p ] 1/2:NSUBJ=tell-IRR1 ‘the story I'm telling now, maybe I can't tell it perfectly (straight), but maybe I will still tell’ [KK, CC 008] (917) shows that - ‘realis’ can be attached to t , apparently to convey a higher likelihood of the proposition. We may thus translate t - as ‘probably’ rather than ‘maybe’. (917) Dubitative t with realis - nangli aphrangphrang, hakoko alam sitame n ng-l [aphr ng~phr ng hak ~k a-l m sit m ] you-HON first~DIST.PL that.time~DIST.PL POSS-matter nevertheless arju'iklong tahailo arj - k-l ng tah i-l hear-FRML-GET DUBIT-RL 'you probably have heard the different matters about the old days' [KaR, SWK 059] 601 12.3.4. Always t t The particle t t means ‘always’ or ‘habitually’. In (918), t t indicates that the situation described is a typical, habitual scenario: this is how it always was. (918) ‘Always’ t t so'arlo atumsi keklem abang dopo [s 'arl a-t m si [ke-kl m a-b ng] d -p ] women:COLL POSS-PL=FOC NMLZ-do POSS-CLF:HUM:PL exist-IRR1 pinso atum abangke osomarpen chelemrong titi; [[pins a-t m ab ng ke] os -m r pen che-l m-r ng tit ] married.man POSS-PL NPDL=TOP child-PL=with RR-play.with.toys-instead always lason arjulonghe [las n arj -l ng he] that.way hear-GET=AFTERTHOUGHT ‘[…] the women would be the working ones, the men would always play with the children instead, this is actually what I've heard’ [KaR, SWK 071] In (919), t t surprisingly occurs with what may be -si ‘NF:RL’, or possibly =si ‘focus’. It is currently not clear how to analyze titisi here, but this demonstrates that t t belongs to the subset of particles that may occur with morphological marking (§12.3). (Also note that there is no doubt that titisi is indeed t t plus a /si/ element, because the habitual function is additionally indicated by the following, reduplicated main verb nangkechodundun.) (919) ‘Always’ t t with -si ‘non-final:realis’ netumta nangtum nangpipo longle thak [ne-t m t nang-t m nang p -p longl ath k 1EXCL-PL=ADD:also 2-PL 1/2:NSUBJ=give-IRR1 earth on.top nangbokchom titisi neta nang b k-ch m tit -/=si] n t 1/2:NSUBJ=serve.small.items-a.little always-NF:RL/=FOC? 1EXCL=ADD:also nangkechodundun nang=ke-ch -d n~d n CIS=NMLZ-eat-JOIN~HAB ‘to us you would also give us, on the ground always you would serve us (food), I also used to eat like that’ [KK, BMS 060] 602 The etymology of t t could be a reduplication of emphatic ti (see §12.3.5), which would make sense given that cross-linguistically, habituality often correlates with reduplicative marking. 12.3.5. Emphatic ti The emphatic particle ti occurs at the end of a sentence and can be translated into English via lexical emphatics such as ‘really’ or ‘definitely’, or the do-emphatic construction. It occurs in positive and negative declarative clauses, as well as in non- declarative clauses, such as imperatives and hortatives. In (920), the first line represents a question that expresses the lack of confidence of the person asking (i.e., the owner of the dog, or ‘grandfather’) that the dog might actually be able to take him (across a huge body of water). The question starts with ahokma? ‘is it true?’, and then asks neponthekjima? ‘will you be able to take me?’. In his reply, the dog tries to reassure his owner that he will indeed be able to take him across the water, and he does that by adding ti. He then also uses a copy verb construction, nangdunle nangdunnoi, which is another type of emphatic construction (see §12.2.3.3). (920) Emphatic ti with declarative, positive verb “ahokma, methan- t “ a-h k ma meth n-sib ngp , ne p n-th k-j m POSS-truth=Q dog.sp 1EXCL:NSUBJ =take.away-know.how-IRR2=Q “ nangponthekpo ti, phu! n nang= n-th - ti ph EXCM 1EXCL 1/2:NSUBJ=take.away-know.how-IRR1 EMPH grandfather:VOC nangdunle nangdunnoi ho pulo tangho nang d n le nang d n-n i h p -l t ngh CIS=join=FOC:IRR CIS=join-INFRML.COND.IMP EMPH:INTERACT say-RL REP '"is it true, dog, you know how to take me?"' '"I certainly know how to take you there, grandfather. Just make sure to join me", he said' [KK, BMS 034-5] (921) offers an example of emphatic ti co-occurring with ho ‘EMPH:INTERACT’ (see §12.3.6), of which there are several instances in the corpus. 603 (921) Emphatic ti with declarative, positive verb (with ho ‘EMPH:INTERACT’) o.... neta lasi ho kiribom ti ho o.... n t las h ke-r -b m t h AFF 1EXCL=ADD thus EMPH:INTERACT NMLZ-search-CONT EMPH EMPH:INTERACT ‘oh, I see. I also am searching for somebody, just like you’ [HK, TR 065] In (922) and (923), ti occurs with directives, specifically the conative imperative -t and the hortative - . (922) Emphatic ti with imperative -t ai tovar nangpektha ti, ko jirpo i tov r nang- -th t ko j rp , how.bad! road 1/2:NSUBJ-give.way-IMP:CON EMPH buddy:VOC friend ne'ik atum aphan an thonji pu ne- k a-t m a-ph n n th n-j pu 1EXCL:POSS-older.brother POSS-PL POSS-NSUBJ rice drop-IRR2 QUOT '"how bad! Please do give way to me, friend. I'm supposed to drop off rice to my brother (and sister-in-law)"' [RBT, ChM 012] (923) Emphatic ti with hortative -n [anke laso kepholok abarika [ nke las ke-ph -l k a-barik and.then this NMLZ-reach-happen.to POSS-OFFICER abangke ningjelemdetlo tangho ab ng ke ningj -lemdet-l t ngh ] NPDL=TOP speak-repeatedly-RL REP paprapnang ti komarli ho {mm} e- r -n ng t ko-marl h ] mm CAUS-be.quick-HORT EMPH buddy:VOC-PL:VOC EMPH:INTERACT AFF and then, that head tiger thathad encountered (the orphan) kept telling, 'let's make it quick, friends!' [HK, TR 153] Lastly, in (924), ti occurs after a negated verb, here a negative hortative. (924) Emphatic ti with negative hortative “ […] ningveke elitumta e vopi ejon [[ningv ke e-li-t m t e v -p e-j n evening=TOP 1PL.INCL-HON- PL=ADD:DM DSM chicken-female one-CLF:animal 604 chothatnang” pulo amat hala apiso abang pulo cho-th t-n ng] p -l ] [am t h la a-pis ab ng p -l AUTO.BEN/MAL-slaughter-HORT say-RL and.then that POSS-wife NPDL say-RL “thatnangne ti sarbura” th t-n ng- t s rbur ]] slaughter-HORT-NEG EMPH old.man ‘ “[…] let's kill us a hen tonight”, he said, (but) the wife said, “let's not, old man (and I won't change my mind)”' [SeT, MTN 007] 12.3.6. Interactive Emphatic ho Compared to ‘emphatic’ ti, ‘interactive emphatic’ ho is more frequent in the recorded text corpus of 13,000 words (i.e., 30 instances of ho versus eight instances of ti). While ti may be the only indicator of emphasis, ho more typically occurs in conjunction with other emphatic elements and constructions. Also, ho often occurs in non-declarative speech acts. In (925), it occurs with the =le copy verb construction (§12.2.3.3). (925) Interactive emphatic ho after verb in emphatic copy verb construction “ t t n nang-p n-th k-p t ph EXCM 1EXCL 1/2:NSUBJ-take.away-know.how-IRR1 EMPH grandfather:VOC nangdunle nangdunnoi ho pulo tangho nang d n l nang d n-n i ho p -l t ngh CIS=join=FOC:IRR CIS=join-INFRML.COND.IMP EMPH:INTERACT say-RL REP '"I certainly know how to take you there, grandfather. Just make sure to join me", he said' [KK, BMS 035] (926) and (927) offer examples of ho occurring together with the feedback or back-channel requesting (§11.1.1.8). (926) Interactive emphatic ho after feedback request marker tangte osomar atum.... ne eson atomo t ngt os -m r a-t m n e-s n a-tom if child-PL POSS-PL 1EXCL one-CLF:thing POSS-story nangthanpo dei ho {to} nang th n- d i ho to 1/2:NSUBJ=tell-IRR1 OK? EMPH:INTERACT OK 'if so then (as in 'you're asking me, if so - then'), (dear) children, I will tell you one story, ok? {OK.}' [HK, TR 001] 605 (927) Interactive emphatic ho after feedback request marker jamborong along hako arnike luji pu he jambor ng a-l ng hak arn ke luj pu h bag POSS-LOC that.time day=TOP mirror QUOT you.know {mm} dei ho mm d i h AFF OK? EMPH:INTERACT ‘in the bag, in the old days, they used to keep a so-called luji, a mirror (container), you know..., right?’ [HK, TR 017] In (928), ho occurs along with the ‘common ground’ marker mati. This shows that ho may emphasize information that the speaker expects the listener to know. The use of ho here implies that the tobacco container will play a key role in the story, so the storyteller wants to make sure the listener pays attention to the mentioning of the tobacco container. (928) Interactive emphatic ho after mati ‘common ground’ atema ajerjer do mati ho a-tem ajerj r d mat h POSS-tobacco.container( Misorongpo arju, "Chonghoisi nang chongho mis rongp arj chongh i si n ng chongh sp.ant ask reason=FOC you frog ami korrakmati?" "Tovar nangdangthipke" a-m k r-r k mati] tov r nang d ng-th e POSS-buttocks bite-RES:little.wound=CG road CIS=block-firmly=TOP 'he asked the ant, "why did you bite the frog in the butt?", "he had come and was blocking the road… and so…"' [RBT, ChM 076] Finally, in excerpt (941) from an interview, the interviewee first speaks and says that she is a Terang family member. The interviewer takes his turn and essentially repeats the information he was just given, using tag questions, which occur after main clauses marked by topic =ke. (941) Tag question with ‘question.tag’ neli dak Ran habe arong Terang hem asor n -l d k [Ran hab ] a-r ng]] [[Ter ng h m] a-s r] 1EXCL-HON here NAME headman POSS-village CLAN house POSS-people ‘I am here at Ran Habe village, a member of the Terang family’ [KaR, SWK 006: KaR] Terang hemsi nangli kedoloke di?, Terang [Ter ng h m si n ng-l ke-d -l =ke d [Ter ng CLAN house=FOC you-HON NMLZ-stay-RL=TOP Q.TAG CLAN hem asorloke di? h m a-s r-l =ke d house POSS-people-RL=TOP Q.TAG ‘so you live in the Terang house, don't you, you're a member of the Terang family, aren't you' [KaR, SWK 007: BTi] 612 Here, the tag questions are clearly not intended to elicit confirmation of the truth of the proposition, as they represent a repetition of already provided information,203 which is marked by clause-final=ke ‘topic’. 12.3.11. Common Ground Marker =mati The sentence-final particle =mati appears to indicate that the information conveyed in a sentence represents common ground between the speaker and the addressee either through knowledge gained from context, or universal or cultural knowledge. In (942), the storyteller had just previously asserted that Bey the Fair and Bey the Black cannot tolerate each other. In this example, she connects this new information to old information mentioned earlier in the story about this being ultimately the grandmother’s fault. (942) =mati indicating old information, here connected to new information […] y t y [B y ke- t pen B y ke- k ke-che- n-C CLAN NMLZ-be.yellow=with CLAN NMLZ-be.black NMLZ-RR-be.able-NEG athaike aphi sarpi abang a-th i ke] a-ph sarp ab ng POSS-place(, that grandmother made that mistake’ [WR, BCS 019] (943) tells the reason why the orphan protagonist of a story is leaving the village, which is because he is hungry and so needs to go look for vegetables. =mati here indicates that the orphan being hungry is not new information: because he is an orphan, of course he will be hungry because he doesn’t have a family to provide for him. The use of the question tag suggests that the storyteller is making sure that the orphan being 203 In fact, the video of this interview shows that the interviewer is not even looking to the interviewee as he is uttering the tag questions, but instead is looking down to his notes. 613 hungry can indeed be considered common ground, and a logical reason for the orphan to leave the village. (943) =mat indicating that statement is uncontroversial apok ingchirdukkemati di {mm} a-p k ingch r-d k ke=mati d mm POSS-stomach be.hungry-INTENS=TOP=CG Q.tag AFF ‘on that day, this orphan was suffering from hunger, wouldn't he have been?’ [HK, TR 010] In (944), =mati occurs in a question, which at first glance poses a problem for the interpretation that =mati marks common ground. It appears, however, that =mati here marks the common ground, or presupposition, that the hanthar fruit fell on the back of the pig, and the information sought by the question is only why it did that. (944) =mati in a question Ha hanthar aphan arjudamlo... "Kopisi nang h hanth r a-ph n arj -d m-l kop si n ng over.there vegetable.sp POSS-NSUBJ ask-go-RL why 2 phakbelengpi amoi klodupmati, hanthar?" ph kbel ngp a-m i kl -d p=mati hanth r pig.sp POSS-back fall-falling.sound.from.high.solid.obj=CG vegetable.sp 'there to the hanthar he went and asked, "why did you possibly fall down on the back of the pig, Hanthar?"' [RBT, ChM 060] 12.3.12. Narrative Style The particle appears to have different functions depending on the dialect. In a number of dialects, it may be used as a synonym of the question tag marker (§11.1.1.7), as in (945) or a synonym of the feedback request marker (§11.1.1.8), as in (946). (945) h with question tag function (like ) […] athakke aina do {mm} ath k ke ain d mm on.top=TOP mirror( s a-phr ng-s nang-li-m n che-th n as n-t therefore POSS-first-SPLT 2-HON-name RR-tell like-COND 616 me'iksenji m - -s n-j be.good-FRML-INTENS-IRR2 ‘so first, if you could tell us your name, that would be wonderful’ [KaR, SWK 004] Besides requests, - also occurs commonly in simple assertive clauses. It appears as though - in assertive clauses is often used at the end of a paragraph or episode in, for example, procedural texts. The reason for this could be that the end of an episode serves as a good moment to use - as a reminder of the formal speech style. In (949), which is a procedural text about traditional washing and cleaning methods and the traditional status of cleanliness, the - is used here at the end of a short paragraph that discusses the suho fruit; in what follows (949), the speaker moves on to talk about a different fruit that is used for washing the head. (949) Formal marker - at the end of a paragraph lasi la suho athe pu abangke pe ri [las l s h a-th pu ab ng ke] [[p r therefore this sp.thorny.plant POSS-fruit QUOT NPDL=TOP cloth EE:p kechok aphan'iklo ke-ch k] a-ph n- -l ] NMLZ-wash.clothes POSS-PURP-FRML-RL ‘therefore, the suho fruit is for washing clothes’ [SiH, CW 007] In the corpus of recorded texts, - does not occur in folk stories, but it does occur in procedural texts. There is one exception, where - does, however, occur in a folk story in the corpus, which is provided in (950); this intonation unit represents the last one of this recording. (950) Formal marker - in last sentence of folk story lasi choboche chosonsesi akai jangikraplo las choboch chosons -si a-k i j ng- -r p-l therefore settle.down EE:choboch -NF POSS-time( kenenang bong tharve nke pin =ke ene-n ng b ng tharv and.then today=TOP fruit HESIT-HORT younger.sibling:VOC mango athele endamnang tharve menpiklo a-th l n-d m-n ng tharv m n-p k-l POSS-fruit=FOC:IRR take-go-HORT mango be.ready.to.eat-very-RL 621 pusi pu tangho tharve athe endamnang pusi p t ngh tharv a-th n-d m-n ng QUOT.COMP say REP mango POSS-fruit take-GO-HORT 'and then, "today, younger brother, let's, let's go and get mangos, the mangos are very ripe", (the older brother) said, "let's go and get mangos"' [KTa, TCS 041] Karbi has borrowed the Assamese hesitation word mane. An example of mane used in Karbi is (956). Here the speaker apparently is trying to remember the word for ‘hill field’ while saying mane, then just uses a descriptive possessive construction, then says kopunelo ‘what do you call it?’, but still does not remember and leaves it at that. (956) Hesitation marker mane ( atumta Rongker pu do tangho hak arn ke tek a-t m t R ngk r pu d t ngh that.time day=TOP tiger QUOT POSS-PL=also FESTIVAL QUOT exist REP ‘at that time (i.e. in the old days), the tigers also (like humans/Karbis) celebrated the Rongker’ [HK, TR 035] {mm monitpenta chingkisai puhe} mm mon t pen t che-ingk -s i pu=he} AFF man=with=ADD:even RR-talk-easily QUOT=AFTERTHOUGHT mm monitpenta chingkisai ahutlo {mm} mm mon t-p n t che-ingk -s i ah t-l mm AFF man-with=ADD:even RR-talk-easily during-RL AFF ‘{they could talk with humans just like that?} Mm. (The story takes place) when they could talk to people just like that.' [HK, TR 036] {ha pirthe kangduk ahut} mm h pirth ke-ingd k ah t mm over.there world NMLZ-immature during AFF ‘{it was when the world was immature?!} Mm.' [HK, TR 037] {lalo anke laso ateke abangke} mm l -l nke las a-tek ab ng ke mm this-RL and.then this POSS-tiger NPDL=TOP AFF ‘{that's it, and then that tiger...} Mm.' [HK, TR 038] hala teke Rongker pu labangso abarikalo tangho la vo [h la tek Rongk r p ] l b ngs a-barik -l t ngh ] [l v that tiger FESTIVAL QUOT this POSS-OFFICER-RL REP this chicken phak kiri abanglo tangho abanglo {kerek ph k ke-r a-b ng-l t ngh ] a-b ng-l {ke-r k pig NMLZ-search POSS-CLF:HUM.PL-RL REP POSS-CLF-RL NMLZ-ask.for abang} kerek abanglo a-b ng ke-r k a-b ng-l POSS-CLF:HUM.PL NMLZ-ask.for POSS-CLF:HUM.PL -RL ‘that one is the main organizer of the Teke Rongker, the one looking for sacrifice, that one - {the collector (who asks for chicken and pig from different places)?!} - he is the collector' [HK, TR 039] 636 {laanke long'etlo} mm l - n ke l ng- t-l mm this-that.much=TOP get-all:S/O-RL AFF ‘{he had already collected everything?!} Mm.' [HK, TR 040] komatne akurja aso vanlo komatne kom t-n a-kurj a-os v n-l kom t-n who-INDEF POSS-muslim POSS-child bring-RL who-INDEF abonggali aso ponlo aphai dopiklo a-bonggal a-os p n-l aph i d -p k-l POSS-Bengoli POSS-child take.away-RL number exist-very-RL ‘he brought some young muslims, he carried some young Bengolis, he already had many of them’ [HK, TR 041] { halatumke} mm { la monitsi kenangpohe halatum h la-t m ke mm l mon t si ke-n ng-p =he h la-tum that-PL=TOP AFF this man=FOC:RL NMLZ-need-IRR1=AFTERTHOUGHT that-PL aphanke halatum, aphanke bi vosi ketheklo} a-ph n ke h la-t m aph n ke b v si ke-th k-l POSS-NSUBJ=TOP that-PL NSUBJ=TOP goat chicken=FOC:RL NMLZ-see-RL ‘{they will need human beings, right? They consider them goats and chickens (i.e. sacrifice)}’ [HK, TR 042] ketheklo {lapulo} mm {mm} ke-th k-l lap l mm mm NMLZ-see-RL like.this-RL AFF AFF ‘he considers them as such is it like that? Mm. Mm.}’ [HK, TR 043] te hala mumding akhei hala t h la ingm m-d ng a-kh i h la and.then/therefore that beard-be.long POSS-community that kopinene {kaprek kaprek} kop -n ~n ke-pr k ke-pr k what-INDEF~DIST.PL NMLZ-be.different NMLZ-be.different 637 akhei ponbomlo akaprek a-kh i p n-b m-l a-ke-pr k POSS-community take.away-CONT-RL POSS-NMLZ-be.different kaprek ponbomlo {mm} ke-pr k p n-b m-l mm NMLZ-be.different take.away-CONT-RL AFF ‘therefore, he (the tiger) is carrying that community of long-bearded ones (i.e. muslims), and whatever other communities, he is carrying different ones’ [HK, TR 044] ingchin aumpensi bengsi {mm keponlo} ingch n a- m=pen=si b ng-si mm ke-p n-l iron POSS-cage=with=FOC:RL lock-NF:RL AFF NMLZ-take.away-RL huladak ateke akangbura ahemsi h lad k a-tek a-kangbur a-h m si there POSS-tiger POSS-village.head.man( i las n-l yes that.way-RL ‘yes, that way’ () [HK, TR 081] “nang vangchitlo! meta melo ” n ng v ng-ch t-l m t m -l you come-just.right-RL be.good=ADD:INT be.good-RL pu tangho pu t ngh QUOT REP ‘ “you came just right, it's very good” ‘ () [HK, TR 082] {anke} anke laso ajangrengsota.... ningjedetlokemati {ningjedetlo} nke nke las a-jangr ngs t .... ningj -d t-l ke=mat ningj -d t-l and.then and.then this POSS-orphan=ADD:DM speak-PFV-RL=TOP=CG speak-PFV-RL ‘{'and then'}-'and then, this orphan had spoken this-{he already said [that]}’ [HK, TR 083] 645 teketa manghutailo tangho{manghutailo} tek t mangh -t i-l t ngh mangh -t i-l tiger=ADD:DM get.surprised-for.a.moment-RL REP get.surprised-for.a.moment-RL “kolo ante nang keneptangke....? dolo ” k lo ant n ng ke-n p-t ng ke....? d -l ITROG=FOC OK.then 2 NMLZ-catch-PFV=TOP exist-RL ‘the tiger was surprised, “which one have you already caught? is it there?” ' [HK, TR 084] {“ahokma nahokmake ”} “ahokma nahokma mane hala ” a-h k ma nah k ma ke a-h k ma nah k ma mane h la POSS-truth=Q lie=Q=TOP POSS-truth=Q lie=Q I.mean( “dolo” {mm} d -l t p -b m-l t ngh l ke d -l mm exist-RL EMPH say-CONT-RL REP this=TOP exist-RL AFF ' “definitely, there’s one here!”' this one (i.e. the orphan) kept saying, () “it's there” ' [HK, TR 088] 646 “kali nang lam ningjebomte, neke kal n ng l m ningj -b m-te n ke NEG.EQU.COP 2 word speak-CONT-if 1EXCL=TOP nangkebengpo ” {“nangkebengpo”} nang=ke-b ng-p {nang=ke-b ng-p 1/2:NSUBJ=NMLZ-lock-IRR1 1/2:NSUBJ=NMLZ-lock-IRR1 ‘ “on the other hand, if you keep speaking like this, I will lock you in” “will lock you in”} ’ [HK, TR 089] „ante kolo nangkeneptang? Nangpaklangtha ” lason nte ko=lo nang=ke-n p-t ng, nang pe-kl ng-th las n OK.then ITROG=FOC CIS=NMLZ-catch-finish 1/2:NSUBJ=CAUS-appear-CON.IMP that.way ajat abanglo he {mm} a-j t ab ng-l h {mm} POSS-type NPDL-RL you.know AFF ' “if so, which one have you already caught? You have to show me!”, that’s how it was’ [HK, TR 090] alangtum akhei mene laso... (ajat al ng-t m a-kh i men las a-j t 3-PL POSS-clan maybe this POSS-type abanglo he) {oi} ab ng-l h ) i NPDL-RL you.know yes ‘maybe he (the tiger that was caught) is from their community (the tiger's community)’ [HK, TR 091] lalo anke “o nang bisasse bo “ l -l nke o n ng bis s-C bo this-RL and.then AFF( opeija ne-ph n t h la si nang s r-l ng my.goodness! 1EXCL-NSUBJ=ADD:even that=FOC:RL 1/2:NSUBJ=be.old-still ‘ “my goodness! this one is still older than me!” ’ (both laughing) [HK, TR 098] “cheplangple ” che-pl ng-C RR-become-NEG ' “any effort will be useless!” ' (says the tiger) (both laughing) [HK, TR 099] ingplongphitlo {ingplongphitlo} ingpl ng-ph t-l ingpl ng-ph t-l run.away.animal-right.away-RL run.away.animal-right.away-RL ingplongphitlo lake {mm} ingpl ng-ph t-l l ke mm run.away.animal-right.away-RL this=TOP AFF ‘he ran away-{he ran away}-he ran away, this one {Mm.}’ [HK, TR 100] t { } chethekloklo mati {mm} l che-th k-l k pen mm a-harch che-th k-l k-l =mati {mm} this RR-see-right.then=from AFF POSS-image RR-see-right.then-RL=CG AFF ingplongphitlo {mm} ingpl ng-ph t-l mm run.away.animal-right.away-RL AFF ‘as he was looking, he of course saw the image and he ran away’ [HK, TR 101] ingplongphitlo anke hanglo tangho ingpl ng-ph t-l nke h ng-l t ngh run.away.animal-right.away-RL and.then call-RL REP {hanglang} la jangrengsoke {o} h ng-l ng l jangr ngs ke call-yet this orphan=TOP EXCM ‘he ran away and, and then, he shouted, the orphan did’ [HK, TR 102] 649 “komantupo aRongkerjike ” {mm} komant -p a-R ngk r-j ke mm when-IRR1 POSS-FESTIVAL-IRR2=TOP AFF ‘ “when will it be, the Rongker?” ‘ [HK, TR 103] “penap ne vangalang ” t (both laughing) “vangalang” pen p n v ng-j -l ng pu t ngh v ng-j -l ng tomorrow 1EXCL come-IRR2-still QUOT REP come-IRR2-still ‘ “tomorrow I will come!” (both laughing), “I will come” ‘ [HK, TR 104] {“nang kedo adim ne nangchinike “} n ng ke-d a-d m n nang chin ke you NMLZ-stay POSS-place 1EXCL 1/2:NSUBJ=know=TOP nangchinike {mm} nang chin ke mm 1/2:NSUBJ=know=TOP AFF ‘{“I know the place where you stay!”}’ [HK, TR 105] “penap vangalang netum abang paderchotpo” {mm} pen p v ng-j -l ng ne-t m ab ng pa-d r-ch t-p mm tomorrow come-IRR2-still 1EXCL-PL NPDL CAUS-be.late-a.bit-IRR1 AFF ' “tomorrow we are coming, but we will be a little bit late” ' [HK, TR 106] “penap Rongker alongsi vangpo {mm} pen p R ngk r al ng si v ng-p mm tomorrow FESTIVAL LOC=FOC:RL come-IRR1 AFF hadakpenlo neta kapadorji h dak=pen=lo n t ke-pa-d r-j there=from=FOC 1EXCL=ADD:also NMLZ-CAUS-be.enough-IRR2 ejonbak {mm} jonnibakke” e-j n-b k mm j n-n -b k ke one-CLF:animal-about AFF CLF:animal-two-about=TOP ‘ “tomorrow we will come to the place of the rongker, from there I will also make it enough, about one or two (more are needed)” ‘ [HK, TR 107] 650 {“nangkokjike”} n ng-k k-j ke need-absolutely.required-IRR2=TOP “nangkokjike” pulo tangho {mm} (both laughing) n ng-k k-j ke p -l t ngh {mm} need-absolutely.required-IRR2=TOP say-RL REP AFF '{[we] need [them]} “we need them” (both laughing)' [HK, TR 108] te hala atarikke hot'etlo {mm} te h la a-tar k ke h t- t-l mm and.then/therefore that POSS-date=TOP fix-PRF-RL AFF la teke atumke {oi} l tek a-t m ke i this tiger POSS-PL=TOP yes ‘then, they had fixed that date (of the Rongker), the tigers’ [HK, TR 109] mane halaso arni abang.... teke Rongker mane h las arn ab ng.... tek R ngk r I.mean( arm t j r-h r-j ma mm j r-h r-l tail=ADD:also be.standing.up-high.up-IRR2=Q AFF be.standing.up-high.up-RL ‘{and his tail might have been standing up?