Moro Cases (was Re: some of... vs. some... et al.)

Tom wrote:
<<
Actually, quite a few head-marking languages do precisely
this.  Since core arguments are cross-referenced on the
verb, you don't need to mark them on the dependent nouns.
Thus, in Meskwaki and Nahuatl, locatives and vocatives
have case suffixes for NPs, but otherwise NPs are entirely
devoid of case-marking.  So, the next question would be:
is Moro a head-marking language?
 >>

Uh...head-marking?  I've never been good at this.  Here's
a big NP:

ej jamala iki jeb@tSo
/all PLU.-camel this CONC.-white/

[CONC. means "concord": Adjectives agree with nouns in class.]

That's "all these white camels".  Now, if you wanted to say
"next to all these white camels", you'd say...

ej jamalanano iki jeb@tSo
/all PLU.-camel-LOC. this CONC.-white/

That's head-marking, right?  (Not that I'm trying to get you
to do my work for me...)  Dependent-marking would be if
the case got tagged onto the adjective, right?

Oh, wait, no, that has to do with verbs.  Yes, in Moro, subject
and object (and, for some reason, I don't think we've tried
indirect objects.  I've got to pencil in the word "give" for next
session...) are marked on the verb.  I can't give you any examples,
because I never paid much attention to the verbs, since my
job is noun cases and adpositions...  :*(

Something like...

udZi ga-n-fo ege
man SBJ.(animate class)-object-hit house
"The man hit the house."

Don't know about that "n", but something like that.  So,
yeah, I guess it does make sense.  But why have special
cases for proper names only?  That's something I've only
seen in, say, languages of the Philippine type, but in those
there are just two different sets of markers: One for nouns,
and one for proper names.  In other words, nouns are
marked.  Why only mark proper names, if you can get
by just fine without it?

Anyway, thanks for your input, Tom!  It'd be nice to
have a linguist in our class helping us out. ;)  j/k

-David

Reply