WA- once more.

R. Rankin rankin at ku.edu
Thu Jan 15 17:46:33 UTC 2004


> Is this all correct?  If so, is it the same across Dhegiha?

As far as I know, it's the same across Dhegiha.

While I'm very hesitant to relate wa- '3pl indef.' to wa-a- '1st pl patient', it
remains a possibility.  In French, for example, the 3rd person impersonal
pronoun "on" [oN] meaning 'one', as in 'one doesn't speak unless spoken to', has
become the de-facto 1st plural pronoun for a majority of French speakers in both
France and Canada.  It is simply replacing "nous" in the subject role.  It
continues to be used with 3rd person verb agreement.  So 'impersonal'  >  '1st
pl' isn't out of the question at all.

Synchronically they've split however.



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