}-his tail was standing up’ () [HK, TR 117] votlo lake (both laughing) -v t-l l ke -IDEOPHONE-RL this=TOP ‘quickly (he ran away) (both laughing)’ [HK, TR 118] anke {mm} jangrengsota kejokloke nke mm jangr ngs t ke-j k-l ke and.then AFF orphan=ADD:DM NMLZ-get.untied-RL=TOP mati {kejoklo} kejoklo mat ke-j k-l ke-j k-l DM NMLZ-get.untied-RL NMLZ-get.untied-RL ‘and then, the orphan got away (lit. got untied, thought he was trapped, but managed to get out of the siutation)’ [HK, TR 119] 653 hem nanglengphitlo lata h m nang l ng-ph t-l l t house CIS=go.long.distance-right.away-RL this=ADD:DM {nanglengphitlo} hem nanglengphit nang l ng-ph t-l h m nang l ng-ph t CIS=go.straight-right.away-RL house CIS=go.like.voice.or.bullet-right.away ‘he (i.e. the orphan) went straight home’ [HK, TR 120] {ahokpetpenke phereduk <...>} a-h k-p t pen ke pher -d k-p POSS-truth-all=with=TOP fear-INTENS-IRR1 ‘{actually, he was quite afraid (the orphan), I assume?}’ [HK, TR 121] mm phereduklo {mm} kapherepen ajatpen he mm pher -d k-l mm ke-pher -p n aj t-p n he AFF fear-quite-RL AFF NMLZ-fear-NF:with GENEX-with EMPH hem {oi} nanglengphitlo {oi} vanglo {oi} h m i nang l ng-ph t-l i v ng-l i house yes CIS=go.long.distance-right.away-RL yes come-RL yes ‘yeah he was quite afraid, he was afraid and tired and everything and went straight home, came there’ [HK, TR 122] vanglo aro hala ningjeduntangdetlomati {mm} v ng-l ar h la ningj -d n-t ng-d t-l mat mm come-RL and/again( “esonbak e-s n-b k a-l m ma e-s n-b k one-CLF:thing-about POSS-matter Q one-CLF:thing-about pachobeidununpo... la {mm} nephansi pa-chob i-d n- n-p ... l {mm} ne-ph n si CAUS-lie-JOIN-be.able-IRR1 this AFF 1EXCL-NSUBJ=FOC:RL nangkepheresi kekatlo apot” nang=ke-pher -si ke-k t-l ap t 1/2:NSUBJ=NMLZ-fear-NF:RL NMLZ-run.away.hum-RL because ‘he came, and then, he already told the tiger (that he will come, so preparations on behalf of the orphan are necessary), “one thing... that is/I mean, I will be able to tell any lie, because he feared me and ran away” ’ [HK, TR 123] 654 {esonbak klemdunpo} “esonbak klemdunlo tangte.... e-s n-b k kl m-d n-p e-s n-b k kl m-d n-l t ngt .... one-CLF:thing-about do-JOIN-IRR1 one-CLF:thing-about do-JOIN-RL if latum esonbak ne longdunpo” {longpo} l -t m e-s n-b k n l ng-d n-p l ng-p this-PL one-CLF:thing-about 1EXCL get-JOIN-IRR1 get-IRR1 ‘{he will do anything}, “if I do any thing there, I will get something” ’ [HK, TR 124] ha anongve hem leroklo {mm} h a-nongv h m l -r k-l mm over.there POSS-evening house reach-COMPL-RL AFF ‘at night, he reached home’ [HK, TR 125] ajirpo chehanglo tangho {mm} a-jirp che-h ng-l t ngh mm POSS-friend RR-call-RL REP AFF ‘he called his friend’ [HK, TR 126] “o jirpo…” {mm} “pilo ko ho ” {mm} “dak o j rp mm p lo ko h mm d k VOC friend AFF what=FOC buddy:VOC EMPH:INTERACT AFF here vangtha ko” {mm} v ng-th ko mm come-CON.IMP buddy:VOC AFF ‘ “o friend!”, “what's up?”, “come here!” ‘[HK, TR 127] halata kidukthektik amonitlo h la t ke-d k-thekt k a-mon t-l that=ADD:also NMLZ-be.poor-as.much.V.as.it.can.be POSS-man-RL {kidukthektik} ke-d k-thekt k NMLZ-be.poor-as.V.as.it.can.be ‘that one also is an unimaginably poor man’ [HK, TR 128] 655 “dak vangtha, ko jirpo ” {mm} d k v ng-th ko j rp mm here come-CON.IMP buddy:VOC friend AFF ‘ “come here, my friend!” ’ [HK, TR 129] “pine akam doma jirpo ho ” {mm} p -n a-k m d ma j rp h mm what-INDEF POSS-work exist=Q friend EMPH:INTERACT AFF ‘ “is there any work, friend?” “’ [HK, TR 130] “ave akamke, seta vangtha he”.... damlo {mm} av a-k m ke set v ng-th he.... d m-l mm not.exist POSS-work=TOP but come-CON.IMP EMPH go-RL AFF ‘ “there is no work, but come here” ... and he went’ [HK, TR 131] “ba ko jirpo {mm} pinike ne ba ko j rp mm pin ke n SURPRISE( teke atum rongkerji” {teke rongkerji} mm tek a-t m r ngk r-j tek r ngk r-j mm village tiger POSS-PL FESTIVAL-IRR2 tiger FESTIVAL-IRR2 AFF ‘ “the news is that, my friend, tomorrow the tigers will have a Rongker” ‘ [HK, TR 135] “tangka atibuk longdunvekpo, ili” t ngk a-tib k l ng-d n-v k-p -l money POSS-earthen.pot get-JOIN-definitely-IRR1 1PL:INCL-HON ‘ “together we will surely get the earthen pots with money” ‘ [HK, TR 136] {“akejoisi longdunlokpo eli”} a-ke-j i si l ng-d n-l k-p -l POSS-NMLZ-be.for.free/in.vain=FOC:RL get-JOIN-definitely-IRR1 1PL:INCL-HON “akejoilo ili longdunpo” a-ke-j i lo -li l ng-d n-p POSS-NMLZ-be.for.free/in.vain=FOC 1PL:INCL-HON get-JOIN-IRR1 ‘{“we will get it without any effort”}-“we will get it without any effort” ‘ [HK, TR 137] {“chepaduk chepalak nangnelo”} che-pa-d k che-pa-l k n ng-C -l RR-CAUS-suffer RR-CAUS-be.tired need-NEG-RL “chepaduk chepalaknang dunnang ” {mm} che-pa-d k che-pa-l k-n ng d n-n ng mm RR-CAUS-suffer RR-CAUS-be.tired-HORT join-HORT AFF ‘{“no need to go through hardship or get tired (we'll just get it free)”}-“let’s make the effort to go there!” ’ [HK, TR 138] “tangka atibuk eli longpo t ngk a-tib k -l l ng-p money POSS-earthen.pot 1PL:INCL-HON get-IRR1 la'an akiduk apot” {mm}... o l - n a-ke-d k ap t mm this-that.much POSS-NMLZ-be.poor because AFF EXCLAM ‘ “we will get the money, as we are so poor... oh!” ’ [HK, TR 139] 657 “t t te m p -n ~pin -C -d t-j ma and.then/therefore future what-INDEF~EE-NEG-PFV-IRR2=Q ” { } ko j rp pu mm buddy:VOC friend QUOT AFF ‘”and there won't be anything (any difficulties, problems, dangers), my friend?”' [HK, TR 140] “jatta manme jirpo; ne pudun'etlo” [j t t m n-C j rp ] n p -d n- t-l type=ADD:EXH become/happen-NEG friend 1EXCL say-JOIN-PRF-RL {pudun'etlo} p -d n- t-l say-JOIN-PRF-RL ‘ “nothing will happen, friend, I've already done the talking (I've made the necessary preparations, taken the necessary precautions)” ‘ [HK, TR 141] “to tangte ” {mm} ajirpo abangke dunlo, “adapprang t t ngt {mm} a-jirp ab ng ke d n-l a-dappr ng OK if AFF POSS-friend NPDL=TOP join-RL POSS-dawn damdappiknangji dei ” {“damdap'onangji dei”} mm d m-d p-p k-n ng-j d i d m-d p- -n ng-j d i mm go-early-very-need-IRR2 right? go-morning-much-must-IRR2 right? AFF “damdappiknangji bang vangve ako eli d m-d p-p k-n ng-j b ng v ng-C ak -l go-early-very-need-IRR2 somebody come-NEG before 1PL:INCL-HON damnangji” {mm} d m-n ng-j mm go-must-IRR2 AFF ‘ “Okay, then!”, that friend followed him, “in the very early morning we need to go” “need to go very early” “we need to go very early, we need to go before anybody gets there” ‘ [HK, TR 142] 658 “damdapprangnangji” {mm} mm to d m-d ppr ng-n ng-j mm mm t go-early-must-IRR2 AFF AFF OK ‘ “in the early morning we need to go” ’ [HK, TR 143] {thurdappik tangho} hala ajirpo abangta th r-d p-p k t ngh } h la a-jirp ab ng t get.up-morning-very REP that POSS-friend NPDL=ADD:also halata kidukdetke mati {kalang} h la t ke-d k-d t=ke=mati kal ng that=ADD:also NMLZ-be.poor( arongke dolo mati {akejoisi ar ng ke d -l =mat ]] a-ke-j i=si one=TOP be.happy=TOP exist-RL=CG POSS-NMLZ-be.for.free/in.vain=FOC:RL kelongdunjike mati} aning arong dokoklo ke-l ng-d n-j =ke mat a-n ng ar ng d -k k-l NMLZ-get-JOIN-IRR2=TOP DM POSS-mind be.happy stay.back-RL ‘he (the friend) hears/agrees with/obeys the words of the orphan; because he will definitely get earthen pots of money, he is happy {they will get it for free} he si definitely happy’ [HK, TR 145] anke damlo adapprang halatum damlo tangho, jirpopo {mm} nke d m-l a-dappr ng h la-t m d m-l t ngh j rp ~p mm and.then go-RL POSS-dawn that-PL go-RL REP friend~DUAL AFF ‘and then, they went, early in the morning they went, the two friends’ [HK, TR 146] 659 aningkanvang Rongker apirda {mm} a-ningk n-v ng R ngk r a-pird mm this POSS-year-every LOC FESTIVAL POSS-place POSS-place.of.worship AFF kithirthipke mati{mm} ke-th r-th p ke=mat mm NMLZ-be.firmly.fixed/unvariable( rongkerji atum abangke h la-t m tek r ngk r ke r ngk r-j a-t m ab ng ke that-PL tiger FESTIVAL=TOP FESTIVAL-IRR2 POSS-PL NPDL=TOP vangvelang {mm} v ng-C -l ng mm come-NEG-yet AFF ‘those, the ones performing the teke rongker have not yet come’ [HK, TR 150] 660 latumke le'etlo {le'etlo} l -t m ke l - t-l l - t-l this-PL=TOP reach-PRF-RL reach-PRF-RL ‘these (i.e., the orphan and his friend) have already reached’ [HK, TR 151] ha thengpi angsongsi dolo banghinita {mm} h thengp angs ng s d -l b ng-hin t mm over.there tree/wood high.up=FOC:RL exist-RL CLF-two=ADD:EXH AFF ‘high up there in the tree they are there, both of them’ [HK, TR 152] anke laso kepholok abarika abangke ningjelemdetlo [ nke las ke-ph -l k a-barik ab ng ke ningj -lemdet-l and.then this NMLZ-reach-happen.to POSS-OFFICER NPDL=TOP speak-repeatedly-RL tangho, “ t ” {mm} t ngh ] [pe-pr p-n ng t ko-mar-l h ] mm REP CAUS-be.quick-HORT EMPH buddy:VOC-HUM:PL-HON EMPH:INTERACT AFF ‘and then, that tiger that had encountered (the orphan), that is the barika, he kept saying, “let's make it quick, friends!”' [HK, TR 153] “pisi kithurvangvedetma ” {mm} p si ke-th r-v ng-C -d t ma mm why NMLZ-get.up-PL-NEG-PFV=Q AFF ‘ “why didn't you get up?” ’ [HK, TR 154] “paprapnang ho” {mm} pe-pr p-n ng h mm CAUS-be.quick-HORT:CON EMPH:INTERACT AFF ‘ “let's try to be quick (with our Rongker)” ‘ [HK, TR 155] “mo ajatjat api vanglote {mm} eli m a-j t~j t a-p v ng-l -t mm -l future POSS-type~DIST.PL POSS-animal come-RL-if AFF 1PL:INCL-HON 661 siksakpo” siks k-p be.difficult-IRR1 ‘ “afterwards if any living being (i.e. the orphan and his friend) comes, it will be difficult for us” ’ [HK, TR 156] “paprap nangji ho paprap nangji ho” pe-pr p n ng-j h pe-pr p n ng-j h CAUS-be.quick need-IRR2 EMPH:INTERACT CAUS-be.quick need-IRR2 EMPH:INTERACT {o} o INTERJ ‘ “we have to make it quick, we have to make it quick” ‘ [HK, TR 157] “hala arni kaprekpen kepheretanglomati” {mm} h la arn ke-pr k=pen ke-pher -t ng-l =mati mm that day NMLZ-be.different=from NMLZ-fear-finish-RL=CG AFF ‘ “the other day, I already got very scared” ‘ [HK, TR 158] “ ‘vangji netumta’ pusi kipudun tangdetlomati” v ng-j ne-t m t pusi ke-p -d n t ng-d t-l =mati come-IRR2 1EXCL:POSS-PL=ADD:also QUOT.COMP NMLZ-say-JOIN finish-PFV-RL=CG {nangledunrokte kopulo} o nang l -d n-r k-t kop lo o CIS=reach-along-completed-COND what.will.happen? AFF ‘ “ ‘we also will come’ he already said” {if they reach, what will happen?} yes’ [HK, TR 159] anke.... paprapta paprap'olo nke.... pe-pr p t pe-pr p- -l and.then CAUS-be.quick=ADD:INT CAUS-be.quick-much-RL dum pinene apotta d m p -n ~n a-p t t plains.fishermen.community what-INDEF~DIST.PL POSS-thing=ADD:EXH 662 a'um akhangrata tangka

a- m a-khangr t t ngk what POSS-cage POSS-basket.to.carry.firewood=ADD:also money atibuk vanlo ajatlo a-tib k v n-l aj t-l POSS-earthen.pot bring-RL GENEX-RL ‘and then, they did everything very quickly, they brought the cage with the fisherman community and the others, and the baskets (with other items needed for the ceremony), and the earthen pots with money’ [HK, TR 160] hala tangka atibuk theklonglo, anke hala ajirpota h la t ngk a-tib k th kl ng-l nke h la a-jirp t that money POSS-earthen.pot see-RL and.then that POSS-friend=ADD:DM aning arong'olo tangho (whispering:) “ei ko jirpo…” a-n ng ar ng- -l t ngh whispering ei ko j rp POSS-mind be.happy-much-RL REP INTERJ buddy:VOC friend ‘he saw those earthen pots with money, and then that friend also became very happy, whispering: “hey buddy…” ‘ [HK, TR 161] {latum natlo kedo ante} l -t m n t lo ke-d nte this-PL where=FOC NMLZ-exist then ‘{so where are they?}’ [HK, TR 162] thengpi angsongsi dolo thengp angs ng si d -l tree/wood high.up=FOC:RL exist-RL ‘they are high up in the tree’ [HK, TR 163] {thengpi angsong arlu'etlo} arlu'etlo tangho thengp angs ng arl - t-l arl - t-l t ngh tree/wood high.up climb-PRF-RL climb-PRF-RL REP ‘{they had climbed up high in the tree?} they had climbed up there’ [HK, TR 164] 663 {latum vangve ako} vangve ako {mm} l -t m v ng-C ak v ng-C ak {mm} this-PL come-NEG before come-NEG before AFF ‘{before they (i.e., the tigers) came?!