Syntax of Lakhota Sentence from "Lakota Eyapaha"

[shokooh Ingham]

This is a bit like the use of -tkha following a verb as in wai-kte -tkha 'I should have gone' or wowas^i echamuN-tkha 'I used to work', where the sentences seem to have an elided sentence following them ie 'I was going to go, but (I didn't)' or 'I worked, but (I've stopped now)'.  It seems less easy to distinguish subordinating from non subordinating conjunctions in Lakota since upi k'uN hehan inkiyayapi 'when they came we went away' and upi na hehan unkiyayapi 'they came and then we went away' are not as easily differentiated from each other syntactically because you can also have upi hehan unkiyayapi which might be translated either way.  I suppose it is also a characterstic of what is esentially an unwritten language, since you don't have to decide where the sentences begin and end.
Bruce

willemdereuse at unt.edu wrote: I do not think we need to consistently distinguish sentence final 
particle from conjunction in the case of an element like eyas^.  Lakota 
conjunctions tend to be phonologically clause-final anyway, rather than 
elements right in between two clauses. There is only one eyas^; no 
syntactic change in progress needs to be postulated.  If the 
conjunction is final some degree of ellipsis can be assumed.  You have 
the same thing in very colloquial English. To retranslate Regina's 
examples: "I'm walking in a spiritual way; I'm blind in one eye, 
but..." "Maybe someone has arrived, but..." It is easier, and less 
colloquial, to do this in Lakota, because there need not be an 
intonational break or comma between the eyas^ and the preceding clause.

Willem

Quoting Clive Bloomfield :

> Hello Regina, First of all, many thanks for those enlightening &  
> subtle comments, as well as for the extra data.
> Your second example is most intriguing! Is "eyas^" there on its way  
> to becoming a sentence-final (adverbial?) particle, (in addition to  
> the more usual conjunctional use), I wonder?
> Presumably also some degree of Ellipsis is operative? (e.g. a  
> suppressed concessive clause, or such.)
>
> On 14/06/2007, at 5:46 PM, REGINA PUSTET wrote:
>
>> Sentence-final eyas^ occurs in my data also. It imposes a  
>> concessive meaning that is sometimes hard to capture in  
>> translations. In
>>
>> wakhaN-yaN    ma-wa-ni                  is^ta  ma- sanila            
>>        eyas^.
>> spiritual-ADV  walk-1SG.AG-walk  eye  1SG.PAT-one+sided  EYAS^
>> 'I'm walking in a spiritual way, although I'm blind on one eye
>>
>> 'although' works as a translation. The next example is a tougher case:
>>
>> tuwa         lel    hi        sece      eyas^.
>> someone  here  arrive  maybe  EYAS^
>> 'Maybe someone has arrived'
>>
>> Here eyas^ implies that the arrival of 'someone' should have been  
>> noticed by the speaker. A more literal translation of your example  
>> might be something like 'although I have dealt with this in great  
>> detail [continuative -haN intensifies action] (and I actually  
>> should have encountered problems), I think it is easy to do'.
>> iNs^e is an attenuating particle that can be translated by 'just'  
>> or 'maybe' in many cases.
>> BTW: is there a typo in kechámiN ? I'm familiar with the form  
>> kechaNmi for 'I think that' only.
>>
>> Regina




       
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