The Folk Biology of the Tobelo People - Smithsonian Institution ...

NUMBER 34 31
Reasons for not considering semantic relations among classes
in die typology proposed wiU be enumerated. Finally, some of
die non-lexemic ways of disambiguating polysemous Tobelo
terms wiU be reviewed.
3.2.1 Words and Phrasal Lexemes
Lexemes may be immediately subdivided into two types:
words (word lexemes) and phrases (phrasal lexemes), each
subdivided into odier types based on morphologicaUy and
syntactically acceptable ways to form compound words or
phrases (see diagram below). This immediately raises die
question of how one recognizes word boundaries in Tobelo.
Almost all Tobelo words are eitiier nouns or verbs. The former
are recognized by a noun marker (o or ma)', die latter have
minimally eitiier a passive prefix or one prefix from eitiier of
two sets of nine subject prefixes (most verb roots can take both
sets of subject prefixes as weU as many more affixes in this
highly synthetic language).
When Tobelo who have learned to write Indonesian turn to
writing Tobelo, tiiey, themselves, like Dutch translators of
Bible stories (Nederlandsch Bijbelgenootschap, 1905; G. EUen,
1933) have great difficulty consistendy separating die chain of
spoken morphs into written words. Often (perhaps on die
analogy of Indonesian subject pronouns?) die subject prefixes
(not other prefixes) are written as separate words, except when
tiiey are elided before some vowels. The o and ma nounmarkers
are very often written as prefixes (if this transcription
is accepted, tiiey would be die only prefixes tiiat did not elide
like die otiiers).
In general, we can consider aU root words plus verb affixes
Simple
(word)
Lexeme
to be single words (verbs). We can also consider tiiat all
particles that (1) can elide eitiier with the verb or witii an affix
that elides witii the verb, or (2) can come between two such
eliding particles or between such a particle and die verb root
are affixes (ratiier than separate words) with respect to the word
boundaries of the verb. As described more fuUy elsewhere
(Taylor, 1984a), die locative pronouns such as -ika 'in a yonder
direction' and -oko 'in a seaward direction' are here considered
suffixes witii respect to the word boundaries of die verb.
In general we may also consider tiiat a noun is the unit that
takes a noun marker (o or ma) or one of the possessive
pronouns. Nouns can then be consistently written as words.
Noun phrases of more tiian a single noun can be recognized
because (unlike compound words) tiiey have complete verbs,
participials, locative and otiier participials or other nouns (with
their own noun-markers) in diem. Thus constructions like o
wakomumu (< wako 'intertwine [vb.]' + mumu 'leaf axis [of
palm leaf]') 'hand-held lift trap for small fish made of
palm-leaf axes' will be considered a compound noun (because
mumu has no separate noun-marker and wako is incomplete
because it has no verb prefix). Compare die phrase o peda ma
hoka ma mumu (X sago-palm [poss.] leaf [poss.] leaf-axis) 'die
leaf-axis of die leaf of die sago palm.' This must be considered
a phrase, not a compound word, because tiiere are separate
possessives or noun-markers for each noun in the phrase. Here
again, the paradigm of locative morphs (-ika 'in a yonder
direction,' -oko 'in a seaward direction,' etc.) may attach to die
noun or noun phrase. When tiiey do so, however, die locatives
must be considered a separate paradigm of enclitics (not
suffixes) attached to die word (o tau-ika 'to die house') or
phrase (o tau ma ago-agom-ika 'to die big house') (see Taylor,
Word lexeme Phrasal lexeme
i
Complex
(word)
Analyzable
(word)
Endocentric
(compound)
Compound
(word)
Endocentric
(Phrasal lexeme)
Exocentric
(compound)
Exocentric
(Phrasal lexeme)