} - before they came’ [HK, TR 165] chepatukliplo angsong {chepatukliplo} che-pat -kl p-l angs ng che-pat -kl p-l RR-hide-quietly-RL high.up RR-hide-quietly-RL ‘quietly they were hiding up there’ [HK, TR 166] hala ejon ateketa vangpo laso angchin [h la e-j n a-tek t ] v ng-p [las a-ingch n that one-CLF:animal POSS-tiger=ADD:also come-IRR1 this POSS-iron a'umsi nanging'omnaipo anke nangbikok... a- m si] nang ing' m-n i-p nke nang b -k k POSS-cage=FOC:RL CIS=cheek-big.solid:O-IRR1 and.then CIS=keep-firmly ‘this one tiger will also come, this iron cage he will keep in his mouth and he will put it in one particular place’ [HK, TR 167] pi apotma sipute bongali a'oso penak {mm} p a-p t ma si-pu-t bongal a-os pen k mm what POSS-thing=Q therefore-QUOT-COND Bengali POSS-child actually AFF ‘what it actually is, is a Bengali boy’ [HK, TR 168] hula ejon ateketa vangpo, [h -la e-j n a-tek t ] v ng-p over.there-this one-CLF:animal POSS-tiger=ADD:also come-IRR1 nanging'omnaipo, mumding aso nangbikok nang ing' m-n i-p ingm m-d ng a-os nang b -k k CIS=keep.in.mouth-big.solid:O-IRR1 beard-be.long POSS-child CIS=keep-firmly ‘that one tiger will come and will keep in his mouth (the iron cage), and will put the young muslim there’ [HK, TR 169] 664 {ha Chomang penak Keche penak dopiklo} pine h chom ng pen k Kech pen k d -p k-l p -n over.there Khasi actually EE:Chom ng actually exist-very-RL what-INDEF dopiklo; ajirpo tangte kaphere'ongsi pu'amatsi d -p k-l a-jirp t ngt ke-pher - ng-s pu am t si exist-very-RL POSS-friend TOP NMLZ-fear-be.much-NF:RL QUOT=afterwards=FOC:RL klemtotlo {oi} kl m-t t-l i tremble-RL yes ‘{actually, there are many Khasis and plains people}- (yes,) there are ones from so many different tribes; but the friend was very scared so he was trembling’ [HK, TR 170] {“ t t ? achimi dokok”} nang th k-l k-t kop lo a-chim d -k k 1/2:NSUBJ=see-happen.to-COND what.will.happen? POSS-claw exist-firmly ‘{“if they happen to see us, what will happen?, they surely have claws”}’ [HK, TR 171] anke ejon nangtetphlut nangthemuchot nke e-j n nang t t-phl t nang th -m ch t and.then one-CLF:animal CIS=exit-suddenly.big.A/O CIS=be.big-COMPAR ‘and then, one (tiger) came out (of the jungle or some area in the Rongker ground) and he was bigger (than expected and than the previous one)’ [HK, TR 172] hala ejon nangtetphlut nangthemuchot {mm} h la e-j n nang t t-phl t nang th -m chot mm that one-CLF:animal CIS=exit-suddenly.big.A/O CIS=be.big-COMPAR AFF ‘(another) one came out and it was much bigger (than the previous one)’ [HK, TR 173] “bai kopuloma “ {mm} b i kop lo ma mm how.mean! what.will.happen?=Q AFF ‘ “oh no, what will happen?” ’ [HK, TR 174] 665 halake kaphere'ong pu'amatlo {mm} h la ke ke-pher - ng pu am t lo mm that=TOP NMLZ-fear-be.much QUOT=and.then=FOC AFF tangka atibukta vanlo {mm} t ngk a-tib k t v n-l mm money POSS-earthen.pot=ADD:DM bring-RL AFF ‘and that one (friend) is very scared; and they are also bringing the earthen pots with money’ [HK, TR 175] tangka atibuk nangnunrenlo t ngk a-tib k nang n n-r n-l money POSS-earthen.pot CIS=put.container-in.a.row-RL ‘they brought the earthen pots with money and put them in a row’ [HK, TR 176] {the'o'otangma, atibukta?} mm th - ~ -t ng ma a-tib k t mm be.big-much~DIST.PL-REP=Q POSS-earthen.pot=ADD:DM AFF ‘{are the earthen pots big?}’ [HK, TR 177] tangka atibuk thepikpik tangho {mm} t ngk a-tib k th -p k~p k t ngh mm money POSS-earthen.pot be.big-very~DIST.PL REP AFF ‘the earthen pots are very big’ [HK, TR 178] ladak avantin puke laso atangka atibuk {mm} lad k a-v n-t n pu=ke las a-t ngk a-tib k mm here POSS-CLF:share-each QUOT=TOP this POSS-money POSS-earthen.pot AFF ‘here, they [put] those tangka atibuk in each share/dish’ [HK, TR 179] anke vanglo la sop chok'etlo pumatsi nke v ng-l l s p ch k- t-l pu m t si and.then come-RL this all be.fine-PRF-RL QUOT=afterwards=NF:RL 666 ingjonglunlanlo karhanghunglo {karhanghunglo} mm ingj ng-l n~l n-l k r-h ng~h ng-l k r-h ng~h ng-l } mm move-big:AO~DIST.PL-RL burn-quite~DIST.PL-RL burn-quite~DIST.PL-RL AFF ‘and then, they came, everything has been arranged nicely and then they looked big and were moving simultaneously and they looked like fire (because of the tiger stripes)’ [HK, TR 180] karklipo {karklipo} seta ke-arkl -p ke-arkl -p [set NMLZ-perform.worship-IRR1 NMLZ-perform.worship-IRR1 but ejonta pakonkelang tangho; halatum aphanta, e-j n t pa-k n-C -l ng t ngh h la-t m a-ph n t ] one-CLF:animal=ADD:even CAUS-use.up-NEG-yet REP that-PL POSS-NSUBJ=also {mm} chok'etlo, tangka atibukke nangle'etlo {mm} ch k- t-l t ngk a-tib k ke nang l - t-l AFF be.fine-all:S/O-RL money POSS-earthen.pot=TOP CIS=reach-all:S/O-RL {nangle'etlo} {nang l - t-l CIS=reach-all:S/O-RL ‘they are just going to perform the worship but they still haven't reduced the number of the men collected for even one (i.e. hadn't sacrificed anybody yet); it' s already all been arranged, the earthen pots have reached’ [HK, TR 181] vangbomlo vangbomlo {mm} v ng-b m-l v ng-b m-l mm come-CONT-RL come-CONT-RL AFF ‘one (tiger) after the next keeps coming’ [HK, TR 182] ha nangkelelesi ke'onglang {mm} h nang=ke-l -C si/-si ke- ng-l ng mm over.there CIS=NMLZ-reach-NEG=FOC:RL/-NF:RL NMLZ-exist.much-still AFF ‘over there still many of them haven't reached’ [HK, TR 183] 667 anke lake phereboplo {mm} nke l ke pher -b p-l mm and.then this=TOP fear-to.death-RL AFF ‘and then, this one (i.e., the friend) was scared to death’ [HK, TR 184] rat chetongte ako {mm} r t che-t ng-C ak {mm} public RR-meet-NEG before AFF ‘before the crowd (of tigers) gathered’ [HK, TR 185] ladak nangkeleke abarika.... asarthe laheiheike lad k nang=ke-l ke a-barik a-s rth lahei~hei=ke here CIS=NMLZ-reach=TOP POSS-OFFICER POSS-village.headman these~DIST.PL=TOP nangle'etlo {oi} nang l - t-l i CIS=reach-all:S/O-RL yes ‘the barika and the sarthe and all the other important tigers have already arrived there’ [HK, TR 186] {memeke atumke nangle} meme atumke m me ke a-t m ke nang l m me a-t m ke dignitaries=TOP POSS-PL=TOP CIS=reach dignitaries POSS-PL=TOP vang'etlohe v ng- t-l =he come-all:S/O-RL=AFTERTHOUGHT {akesarsar atum abangke} mm vangetlo a-ke-s r~s r a-t m ab ng ke mm v ng- t-l POSS-NMLZ-be.old~DIST.PL POSS-PL NPDL=TOP AFF come-all:S/O-RL ‘{all the dignitaries have already arrived?!}-all the dignitaries have already arrived... the old ones have come’ [HK, TR 187] ajirpoke kaphere'ong amat laso athengpi angsongpen a-jirp ke ke-pher - ng am t las a-thengp angs ng=pen POSS-friend=TOP NMLZ-fear-be.much and.then this POSS-tree/wood up=from 668 chirip thekthedetlo nangklodurlo che-r p th k-C -d t-l nang kl -d r-l RR-hold.firmly know.how-NEG-PFV-RL CIS=fall-fall.down.bigger.than.expected-RL nangklo [nang kl ] CIS=fall ‘the friend was very scared and then from above this tree he didn't know how to hold on to it firmly and he fell down’ [HK, TR 188] latum achitimsi klodamduplo l -t m a-chit m si kl -d m-d p-l this-PL POSS-half=FOC:RL fall-go-falling.sound.from.high.solid.obj-RL {mm klodamduplo} mm mm kl -d m-d p-l ] mm AFF fall-go-falling.sound.from.high.solid.obj-RL AFF {nangklodurlo} mm [nang kl -d r-l ] mm CIS=fall-fall.down.bigger.than.expected-RL AFF ‘right in the middle of them he fell down, yeah he fell down...he fell down...’ [HK, TR 189] hala ajirpo abangke lake hala h la a-jirp ab ng ke l ke h la that POSS-friend NPDL=TOP this=TOP that t atumta kl -d p-p n ke tek a-t m t fall-falling.sound.from.high.solid.obj-NF:with=TOP tiger POSS-PL=ADD:DM langphronglohe jo {mm} langphronglo l ng-phr ng-l =he h j mm l ng-phr ng-l see-PL:S/A-RL=AFTERTHOUGHT you.know see AFF see-PL:S-RL ‘that friend, that one fell down and all the tigers saw him’ [HK, TR 190] “piloma lake ” {“piloma anhelo... ”} pu p lo ma l ke [p lo ma n-hel ...] pu what=FOC=Q this=TOP what=FOC=Q this.much-RL:EMPH QUOT ‘ “what is this?” (said the tigers) “what is this?” ’ [HK, TR 191] 669 langphrong hala abarikake <...> “lake komarli” l ng-phr ng h la a-barik ke l ke ko-mar-l see-PL:S that POSS-OFFICER=TOP this=TOP buddy:VOC-PL:HUM-HON ‘they saw them and that barika tiger said, “see friends!” ‘ [HK, TR 192] "t t t t> todappen tum pen nang=ke-p -d n- t tod p=pen yesterday=from 1/2:NSUBJ=NMLZ-say-JOIN-PRF finish-PRF this.morning=from ne nangpuloke, paprapnang! pu” hala ajirpo n nang p -l =ke pa-pr p-n ng pu h la a-jirp 1EXCL 1/2:NSUBJ=say-RL=TOP CAUS-be.quick-HORT:CON QUOT that POSS-friend abangke mm ab ng=ke mm NPDL=TOP this=TOP AFF ' “from yesterday I've told you and from this morning I've told you, hurry up!”, that friend…’[HK, TR 193] “la akangburapen abarika l a-k ngbur pen a-barik 2=also this POSS-village.head.man( kevanglo ho ” putangho n t ke-v ng-l ho pu-t ngh 1EXCL=ADD:also 2 NMLZ-come-RL EMPH:INTERACT QUOT-REP amat bephlunglo anke (laughing) am t b -phl ng-l nke and.then chase.away-spreading-RL and.then kat'etlo {kat'etlo} mm kat'etlo{mm} k t- t-l [k t- t-l ] mm k t- t-l mm run.HUM-all:S/O-RL run.HUM-all:S/O-RL AFF run.HUM-all:S/O-RL AFF ‘ “I'm also coming!” and then they chased them away, they ran away in all directions’ [HK, TR 195] 670 amat la jangrengso atum abangke jirpopo laso atangka am t l jangr ngs a-t m ab ng ke j rp ~p las a-t ngk and.then this orphan POSS-PL NPDL=TOP friend~DUAL this POSS-money atibuk halake ajatta van'un'elo ajirpo a-tib k h la ke a-j t t v n- n-C -l a-jirp POSS-earthen.pot that=TOP POSS-type=ADD:EXH bring-be.able-NEG-RL POSS-friend abangke thengpi angsongpen nangkeklosi {mm} thinilo ab ng ke thengp angs ng pen nang=ke-kl -si mm th n -l NPDL=TOP tree/wood high.up=from CIS=NMLZ-fall-NF:RL AFF be.almost.dead-RL {mm} bonseta nangdunbor'ibor'alo e mm b nset nang d n-bor' -bor' -l e AFF but CIS=join-w.great.effort-EE:bor' -RL INTERJ ‘and then, the orphan and the other one, the friends carried (home) all the earthen pots, that friend didn't manage to carry anything, he had fallen down from the tree and hurt himself badly, but struggling and pushing on he made it home’ [HK, TR 196] laso atangka'anke jangrengsosi kevanthulo las a-t ngk - n ke jangrengs si ke-v n-th -l this POSS-money-up.to=TOP orphan=FOC:RL NMLZ-bring-again-RL ‘all this money the orphan brought back again all by himself’ [HK, TR 197] la jirpopo chethaksi {mm} aphike l j rp ~p che-th k-si a-ph ke this friend~DUAL RR-divide-NF:RL POSS-after=TOP cholongloklo {cholongloklo} to to {mm} cho-l ng-l k-l [cho-l ng-l k-l ] t t {mm} AUTO.BEN/MAL-get-happen.to-RL AUTO.BEN/MAL-get-happen.to-RL OK OK AFF ‘the friends divided the money and afterwards they definitely got rich’ [HK, TR 198] la'anhelo tangho l n=hel t ngh this=that.much=RL:EMPH REP ‘that’s it’ [HK, TR 199] 671 jumepik phu! nang tomo kethan arj -m -p k ph n ng tom ke-th n listen-GOOD-very grandfather:VOC you story NMLZ-tell penapta nangthantha dei {oi to} mm pen p t nang th n-th d i [ i t mm tomorrow=ADD:also 1/2:NSUBJ=tell-CON.IMP right? yes OK AFF ‘very nice (to hear), grandfather, tomorrow you'll also need to tell us a story, okay? okay ’ [HK, TR 200] 672 APPENDIX D 16. TEXT: RBT, CHM (FOLK STORY) Folk story about a chain reaction of events that sets off when a frog blocks the road and sits down on an ant that in turn bites the frog; from there on, one animal suffers from being disturbed or hurt by another animal, and as a consequence accidentally disturbs or hurts another animal, and so on: the ant disturbs the frog, the frog disturbs the squirrel, the squirrel disturbs the pig, the pig disturbs the bird, the bird disturbs the elephant, the elephant kicks a rock, which then kills the daughter of the king. The king traces back the chain reaction to the frog and the ant, and punishes both of them. The audio file for the entire text RBT, ChM is available under the DOI name 10.7264/N3XK8CTJ at https://scholarsbank.uoregon.edu/xmlui/handle/1794/13657 nelimenke Rongbang Teron, ne-li-m n ke R ngb ng Ter n 1EXCL-HON=TOP 1EXCL:POSS-HON-name=TOP NAME CLAN motiyar , kedoke Ujandongka Teron arong mot y r ke-d ke Uj ndongk Ter n a-r ng OFFICER responsibility NMLZ-stay=TOP VILLAGE CLAN POSS-village 'I... my name is Rongbang Teron, I have the responsibility of a Motiyar, I live in Ujandongka, Teron Village' [RBT, ChM 002] choklemdun habe bangphli aso; habe [cho-kl m-d n hab b ng-phl a-s ] [[hab AUTO.BEN/MAL-do-JOIN headman CLF:HUM:PL-four POSS-child headman bangphli atum alongsi, nem chodun rakom chodun b ng-phl a-t m al ng si] [n m ch -d n] [rak m ch -d n] CLF:HUM:PL-four POSS-PL LOC=FOC:RL custom eat-JOIN EE:n m eat-JOIN ajor chodun akri chodun [a-j r ch -d n] [a-kr ch -d n]] POSS-slice.of.meat eat-JOIN POSS-EE:j r eat-JOIN ‘working together, there are four Habe in this area (children of this area), together with the four Habe, we accept the responsibility of this post, we eat together the long slices of meat’ [RBT, ChM 003] 673 matsi ajor akri pinchongma lake chu [m t si a-j r a-kr pinch ng ma] [l ke ch who=FOC:RL POSS-slice.of.meat POSS-EE:j r create=Q this=TOP long.ago Socheng Rengbonghompensi bang habe atum haren Soch ng Rengbongh m pen si b ng hab a-t m har n VILLAGE NAME=from=FOC:RL somebody headman.assistant POSS-PL EE:hab atum... e kethe atum kiding atum a-t m e ke-th a-t m ke-d ng a-t m POSS-PL DSM NMLZ-be.big POSS-PL NMLZ-be.long POSS-PL solangdo arnam pharo atumsi bang ajor solangd arn m phar a-t m si b ng a-j r four.chieftains( misorongpo atum korte banghini mis rongp a-t m kort b ng-hin ant.sp POSS-PL brother CLF-two ‘there were two … ant brothers’ [RBT, ChM 008] chonghoke ejonvet misorongpoke a'ik [chongh ke e-j n-v t] [mis rongp ke a- k frog=TOP one-CLF:animal-only ant.sp=TOP POSS-older.brother atum atipi atum adappen rit damjuilo a-t m a-tep a-t m a-d p pen r t d m-j i-l ] POSS-PL POSS-elder.brother's.wife POSS-PL POSS-morning=from field go-away-RL ‘the frog was alone, the ant's older brother and his wife had gone to the jhum field in the morning’ [RBT, ChM 009] e misorongpoke <...