Pronouns: temporal paradigms

[Matthew Dryer]

This isn't exactly what Dan was asking for, but Cebuano has a set of
demonstrative words that function as predicates and that vary for four
possible values of distance, based on the four possible combinations of
+/-near speaker, +/-near hearer, which also vary for tense (past vs.
present vs. future), with meanings like "X is here".  They are also used in
combination with locative expressions to predicate location.  Thus "He is
in Manila" will employ the appropriate demonstrative word (such as the one
for not near speaker and not near hearer, if neither of them is in Manila).
Interestingly, verbs in Cebuano do not vary for tense, so these
demonstrative words are clearly not verbs (although they occur in the
predicate position in which verbs appear).  This set of words also includes
three interrogative words, one for each tense (e.g. "Where was he?")  See
Wolff (1966: 42) for details.

Wolff, John V. 1966.  Beginning Cebuano, Part 1.    New Haven: Yale
University Press.

Matthew Dryer