Compounding

Compounding is another morphological process for deriving nouns in Tinrin. Compounds are a type of word structure made up of two or more constituents, each belonging to a category of nominals or verbs (cf. Selkirk 1982). The compound itself is either a noun or a verb. These constituents cannot be separated by any modifier, nor can either of them take individual adjuncts.

A compound noun normally consists of a nominal on the left and a nominal or verb on the right. Only a few compound nouns have a verb as their initial element.

The nominal on both left and right can be either free form or bound form. When the nominal on the right is the bound form, the compound itself is also a bound form.

When the left element is a bound form or when the last syllable of the left element is dropped when compounded, the parts of the compound are bound to each other as a single phonological unit. In this case, the primary accent normally falls on the first syllable of the compound (e.g. mee-marri "plateau of coral")

When the first element is a free form noun or a verb, the initial syllables of each constituents normally bear primary accent (e.g. w? asü "a kind of banana with red fruit").

There are a variety of syntactic relationships possible between the constituents. However, there seems to be always the head - modifier relation in them. The compound is left headed, with the right component defining the nature, quality or contents of the referent on the left.

The meaning of a compound sometimes does not reflect the sum of the meanings of its parts (e.g. verre wäwarra (special stone, mouse) "groin").

4.3.1 Nominal compounds

The vast majority of compound nouns have a construction with the first element as a nominal.

(A) Compounds formed with a free common noun as the first element <free common noun + free common noun>

wasaa huarri (reed, a kind of bird) "a swamp reed" f5 mwämwä (genre, great hut, meeting place) "a clan" verre wäwarra (special stone, mouse) "groin"

wi asü (banana, sun) "a kind of banana with red fruit"

The derived nouns with the prefix nri- can also be the first element of compound nouns, with the second element being the semantic subject/object of the verbal stem of the first element.

nri-pwo asu (settling place, sun) "sunny place" nri-bwerri asü (marking place, sun) "time of the day"

nri-bwerri pue nrorro (marking place, site, five) "special five days of a person who prays for rain" (he has to hide himself for five days)"

< free common noun + bound noun>

6 asirri hi-nri (pot, three, leg-3sg) "three legged pot" < free common noun + verb>

fo fadro (genre, walk) "companion"

moo fadro (a kind of native money, walk) "present, offering"

(B) Compounds formed with bound noun as the initial element

In the following words, the two (or three) parts of the compound are linked closely to form a single phonological unit, with the first element being a bound form noun, (and the second, if there are three parts).

<bound form noun + free common noun>

pwö-nraa (package-straw) "straw ridging of the house" 6-mwa (head-house) "conch of the summit of house" fwii-trorrodri (excrement-bee) "honey"

no-saa (bone-one) "mountain range" noo-hau (spine-demon) "a kind of ivy" wave-ko (joint-message) "word" mehi-mwie (finger-woman) "thumb"

be-ta (arm-taro) "mourning" (people put this on when they are in mourning.) be-trujti (arm-sea) "seaside"

In the following compounds, the last syllable of the first element is either dropped or loses its length, when compounded.

puu-mou (puue fishing net-small mesh) "net with small mesh"

6-hüüdrü (ögi bark-niaouli) "bark of niaouli (indigenous eucalyptus)" me-hi (mee edge-leg) "finger"

(they form a bound form compound)

pwö-pwe-örrö- (package-testicle-penis) "penis sheath" virri-6- (shell-head) "skull"

virri-hi- (shell-leg) "nail"

nrifo-pe- (mouth-buttocks) "anus"

üü-mäa- (base-thigh) "the upper part of thigh" nö-be-(bone-arm) "bone of wing or arm" wa-mee-fwii- (hair-edge-excrement) "tail" waa-tra- (root-blood) "vein"

üü-be- (base-arm) "shoulder" wave-hi- (joint-leg) "ankle"

erre-kö-/herre-kö- (content-message) "content of message" cbound form noun + quantifier

mee-saa (edge- one) "spear with one point at the end" cbound form noun + verb>

(last two words are link nouns)

mee-mani (edge-be dry) "plateau of coral" mee-dri (edge-be damp) "spring"

mee-tri (edge-to thrust in) "spear with many points at the end" herre-kari(content-to hunt) "meat"

püü-maa (buttock-be red) "poisonous spider" hirre-fadro (teammate-to walk) "companion" erre-iga (content-to dream) "dream"

erre-havari (content-to say right) "good reason" troö-hara (back-to eat) "afternoon, after eating" no-ma-(liquid-to urinate) "urine"

no-ti-(liquid-to suck) "milk"