> a'ik aphan... an kethondam e mis rongp ke a- k a-ph n n ke-th n-d m DSM ant.sp=TOP POSS-older.brother POSS-NSUBJ rice NMLZ-drop-GO ‘the ant was on the way to drop off rice for his older brother’ [RBT, ChM 010] amat horbong anbor... inghorpontanlo am t h r-b ng n-b r ingh r-p n-t n-l and.then liquor-gourd rice-wrapped.bundle carrying.load-take.away-S/O:big-RL chonghokalosoke tovar dakkrang chongh kal s ke tov r d k-kr ng frog.sp=TOP road assume.spreadout.position-VSE 'and then, the ant was carrying heavily on the liquor gourd and the rice bundle, and the frog was spread out in the road, blocking the way' [RBT, ChM 011] 675 ai tovar nangpektha ti ko jirpo, i tov r nang p k-th ti ko j rp , how.bad! road 1/2:NSUBJ=give.way-IMP:CON EMPH buddy:VOC friend ne'ik atum aphan an thonji pu ne- k a-t m a-ph n n th n-j pu 1EXCL:POSS-older.brother POSS-PL POSS-NSUBJ rice drop-IRR2 QUOT '"how bad! Please do give way to me, friend. I'm supposed to drop off rice to my brother (and sister-in-law)"' [RBT, ChM 012] arvi suinangta dannokso ar'e suinangta dannokso [arv s i-nangt dannoks ] [ar' s i-nangt dannoks ] left turn-if.alternatively danger right turn-if.alternatively danger 'if I turn left, it will be dangerous, if I turn right, it will be dangerous' [RBT, ChM 013] la nekengdak arum lutponchoksi [l ne-k ng-d k ar m l t-p n-ch k-si this 1EXCL:POSS-foot-road.inbetween down enter-CARRY-disappearing-NF:RL apotlo ko mopen pu kedam ap tlo ko] [m pen p ke-d m should buddy:VOC while=from this.side NMLZ-go chingkiponklung atum'anta che-ingk -p n-kl ng a-t m- n t ] RR-talk-CARRY-echoing.sound POSS-PL-all=ADD:EXH ‘ “you should pass through between my legs, buddy, just awhile earlier, all of these people that are talking there have done the same” ‘ [RBT, ChM 014] bang nekengdak arumloklo kedam b ng ne-k ng-d k ar m-l k lo ke-d m somebody 1EXCL:POSS-foot-road.inbetween down-just=FOC NMLZ-go ‘ “the other people simply passed through between my legs” ’ [RBT, ChM 015] pulo akengdak arum kilut ahut amat… p -lo [a-k ng-d k ar m ke-l t ah t am t] say-RL POSS-foot-road.inbetween down NMLZ-enter during and.then 676 anborpenpen chongho abang ingnidunpret n-b r p n~p n chongh ab ng ingn -d n-pr t rice-wrapped.bundle=with~DISTR.PL frog NPDL sit-JOIN-acting.on.inflated.obj ‘the frog said, and as the ant was passing through, with all its rice bundles, the frog sat down (pressing down the rice bundles)’ [RBT, ChM 016] amat misorongpo abang... aning siksaklo jo an [am t mis rongp ab ng a-n ng siks k-l ] [j ] [ n and.then ant.sp NPDL POSS-mind be.difficult-RL see rice ingnipipretlo chongho ami korlut ingn -p -pr t-l ] [[chongh a-m ] k r-l t] sit-BEN/MAL-acting.on.inflated.obj-RL frog POSS-buttocks bite-enter ‘and then, the ant was annoyed, see!, the frog sat down on the rice bundles (to the detriment of the ant), and the ant bit the frog’s butt with the teeth entering’ [RBT, ChM 017] amat chonghota chonthap chonphrulo am t chongh t ch n-th p ch n-phr -l and.then frog=ADD:DM jump-here.and.there.1/2 jump-here.and.there.2/2-RL kesolo... karlesibongpo adon chonrai ke-s -l karl sib ng-p a-d n ch n-r i NMLZ-hurt-RL squirrel.sp-male POSS-bridge jump-solid.obj.breaking ‘and then, the frog was jumping everywhere because he was hurt, and he jumped on the ladder of the squirrel and it broke’ [RBT, ChM 018] amat karlesibongpota... aning thilo: “mat [am t karl sib ng-p t ... a-n ng th -l ] [m t and.then squirrel.sp-male=ADD:DM POSS-mind be.short-RL who akethek mat akere mat akangtang a-ke-th k m t a-ke-r m t a-ke-ingt ng POSS-NMLZ-know.how who POSS-NMLZ-be.smart who POSS-NMLZ-be.strong mat akangsaksi ne dondon chonraima?” m t a-ke-ings k si ne-dond n ch n-r i ma] who POSS-NMLZ-EE:ingt ng=FOC:RL 1EXCL-ladder jump-RES:solid.obj.breaking=Q 677 pu, lata pu l t QUOT this=ADD:DM ‘and then, the squirrel... got mad, “who is the wise one, who is the smart one, who is the strong and mighty one, and sat down on my ladder so it broke?” it (the squirrel) (said)’ [RBT, ChM 019] aning kithi, thengpi arongtin thengphrang [a-n ng ke-th ] [thengp a-r ng-t n th ngphr ng POSS-mind NMLZ-be.short tree/wood POSS-CLF:plant-each EE:thengp arongtin rikang asitin rotthap a-r ng-t n rik ng a-s -t n r t-th p POSS-CLF:plant-each creeper POSS-one-each cut-here.and.there.1/2 rotphrulo, hanthar athe rotpet r t-phr -l ] [hanth r a-th r t-p t] cut-here.and.there.2/2-RL vegetable.sp POSS-fruit cut-RES:cut.off ‘it was mad, and then, (the squirrel) gnawed each tree and creeper, and it gnawed the hanthar athe’ [RBT, ChM 020] phakbelengpi amoi peklodup ph kbel ngp a-m i pe-kl -d p pig.sp POSS-back CAUS-fall-falling.sound.from.high.solid.obj ‘it made it (the fruit) fall down on the back of a pig’ [RBT, ChM 021] mat laso aphakta kathirikpenlo, lata m t [las a-ph k t ke-thir k-pen-l ], [l t and.then this POSS-pig=ADD:DM NMLZ-startle-NF:with-RL this=ADD:DM timurthap timurphru, lobong timurphlut, vo'arbipi tim r-th p tim r-phr ], [lob ng tim r-phl t] [v 'arb -p root-here.and.there.1/2 root-here.and.there.2/2 plantain root-miss/fail bird.sp-female atar saprai, an aso a-t r s p-r i] [ n a-s POSS-nest beat.w/sth.flexible-solid.obj.breaking that.much POSS-child 678 joningkoi jonthomkep kedoji, lata j n-ingk i j n-th m-k p ke-d -j [l t CLF:animal-twenty CLF:animal-three-ten NMLZ-exist-IRR2 this=ADD:DM aso kaluksonlo a-s ke-luks n-l POSS-child NMLZ-lose( turthap a-ingn r t ke-ingr ng aj t t r-th p POSS-elephant=ADD:DM NMLZ-roar GENEX kick-mindlessly turphrulo... harlong turpur t r-phr -l harl ng t r-p r kick-EE:-th p-RL stone kick-move.over 'this elephant was roaring and everything and kicked around mindlessly, and kicked over a rock' [RBT, ChM 025] 679 harlong turpurlo, aharlong ingplonglo, richo [harl ng t r-p r-l ], [a-harl ng ingpl ng-l ], [rich stone kick-move.over-RL POSS-stone run.away.animal-RL king asopi abang ha langhe lang kachinglu... a-oso-p ab ng h l ngh l ng ke-chingl ] POSS-child-female NPDL over.there washing.place water NMLZ-take.bath amat lang kachinglu ketangpen kevang amat richo [am t l ng ke-chingl ke-t ng-pen ke-v ng am t rich and.then water NMLZ-take.bath NMLZ-finish-NF:with NMLZ-come and.then king asopi aphan baplam a-oso-p a-ph n b p-l m] POSS-child-female POSS-NSUBJ press.down-RES:paste.like ‘it kicked the rock, the rock rolled away, the daughter of the king was taking a bath there at the washing place, and then after having finished taking her bath, she was coming (home), and then it flattened the king's daughter’ [RBT, ChM 026] amat “an arni tiliphak potsi am t [[ n arn til -ph k p t si and.then that.much sun decline-almost.completely reason=FOC:RL neso langhe kedam vangverekma ” pulo richo, [ne-os l ngh ke-d m] v ng-C -r k ma] p -l rich ] 1EXCL:POSS-child washing.place NMLZ-go come-NEG-late=Q say-RL king donsuri arat chingthumdunlo..., [d n-sur a-r t che-ingth m-d n-l ] CLF:household-thousand POSS-public( ingnar nothongpo aphan arjudamlo noth ng-p le> [ingn r noth ng-p a-ph n] arj -d m-l ] deaf- MODIF =FOC:IRR elephant deaf- MODIF POSS-NSUBJ ask-GO-RL '"who then is the guilty one?", , he went to ask the deaf elephant' [RBT, ChM 032] “ i chonghoisi nang harlongle [p chongh i si n ng harl ng le what reason=FOC:RL you stone=FOC:IRR your kiturnek kiturnok? Neso apran ke-t r-n k ke-t r-n k] [ne-os a-pr n NMLZ-kick-doing.bad.unnecessarily NMLZ-kick-EE:-n k 1EXCL:POSS-child POSS-life damjuilo, pinike nangpran damji nangmui d m-j i-l ] pin ke nang-pr n d m-j nang-m i go-away-RL today=TOP 2:POSS-life go-IRR2 2:POSS-EE:pr n( d m-j ] go-IRR2 1/2:NSUBJ=beat.w/sth.flexible-go-IRR2 nangsapji nangthengji ” nang s p-j nang th ng-j 1/2:NSUBJ=beat.w/sth.flexible-IRR2 1/2:NSUBJ=beat.w/sth.solid-IRR2 ' “what did you kick the rock for? The life of my daughter has gone. Today your life and everything will go, I will beat you, I will make you suffer!” ' [RBT, ChM 033] pulo ingnar nothongpo chethakdunlo, "o bang p -l [ingn r noth ng-p che-th k-d n-l ] [o b ng say-RL elephant deaf- MODIF RR-answer-JOIN-RL VOC CLF 682 voarbipi, akam kechomathale neno v arb p a-k m ke-chomath le ne-n bird.sp POSS-work NMLZ-think.with.bad.intentions=FOC:IRR 1EXCL:POSS-ear nanglutchok nangarkerakrakdetkema?" nang l t-ch k nang ark -r k~r k-d t ke ma] CIS=enter-disappearing CIS=scratch-RES:little.wound~DISTR.PL-PFV=TOP=Q 'he said and then, the deaf elephant answered, 'O Vo arbi, what were you thinking, coming into my ears and scratched there; that's why" [RBT, ChM 034] amat "neta dothekthe sangthekthelo, am t [n t d -th k-C s ng-th k-C -l ] and.then 1EXCL=ADD:DM stay-know.how-NEG take.rest-know.how-NEG-RL neno kangthak neno kangthong amat neta [ne-n ke-ingth k ne-n ke-ingth ng] am t [n t 1EXCL:POSS-ear NMLZ-itch 1EXCL:POSS-ear NMLZ-be.deaf and.then 1EXCL=ADD:DM turthap turphrulo, ahoklo, neke harlong t r-th p t r-phr -l ] [a-h k-l ] [n ke harl ng kick-mindlessly kick-EE:-th p-RL POSS-truth-RL 1EXCL=TOP stone turpurlo" t r-p r-l ] kick-move.over-RL 'and then, "I also didn't know how to stay or how to rest, my ears were itching, my ears are deaf, and then it's true I was kicking here and there, and I kicked the rock"' [RBT, ChM 035] ha nangso aphan rodamji marek pupe h nang-os a-ph n r -d m-j mar k pu-C over.there 2:POSS-child POSS-NSUBJ hit-GO-IRR2 unexpectedly QUOT-NEG 'there (the stone) went and unintentionally hit your child' [RBT, ChM 036] "apot nele kechokche kali, richo. Hala [ap t n le ke-ch k-C kal rich ] [[h la because 1EXCL=FOC:IRR NMLZ-be.fine-NEG NEG.EQU.COP king that 683 voarbipi aphanle arjudamnoi" v arb -p a-ph n le] arj -d m-n i] bird.sp-female POSS-NSUBJ=FOC:IRR ask-go-INF.COND.IMP '"therefore, I'm not the guilty one, king, go ask that Voarbipi!"' [RBT, ChM 037] voarbipi along richo atum damlilo [v arb -p a-l ng] [rich a-t m] d m-l -l bird.sp-female POSS-LOC king POSS-PL go-again-RL 'the people of the king next went to the Voarbipi' [RBT, ChM 038] "O voarbipi, nangbang doma?", pulo, "Do." o v arb -p nang-b ng d ma p -l d VOC bird.sp-female 2:POSS-body stay=Q say-RL stay ' “O Voarbipi, are you there?”, (the king) said, “I'm here”.' [RBT, ChM 039] "Piloma richo?" "Richo kali! Pisi nang ingnar [p lo ma rich ] [rich kal ] [p si n ng ingn r what=Q king king NEG.EQU.COP why you elephant nothongpo ano lutchokmati? Nang pinike noth ng-p a-n l t-ch k mati] [n ng pin ke deaf- MODIF POSS-ear enter-disappearing=CG you today=TOP nangpran damji nangmui damji!" nang-pr n d m-j nang-m i d m-j ] 2:POSS-life go-IRR2 2:POSS-EE:pr n( damthulelo, lobong along, m t rich a-t m d m-th -l -l , lob ng a-l ng, and.then king POSS-PL go-again-again-RL plantain POSS-LOC 'and so, the king and his people went again, to the plantain' [RBT, ChM 045] 685 "O lobong, chonghoisi nang... voarbipi atar o lob ng, chongh i si n ng... v arb -p a-t r VOC plantain reason=FOC:RL 2 bird.sp-female POSS-nest kesapraimati? Nangpran damji, ke-s p-r i mati nang-pr n d m-j NMLZ-beat.w/sth.flexible-solid.obj.breaking=CG 2:POSS-life go-IRR2 nangmui damji, nangjat nangkhong nang-m i d m-j nang-j t nang-kh ng 2:POSS-EE:pr n( [nang-t m kop si lob ng ke-tim r-th p ke-tim r-phr ] 2:POSS-PL why plantain NMLZ-root-mindlessly NMLZ-root-EE:-th p Vo'arbipi atar kesaprai athema ” [v arb -p a-t r ke-s p-r i ath ma] bird.sp-female POSS-nest NMLZ-beat.w/sth.flexible-solid.obj.breaking because '"Why do you (pigs) go around lifiting up plantains more than you need to? that's why you destroyed the nest of the Voarbi"' [RBT, ChM 055] "ai,... ne kali, richo" i n kal rich how.bad! 1EXCL NEG.EQU.COP king '"ai, it wasn't me, king!"' [RBT, ChM 056] “bang hantharsi nemoi nangklodup, [b ng hanth r si ne-m i nang kl -d p] CLF vegetable.sp=FOC:RL 1EXCL:POSS-back CIS=fall-falling.from.high:solid.obj neta keso kasiksaksi” [n t ke-s ke-siks k-si] 1EXCL=ADD:DM NMLZ-hurt NMLZ-be.difficult-NF:RL ‘ “a hanthar fruit fell on my back, so I was hurt and disturbed” ’ [RBT, ChM 057] “ahoklo neta timurthap timurphru amat a-h k-l n t tim r-th p tim r-phr am t POSS-truth-RL 1EXCL=ADD:DM root-mindlessly root-EE:-th p and.then ahok, lobong timurpur” a-h k lob ng tim r-p r POSS-truth plantain root-move.over ‘ “it's the truth, I was lifting up things with my snout, and then I uprooted the plantain’ “ [RBT, ChM 058] <...