Plains Cree: A Grammatical Study - Computer Science Club

34 [TRANS. AMER. PHIL. SOC.
4.12. awina 'who'
awtna 'who' has only animate forms:
3 awmna
3p awiniki
3' awinihi
WOLFART: PLAINS CREE
4.121. awina has two distinct but clearly related
uses. As an interrogative pronoun, awina shows
concord with the other nominal or pronominal expressions
in a sentence. Having animate forms only, it is
complemented in this function by the inanimate
interrogative kikway (4.31).
awmna may occur by itself, e.g. T10p89 eha, awmna?
'Yes, who?'; T10p7 awTn etokwe. "Who, I wonder';
T520p7, 8 awiniki kanihk. 'Who are they, then?'
P72-4 "kitdnisindw eh-witapimdt ndpewa." "awinihi?"
itwew kiseyiniw. ' "Our daughter is sitting by the side
of a man (3')." "Who is he," said the old man.'
It may occur as part of an equational sentence, e.g.,
T27p2, 3 awina naha nete. 'Who is that one yonder?'
awina ana naha kd-pe-sdkewet. 'Who is that, that
one yonder, coming into the open?'
Or it may function predicatively with a conjunct
clause depending on it, e.g., T10pl2 awina ekosi
e-itwet. 'Who says so?' T54p3 awina kd-nakatiht.
'Who was left behind (indf-3)?'
4.122. In combination with a following demonstrative,
awina expresses surprise, e.g., T504p2 awana
ana . . . 'Who (was it but) that one ... .
In this function, awina is not usually inflected (but
see P98-5); thus, we find it with any inflected form,
of either gender, of the demonstratives; e.g., T73p15
awmn es ohi (3') ekota owLkimdkana (3') ki-apiyiwa
(3'), . . . 'What was this (3'), his wife (3') sat (3')
there, . . .'; T103p4 aspin esa awina oma watihk.
'Away (she went), lo and behold, into a hole.'
Where it expresses surprise, awina exactly parallels
the particle pdti, e.g., T46p6 pot dhi (3') esa owikimdkana
(3') . . . 'What was that (3') but her husband
(3') . . '
4.123. The stem awin- also occurs with the suffix
/epan/ 'former, absent' which in this environment is
mutually exclusive with the number-obviation endings;
cf. 3.5, 5.321. Thus, T115p8 awtnipan ocahpihcisa
'gone was his tobacco-pouch (3').'
Much like its counterpart nama klkway (4.323),
awmnipan most typically means 'not here any more';
in this form, too, there is clearly an element of surprise
(cf. 4.122 above). Thus, T18-8 wiyapaniyik e-koskopayit,
awmnipan otema (3'). 'When he got up the
next morning, his horse (3') was gone'; T28p10
e-apasdpit, awlnipan. 'When he looked back:
nobody.'
awinipan may even occur in collocation with an
inanimate noun and, indeed, together with kikway:
T125-6 awmnipan oma mikiwdhpis. 'That wigwam
(0) was gone!' T125-8 .. . -nandtawdpit, awinipan
kikway, awtnipan oma mikiwdhpis. '. . . when he
looked around, nothing, that wigwam (0) was gone!'
4.13. tdni 'which'
tdn- is a delimiting interrogative.
3
3p
3'
0
Op op
tini
tdniki
tdnihi
tdni, tdnima
tanihi
The inanimate singular form is problematic; the
variant one would expect in this paradigm is tdnima.
tdnima is homonymous with a particle meaning 'how
much, where' (which presumably developed from the
pronoun), and this may well be the reason for the
spreading of tdni.
Just like the numerous particles based on the root
tan-, the delimiting interrogative tan- functions
primarily as a conjunction, e.g., T28p3 mdnakisk
tdnihi ekoni e-wiyinoyit e-ati-pimikwepitdt . . .
'Then, which ever ones (3') were fat (3'), of those
(3') he twisted the neck (3-(3')) . . . .' S280-8
tdnimah kostahkih, otah k-esiwepinanaw. 'Whichever
he fears, there we shall throw him.' tdni also occurs
with the pronoun ana as predication: P200-31 tdn ana
mdka eh-okimdwit . 'But which is the one who
is the chief . .'; P280-1 tdn dnim dyi okimdw
wkkih? 'Which is the chief's tent?' tdni is typically
counterbalanced by the delimiting demonstrative
ewako (4.41) or by a particle based on the same root,
e.g., ekota 'there': S103-24 ekwah tdnihi eh-wiyinoyit,
ewakonih tehtapiw awa mistanask. 'Then whichever
one was the fattest on this one Badger sat down';
P222-32 tdn ewakw etoke mdka, ntdtem? 'But which
one is it, Fellow-tribesman?' S129-46 ekwah tdnihi
eh-miywdsiniyikih wiyasah, ekotah pdnahikeyiwah
tawdsima. 'Then by the best stores of meat, there his
children cleared away the snow.'
4.2. PRONOMINAL PARADIGM II
The pronominal paradigm II has the following
basic set of endings.
3
3p
3'
0
Op
-a
-ehkdk
-ehd
-e
The pronouns of this type are not common in texts;
only the tdniwd paradigm is fully exemplified in
recently collected texts.
4.21. tdniwd, ewakwd 'where is he, there he is'
tdniwd 'where is he' and ewakwd 'there he is' are
verb-substitutes which might well be called "ex-
istential" pronouns. They function as predications