Serial verbs with motion verb.

[Claire Bowern]

Hi everyone,
A couple of people have asked for more explicit data on the Titan serial
verb problem (sorry, should have provided this first!)

"Taru    ka   la suari    ni   kile Palitawi!"
1dl.inc hort go pull_out fish fut-to P
(I.13.4)

"Let's go to Palitawi and catch fish." (they've caught all the fish on
Nauna, so they need to go _to P_ and catch fish).

and another:

I   la    tawi manaon  ile ngai.
3sg go lay  egg     n.fut-into  cave
"She [a turtle] went into a cave and laid her eggs."  (I.3.2)

ile and kile are the same thing (one in future tense, but that's another
story..). It always involves motion; there's another preposition, (k)ila,
for 'at'. I believe the first example would be well-formed if it were _taru
ka la ni kila e P_, where it would mean 'let's go and catch fish at P.'

So, the problem is that the PPs are governed by only one verb in the VP.
That, I suppose, is understandable (but a bit odd) if one considers these
sorts of nuclear serial verb constructions uniclausal and semantically
unitary. The weird thing about these Titan verbs is that the first verb in
this sort of serial verb construction (SVC from now on) is restricted to
about 6 motion and position verbs. They are highly grammaticalised, to the
extent that I am seriously considering not calling them SVCs at all, but
auxiliaries + main verb. There are "SVCs" with  _la_, for example, in which
there is no motion, but the _la_ denotes progressive aspect. So, it seems
very odd to me that these forms can be highly semantically bleached/altered
yet still govern arguments in the clause (and these and other examples make
it clear that it;s the first verb of the SVC, not the second, that's
governing these arguments/adjuncts).

Joel mentioned Loniu. Joel - I have a copy of both of Patricia Hamel's
works that you mention. I haven't read them recently but I have a strong
memory of the equivalent Loniu constructions being a bit different. They
have the same thing, with la as a quasi-auxiliary (and as a
quasi-preposition), but I think I would want to argue that both
constructions have been further bleached in this dialect of Titan than in
Loniu. I'll check again and report back.

Thanks to everyone who's sent emails. I probably just need more data. I
don't suppoe there's anyone heading off to the Admiralties in the next few
months?..

Claire


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