(not so) Silly terminological question.

[ROOD DAVID S]

Bob has raised an important issue that needs some thought.  John's
"applicative" answer is ok, except that it also applies to the real
locatives -- adding "a-" or "o-" to a verb often changes its argument
options, just as i- does.  The term "applicative" refers to the function of
the morpheme, not its meaning.  I think Bob is looking for a meaningful
abbreviation that will separate the i- from a- and o- as well as from ka,
yu, ya, etc.

I have always been comfortable with lumping the i-instrumental with the
locatives and remarking that the label doesn't cover the full range of the
forms, but I know others don't like that kind of non-mnemonic labeling.
We could try something like "inst" vs. "instr", I suppose.

David


David S. Rood
Dept. of Linguistics
Univ. of Colorado
Campus Box 295
Boulder, CO 80309-0295
USA
rood at colorado.edu

On Tue, 4 Dec 2001, Koontz John E wrote:

> On Tue, 4 Dec 2001, Rankin, Robert L wrote:
> > In interlinear translations I mark these latter as INSTR.  But then what do
> > I do with the former type?  It distributes like the locatives, but it isn't
> > a locative.  Sometimes I've called the "instrumentive", which sounds silly
> > and is confusing to boot.  I'm just revising a paper in which I have to
> > solve this problem.  Anyone have an opinion??
>
> In a general way and in terms of specific use it might be called (an/the)
> applicative, it seems to me.  I can understand that this might not appeal
> to everyone.  It's not an applicative in the purest sense of inducing verb
> (personal) concord, but it does figure in the verb form and it does
> indicate means.  In OP i- can govern an NP complement and is the vicar of
> the uN construction in Dakotan.
>
> I actually think that the i- (or some of the homophones that occupy the
> same slot) does (or do) act as a locative in a general way,
>
> I'm thinking of instances like:
>
> i'/bahaN 'to think'
> i'/dhe 'to talk of, to promise'
>
> but one might also wonder about i- on
>
> a) positionals (idhaN, ithe, ihe), and
>
> b) one of the derived numeral types (i-NUMERAL and we-NUMERAL) - I forget
> which (ordinal?).
>
> Of course, like applicative, locative has narrower and wider meanings.
>
> How about i- in idha- (cf. Da iya-) and udhu (cf. Da iyo-)?
>
>