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Categories of the Noun Phrase in Jarawara

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  13 February 2001

R. M. W. DIXON
R. M. W. DIXON
Affiliation:
Research Centre for Linguistic Typology, La Trobe University, Melbourne
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Abstract

The head of an NP is taken to be that component which determines the categories of the NP as a whole. First impression of an NP in Jarawara (Arawá family, Brazil) involving inalienable possession (e.g. o-mano ‘my arm’) is that there is conflict of criteria concerning what is head. The gender of the NP, for verbal suffix agreement, is determined by the possessor (here Isg prefix o-), suggesting that this should be taken to be head. But the whole NP counts as 3rd person, for verbal prefix agreement, suggesting that the possessed noun (mano ‘arm’) should be taken as head. Furthermore, the NP counts as inanimate. Detailed analysis shows that there is in fact no conflict. All NPs in this language are 3rd person (1st and 2nd persons being confined to head marking within the predicate and functioning as possessors within an NP, not as full NPs). And all NPs involving inalienable possession count as inanimate. The only variable is gender, which is determined by the possessor; plainly, this is the unequivocal head of the NP.

Type
Research Article
Information
Journal of Linguistics , Volume 36 , Issue 3 , November 2000 , pp. 487 - 510
Copyright
2000 Cambridge University Press

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Footnotes

My greatest debt is of course to the Jarawara people who have patiently taught me their language and answered my questions – Okomobi, Mioto, Soki, Kamo, Botenawaa, Kakai, Wero and others. Alan Vogel is collaborating with me on a grammar of Jarawara and has discussed with me many times the matters dealt with in this paper. Dan Everett helped to articulate the problem, back in 1993. As always, Alexandra Aikhenvald has encouraged this work, and helped me to improve it by her critical and constructive comments.Abbreviations used in this paper are: A, transitive subject function; AUX, auxiliary; DEC, declarative; du, dual; exc, exclusive non-singular; f, F, feminine; FPef, far past tense in eyewitness evidential, feminine form; FUT, future modality suffix; inan, INAN, inanimate; inc, INC, inclusive non-singular; INTERROG, interrogative; IPem, immediate past tense in eyewitness evidential, masculine form; m, M, masculine; NP, noun phase; n-sg, N-SG, non-singular; O, transitive object function; Oc, prefix marking an O-construction where both A and O arguments are 3rd person; PERI, postposition marking peripheral function; PL, pl, plural; POSS, possessive; PN, (inalienably) possessed noun; S, transitive subject function; sg, SG, singular. In all examples the predicate is enclosed between braces, {…}, and NPs within square brackets, […].