> “hanthar aphan arjudamnoi ” hanth r a-ph n arj -d m-n i vegetable.sp POSS-NSUBJ ask-go-INF.COND.IMP ' “go and ask the Hanthar” ' [RBT, ChM 059] 688 ha hanthar aphan arjudamlo... "Kopisi nang h hanth r a-ph n arj -d m-l kop si n ng over.there vegetable.sp POSS-NSUBJ ask-go-RL why 2 phakbelengpi amoi klodupmati, hanthar?" ph kbel ngp a-m i kl -d p mati hanth r pig.sp POSS-back fall-falling.sound.from.high.solid.obj=CG vegetable.sp 'there to the hanthar he went and asked, "why did you possibly fall down on the back of the pig, Hanthar?"' [RBT, ChM 060] “nangrong nangrim nangpiviretji, sala ” nang-r ng nang-r m nang pi-v r- t-j sala 2:POSS-plant 2:POSS-EE:r ng 1/2:NSUBJ=CAUS-lose-all:S/O-IRR2 damn.you! 'I will destroy your stem and everybody (of your species), damn you!' [RBT, ChM 061] "Ai richo, nejat nepivirri, nekhong i rich ne-j t ne pi-v r-r , ne-kh ng how.bad! king 1EXCL:POSS-type 1EXCL:NSUBJ=CAUS-lose-PROH 1EXCL:POSS-tribe nepivirri!" ne pi-v r-r 1EXCL:NSUBJ=CAUS-lose-PROH '"ai, king, don't kill the ones of my kind, don't kill my tribe!"' [RBT, ChM 062] “nele kechokche kali. Ne neri [n le ke-ch k-C kal ] n ne-r 1EXCL=FOC:IRR NMLZ-be.fine-NEG NEG.EQU.COP 1EXCL 1EXCL:POSS-hand ehongvetsi chiripling anat” e-h ng-v t si che-r p-l ng a-n t] one-CLF:long.cylindrical-only=FOC:RL RR-hold.firmly-sth.small.hanging POSS-only ' “I'm not the guilty one, I was just holding myself with one hand only” ' [RBT, ChM 063] “ arlesibongpo abang neri nangrotpet amat [karl sib ng-p ab ng ne-r nang r t-p t] am t squirrel.sp-male NPDL 1EXCL:POSS-hand 1/2:NSUBJ=cut-sd.of.resulting.event and.then 689 neta ahoklo phakbelengpi amoi [n t a-h k-l ph kbel ngp a-m i 1EXCL=ADD:DM POSS-truth-RL pig.sp POSS-back chonduplo” ch n-d p-l ] jump-falling.from.high:solid.obj-RL ' “the squirrel gnawed off my hands and then, it's true, I jumped on the pig's back” ' [RBT, ChM 064] apot nangle arjudamnoi, ha karlesibongpo aphan ap t n ng le arj -d m-n i, h karl sib ng-p a-ph n because you=FOC:IRR ask-go-INF.COND.IMP over.there squirrel.sp-male POSS-NSUBJ 'therefore, you (only you), go and ask, there, the squirrel' [RBT, ChM 065] ha karlesibongpo along arjudamlo... "Te h karl sib ng-p al ng arj -d m-l t over.there squirrel.sp-male LOC ask-go-RL and.then karlesibongpo, pisi nang hanthar athe karl sib ng-p p si n ng hanth r a-th squirrel.sp-male why you vegetable.sp POSS-fruit kerotpetle... phakbelengpi amoi ke-r t-p t le ph kbel ngp a-m i NMLZ-cut-sd.of.resulting.event=FOC:IRR pig.sp POSS-back peklodup athema?" pe-kl -d p ath ma CAUS-fall-falling.sound.from.high.solid.obj because 'over there he went and asked the squirrel, "so then, squirrel, why did you gnaw on the Hanthar and thus made it fall down on the back of the pig?"' [RBT, ChM 066] “apot pinike nangreng sopikji” ap t pin ke nang-r ng s -p k-j reason today=TOP 2:POSS-skin hurt-very-IRR2 'therefore, today, your skin will hurt badly today' [RBT, ChM 067] 690 “ai nepran neenri, nemui i ne-pr n ne n-r ne-m i how.bad! 1EXCL:POSS-life 1EXCL:NSUBJ=take-NEG.IMP 1EXCL:POSS-EE:pr n( am t [chongh a-ph n] mis rongp arj -l p -chongh i si and.then frog POSS-NSUBJ ant.sp ask-RL what-reason=FOC:RL 'and then ' [RBT, ChM 073] chongho aphan arjulo, "Pi chonghoisi nangke karle [chongh a-ph n arj -l ] [p chongh i si n ng ke karl frog POSS-NSUBJ ask-RL what reason=FOC:RL you=TOP squirrel adon chonraimati?" pu a-d n ch n-r i mati] pu POSS-bridge/ladder jump-RES:solid.obj.breaking=as.you.know QUOT ‘(the king) asked the frog, "Why did you jump on the ladder of the squirrel?"' [RBT, ChM 074] “misorongpota nemi nangkorrakke” mis rongp t ne-m nang k r-r k=ke ant.sp=ADD:DM 1EXCL:POSS-buttocks 1/2:NSUBJ=bite-RES:little.wound=TOP ' “the ant bit me in my butt” ' [RBT, ChM 075] misorongpo arju, "Chonghoisi nang chongho mis rongp arj chongh i-si n ng chongh ant.sp ask reason-FOC you frog ami korrakmati?" "Tovar nangdangthipke" a-m k r-r k mati] tov r nang d ng-th p ke POSS-buttocks bite-RES:little.wound=CG road CIS=block-firmly=TOP 'he asked the ant, "why did you bite the frog in the butt?", "he had come and was blocking the road"' [RBT, ChM 076] 692 o mota nangtum kachekoi o m t nang-t m ke-che-k i INTERJ you future=ADD:EXH you-PL NMLZ-RR-accuse nangbe doji nang-b d -j 2:POSS-habit exist-IRR2 '"o, you will (continue to) in the future have a habit to accuse each other"' [RBT, ChM 077] misorongpo aphan chujengpen avam kokdong mis rongp a-ph n ch j ng pen a-v m k k-d ng ant.sp POSS-NSUBJ single.hair=with POSS-waist tie-attached pechengran pe-ch ng-r n CAUS-be.narrow.inbetween-delicate/about.to.break ‘(the king) took the ant on its hair and tied it up on its waist' [RBT, ChM 078] chongho aphan jamir abupen chongh a-ph n jam r a-b pen frog POSS-NSUBJ grain.sp POSS-bundle=with sapphratphratdet amat abang s p-phr t~phr t-d t am t a-b ng beat.w/sth.flexible-sd.beating~DISTR.PL-PFV and.then POSS-CLF:HUM.PL pevangphrok pe-v ng-phr k CAUS-come-bulging.out ‘and with a bundle of jamir they beat the frog so his skin got swollen’ [RBT, ChM 079] ansi ingtonlo nsi ingt n-l after.that conclude-RL 'and that's it’ [RBT, ChM 080] 693 APPENDIX E 17. TEXT: WR, BCS (FOLK STORY) This folk story gives an account of subdivisions within the Bey clan. The first part of the folk story focuses on the two brothers y ’ (Bey the Black) and y ’ t (Bey the Fair) and their falling out over changing marriage plans as a result of the grandmother’s advice. The second part of the story focuses on members of the Bey Ronghang clan and gives an account of why in modern times they are not allowed to grind rice for rice beer. The story’s account is that in mythological times, the Bey Ronghang women kept grinding rice for rice beer without doing anything else, even forgetting to breast-feed their children, which subsequently died from starvation. The audio file for the entire text WR, BCS is available under the DOI name 10.7264/N3JD4V2T at https://scholarsbank.uoregon.edu/xmlui/handle/1794/13657 hako ahut hedi Bey atum korte bangkethom do tangho hak ah t hed B y a-t m kort b ng-keth m d t ngh that.time during NP.EMPH CLAN POSS-PL brother CLF:HUM:PL-three exist REP 'in the old days, you know, there were three Bey brothers, they say' [WR, BCS 001] Bey atum korte bangkethom do aklengsi abangke [B y a-t m kort b ng-keth m d ] [a-kl ng-s ab ng ke CLAN POSS-PL brother CLF:HUM:PL-three exist POSS-old.one-SPLT NPDL=TOP Bey Ki'ik adakvam abangke Bey Ke'et B y ke- k] [adakv m ab ng ke B y ke- t CLAN NMLZ-be.black second.child NPDL=TOP CLAN NMLZ-be.yellow akibi abangke Bey Ronghang [a-ke-b ab ng ke B y Rongh ng] POSS-NMLZ-be.small NPDL=TOP CLAN CLAN 'there were three Bey brothers, the oldest one was Bey the Black, the second one was Bey the Fair, and the small one was Bey Ronghang' [WR, BCS 002] 694 anke latum thelo dinglo, piso some enlo tangho nke [la-t m th -l d ng-l ] [p s s m n-l ] t ngh and.then this-PL be.big-RL be.long-RL wife EE:p s take-RL REP 'and then, they grew up and they got married, so they say' [WR, BCS 003] piso some enlo anke Bey Ki'ik abangta [p s s m n-l ] nke [B y ke- k ab ng t wife EE:p s take-RL and.then CLAN NMLZ-be.black NPDL=ADD:also:PRL ahem arit dolo Bey Ke'et abangta a-h m a-r t d -l ] [B y ke- t ab ng t POSS-house POSS-field exist-RL CLAN NMLZ-be.yellow NPDL=ADD:also:PRL ahem arit dolo Bey Ronghang abang, a-h m a-r t d -l ] [B y Rongh ng ab ng POSS-house POSS-field exist-RL CLAN CLAN NPDL akibi abangta, ahem arit dolo a-ke-b ab ng t a-h m a-r t d -l ] POSS-NMLZ-be.small NPDL=ADD:also:PRL POSS-house POSS-field exist-RL 'they got married, and then Bey the Black had his (own) house and property, Bey the Fair likewise had his (own) house and property, and Bey Ronghang, the young one, also had his (own) house and property' [WR, BCS 004] anke aklengsi abangke piso some enlo apotsi, nke a-kl ng-s ab ng ke p s s m n-l ap t si and.then POSS-old.one-SPLT NPDL=TOP wife EE:p s take-RL reason=FOC:RL asomar thelo dinglo tangho a-oso-m r th -l d ng-l t ngh POSS-child-PL be.big-RL be.long-RL REP 'and then, the oldest had gotten married and so his children grew up' [WR, BCS 005] asomar thelo dinglo, anke Bey Ke'et a-oso-m r th -l d ng-l nke B y ke- t POSS-child-PL be.big-RL be.long-RL and.then CLAN NMLZ-be.yellow abangta lason thakthaklo, piso some enlo; potsi ab ng t las n thakth k-l p s s m n-l ap t si NPDL=ADD:also that.way same-RL wife EE:p s take-RL reason=FOC:RL 695 halata asomar thelo dinglo h la t a-oso-m r th -l d ng-l that=ADD:also POSS-child-PL be.big-RL be.long-RL 'his children were growing up and then Bey the Fair also did the same and he got married and so with respect to him also, his children grew up' [WR, BCS 006] an Bey Ronghang akibisi abangta piso n B y Rongh ng a-ke-b -s ab ng t p s and.then CLAN CLAN POSS-NMLZ-be.small-SPLT NPDL=ADD:also wife some enpen, asomar thelo dinglo; anke s m n-pen a-oso-m r th -l d ng-l ] [ nke EE:p s take-NF:with POSS-child-PL be.big-RL be.long-RL and.then aklengsi abangke... la Bey Ke'et Bey a-kl ng-s ab ng ke... [l B y ke- t B y POSS-old.one-SPLT NPDL=TOP this CLAN NMLZ-be.yellow CLAN Ronghang lapen Bey Ki'ik atum, angjirta do pu Rongh ng lap n B y ke- k a-t m a-ingj r t d pu CLAN and CLAN NMLZ-be.black POSS-PL POSS-sister=ADD:also exist QUOT 'and then, Bey Ronghang, the youngest, he also got married and his children grew up, and then, the oldest one, that Bey the Fair, Bey Ronghang, and Bey the Black, they also had a sister' [WR, BCS 007] angjirta do anke, la angjirpi abangta a-ingj r t d nke [l a-ingj r-p ab ng t POSS-sister=ADD:also exist and.then this POSS-sister-female NPDL=ADD:also penan dolo; anke a'ik aklengsi along Bey pen n d -l ] nke [[[a- k a-kl ng-s al ng] [B y husband stay-RL and.then POSS-older.brother POSS-old.one-SPLT LOC CLAN Ki'ik ahemsi piso kehangdam tangho ke- k a-h m si]] p s ke-h ng-d m] t ngh NMLZ-be.black POSS-house=FOC wife NMLZ-ask-GO REP 'they also had a sister, and then the sister also got married, and then to the oldest brother, to Bey the Black's house, she went to ask for a wife (for her son) [WR, BCS 008] 696 piso hangdamlo anke kene, ‘Bey Ki'ik‘ pu p s h ng-d m-l nke ken B y ke- k pu wife call-GO-RL and.then filler CLAN NMLZ-be.black QUOT apotsi halatumke asomar abang ikpikpik ap t si h la-t m ke a-oso-m r ab ng k-p k~p k because=FOC:RL that-PL=TOP POSS-child-PL NPDL be.black-very~DIST.PL 'she went to ask for a wife, and then, ehm, because he was called ‘Bey the Black’, they, his children were all very black' [WR, BCS 009] an ‘Bey Ke'et’ pu atum abangke asomar n B y ke- t pu a-t m ab ng ke a-oso-m r and.then CLAN NMLZ-be.yellow QUOT POSS-PL NPDL=TOP POSS-child-PL abang etpik tangho ab ng t-p k t ngh NPDL be.yellow-very REP 'and then, with respect to the so-called ‘Bey the Fair’ and his family, his children were very fair' [WR, BCS 010] t t ‘Bey n las la-t m kort b ng-hin a-l ng pen [B y and.then therefore this-PL brother CLF:HUM:PL-two POSS-LOC=from CLAN Ki'ik’ pu abang ahemsi angjirpi abang ke- k pu ab ng a-h m si] [a-ingj r-p ab ng] NMLZ-be.black QUOT NPDL POSS-house=FOC POSS-sister-female NPDL piso hangdamlohe p s h ng-d m-l he wife call-GO-RL=EMPH ‘and then, therefore, among the two brothers, their sister went to the so-called ‘Bey the Black’, to his house, to ask for a wife, you know’ [WR, BCS 011] [p s h ng-d m-l ] [ nke [h la a-ph sarp ] d -l ng wife call-GO-RL and.then that POSS-grandmother old.woman exist-still tangho, la Beyhem asarpihe… aphi t ngh ] [l B y-h m a-sarp he...] [a-ph REP this CLAN-house POSS-old.woman=AFTERTHOUGHT POSS-grandmother 697 sarpi dolang, anlo aphi abang kipu tangho, sarp d -l ng] [ nlo a-ph ab ng ke-p t ngh ] old.woman exist-still and.then POSS-grandmother NPDL NMLZ-say REP hala asupo aphanlohe asopi [h la a-su-p a-ph n lo he] [a-oso-p that POSS-grandchild-male POSS-NSUBJ=FOC=AFTERTHOUGHT POSS-child-female aso aphanlohe [hala a'ik a-os a-ph n lo he] [h la a- k POSS-child