Escolar Documentos
Profissional Documentos
Cultura Documentos
in Chamorro Narratives
Empirical Approaches
to Language Typology
4
Editors
Georg Bossong
Bernard Comrie
Mouton de Gruyter
Berlin New York Amsterdam
Transitivity and
Discourse Continuity
in Chamorro Narratives
by
Ann M. Cooreman
Mouton de Gruyter
Berlin New York Amsterdam 1987
Mouton de Gruyter (formerly Mouton, The Hague)
is a Division of Walter de Gruyter & Co., Berlin.
Cooreman, Ann .:
Transitivity and discourse continuity in Chamorro narratives / by
Ann M. Cooreman. Berlin ; New York ; Amsterdam ; Mouton
de Gruyter, 1987. -
(Empirical approaches to language typology ; 4)
ISBN 3-11-011307-4
NE: GT
Copyright 1987 by Walter de Gruyter & Co., Berlin. All rights reserved, including
those of translation into foreign languages. No part of this book may be reproduced in
any form by photoprint, microfilm, or any other means nor transmitted, nor
translated into a machine language without written permission from Mouton de Gruyter,
a Division of Walter de Gruyter & Co., Berlin.
Printing: Ratzlow-Druck, Berlin. Binding: Dieter Mikolai, Berlin. Printed in Germany.
Acknowledgements
Acknowledgements
Chapter 1: Introduction 1
1. Functional approach to the study of language 1
2. Data base
3. Outline 7
Notes 9
Chapter 2: Methodology 11
1. Thematicity and topicality 11
2. Topicality and the quantitative method 12
3. Limitations to the quantitative method 20
Chapter 3: Chamorro morphology and syntax 22
1. Phonology 22
1.1. Phonemic inventory 22
1.2. Stress rule 24
1.3. I-umlaut 24
2. Morphology 25
2.1. The make-up of the noun phrase 25
2.2. Verb phrase morphology 34
2.3. Word order 55
Notes 56
Chapter 4: The role of topicality in a general comparison of
the coding devices of transitive propositions 57
1. Preliminaries 57
2. Quantitative results and graphs 60
3. Discussion 62
Vlll
Notes 136
Chapter 7: Complex sentence constructions 139
1. The ergative infix -UM- 140
1.1. Complement clauses 140
1.2. Distribution of-UM- in other complex
clauses 157
1.3. General characteristics of the ergative
-UM- construction 169
2. Nominalizations 176
Notes 180
Chapter 8: Discoure organization and paragraph
thematicity 182
1. Thematicity and subject coding 183
1.1. Thematicity and the general rule of
topicality 184
1.2. Thematicity and the rule of topic-shift 189
1.3. Conclusions 191
2. Thematicity and subject inversion 193
Notes 209
Chapter 9: Conclusions 210
Appendix A: Sample story 215
Appendix B: List of Abbreviations 227
References 229
Index 241
Chapter One
Introduction
on the use of single, isolated sentences and while this has proven to be
a fruitful paradigm in many regards, units of discourse larger than
single sentences have more utility from a functional perspective in elu-
cidating the role of such pragmatic factors.
There are many indications that the syntactic coding of transitive
propositions is not entirely independent of discourse context, e.g., the
topic status of both arguments in the clause. There are at least two
aspects involved in measuring the topic status of any referent in the
discourse: (a) the nature of the NP through which reference is made,
and (b) the status of this referent as given or new information in the
discourse register established between the interlocutors and the degree
of participation in the narrative (i.e., its degree of topicality).
In connection with the first aspect, there is evidence that certain
NP's coded by certain syntactic devices (e.g., pronouns) tend to occur
as topics in the discourse more often than others (e.g., indefinite
NP's). (See Givon (Ed.) 1983c.) In addition, linguists have observed
that certain semantic case roles (e.g., Agents) lend themselves better
to become topics in the narrative than others (e.g., Locatives, Instru-
mentals, etc.). Both observations have led to the ranking of these
syntactic devices and semantic case roles on two distinct hierarchies of
natural topics given in (1) and (2) respectively:
(1) O-anaphora > verb agreement > pronoun > def. full NP >
modified definite NP > indef. NP (Givon 1981, 1982)
they noted that the way transitivity gets marked in the sentence is
dependent on the function of the sentence as a whole in the discourse,
which they ultimately relate back to the distinction between back-
grounded and foregrounded information.
