TriCons Notes: outline

[qiihoskeh]

outline for TriCons morphology -- I will continue to edit this post.

The 1st argument is indicated by some kind of suffix: either a case suffix, a personal suffix, =infinitive, or =adverbial. Divalent words (may) have personal prefixes for the 2nd argument. Trivalent words have a 3rd argument, whose marker isn't determined yet.

Trivalent auxiliaries need 2 stems:

1. the infinitive coreferences the 1st argument


2. the infinitive coreferences the 2nd argument

Derivations

• Verboids


• Nominoids
  • patient (uses affix)
  
  
  • agent (uses affix)
  
  
  • instrument (uses affix)
  
  
  • location (uses affix)
  
  
  • characterized by (multiple?)


• Adjectoids
  • resulting state
  
  
  • ready state

Verboid Forms

Finite Verbs

suffix: personal
voice: no inverse; valence-reducing voices (reflexive, passive, antipassive) marked by prefix.
aspect: perfective, imperfective, ???
mood: indicative, subjunctive, imperative (perfective only), contrafactual?

Infinitives or Gerunds

suffix: =infinitive
voice: active, inverse; valence-reducing voices (reflexive, passive, antipassive) marked by prefix.
aspect: perfective, imperfective, ???
mood: not distinguished.

Any argument of a gerund would take the genitive case, while those of an infinitive take the same case as that of a finite verb. Possibly, the stem of an infinitive is the same as that of the finite verbs, with the =infinitive suffix being a coreferential personal marker. An infinitive clause would then be a subordinate clause minus the Subordinate Clause Initiator (which might be from an indefinite pronoun with objective case).

Participles

suffix: case
voice: active, inverse; valence-reducing voices (reflexive, passive, antipassive) marked by prefix.
aspect: perfective, imperfective, ???
mood: not distinguished, although indicative/subjunctive distinction would be desirable.

Prepositions

suffix: =adverbial
voice: active, inverse; valence-reducing voices (reflexive, passive, antipassive) marked by prefix.
aspect: not distinguished.
mood: not distinguished.

Nominoid and Adjectoid Forms

Noun/adjective forms take case suffixes. There are either copular (verb) forms or a copula (used with the objective case). Neither distinguishes aspect or mood. There might be inverse forms for divalent nominoids.

Affixes

Case Suffixes

Abs /u:/ absolutive
Erg /A:/ ergative
Ins /a/ instrumental
Obj /i:/ objective (3rd argument if trivalent verb, may be 2nd argument of divalent verb)
Gen /o:/ genitive (2nd argument of noun or adjective)
Voc /e:/ vocative

The 1st argument of all verbs is absolutive, except that some verbs allow an ergative argument instead. Any 2nd argument of those verbs that allow this is objective and of those that don't it's ergative, for which an instrumental can be used instead. The 3rd argument of a trivalent verb is always objective.

The auxiliary marker replaces that corresponding to the objective case argument.

Number

Plural nouns either add a plural marker or replace the derivational marker. Adjectives don't distinguish singular and plural.

Personal Affixes

Location is either proximal, distal, or proximal + associated distal entities. Number isn't distinguished for the last of these, which is marked by /i/. Singular is /u/ and plural is /a/. Exception: 1st person (exclusive) (proximal) singular is /ma/.

Note that these phoneme assignments may change.

1X /m/ 1st person eXclusive: no distal, no proximal plural
2X /t/ 2nd person eXclusive: no distal
2N /ts/ 2nd person iNclusive: no distal
3A 3rd person Animate: /k/ is proximal and /y/ is distal
3I 3rd person Inanimate: /dj/ is proximal and /l/ is distal, number not distinguished
Un /n/ Unspecified argument: no distinctions, no phrase can appear
Ex /q/ Explicit argument: no distinctions except in phrase, which must appear
IR? /w/ ??? (possibly infinitive/coreference): one form for all

Voice Prefixes

These replace the personal prefix and reduce the valence.

Rfx /r/ Reflexive
Pas / / Passive voice
AnP / / Antipassive voice

The antipassive prefix deletes the original 1st argument and makes the original 2nd argument the 1st argument.