POSS-NSUBJ=FOC=AFTERTHOUGHT that POSS-older.brother abangke ‘Bey Ki'ik’ pu apot... anke kene ab ng ke B y ke- k pu ap t] [ nke ken NPDL=TOP CLAN NMLZ-be.black QUOT because and.then HESIT aphi sarpi abang kipu tangho a-ph sarp ab ng ke-p t ngh ] POSS-grandmother old.woman NPDL NMLZ-say REP ‘and then there was still their grandmother (i.e. father's mother of the three brothers and one sister), the old woman. The old woman of the Bey house, you know. His grandmother, the old woman was still there. This was how it was, up to here. And then the grandmother was saying, to her grandson, you know. To her daughter's son, you know. The eldest brother, because he was called Bey the Black... The grandmother, the old woman said’ [WR, BCS 012] “hala adakvam aphanlohe... Bey [h la adakv m a-ph n lo he] [B y that 2POSS- second.child POSS-NSUBJ=FOC=AFTERTHOUGHT CLAN Ke'et abang aphanlo... nangong adakvam ke- t ab ng a-ph n=lo] [nang- ng adakv m NMLZ-be.yellow NPDL POSS-NSUBJ=FOC 2:POSS-maternal.uncle second.child ahemsi kene asopi arje a-h m si] ken [a-oso-p arj POSS-house=LOC HESIT POSS-child-female appearance kemerintihe po nang hadak Bey ke-m -rint he] [p n ng h d k B y IPFV-be.good-equally:PL:S/A=EMPH father you there CLAN 698 Ki'ik ahemsi nang piso hangdamrong” ke- k a-h m si n ng p s h ng-d m-r ng] NMLZ-be.black POSS-house=FOC:RL 2 wife call-GO-instead ‘ “it's to your second-born (maternal uncle), you know, to Bey the Fair (that you should go and ask for a wife), at your second-born maternal uncle's house, his daughters are all equally beautiful, you know, father, you went there to the house of Bey the Black to ask for a wife instead” ‘ [WR, BCS 013] “nangong akleng ahemke, nangong [nang- ng a-kl ng a-h m ke] [nang- ng 2:POSS-maternal.uncle POSS-old.one POSS-house=TOP 2:POSS-maternal.uncle ahemripo ahemke, la'an abang a-h m'r -p a-h m ke] la= n ab ng POSS-oldest.son-male POSS-house=TOP this=that.much NPDL ki'ikrintile putangho ke- k-rint le p -t ngh IPFV-be.black-equally:PL:S/A=FOC:IRR QUOT-REP ' “the family of your oldest maternal uncle, the family of your uncle who is the eldest son of the family, all of them are so black (so you shouldn't get your wife from them)” ‘ [WR, BCS 014] anlo aphi abangke aphi sarpi abang la nlo aph ab ng ke [a-ph sarp ab ng] [l and.then after NPDL=TOP POSS-grandmother old.woman NPDL this asopi asopo aphan pudet apot a-oso-p a-oso-p a-ph n p -d t ap t] POSS-child-female POSS-child-male POSS-NSUBJ say-PFV because asupo aphan hadak nangong “ Bey Ke'et ahemle piso ke- k> B y ke- t a-h m le] [p s NMLZ-be.black CLAN NMLZ-be.yellow POSS-house=FOC:IRR wife hangdamrongnon hadaksi abang h ng-d m-r ng-n n] h d k si a-b ng call-GO-instead-COND.IMP there=FOC:RL POSS-somebody/people 699 ke'etrinti” pu apot, asupo ke- t-rint pu ap t] [a-su-p IPFV-be.yellow-equally:PL:S/A QUOT because POSS-grandchild-male abangta aphi alam apot kroidetlohe ab ng t ] [[a-ph a-l m] ap t] kr i-d t-l he NPDL=ADD:DM POSS-grandmother POSS-word because agree-PFV-RL=EMPH 'it was the grandmother, the grandmother, the old woman, because she had said to the son of her daughter, to her grandson, “there to your uncle, to Bey the Fair's house go and ask for a wife. There, the people (i.e. daughters) are all equally fair”, because she said that, because these were the words of his grandmother, the grandson agreed, you know’ [WR, BCS 015] aphi alam apot kroilo, anke hala Bey [a-ph a-l m ap t kr i-l ] nke [h la B y POSS-grandmother POSS-word because agree-RL and.then that CLAN Ki'ik ahemke piso hangdam'et jat'et ke- k a-h m ke p s h ng-d m- t j t- t] NMLZ-be.black POSS-house=TOP wife call-GO-PFT GENEX-PFT lo han sik'et jat'et [kachepangri [l h n s k- t j t- t] [ke-che-pangr banana.leaf curry prepare-PFT GENEX-PFT NMLZ-RR-reconcile pangdonnangji aphan kesiktang'anta pangd n-n ng-j aph n ke-s k-t ng- n t even.out-need-IRR2 PURP NMLZ-prepare-finish-all=ADD:EXH siktheilo, an hadak abangke lo han s k-th i-l ] [ n h d k ab ng ke l h n prepare-all.of.a.set:S/O-RL and.then there NPDL=TOP banana.leaf curry thuruilo, hala aphi alam karju an th -r i-l ] [h la a-ph a-l m ke-arj n rot-many-RL that POSS-grandmother POSS-word NMLZ-listen because Bey Ke'et ahem hedi hadak asopi B y ke- t a-h m hed h d k a-oso-p CLAN NMLZ-be.yellow POSS-house NP.EMPH there POSS-child-female la Bey Ke'et asopi aphansi hedi l B y ke- t a-oso-p aph n si hed this CLAN NMLZ-be.yellow POSS-child-female NSUBJ=FOC:RL NP.EMPH 700 piso hangdamrong hadaksi pangri pangdonrong tangho p s h ng-d m-r ng h d k si pangr pangd n-r ng t ngh wife call-GO-instead there=FOC:RL reconcile even.out-instead REP ‘because it was his grandmother's advice, he agreed, and so he went to Bey the Black's house to ask for a wife and do all the formalities, and prepare the banana leaves and the curry (for the wedding) and everything, they prepared all of the necessary things for the wedding, and then there all the food got rotten, (because) he had followed his grandmother's advice and had gone to Bey the Fair's house, you know; there (that man's) daughter, to the daughter of Bey the Fair, you know, he went to ask for her as a wife instead, there he went to get married instead' [WR, BCS 016] y pangr pangd n-r ng-l nke h aph ke l B y reconcile even.out-instead-RL and.then over.there after=TOP this CLAN Ke'etpen Bey Ki'ik abangke aning ke- t pen B y ke- k ab ng ke a-n ng NMLZ-be.yellow/fair=with CLAN NMLZ-be.black NPDL=TOP POSS-mind che'oitanglo che- i-t ng-l RR-be.sad-finish-RL ‘they got married, and then after this, Bey the Fair and Bey the Black got upset with each other’ [WR, BCS 017] hala Bey Ki'ik atumke lo han [h la B y ke- k a-t m ke] [l h n that CLAN NMLZ-be.black POSS-PL=TOP banana.leaf curry thik'etlomati kene kecho kijunnangji, th k- t-l mati ken [ke-ch ke-j n-n ng-ji] be.okay( aphi sarpi abang a-th i ke] a-ph sarp ab ng POSS-place(, grandmother made a mistake, you know’ [WR, BCS 019] t “nangong, Bey [a-su-p a-ph n p -d n-d t] [[nang- ng B y POSS-grandchild-male POSS-NSUBJ say-JOIN-PFV 2:POSS-maternal.uncle CLAN t ” ke- t a-h m si] [a-oso-p ] [arj ke-m ]] NMLZ-be.yellow POSS-house=LOC POSS-child-female appearance IPFV-be.good 702 t , hadak chepangridet apot hedi; pu p -d n-d t-pen h d k che-pangr -d t ap t hed QUOT say-JOIN-PFV-NF:with there RR-reconcile-PFV because EMPH anke Bey Ki'ik abangke seme ketang tangho nke B y ke- k ab ng=ke sem ke-t ng t ngh and.then CLAN NMLZ-be.black NPDL=TOP oath( kedo abangke thap a-sem ke-d ab ng ke [th p POSS-vow( thesere kelik arl pen] e-s n theser ke-l k inside=from one-CLF:thing POSS-fruit fruits IPFV-pluck ‘there's a rooster crowing (in the background)... one cultivator (/farmer) inside his own garden is picking one kind of fruit’ [SiT, PS 002] dondon chedonsi... anke amonit abang [dond n che-d n-si...] [ nke [a-mon t ab ng] ladder RR-place.ladder/bridge-NF:RL and.then POSS-man NPDL pe akelokpen keroi isi ajamborong [[p a-ke-l k pen ke-r i is a-jambor ng cloth POSS-NMLZ-be.white=with NMLZ-sew one POSS-bag 709 arlosi lahai kethap lapen arum kevan arl si] [lah i] ke-th p]] lap n [ar m ke-v n]] inside=FOC:RL these NMLZ-put.inside and down NMLZ-bring 'he's placed himself a ladder... and then, the man, into one bag sown from white cloth he puts these (fruits), and then brings them down’ [SiT, PS 003] lake phatang alongsi kethap l ke [phat ng a-l ng si] ke-th p this=TOP B.BASKET POSS-LOC=FOC NMLZ-put.inside ‘he is putting them in a phatang bamboo basket’ [SiT, PS 004] ajahak atheke longle athak klobom lapusonta do [[ajah k a-th =ke] [longl a-th k] kl -b m] [l pus n t d ] some POSS-fruit=TOP earth POSS-on.top fall-CONT like.this=also exist 'some fruits keep falling on the ground, that's also (something that is) happening [SiT, PS 005] so amonit achethok along peta do aphu alongke phutupsi kachekup choi a-l ng=ke> [a-ph a-l ng=ke phut p si ke-che-k p] [ch i POSS-LOC=TOP POSS-head POSS-LOC=TOP hat=FOC:RL NMLZ-RR-cover shirt ki'iksi kachingchoi ke- k si ke-chingch i] NMLZ-be.black=FOC:RL NMLZ-wear ‘this man also has a cloth on his neck, on his head he wears a hat, he wears a black shirt’ [SiT, PS 006] dondon do a-rongta the'o, laso athesere [[dond n d a-r ng t th - ] las a-theser ladder exist POSS-plant=ADD be.big-much this POSS-fruits a-rong... bita nangkangreng ase a-r ng...] [b t nang=ke-ingr ng a-s POSS-plant goat=even CIS=NMLZ-call(small.animals) POSS-disease 710 kethepar ke-th -p r] NMLZ-be.big-very ‘there's a ladder, the tree is very big; this fruit tree..., the voice of a goat is also very loud’ [SiT, PS 007] laso kethap aphrang aphrang longle keklo alongpen las ke-th p aphr ng~aphr ng longl ke-kl al ng pen this NMLZ-put.inside before~INTENS this earth NMLZ-fall LOC=from humsi laso aketer athesere longle h m-si las a-ke-t r a-theser longl pick.up-NF:RL this POSS-NMLZ-be.dirty POSS-fruits this earth kero'anke halaso apepensi venlo ke-r n ke h las a-p pen si v n-l NMLZ-hit=all=TOP that POSS-cloth=with=FOC:RL wipe-RL 'just before putting them into (the basket), he picks them up from having fallen onto the ground, and these dirty fruits, all the ones that were dirty, with this cloth, he wiped them clean’ [SiT, PS 008] anke lasonsi thapbomlo nke las n si th p-b m-l and.then that.way=FOC:RL put.inside-CONT-RL ‘and then, like this he kept putting them inside (the baskets)’ [SiT, PS 009] ha achar tovar kengkeng inut phutup [[h ach r tov r kengk ng] [e-n t phut p over.there far.away road all.the.way one-CLF:HUM:SG hat kachikupdong amonit... bi api ke-che-k p-d ng a-mon t]... [b a-p ] NMLZ-RR-cover-attached POSS-man goat POSS-female nangchithurkrikrisi laso thesere nang chith r-kr -kr -si] [las theser CIS=drag-follow.closely-follow.closely-NF:RL this this fruits 711 kelik amonit adung'an nanglelo ke-l k a-mon t ad ng- n] nang l -l NMLZ-pluck POSS-man near-up.to CIS=reach-RL ‘over there, far away, all the way down the road, one hat-wearing man, dragging along a female goat, close up to this fruit picking man he reached’ [SiT, PS 010] laso amonitta... lapu bi ponlo abi abangke las a-mon t t ... lap b p n-lo a-b ab ng ke this POSS-man=ADD like.this goat take.away-RL this POSS-goat NPDL=TOP kedun mo ke-d n m NMLZ-join hesitate ‘this person also... like this carries the goat, this goat is hesitating to go along’ [SiT, PS 011] ne kachopanji aning [n ke-chop n-j a-n ng something NMLZ-eat-just NMLZ-look.for.food-IRR2 POSS-mind kehang ason bonsita halaso amonit chingtontesi ke-h ng as n] b nset h las a-mon t chingt n-C -si NMLZ-want like but that POSS-man stop.for.awhile-NEG-NF:RL chithurponbomlo chith r-p n-b m-l drag-take.away-CONT-RL 'it's as if the goat wants to graze, but that man without stopping for awhile keeps dragging (the goat) away' [SiT, PS 012] abi ponbomlo ha helovinglo a-b p n-b m-l h hel -v ng-l POSS-goat take.away-CONT-RL over.there be.far-very-RL ‘he keeps taking the goat away, over there far away’ [SiT, PS 013] anke laso amonit abangke, la chotiki nke [las a-mon t ab ng=ke] [l cho-tik and.then this POSS-man NPDL=TOP this AUTO.BEN/MAL-cultivate 712 chonghoipen kecho amonit abangke... puthot cho-ingh i-pen ke-ch a-mon t ab ng ke]... puth t AUTO.BEN/MAL-do-NF:with NMLZ-eat POSS-man NPDL=TOP next/again angsong arlusi... thengpi arong arlusi athe likbomlo angs ng arl -si... thengp a-r ng arl -si a-th l k-b m-l high.up climb-NF:RL tree/wood POSS-plant climb-NF:RL POSS-fruit pluck-CONT-RL ‘and then, this man, the man who lives off of (lit., eats from) cultivating, again climbed up, climbed up in the tree and kept picking the fruit’ [SiT, PS 014] laso ahut amat inut akaprek amonit [las a-ah t am t] [e-n t a-ke-pr k a-mon t this POSS-during and.then one-CLF:HUM:SG POSS-NMLZ-be.different POSS-man abangke saikel nangardonsi vanglo... laso amonitta a-b ng ke] saik l nang ard n-si v ng-lo... las a-mon t t NPDL=TOP bicycle( lap n=ke ar m l dond n ad ng-h t am t... and.then=TOP down this ladder near-INTENS self 713 phatang hini plengchongchong... thesere kiliktang phat ng hin pl ng-ch ng~ch ng... theser ke-l k-t ng kd.basket two be.full-slightly.high~INTENS fruits NMLZ-pluck-PFV theklonglo lapenke saikel pasangkoklo th kl ng-l lap n=ke saik l pa-s ng-k k-l see-RL and.then=TOP bicycle( asaikel kapasangkokra a-saik l ke-pe-s ng-k k-ra take.rest-firmly POSS-bicycle( saikel along'an saik l a-l ng= n POSS-kd.basket LOC-up.to bicycle(, to the bicycle he brings