In some ergative languages, the choice between ergative and non-
ergative markers in the clause coding a transitive proposition is also
dependent on the topic status of the two major arguments. To cite
one example of particular relevance: Chung (1980) claimed that in
Chamorro a "semantic filter" blocks sentences in which the Object is
of higher "individuation" than the Agent. This constraint correlates
with discourse-pragmatic restrictions as well, as it operates along the
same hierarchy of topicality. (See Chapters 4 and 5.) Chamorro
grammar seems to rule out sentences in which the Agent NP ranks
lower than the Object NP on this hierarchy. According to Chung,
antipassives and passives will be used instead of the ergative construc-
tion in these cases.
The same hierarchy of natural topics seems to be involved in the
explanation of split ergative systems. Based on the theory of marked-
ness, Silverstein (1976) set up a hierarchy of NP's which he called
"the hierarchy of features." He observed that in many languages with
split ergativity, those NP's which are the most marked in this system
tend to be involved in a nominative-accusative coding system. The
least marked NP's on the other hand, are syntactically coded along
ergative-absolutive lines. Since Silverstein's hierarchy matches the
hierarchy of natural topics in (1), one is led to conclude that the
different syntactic coding systems, ergative vs. nominative-
accusative, are motivated by the same functional properties. A plau-
sible candidate for the "glue" that holds this system together can be
found in the discourse context; as I will show in the following
chapters there is considerable evidence in Chamorro that the different
syntactic coding devices are related to the degree of topicality of the
major arguments in the transitive proposition. The items which axe
likely to be marked on a nominative-accusative basis are also more
likely to appear as topics in natural discourse. There is a very strong
correlation between the degree of topicality of certain kinds of
referents and their topic-worthiness in narratives. The degree of
Functional approach to language 5
2. D a t a B a s e
The data used for the present study consists principally of 200 pages
of transcribed narratives told by various Chamorro speakers. These
narratives were collected on tape during a four month stay on the
Island of Saipan from October 1982 through January 1983. This pro-
ject was supported by a Grant for the Improvement of Doctoral
Dissertation Research from the National Science Foundation. The
data include legends and stories from the Mariana Islands and per-
sonal narratives as told by 12 different speakers ranging in age from
35 to 72, with various backgrounds: Connie Aldan (secretary),
Escolastica Cabrera (shopkeeper), Amalia Diaz (retired housewife),
Frank Diaz (businessman and former mayor of Saipan), Thomasa
Deleon Guerero (housewife), Maria Reyes (housewife), Maria Rosario
(assistant at the Bilingual Program), Francisco Sablan (farmer, fisher-
man), Luisi C. Sablan (cleaning lady), Jose Sablan (government
employee), Juan Sanchez (bus driver), Jacoba Songsong (from Rota,
housewife). Examples coming from these narratives will be cross-
referenced in this work according to page and line number in the tran-
scriptions which I have on file.
The narratives were transcribed from the tapes and morphologi-
cally analyzed with the help of four native speakers with whom I
worked on a regular basis: Maria Rosario, age 37, worked for the Bil-
ingual Program, section Social Studies, developing educational
Outline 7
3. Outline
Notes
3. Until recently, English was the only language used in the school
system. The Bilingual program on Saipan promotes the teaching
of both Chamorro and Carolinian (used by a minority of speakers
on the Island), and was initiated several years ago. Some subjects
10 1. Introduction
Methodology
1. T h e m a t i c i t y and topicality
with one or more major referents (most often animate). Shifting the
attention from one major referent to another may result in a change
of action as well, which in turn may or may not result in the start of
a new paragraph. Thus, referential continuity often reflects thematic
continuity in the paragraph. Both are discourse structuring princi-
ples. However, since referents are concrete in the narrative, their con-
tinuity is more easily assessed than the less obvious and sometimes
abstract theme in the paragraph or the text as a whole.
Givon's quantitative method, which can assess the referential con-
tinuity or degree of topicality of the arguments in any clause, will
help to unearth several general tendencies which show that the choice
of some constructions in the narrative is largely dependent on the
relative degree of topicality of the two major participants in the tran-
sitive proposition. Thus, the Chamorro speaker can manipulate the
syntactic constructions as discourse structure coding devices.
I need to point out here that ifas suggestedthe choice of one
construction over the others is largely dictated by the structure of the
discourse, and provided that referential continuity is only a partial
reflection of a higher discourse organizing principle, i.e., that of
thematicity, then we cannot and should not expect that the general
tendencies uncovered by the assessment of the degree of topicality of
the participants in transitive propositions can account for every
instance of a particular construction in its given discourse environ-
ment. We may expect deviations from certain regularities predicted
by the quantitative assessment of topicality to occur which may in
turn be related to and explained in terms of the thematic unity of the
paragraph or the narrative as a whole. (See Chapter 8 for examples.)
In (1) the fisherman is mentioned for the first time in the story. This
referent gets the maximum value for referential distance, namely 20.