(C) Compounds formed with location noun as the initial element clocation noun + free form noun>

dro-mwä (surface-house) "roof'

nrfnäwä-hörrö (between-sacred) "week"

clocation noun + bound form noun> (they form a bound form compound) padrerre-wejö-(side-nose) "wings of the nose"

nrüwü-wejö- (inside-nose) "nostrils" nrüwü-hi- (inside-leg) "sole of the foot" nrinäwä-hi- (between-foot) "step"

(D) Compounds formed with possessive classifiers as the initial or second element ere-föku (food-trap) "bait"

ere-di (food-to fish) "bait"

Compound formation with a verb as the initial element is not used productively. The only such forms attested are:

<verb + (bound form noun) + free form noun >

ii mwa (to fly, house) "beams, timbers used for the house" seraa be-ta(to discard, arm-taro) "dance of dead people" seghe gä (to injure, colour) "tatoo"

nrü fao (to release, iron) "telephone" <verb + verb>

ha savaa (to speak, to defend) "law" n juo (to dance, to sit) "sitting dance" go vürrü (to crawl, to climb) "a grub"

Chapter 5

Verb Morphology

Verbs in Tinrin (which are discussed as a word class in 3.2) can be either

morphologically simple or morphologically complex. The latter can be derived by the processes of prefixation, suffixation, reduplication or compounding. Prefixation and suffixation are used very productively in the derivation of new stems, but reduplication is restricted to some isolated stems.

5.1 Prefixation

There are a number of prefixes (either productive or non-productive) involved in the derivation of Tinrin verbs. These prefixes can be classified into three groups:

1) causative prefix fa-

2) condition/stative prefix o-

3) classificatory prefixes, either indicating the mode/cause of action or event or indicating the manner of action or motion

The first two prefixes may be called modal prefixes, as they are used to express cause and condition/state. They are distinguished from the third group, classificatory prefixes, not only on semantic grounds, but also in that they derive particular types of verbs from other verbs or nouns. Classificatory prefixes are mostly prefixed to bound form verb stems, as exemplified in section 5.1.3.1 below. Also, modal prefixes can be affixed to a verb which has a classificatory prefix, but classificatory prefixes cannot be affixed to a verb which is prefixed with fa- or o~. For example, o-e-ghe <condition-by teeth-injured> "be rough", fa-e-ghe <CAUS-by teeth-injured> "to get someone bitten"; but *e-fa-me <by teeth-CAUS-die> "to kill by biting", ta-fa-si <hitting-CAUS-go> "to chase" is an exceptional case in which the order of a classificatory prefix and causative prefix is inverted. Causative prefix fa- can also be prefixed to derived verbs with the prefix o-: fa-o-tarragho <CAUS-condition-mud> "to soil".

5.1.1 Causative prefix/a-28

This is a very productive prefix, which can be prefixed to almost any verb, either intransitive or transitive.

Verbs prefixed with this fa- tend to have explicit objects, though not necessarily. (A) fa- prefixed to intransitive verbs

When fa- is prefixed to intransitive verbs, it transitivizes them. The derived form will generally have the sense referred to as the "corresponding transitive" (Masica

1976:46) such as English rise > raise, fall > drop (tr). However, fa- always preserves the possibility of indirect causation, which will be referred to later.

In this construction, the subject of the intransitive verb becomes the object of the derived verb, and the causer NP is added as an agent.

S > 0

döwö-rö "my clothes" in the following examples is the subject of the intransitive verb in (244), but becomes the object in (245):

(244) nra marri nrä döwö-rö 3sg dry sm clothes-lsg "My clothes are dry."

(245) nrä fa-marri döwö-rö nrä nanu

3sg CAUS-dry clothes-lsg sm Nanu "Nanu dries my clothes."

The newly introduced agent in this construction does not necessarily undertake an action which directly leads to the situation expressed: he may merely give an order to someone to do so, or he may do something that indirectly causes the situation, without his volition being involved. The following sentence, therefore, can be interpreted as either direct or indirect causation.

(246) wiri fa-me toni

2pl CAUS-dead Tony

"You killed Tony ./You got Tony killed./Y ou caused Tony to die."

Since the causer does not always need to have volition, the agent can be inanimate as illustrated in the following sentence:

(247) nra fa-mam dodrae nrä wanre 3sg C AUS-dry rag sm wind "The wind dried the rags."

Something (either human, animate or inanimate) which is used as an instrument can be expressed with the aid of the preposition nri.

