DPs and Demonstratives

[Rory M Larson]

> Rory,
>            Are there any intonational clues, e.g. a separation of N from
> dem-det that doesn't occur with n-det alone?
>            David

That's a good question, to which I wish I had a better answer.  The N
dem-det construction occurs occasionally in the 19th century historical
literature, and I'm sure our speakers have not objected to constructions
using it, but off the top of my head I can't recall them ever using it
spontaneously.  N dem-det may be a device for packing information into
complex sentences, which do not seem to be much used anymore, at least by
our speakers.

What I think I can say is that in both N-det and dem-det constructions, the
first element is sharply accented, with the -det very de-accented and
almost swallowed by the preceding element, as it were.  The relationship of
-det to its preceding element is apparently very tight.

((Thinking about it a little bit more, perhaps I do recall the intonational
pattern of some speaker-originated N dem-det constructions, but I'd like to
make what I say very tentative until I can confirm it.  I THINK I have
heard such phrases as "Nu' s^e'akHa" or "Wa?u' s^e'dhiNkHe", in which there
seems to be a tiny bit of dead space, or prolongation of the accented final
vowel, at the end of the noun before the demonstrative, which itself is
sharply accented as usual.  The effect might be like putting a comma after
the noun.  Again, don't take this impression of mine too seriously yet.
I'll aim to keep this question in mind in future sessions with our
speakers.))

Perhaps other Dhegihanists can weigh in on this?

Rory