In clause (2) we see another reference to the fisherman in the form of
subject agreement on the irrealis verb (i.e., u-). We do not get a new
mention of this particular referent until clause (6). Thus the value for
topical persistence for the peekadot in clause (l) is 1. In clause (3) the
sun is mentioned for the first time in the story but is not referred to
again in the remainder of the narrative. Thus its value for referential
distance is 20 and for topic persistence it is 0. In (6) we return to the
fisherman in the form of verb agreement (i.e., ha-, which is the erga-
tive agreement marker for third person singular referents). Since
there are three clauses which come between this new reference to the
fisherman and the previous one in clause (2), the referential value for
the fisherman in clause (6) is 3. The topic persistence value is 4 since
the referent is an argument of the predicate (viz. subject in each case)
in the next four clauses of our text sample here. The net is mentioned
for the first time in clause (6) and is not referred to again until clause
(9). Thus we get 20 and 0 respectively as values for referential dis-
tance and topic persistence for the referent net in clause (6). When it
is mentioned again in clause (9) under the form of a 0-anaphor, the
referential distance is 3 and as far as our excerpt goes the value for
topic persistence is 0.
18 2. Methodology
Similarly, the term Object also covers NP's whose semantic role is
that of Dative-Beneficiary in direct object position of an active clause
and subject position of a passive clause. Compare:
One would expect a difference in average values for the two quantita-
tive measurements of the Dative-Beneficiary pointing towards a
higher degree of topicality when it has been shifted as compared to
when it has not. (See Givon 1981.) Unfortunately, the data collected
did not provide enough instances to empirically validate this expecta-
tion in Chamorro.
1. Phonology
1.1.1. Vowels. Chamorro has six distinct phonemic vowels and two
diphthongs represented in the diagram below. The left hand column
presents the spelling convention, the right hand column the phonetic
symbols.
distinction which is only upheld when the vowels are in stressed posi-
tion:
(3) 1 1 1 1 1 1
"3 ;
* > > s
rz is >, bo
-Q .2
x>
J
stop t d k g '
b d g
gu(gw)
affricate ch[ts] y[dz]
fricative f s h
nasal m ng
liquid 1 r
24 3. Chamorro morphology and syntax
l.S. I-umlaut
2. M o r p h o l o g y
2.1.1. Noun markers. Indefinite NP's are generally not marked for
case in Chamorro. They are, however, optionally preceded by an
indefinite article un.
Within the definite NP's three categories should be distinguished:
pronouns, proper names, and NP's containing common nouns. The
class of proper names also includes, for purposes of morphology, those
nouns which refer to specific individuals such as father, mother, pri-
est, to whom in general a lot of respect and reverence are accorded.
The case markers for definite NP's take the following forms:
26 3. Chamorro morphology and syntax
Place names in the locative case are always preceded by the marker
giya. An unmarked case marker specific for place names is also avail-
able, viz. iya, but is only optionally used.
Besides case markers, Chamorro also has two classifiers which are
occasionally used: na' and ga'. The first refers to edible things, the
second to animals used as pets (e.g., ga' is a recognizable part in the
word ga'lagu 'dog'; lagu means 'west' on Saipan, so the etymology of
the word may be 'animal used as pet in the west.') The word itself is
now inseparable and considered one root). Thus one can make a clear
distinction in Chamorro between a chicken which is intended for con-
sumption, and one which is raised as a pet.
(22) t na'-mu
'your food'
(23) t ga'-ha
'his pet'
Singular Plural
First Person yo' hit (ine I.)/ham (txcl.)
Second Person hao hamyo
Third Person gut' siha
Singular Plural
First Person guahu hita(incl.)/hami(txcl.)
Second Person hagu hamyo
Third Person gutya tiha
Examples:
Singular Plural
First Person -hu/'ku - ta(incl.)/- mami(txel.)
Second Person mu - miyu
Third Person na -hiha
Examples:
2.2.1. The Chamorro basic clause. Chamorro has three different types
of agreement which occur in basic sentences.2 The choice of which
agreement type to use is dependent on two features: (a) whether the
sentence is syntactically transitive, and (b) whether the clause is
marked for irrealis or re alia. The realis is used to mark events which
occur in the present or which have occurred in the past; the irrealis
refers to future events with respect to an established time of reference
in the narrative. Thus, the irrealis can also be used to indicate an
event in the past but which is reported to have occurred later with
respect to another event mentioned in the narrative. In addition, the
irrealis is also used to mark hypothetical events. Example:
TRANSITIVE INTRANSITIVE
Singular Plural
First Person hu- ta- (inel.Jtn- (excl.)