(248) nrä fa-si busi nri traiki 3sg CAUS-go cat INST dog "He chased the cat away using the dog." other examples:

fa-fi (CAUS-go) "to chase, cause someone to go"

fa-ti (CAUS-be big) "to enlarge, respect, raise, breast feed" fa-harru (CAUS-be good) "to respect, make good"

fa-drarraa (CAUS-be large) "to enlarge,extend" fa-de (CAUS-hang down) "to hang"

fa-o-tarragho (CAUS-condition-mud) "to soil, stain" fa-taa (CAUS-be bad) "to damage, do a harm to" fa-truurro (CAUS-stand) "to stop, call a halt" fa-barra (CAUS-be afraid) "to frighten" fa-bo (CAUS-boil) "to boil, cook"

fa- sometimes makes active a base with meanings that in English are essentially passive.

fa-pwürrü (CAUS-be lost) "to lose"

fa-pöpönoo (CAUS-be surprised) "to surprise" (B) fa- prefixed to transitive verbs

When/a- is prefixed to a transitive verb, the object of the derived verb in this

construction can be either 1) the subject (agent) or 2) the object of the original transitive verb.

1) A > O

The agent of the following sentence (249) appears as object of the causative verb in (250).

(249) ke hara nraasi 2sg eat rice "You eat rice."

(250) saburina nra fa-hara nrii Sabrina 3sg CAUS-eat 2sg "Sabrina fed you."

Since the original A becomes O, the referent of the new O is always human or animate. (The original O is demoted to optional prepositional phrase, as we shall see later.)

The set of transitive verbs which occur in this type of causative construction is very restricted. It includes ingestive verbs such as hara "to eat (fruit)", ho "to eat (meat), e

"to eat (staple)", odho "to drink" and some perceptive verbs such as fwirri "to listen",

trütrüü "to see, watch" and barri "to fear". These verbs may be regarded as "half intransitive"29: the speaker’s focus is more on the subject and his activity and not so much on the object.

While trütrüü "to see, watch" belongs to this type, pee "to look, see" and jorri "to see", which are both perceptive verbs and share similar meaning, do not. When pee and

jorri are prefixed by fa-, their original objects remain objects, e.g .fa-jorri peci ei ubo

(CAUS-see paper to Ubo) "to show paper to Ubo"; fa-pee mwie ei nri (CAUS-see woman to 3sg) "to show (introduce) a woman to him".

trütrüü is distinguished from these two verbs, since the speaker’s concern is more on the activity and not the object. It can also be explained by the fact that imperative form

trütrüü "watch!" is totally acceptable, whereas jorri cannot be used in imperative mood. Verbs of this type usually involve direct causation as with intransitive verbs, though it could be indirect causation depending on the context (e.g. fa-fwirri means normally "to talk to" but it can mean "to make someone listen").

29 Masica (1976:45) suggests that ingestive verbs be regarded as occupying a halfway station between intransitive and transitive, since the object in question can frequently be dispensed with in favour o f concentration on the activity as such: one can speak o f eating, (hearing) (just as walking) as an activity.

Accordingly, the object of the original transitive verb is often suppressed; if the speaker wants to express the original verb’s object explicitly, then it can occur in an oblique case, nraasi "rice" in sentence (249) above would appear as follows: (251) saburina nrä fa-hara nrii nri nraasi

Sabrina 3sg CAUS-eat 2sg O rice "Sabrina fed you rice."

Another verb which occurs in this construction, barri "to fear" has the corresponding intransitive form, barra "be afraid". (This is the only pair of examples with

transitive/intransitive marking on the final vowel.) When the causative fa- is prefixed to barra, the original subject naturally becomes the object of the causative verb. Therefore, these two verbs derive sentences with similar meanings. Intransitive (252a) and transitive (253a) sentences derive causative constructions (252b) and (253b) respectively:

(252a) ke barra 2sg afraid "You are afraid."

(252b) nrä fa-barra nrii 3sg CAUS-afraid 2sg "He frightened/made you afraid." (253a) ke barri sibti

2sg fear rat "You fear the rat."

(253b) nrä fa-barri nrii 3sg CAUS-afraid of 2sg

"He made you afraid (of something)."

As discussed earlier (examples 248 and 251), we can add the instrumental to construction (252b), and the (original) object to construction (253b), both marked by

nri. Again, similar sentences result, such as the following. The meaning of these sentences may perhaps differ in a subtle way (as glossed here), although they seem to be used indifferently.

(254) nrä fa-barra nrii nri sibu

3sg CAUS-afraid 2sg INST rat "He frightened you with the rat."

(255) nrä fa-barri nrii nri sibu 3sg CAUS-fear 2sg O rat "He made you afraid of the rat."

