Chapter 6: Tense, aspect and mood

form and distribution, also suggest a considerable time depth for the Enindhilyakwa suffix, and
possibly a relationship with the Yolngu suffix.
6.8 Summary
The Enindhilyakwa TAM system consists of six main conjugational classes, characterised by
formally distinct pairs of non-past and past suffixes. The tense suffixes simultaneously encode
aspect: the NP2 and P2 suffixes are aspectually neutral, whereas the NP1 and P1 tense suffixes
describe an event as atomic - that is, as telic, instantaneous and without proper subparts. Aspect is
neutralised in the negated past, and a separate NP3 suffix is used for the negated non-past.
Mood is encoded through a combination of prefixes and suffixes. For example, a judgment of
(un)desirability (deontic mood) may be expressed by combining realis prefixes and non-past
suffixes. A consequence of this composite system is that many prefix and suffix combinations are
ambiguous between a non-modal and a modal reading (as is the case for many other non-Pama-
Nyungan languages with systems of composite mood marking). The intended meaning has to
come from the context.
Irrealis prefixes combined with P2 suffixes are used in negated past clauses (combined with
negative particle nara), and to express foreclosed past counterfactuals. This could mean that the
same construction is used for negated past events (‘I didn’t…’) and for negative past deontic
constructions (‘I shouldn’t have…’), as happens in for instance Murrinh-Patha - though this
ambiguity has not been tested for Enindhilyakwa.
The very common but elusive -ma ~ -mvrra suffix that follows the tense/aspect inflection was
argued to be a first person focalisation marker. It is used when the speakers wants to convey that a
proposition is his or her observation, perception, opinion, and so on. Consequently, the suffix is
particularly common (but optional) with first person subjects or objects, in narratives where the
speaker was an eyewitness to the scene he or she describes, and in elicited sentences. This suffix is
obligatory in the negated non-past and on the verb in a subordinate clause. Here the suffix is
bleached of its meaning. The suffix is blocked in conditional subordinate clauses marked by LOC
case -manja, on nominalised verbs, on verbs marked with the PURP clitic =yadha, and in the
negated past - all of which express unrealised events.
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