Washo clausal embedding

Washo (Hokan/isolate, ISO 639-3 was) has two ways of embedding a clause under a verb. A verb of knowledge or perception such as hamup'ay 'forget' or i:gi 'see' takes a nominalized clause: the clause keeps its subject agreement, tense and switch-reference marking, stays in the independent mood -i, and closes with the nominalizer -gi ~ -ge, which inflects for case. A verb of thought or speech such as hamu 'think' or i:d 'say' is intransitive, and the clause it embeds is bare: it carries the dependent mood -aʔ, no nominalizer and no switch-reference marking. The two classes differ in transitivity, which each verb's frames record: 'know' and 'see' also take plain noun-phrase objects, while 'think' is questioned with how rather than what, and 'dream' embeds a bare clause only with the reflexive prefix gum-. 'Know', 'remember' and 'believe' are inherently negative, so their positive reading carries the negative suffix -e:s, and 'remember' is negated 'forget'.

Forms follow Jacobsen's orthography: : marks vowel length, ʔ ɨ ŋ are IPA, and stress is acute. The data are Bochnak and Hanink's; their analysis of the split as complementation against modification is Studies/BochnakHanink2021.lean.

References

• [BH21]
• [Han21]
• [Noo07]
• [Jac64]

Clause-typers

def Washo.ge : Complementizer

The clausal nominalizer -ge, the accusative form of -gi ~ -ge that attitude complements bear (fn. 6). The clause it closes keeps subject agreement, tense, the independent mood and switch-reference marking, so it is coded as a finite indicative clause in a nominal shell.

Equations

• Washo.ge = { morphs := [Morphology.Morph.suff "ge"], coding := some Complement.Coding.indicative, verbForm := some UD.VerbForm.Fin, licenser := some Complementizer.Licenser.nominal }

def Washo.aq : Complementizer

The dependent mood -aʔ, which marks a bare embedded clause and never a matrix clause; the clause it marks carries no nominalizer and no switch-reference marking (§3.2.1).

Equations

• Washo.aq = { morphs := [Morphology.Morph.suff "aʔ"], verbForm := some UD.VerbForm.Fin, licenser := some Complementizer.Licenser.verbal }

Predicates

structure Washo.Verbextends Verb : Type

A Washo complement-taking predicate is a verb entry with its [Noo07] class and the clause-typer of the clause it embeds.

• valency : Valency
• voiceType : Option VoiceType
• passivizable : Bool
• perfectAuxiliaries : Finset PerfectAuxiliary
• vendlerClass : Option Aspect.VendlerClass
• scaleDimension : Option Degree.ScalarDimension
• scalePolarity : Polarity
• direction : Option Spatial.Path.Direction
• incrementality : Option Aspect.Incrementality
• phasal : Option Aspect.Phasal
• factivity : Option Presupposition.Factivity
• implicative : NaturalLogic.ImplicationSignature
• opaqueContext : Bool
• attitude : Option _root_.Attitude
• readings : List Reading
• complementSig : Option NaturalLogic.Signature
• levinClasses : Finset ArgumentStructure.LevinClass
• levinExcluded : Finset ArgumentStructure.LevinClass
• root : Semantics.Root
• morphs : List Morphology.Morph
• speechActVerb : Bool
• senseTag : SenseTag
• predicateClass : Option Complement.PredicateClass

  The [Noo07] class, none where the data give no clear assignment.

• typer : Complementizer

  The clause-typer on the embedded clause (Table 1).

def Washo.es : Morphology.Morph

The negative suffix -e:s.

Equations

• Washo.es = Morphology.Morph.suff "e:s"

def Washo.gum : Morphology.Morph

The reflexive prefix gum-.

Equations

• Washo.gum = Morphology.Morph.pref "gum"

def Washo.hamupay : Verb

hamup'ay 'forget' (1).

Equations

• One or more equations did not get rendered due to their size.

def Washo.hamupayEs : Verb

hamup'ay-e:s 'remember', negated 'forget' (8).

Equations

• One or more equations did not get rendered due to their size.

def Washo.ashashEs : Verb

ašaš-e:s 'know', negated 'not know'; it also takes a plain DP ((6), (79)).

Equations

• One or more equations did not get rendered due to their size.

def Washo.iigi : Verb

i:gi 'see'; it also takes an internally headed relative and a plain DP ((10), (20), (89)).

Equations

• One or more equations did not get rendered due to their size.

def Washo.damal : Verb

damal 'hear', attested only with event nominalizations, the perception reading that needs no FPROP shift ((11), (84)).

Equations

• One or more equations did not get rendered due to their size.

def Washo.hamu : Verb

hamu 'think', intransitive, questioned with how rather than what ((2), (49)).

Equations

• One or more equations did not get rendered due to their size.

def Washo.iid : Verb

i:d 'say', intransitive ((14), (50)).

Equations

• One or more equations did not get rendered due to their size.

def Washo.metgiibilEs : Verb

mɨtgi:bɨl-e:s 'believe', negated 'disbelieve' (16).

Equations

• One or more equations did not get rendered due to their size.

def Washo.suus : Verb

suʔuʔuš 'dream' without the reflexive, transitive; its nominalized clause is an internally headed relative ((53), (55)).

Equations

• One or more equations did not get rendered due to their size.

def Washo.gumsuus : Verb

gum-suʔuʔuš 'dream' with the reflexive, intransitive; its dependent-mood clause is read as a that-clause ((15), (52), (54)).

Equations

• One or more equations did not get rendered due to their size.

def Washo.verbs : List Verb

The predicates with per-predicate data in the paper.

Equations

• Washo.verbs = [Washo.hamupay, Washo.hamupayEs, Washo.ashashEs, Washo.iigi, Washo.damal, Washo.hamu, Washo.iid, Washo.metgiibilEs, Washo.suus, Washo.gumsuus]

theorem Washo.typer_eq (v : Verb) : v ∈ verbs → v.typer = if v.IsIntransitive then aq else ge

An intransitive predicate embeds a dependent-mood clause and a transitive one a nominalized clause (Table 1).