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2.1.2. Emphatic determiners

In addition to their regular forms, the independent determiners also have emphatic forms, which are given below:

These determiners mark the noun phrase as having special emphasis. They are generally used when the noun phrase occurs before the verb, in either the high or low focus position (sections 5.3 and 5.4). Note that, unlike the non-emphatic independent determiners, the emphatic determiners are not marked for case (and do not trigger oblique case agreement on a following noun; section 2.2.3). The case of a noun phrase headed by an emphatic determiner must be inferred from context.

Some examples of emphatic determiners are given below:

Akyini uslulhkà suklut
2p:Emph finish-must-3sI:Abs work
"It's you who must finish the work"

Ma ani Elim kuoponun inlotka
1s:Erg 3sA:Emph Elim talk:with-Past yesterday
"It's Elim who I talked to yesterday"

Emphatic determiners are frequently used to indicate a contrast between two noun phrases:

Tun ami uimotini Sakial, usna tietu atioi
not 1s:Emph love-Neg-3sA:NA Sakial, but only Refl:Emph
"Sakial doesn't love me, but only himself"

Noun phrases headed by emphatic determiners may be used as utterances by themselves, which serve to call attention to, or assert the existence of, a particular individual:

Miò'n lhoma? Ami!
who-Qu be:there? 1s:Emph
"Who's there? It's me!"

2.1.3. Clitic determiners

Besides the full forms of the determiners discussed above, there are also clitic (suffixed) determiners. These attach to the end of a predicate - a noun, verb, or preposition - when the noun phrase headed by the determiner is adjacent to the predicate, and acts as one of its arguments (subject, object, possessor, etc.).

Clitic determiners form a phonological (and orthographic) word with the element they attach to, and thus cause a shift in stress:

te hálma "the book"
te halmáku "your book"

Note that only one clitic may attached to a given predicate. If a particular predicate has two following arguments which are each headed by a determiner, only the closer of the two determiners will attach to the predicate:

Na mikal uthmeni moihai mo halma
3sA:Erg boy give-Cpl-3sA:NA girl-Dat 3sN:Abs book
"The boy gave the girl a book"

Na mikal uthmemu halma inai moihai
3sA:Erg boy give-Cpl-3sN:Abs book 3sA:Dat girl-Dat
"The boy gave a book to the girl"

The above two examples show that either -ni (the clitic form of inai) or -mu (the clitic form of mo) may be attached to the verb uthme "gave", but not both.

There are two sets of clitic determiners, which I will call the absolutive (Abs) set and the non-absolutive (NA) set.

(1) The absolutive (Abs) clitics are as follows:

Absolutive clitics are mostly found on verbs, where they indicate the absolutive argument (the intransitive subject or transitive object) of the verb. Note that clitics are attached to the verb after any tense/aspect, negation, or order suffixes (see 3.1):

Na Han kahteme
3sA:Erg Han hit-Cpl-1s:Abs
"Han hit me"

Na Han kahteke
3sA:Erg Han hit-Cpl-2s:Abs
"Han hit you"

Na Han kahtekim
3sA:Erg Han hit-Cpl-1p:Abs
"Han hit us"

Na Han kahtemu
3sA:Erg Han hit-Cpl-3sN:Abs
"Han hit (some)one"

Na Han kahtemu ikei (= kahte + mo ikei)
3sA:Erg Han hit-Cpl-3sN:Abs dog
"Han hit a dog"

Note that the third person specific endings have two forms: The full forms -ne, -se, and -te are used after a consonant, while the reduced forms -n, -s, and -t are used after a vowel. E.g. the full forms are used after the past tense suffix -un, while the reduced forms are used after the completive suffix -e:

[to be continued]

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Section 2.1 continued.