Tense, aspect and time in Siouan.

[ROOD DAVID S]

from David Rood:

On Thu, 22 Jun 2000, R. Rankin wrote:

> It looks to me as though there may be a perfect and
> an imperfect, both derived from *?uN 'do' ultimately.  It may be that
> only one of the two is found in a given language, or we may yet discover
> both throughout Mississippi Valley Siouan (tho' with all the work that's
> been done on Dakotan, I tend to doubt that, since someone would have
> probably spotted it).

You give us too much credit, I fear -- we all tend to revere Boas and
Deloria enough to fail to ask questions they didn't answer already, and
real discourse studies are scarce.  Also, I think the fact that the
distinction is likely marked by particles makes it probable that the
marking is optional -- if the meaning is clear from context, don't mention
it.  Another topic to put in the "things we really ought to look at "
list.
	This suggestion takes me back to the observation that k?uN and ?uN
are sometimes in apparent free variation as clause-finals.  I don't
believe there is any such thing as free variation between particles like
that, just opaque linguists; maybe this is a clue we could follow to try
to elucidate the difference here.  I'm intrigued by the gaN/aN variation
in Omaha now, too.
	David