Working Paper on Irrealis, Imperative Mode and Complementation ...

on the point of Ø-pinch neck-pro3 Br’er heron by-OBL-DIS-DEF crab
“On the point of being pinched the neck of the heron by the crab...”
Here we find an unmarked monomorphemic base (supit, pinch) whose complement
(tӗnggӗknya si baka, the neck of the heron) is a patient, while the agent is expressed in a byphrase
(de-nikang yuyu, “by the crab”). Once again we appear to see here a feature of nonformal
languages, where the semantic role of the major complement of a VP can be in
unmarked form without any loss of meaning. This contrast of a linkage of morphological
cross-referencing with formal language, and a relative lack of morphological marking with
non-formal speech has been the subject of numerous articles on Malay by Geoffrey
Benjamin. In his paper of (1993) he speaks of a contrast between a “condensed”mode of
langauge that is also “event-focussed” and to be associated with the pragmatic concerns of
everyday life. He contrasts this with an “articulated” mode that is “participant-focussed”,
typical of high status or “standard” varieties of language usually associated with the political
center, and (for Malay) marked by a reliance on voice-marking and related morphology that
plays a much stronger role in the “articulated” mode than in ‘everyday speech’.
115)
lah wus mangko tӗkeng talaga in-uwa(a)akӗn-a
EMPH PERF now-MED arrive-LOC-DEF lake UV2-release-Tr2-IRR
gulu mami de-nta
neck pro1-poss by-pro2
“Now then, (we have) already arrived now at the lake, let my neck be released by you.”
In (113) we saw a case where what appears to be a (negative) direct imperative (aywa salahakӗn,
don’t do wrong) takes a patient argument as its main complement, but is devoid of
(primary) voice-marking morphology. In this example the complement of the irrealis form
uwakӗna is a patient (gulu mami, my neck) and the erstwhile agent is (again) expressed in a
by-phrase (de-nta, by you). In this case we can read uwakӗna as an irrealis form with “mild
imperative” force, and can thus make a more “traditional” analysis based on deletion of the
UV2 marker under conditions of irrealis. However, the prevalence of unmarked
monomorphemic bases in samples that appear to reflect the patterns of “ordinary speech”
means that we may be over-interpreting here, and that the uwakӗna should be analyzed as Øuwa-Tr2-IRR.
The problem that arises here brings to mind Kroeger’s (1998:5) objections to some parts of
Foley’s (1998) argument for a “cross-linguistic correlation between [...] two properties, i.e.
pre-categorial roots and symmetric voice systems”:
T. Hunter, ISLOJ <strong>Working</strong> <strong>Paper</strong>, 29 May 09, page 50