Berik/Grammar

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Revision as of 12:09, 13 February 2018 by Dswanso1 (talk | contribs) (Gender)

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(further formatting later)

Nouns

Nouns as suffixes

Nouns occurring as the subject of a sentence typically receive the suffix «-na». However, not every noun receives this inflection.

  • Consider the following examples where subjects receive the suffix «-na»
    • bangge<n><subj> ↔ banggena

Verbs

Number

Intransitive verbs agree with the subject for dual number by adding the pluralizer word «ge» before the verb.

  • jila<v><iv><du> ↔ ge jila
  • sofwa<v><iv><du> ↔ ge sofwa
  • nasona<v><iv><du> ↔ ge nasona
  • fina<v><iv><du> ↔ ge fina

For plurals 4 examples are given, but the pattern isn't clear.

  • jila<v><iv><pl> ↔ ge jalbili
  • sofwa<v><iv><pl> ↔ ge sofwabili
  • nasona<v><iv><pl> ↔ ge nasbawena
  • fina<v><iv><pl> ↔ ge fibili

Transitive verbs mark the number of the object.

In dual, the ending appears to be «-sona» for verbs ending in «-(b)ana», which is sometimes accompanied by a vowel change in the stem. There is not enough data to find a pattern for other types of verbs.

  • damtana<v><tv><du> ↔ domsona
  • saftana<v><tv><du> ↔ sofsona
  • nasbana<v><tv><du> ↔ nasona
  • telbese<v><tv><du> ↔ telmisi
  • wirusu<v><tv><du> ↔ wirsosa

Plural is again difficult to make out.

  • damtana<v><tv><pl> ↔ damtabili
  • saftana<v><tv><pl> ↔ saftabana
  • nasbana<v><tv><pl> ↔ nasbabili
  • telbese<v><tv><pl> ↔ telbebesi
  • wirusu<v><tv><pl> ↔ wirtababisi

Gender

Many verbs agree with the gender of the object. Some these have a regular suffix alteration between -bana and -bili