postposition on finite verb forms?

[Claire Bowern]

Just to add to the pool of examples where "postpositions" occur on fully
finite verbs. In the languages of the Nyulnyulan family (NW Australia)
the applicative marker is historically the instrumental case marker
(*-ngany). The  applicative has either grammaticalised quite recently or
is still closely associated with the instrumental, In Western Nyulnyulan
there is a sound change -ny > zero / _# which affects the instrumental
suffix. It also affects the applicative, even though the applicative has
other morphology after it and so isn't (usually) word final.

Some examples (note that there are two applicatives, which have
different relative placement in the morphology, both of the form -nga).

roowil innyana
walk 3-tr(pst)-'catch'-remote past

"he/she walked"

roowil innyanang
walk 3-tr(pst)-'catch'-rem past-applic
"he/she walked with someone."

(More examples and discussion than anyone would ever need are available
in my dissertation on the history of Nyulnyulan verb morphology. Please
email me offlist if you would like a copy.)
Claire



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Dr Claire Bowern
Linguistics, Rice University
Houston TX