2) 0>0

The majority of transitive verbs belong to this type, that is, where the original O stays as O in the derived causative constructions. The original A is deleted or occurs in the oblique case.30

30 in Fijian the first type o f causative constructions occurs with most Agent verbs (A-type verbs) and the second type with Patient verbs (O-type verbs) and some Agent verbs (Arms 1974:83).

This construction involves indirect causation: i.e. the action is performed through an intermediary agent. The following examples, (256a) as the original, and (256b)

causative, illustrate this:

(256a) nrä soghe toni nrä mwie 3sg stab Tony sm woman ”A woman stabbed Tony."

(256b) nrä fa-soghe toni nra saarri 3sg CAUS-stab Tony sm Charlie

"Charlie got Tony stabbed. (Charlie made someone stab Tony.)"

The agent of the original sentence can be expressed in the oblique case, marked by

nri, if the speaker wants to make the agent explicit.

(256c) nrä fa-soghe toni nrä saarri nri treanrii 3sg GAUS-stab Tony sm Charlie by person "Charlie got someone to stab Tony."

In the following three constructions, (257) contains an intransitive verb prefixed by

fa- and an instrumental NP, (258) contains a first-type transitive verb prefixed by fa-

and its object, and (259) contains a second-type transitive verb prefixed by fa- and its original agent, although all appear similar on the surface because the element which is optional in its new role is always marked by nri.

(257) nrä fa-marri dri-nawa nri asü 3sg CAUS-dry leaf-coconut INST sun

"He dried the coconut leaves under the sun. (using the sun)"

(258) nrä fa-ho ru nri bwö

3sg CAUS-eat(meat) ldlinc O crab "He made us eat the crab."

(259) nrä fa-fwi mwä nri toni 3sg CAUS-make house A Tony "He got the house built by Tony."

In the case of a di-transitive verb, the indirect object is marked by the dative ei in the same way as in a sentence with a non-derived verb:

(260a) nrä nrorri nraasi ei gogo 3sg give rice to Gogo "He gave rice to Gogo."

(260b) nrä fa-nroni nraasi ei gogo 3sg CAUS-give rice to Gogo "He got someone to give rice to Gogo."

It is possible to add the agent (marked by n r i) to the above sentence, either after

nraasi or gogo. It does not, however, seem to be common; maybe because this pattern of sentence is oriented to the object so that the person who actually does the action is not so important.

Other examples:

fa-wiria (CAUS-cut) "to have something cut"

fa-nyorro (CAUS-cook) "to have something cooked" fa-ta (CAUS-kill/hit) "to get someone killed or hit" fa-hodro (CAUS-bum) "to get something burnt"

5.1.2 Condition/stative prefix o-31

o- is a very productive prefix. It is normally prefixed to nouns (occasionally to verbs, too), and derives Stative verbs, indicating "be full of, be in excessive state of something, be in certain condition".

<prefixed to nouns>

o-mii (full-grass) "be overrun with grass" o-roo (full-earth) "be dirty with mud" o-arroo (condition-water) "be watery"

o-tarragho (condition-mud holes) "be muddy" o-pwove-nri (condition-piece-3sg) "be in pieces" o-tra (condition-blood) "be bloody"

<prefixed to verbs>

o-nrua (condition-be dirty) "be very dirty, be full of dirt" o-eghe (condition-to bite) "be rough"

5.1.3 Classificatory prefixes

There are a number of prefixes attested which indicate some modes/causes of the action or event expressed by the verb stem, or indicate some manner of action or motion. These prefixes may be considered as classificatory prefixes,which among Austronesian languages have been regarded by linguists as areal features of the Papuan Tip languages (Ezard 1978:1170; Bradshaw 1982:60).

Tinrin classificatory prefixes can be grouped into two sets: those indicating the mode or cause of some action or event, and those indicating manner of the action or motion.

The majority of verbs with a classificatory prefix are transitive, but not all. Some prefixes occur in both intransitive and transitive verbs e.g.fd-töghurra "to walk lame" (intr.) and fd-piri "to stamp with foot" (tr.). Prefix mi- "spontaneity" always occurs in intransitive verbs. Sometimes prefixes transitivize intransitive verb stems. This will be explained later.

Tinrin Classificatory prefixes share a common feature in that they are mostly prefixed to bound form verb stems32 which often indicate resultative states brought about by the cause or through the manner expressed by a prefix. These forms are discussed in the following section.

The possible combinations of prefixes and bound form verb stems are illustrated in the table at the end of the section.

In document A grammar of Tinrin (New Caledonia) (Page 130-139)