subject prefix

[John Sullivan]

Thanks Michael, this is pretty much the way I understand it. I think Andrews calls them “personal pronouns”.
John

On Mar 18, 2014, at 22:38, Michael McCafferty <mmccaffe at indiana.edu> wrote:

> John,
> 
> I understand what you're talking about in terms of the "alien"
> structure of Nahuatl, in terms of its being a language composed of
> "nuclear clauses," as Andrews calls them, which is not what
> Indo-European languages are about.
> 
> For me "niquitta in chichi" is more like "I see him, which is a dog",
> and that "inner" translation helps me in seeing the nuclear clause
> nature of Nahuatl. But I agree that there is a zero prefix before
> "chichi".
> 
> From this perspective these "yolcameh" you're talking about are indeed
> subject prefixes.
> 
> I think there might be a challenge is see these subject prefixes as
> indeed subject prefixes because of the nature of Indo-European
> languages.
> 
> I hope I have somewhat understood your question.
> 
> Best,
> 
> Michael
> 
> 
> 
> Quoting John Sullivan <idiez at me.com>:
> 
>> We are having a grammatical discussion here in Warsaw concerning the
>> nature of the Nahuatl subject prefix.  I guess you could say that ti-
>> functions as a subject in:
>> 	a) titlacah, We are people
>> 	b) tinehnemih, We are walking
>> But what about in:
>> 	c) Xitechpalehui in timomacehualhuan, Help us, your vassals
>> 	d) topampa in timomacehualhuan, because of us, your vassals
>> I?m using these examples because the ?subject prefix? is explicit.
>> But the question actually arose after looking at an example like:
>> 	e) niquitta in chichi, I?m looking at the dog. (which I would
>> literally translate as ?I´m looking at it, the dog"
>> In this case, some people say that there is not even a meaningful Ø-
>> at the beginning of chichi. Now I know that there is. But I want to
>> know exactly what it is doing. It seems that what we have called a
>> ?subject prefix? can serve:
>> 1. as the subject of a noun, i.e. titlacah, We are people
>> 2. as the subject of a verb, i.e. tinehnemih, We are walking
>> 3. as something that links the noun referent of a verbal object
>> prefix to that very verbal object prefix via the category of
>> person/number (in conjunction with the noun´s number suffix), i.e.,
>> Xitechpalehui in timomacehualhuan, Help us, your vassals
>> 4. as something that links the noun referent of relational prefix to
>> that very relational prefix via the category of person/number (in
>> conjunction with the noun´s number suffix), i.e., topampa in
>> timomacehualhuan, because of us, your vassals
>> 	So the question is, Is there a better term that ?subject? to refer
>> to the ?subject prefixes?? Or are the Poles just unnecessarily
>> complicating things?
>> John
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