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internal or final. Subject position is determined by different syntactic, semantic and
phonological factors. First, subject position is constrained by clause type, as not all of
these positions are available to the subject in all clause types. Second sentences with
subject initial, internal and final sentences differ in their intonation and information
status. These differences in semantics and phonology, I will argue, are reflected in the
syntax.
Before turning to the examination of these constructions, in this chapter, I provide
an introduction to the Marshallese language, as well as other Micronesian languages. This
chapter also presents biographical information on the Marshallese speakers consulted for
this project, a brief description of other scholarly work on Marshallese and an outline of
the dissertation.
1.1 Introduction to the Marshallese language
Marshallese is an Oceanic language of the Micronesian sub-branch of the Austronesian
language family and is spoken in the pacific islands nation of the Republic of the
Marshall Islands (RMI). Its location is circled in Figure 1. There are about 62,000 native
speakers of Marshallese in the RMI and in the US (The World Factbook 2008).
2