the basket, the basket he is trying to put on the cycle’ [SiT, PS 021] amat amonitta ajon thihek am t a-mon t t a-j n th -h k and.then POSS-man=also POSS-height be.short-INTENS ‘and then, the person is short’ [SiT, PS 022] lapenke saikel along aphrang anatsi lap n=ke saik l a-l ng a-phr ng a-n t si and.then=TOP bicycle( si ingchin apum along ingnisi... saikel s ingch n a-p m a-l ng ingn -si... saik l therefore iron POSS-CLF:round POSS-LOC sit-NF:RL bicycle( dambomlo... anke kedambom ahut ha d m-b m-l ... nke ke-d m-b m ah t h this go-CONT-RL and.then NMLZ-go-CONT during over.there anatthupen inut arloso oso, skul a-n tth pen e-n t rlos os sk l POSS-direction=from one-CLF:HUM:SG woman child school( arlososo abangpen rlos ~s ab ng pen this bicycle( kapathu abol lapenke bet [tennis ke-path a-b l lap n=ke b t tennis( t-d ng e-n t os ab ng=ke]... lap n ke touch-attached one-CLF:HUM:SG child NPDL =TOP and.then=TOP this kachingkoidup amonit [ke-chingko -d p a-mon t NMLZ-fall.down.HUM-falling.sound.from.high.solid.obj POSS-man aphan a-ph n] POSS-NSUBJ this fruits POSS-kd.basket these.types.of fruits LOC 717 aphatang along thesere thapdunlo rapdunlo, laphan a-phat ng a-l ng theser th p-d n-l r p-d n-l l -ph n POSS-kd.basket POSS-LOC fruits put.inside-JOIN-RL help-JOIN-RL this-NSUBJ ‘(there’s) one child who’s holding a tennis ball and a bat, and then for the person who had fallen down, they put with him the fruit in the basket, they helped him’ [SiT, PS 032] rapdun'et aphike la saikel r p-d n- t aph =ke [l saik l help-PFV-PRF POSS-after=TOP help-JOIN-PRF after=TOP this bicycle( arlong [e-n t os ab ng=ke] [l aphr ng a-l ng ke-d arl ng] one-CLF:HUM:SG child NPDL=TOP this first POSS-LOC NMLZ-exist stone terekpiphitlo...] penke padamlo ter k-p -ph t-l ... p n=ke pa-d m-l move-BEN/MAL-away-RL and.then=TOP CAUS-go-RL ‘after helping, the bicycle rider again got on his way, and then one child, the one who was in front, he moved the stone away for him, and then they (the children) let him (the bicycle boy) go away’ [SiT, PS 033] latum bangkethomke amethang atovar chedamlo, [[l -t m b ng-keth m ke] a-meth ng a-tov r che-d m-l ] this-PL CLF:HUM:PL-three=TOP POSS-self POSS-road RR-go-RL lapenke saikel ingdoiponbomsi, [lap n ke saik l ingd i-p n-b m-si and.then=TOP bicycle( chingtonkoklo h la saik l ke-ingd i-p n ab ng t chingt n-k k-l that bicycle( kipidunthu apot, laphan lap n=ke [l phut p ke-p -d n-th ap t] l -ph n and.then=TOP this hat NMLZ-give-JOIN-again because this-NSUBJ aning ingsamsi, thesere pumni tekanglo a-n ng ings m-si theser p m-n tek ng-l POSS-mind be.cold-NF:RL fruits CLF:round-two leave.for-RL ‘and then, because he returned the hat, he (the bicycle boy) was grateful to him and gave him two pieces of fruit’ [SiT, PS 039] 719 an laso a'oso abang thesere pumni hala ajirpo n [las a-os ab ng] [theser p m-n ] [h la a-jirp and.then this POSS-child NPDL fruits CLF:round-two that POSS-friend banghini aphan chepaklangdamlo b ng-hin a-ph n] che-pa-kl ng-d m-l CLF:HUM:PL-two POSS-NSUBJ RR-CAUS-appear-GO-RL ‘and then, this child went to show the two pieces of fruit to those two friends’ [SiT, PS 040] t t che-pe-kl ng-d m-pen... l -t m ke-d m-th pangch ng-l RR-CAUS-appear-GO-NF:with this-PL NMLZ-go-again start-RL ‘after going to show them, they again started to go’ [SiT, PS 041] anke ajabok along kethapthot nke [a-jab k a-l ng ke-th p-th t and.then POSS-pocket( kelikdam amonit abangta nangsunlo p n=ke h la theser ke-l k-d m a-mon t ab ng t nang s n-l and.then=TOP that fruits NMLZ-pluck-GO POSS-man NPDL=also CIS=descend-RL ‘and then, the man who had gone to pick fruits, on the other hand, has come down’ [SiT, PS 043] lapenke... phatang along thesere thaplelo... bonta isi lap n=ke... phat ng a-l ng theser th p-l -l ... b nt is and.then=TOP kd.basket POSS-LOC fruits put.inside-again-RL but one 720 aphatang along thesere chetheklongledetlo a-phat ng a-l ng theser che-th kl ng-C -d t-l POSS-kd.basket POSS-LOC fruits RR-see-NEG-PFV-RL ‘and then, he again put more fruit in the baskets, but in one basket he didn't see any fruit’ [SiT, PS 044] anke laso a'osomar atum nangke'otkrei nke [[las a-os -m r a-t m] nang=ke- t-kr i and.then this POSS-child-PL POSS-PL CIS=NMLZ-touch-DISTR.PL atheseresi langdunveretlo... anke inut a-theser si] l ng-d n-ver t-l ... nke e-n t POSS-fruits=FOC:RL see-JOIN-INTENS-RL and.then one-CLF:HUM:SG abangke juiponbom thengponbomlang ab ng=ke j i-p n-b m th ng-p n-b m-l ng NPDL=TOP play-on.the.way-CONT beat.w/sth.solid-on.the.way-CONT-still ‘and then, he (the old man) keeps watching the fruit that these children are each holding, and then one keeps playing, keeps beating still’ [SiT, PS 045] anke la chelangdundinglo kanghupon>, “latumtong cho-ingh -p n ke-ingh -p n l -t m-t ng AUTO.BEN/MAL-steal-take.away NMLZ-steal-take.away this-PL-INDIR.ITROG kepon'etma? lajo ” pu lapusonsi ke-p n- t ma l -j pu l pus n si NMLZ-take.away-all:S/O=Q this-see! QUOT like.this-instead.of like.this=FOC:RL kamatha ke-math NMLZ-think ‘and then he kept watching them for a long time, "could they have taken them all away, look at that", like this he was thinking’ [SiT, PS 046] amat jutletlo am t j t-l t-l and.then finish-PFV3-RL ‘and then, (the story) is finished’ [SiT, PS 047] 721 APPENDIX G 19. TEXT: SIH, KH (PROCEDURAL TEXT) This procedural text discusses how alkaline food (called kangmoi ahan) is prepared. The procedure involves burning jhum fields and using the ashes. This type of food has a high significance in Karbi culture. The audio file for the entire text SiH, KH is available under the DOI name 10.7264/N3ST7N4P at https://scholarsbank.uoregon.edu/xmlui/handle/1794/13657 e elitum Karbi atum kangmoi ahan e [e-li-t m Karb a-t m] ke-ingm i a-h n DSM 1PL.INCL-HON-PL PN POSS-PL NMLZ-cook.with.alkaline POSS-vegetables t ’helo ke-cho-t n a-r n-ke las n- k-hel NMLZ-AUTO.BEN/MAL-cook POSS-custom-TOP that.way-FRML-RL:EMPH ‘the custom of our Karbi people's way of cooking ourselves vegetables with alkaline is like this’ [SiH, KH 001] mane hu inglong aritsi elitum… mane h ingl ng a-r t si e-li-t m I.mean( ingsir'etlo tangte pacharmatpo; nsi [l ng d ng-p ] nke [las ings r- t-l t ngt pacharm t-p ] then water pour-IRR1 and.then then filter-PRF-RL if test.if.taste.is.good-IRR1 chenangchitpen, phu'iksopen elitum han [chen ng-ch t-p n phu' k-s pen e-li-t m h n match-finally-NF:with earthen.pot-DIM=with 1PL.INCL-HON-PL vegetables 723 tun'ikpo t n- k-p ] cook-FRML-IRR1 ‘and then, we pour water and then when (the bisir) has filtered (the ashes), we test the taste, and after finding it matching, we cook the curry in a small earthen pot’ [SiH, KH 007] ansi la hepi ason ingmoipo hepipen thijok a'ok nsi l hep as n ingm i-p hep pen thij k a- k then this brinjal like cook.with.alkaline-IRR1 brinjal=with deer POSS-meat tangho pine lason kechongmoi t ngh p -n las n ke-cho-ingm i REP what-INDEF that.way NMLZ-AUTO.BEN/MAL-cook.with.alkaline ‘and then, we cook brinjal or something similar with the alkaline, we cook brinjal and deer meat, so they say, or whatever like that’ [SiH, KH 008] kechome'aretke aseng ke-ch -m -ar t ke a-s ng NMLZ-eat-GOOD-INTENS=TOP POSS-condiments kejok'ikke lapuhelo ke-j k- k ke lap -h lo NMLZ-drop.into.container-FRML=TOP like.this-RL ‘to become very tasty, condiments are added like this’ [SiH, KH 009] mane kopune aseng man ko-pu-n a-s ng HESIT( cham'et arni te'etpo ch m- t arn t - t-p sun wash-PRF sun let.dry.by.sun-PRF-IRR1 ‘and then, you need to clean it and let it dry in the sun’ [SiH, KH 012] ansi elitum pakrengdunpo, anke horpentame nsi e-li-t m pa-kr ng-d n-p nke h r pen t m then 1PL.INCL-HON-PL CAUS-be.dry-JOIN-IRR1 and.then liquor=with=any jattame ingti patippo, tokklingpo j t t m ingt pat p-p tokkl ng-p GENEX=any salt mix-IRR1 pound.until.tight-IRR1 ‘and then, we need to dry it, and then either with liquor or something else we need to mix it with salt and pound until it's tight/crushed to a paste’ [SiH, KH 013] anke nemphruphlungpo nke nemphr -phl ng-p and.then have.sweet.smell-spreading-IRR1 ‘and then it will develop a sweet smell’ [SiH, KH 014] laso akenemphru ajoinesi han [las a-ke-nempr a-join si h n this POSS-NMLZ-have.sweet.smell POSS-reason=FOC:RL prepared.vegetables akechome e la kangmoi a-ke-ch -m ] e [l ke-ingm i POSS-NMLZ-eat-GOOD DSM be.ready.to.eat this NMLZ-cook.with.alkaline ahan aphule kachenang a-h n a-phul ke-chen ng POSS-prepared.vegetables POSS-pot NMLZ-match 725 akechomeke lason kejok a-ke-ch -m ke las n ke-j k POSS-NMLZ-eat-GOOD=TOP that.way NMLZ-drop.into.container aseng do'o apotlo e tiha a-s ng d - ap t-lo e tih POSS-condiments exist-much because-RL DSM kd.root.spice jokpo j k-p drop.into.container-IRR1 ‘this fragrant smell is the reason why the curry is tasty; in order to make the dish tasty, you have to add many condiments like this, because of that you have to add tiha’ [SiH, KH 015] pine pine natne riho p -n p -n n t-n rih what-INDEF what-INDEF direction-INDEF fruit.of.creeper jokprepo j k-pr -p drop.into.container-spread.all.over-IRR1 ‘and then add whatever, for example riho’ [SiH, KH 016] lapulo lasi elitum Karbi atum kangmoi lap =lo las e-li-t m Karb a-t m ke-ingm i like.this=FOC then 1PL.INCL-HON-PL PN POSS-PL NMLZ- cook.with.alkaline ahan kechotun kejoknangji a-h n ke-cho-t n ke-j k-n ng-j POSS-curry NMLZ- AUTO.BEN/MAL-cook NMLZ-add-must-IRR2 aseng anke lapu'ik helo a-s ng nke lap - k-hel POSS-condiments and.then like.this-FRML-RL:EMPH like this we Karbi people cook with alkaline, cook the curry, and add the condiments, like this it is [SiH, KH 017] lapente… isi alam dothulang lap nte is a-l m d -th -l ng after.this one POSS-matter exist-again-yet ‘after this… there is still one more thing’ [SiH, KH 020-2] 726 kene elitum Karbi atumke jat chojun ken [e-li-t m Karb a-t m ke j t [ch j n HESIT 1PL.INCL-HON-PL PN POSS-PL=TOP type CELEBRATION choku punoi ajat punoi kangmoi ahan chok pun i aj t pun i] [ke-ingm i a-h n] EE:choj n say/e.g. GENEX say/e.g. NMLZ-cook.with.alkaline POSS-curry tunte pulotangte elitumke chokche t n-t p lot ngt ] [e-li-t m ke ch k-C cook-NEG if 1PL.INCL-HON-PL=TOP be.fine-NEG karkli kaphojo ke-arkl ke-phoj ] NMLZ-bewail NMLZ-EE:arkl ‘so... for us Karbi people, consider any celebration or anything, if we don't cook alkaline curry, for us, the celebration is not adequate’ [SiH, KH 023] pirthe along seta pine se-kasadi tangho kopine pirth a-l ng set p -n s -kasad t ngh kop -n world POSS-LOC but what-INDEF precelebration.rituals REP what-INDEF tangho puta elitumke t ngh p t e-li-t m ke REP QUOT=ADD 1PL:INCL-HON-PL=TOP hanmoi hanmi nangji hanmo hanm n ng-j ingmoi.curry food.taken.with.liquor need-IRR2 ‘everywhere, for whatever, for any kind of precelebration rituals we need the curry made with alkaline’ [SiH, KH 024] lapente chojun kasadi tangho rongker kasadi lap nte ch j n kasad t ngh r ngk r kasad and.then CELEBRATION CELEBRATION REP FESTIVAL CELEBRATION tangho puta hanmoi hanmi doji t ngh p t hanm i hanm d -j REP QUOT=ADD:EXH ingmoi.curry food.taken.with.liquor exist-IRR2 ‘and then, there will be the alkaline curry for the Chojun Kasadi and the Rongker Kasadi etc.’ [SiH, KH 025] 727 chojunta hanmoi doji ajat doji, lasi ch j n t hanm i d -j aj t d -j las CELEBRATION=ADD:also ingmoi.curry exist-IRR2 GENEX exist-IRR2 then elitumke jutang jubat along'an pusetame e-li-t m ke [jut ng jub t a-l ng n p set m ] 1PL.INCL-HON-PL=TOP custom EE:jut ng POSS-LOC=all likewise kangmoi ahan abangke elitumke ke-ingm i a-h n ab ng ke e-li-t m ke NMLZ-cook.with.alkaline POSS-curry NPDL=TOP 1PL.INCL-HON-PL=TOP kenangsot ke-n ng-s t NMLZ-need-be.required ‘there is alkaline curry at the Chojun also, and other things also (at the Chojun), therefore for us, wherever there are customs performed, alkaline curry is required for us’ [SiH, KH 026] ha pirthe kangdukpen pusetame kangmoi h pirth ke-ingd k pen p set m ke-ingm i over.there world NMLZ-immature=since likewise NMLZ-cook.with.alkaline ahanke elitumke jat alongta ledunlo a-h n ke e-li-t m ke j t al ng t l -d n-l POSS-curry=TOP 1PL.INCL-HON-PL=TOP type LOC=ADD:EXH reach-JOIN-RL ‘when long ago, the world was soft, the curry cooked with alkaline, for us, reaches every type (of celebration) (i.e., is required for each celebration)' [SiH, KH 027] biya-baru alongpen chenglok chojun choku biy -bar al ng pen ch ng-l k ch j n chok equalize(