Algonquian Parellel? Muskogean Parallel?

Koontz John E John.Koontz at colorado.edu
Tue Oct 1 23:38:00 UTC 2002


It occurs to me that I've heard of a class of verbs in Algonquian
languages that are similar to Omaha-Ponca (et al.) 'to lack; not to have'.
The characteristic of 'to lack; not to have' is that it takes two
arguments, but only the person lacking the thing can be non-third person
and govern concord, at least as I have encountered the verb.

Thus, with made up examples:

neghe=the aNdhiNge
pot   the I don't have

neghe=the dhidhiNge
pot   the you don't have

neghe=the dhiNga=i
pot   the he doesn't have

But:

*I don't have you.
*He doesn't have you.

Aside from the wrinkle that the inflectional prefixes are patient (object,
stative)  forms, which leads to a sort of experiencer analysis ('me
lacketh' or 'I lack' rather than 'I don't have'), this reminds me of
certain Algonquian transitive stems I've heard of that agree only with the
subject, not the object.  (I hope it was that way, and not the reverse!)
Were these called pseudo-intransitives or pseudo-transitives?  Or maybe
half(-assed) transitives?

Is there a parallel in Muskogean, too?  I seem to recall reading that
Chickasaw (?) had a class of experiencer verbs in addition to a more or
less Siouan-ish active/stative/transitive pattern.  I hope I'm not
hallucinating this ...

Oh, did I say that out loud?



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