Second Person tin- en-
Third Person fi a-
m -
a-
Singular Plural
0/- um- man-
The infix -um- which is placed before the first vowel of the verb stem
has a metathesized allomorph mu- prefixed to the predicate when it
has a liquid or a nasal as initial consonant. Example:
Singular Plural
First Person (bai)hu- (u)ta-(inc\.)/(bai)tn-(exc\.)
Second Person tm- en-
Third Person u- u-(intrans.)/uma-(trans.)
giya Guam.
LOC Guam
'John went to Guam.'
b. Si Juan h-um- anao
UNM John SING- go
giya Guam.
LOC Guam
'It was John who went to Guam.'
Relative clauses can also precede the head provided that the link-
ing particle na be used to separate the head from its modifying
relative clause. Compare (74) with (73):
t manha.
the coconut
'Someone was cutting the green coconuts.' (24;15)
1. Relative clauses:
2. WH-questions:
3. Focus constructions:
As (97) shows, the nasal assimilation rule described for the plural
agreement marker also applies to the homophonous antipassive
marker.
result be reduced to [a] before -gut by some speakers. The suffix -yi is
used after vowels, and -t after other consonants. Examples:
(101) a et Juan
E.3s-buy UNM John the
niyok.
coconut
'John bought the coconut, >
b. Ha- na'- fahan si Juan
E.3s-CAUS- buy UNM John
si Maria ni niyok.
UNM Mary OBL coconut
>
'John made Mary buy the coconut.
(102) a.
a H-um- anao yo' gi tenda.
SING- go A.Is LOC store
went to the store.'
b. Ha- na'- hanao yo' si
E.3s-CAUS- go A.Is UNM
nana- hu gi tenda.
mother- Is.POS LOC store
'My mother made me go/sent me to the store.'
The antipassive of a verb prefixed with the causative na- does not
involve prefixation of the antipassive marker man-. Instead, the
antipassive form of a causative verb is marked by a shift forward of
the main stress onto the causative prefix, away from the verb stem.
(See Gibson 1981.)
The basic, most common word order in Chamorro is VSO so that two
full definite NP's axe never misinterpreted as to their syntactic
interpretation. However, other word order patterns occur as well,
predominantly SVO. VOS is obligatorily used just in case the direct
object is pronominal and the subject is a full NP. Examples:
Notes
1. See Gibson 1981; Chung 1978a and b, 1980, 1982; Topping 1975;
Costenoble 1940; Safford 1903-05; Home 1977; Latta 1972; New-
man 1977; among others.
2. Basic sentences are semantically and pragmatically unmarked.
They are main, affirmative clauses which are most frequently used
in narrative discourse to convey new information.
3. The term "promotional suffix" is borrowed from Relational Gram-
mar, proponents of which have spent much time discussing syntac-
tic processes such as the one described in this section. In this
view, the rule of passivization is seen as the advancement or pro-
motion of an NP out of the syntactic role of direct object into the
role of subject in the clause. This process is also called a 2 to 1
advancement where 2 stands for the role of direct object and 1 for
the role of subject. The original 1 becomes a chomeur (i.e.,
oblique NP) as a result.
Similarly, Dative Movement involves the promotion of an NP
from the 3 (i.e., indirect object) into the 2 position resulting in the
demotion of the original 2 into the position of a chomeur: (See for
example Perlmutter and Postal 1974; Johnson 1974; Keenan
1975.) In Chamorro, the promotion to direct object is not limited
to indirect objects such as Datives and Beneficiaries but includes
Locatives as well.
Chapter Four
1. Preliminaries
in the data. Since the values for passives and antipassives cover both
realis and irrealis forms of these clause patterns, I conflated the two
syntactically transitive constructions into one category as well.
Separate measurements for ergative and irrealis transitive clauses
revealed no significant difference between the two with respect to the
relative topicality of the major participants in the propositions they
encode so that the conflation of both constructions is justified for the
present purposes.
topic
persistence 2.0 0.2 2.4 --- 0.8 0.3
topic
persistence 2.1 0.7 2.1 0.9 1.4 0.8
62 4. General comparison
topic
persistence 0.8 1.3 0.7 1.2 0.8 1.5
topic
persistence 0.6 1.8 0.4 1.9 0.7 1.5
3. Discussion
I I I I
MA IN TRANS A.P.
MA IN TRANS A.P.
20 ,
15 -
10-
5 -
Object Agent
0
~ 1 I
IN TRANS A.P.
3-1
Agent
2 -
1 - '.. Object
T ~ 1
MA IN TRANS A.P.
Object
20-,
15 -
Agent
10-
5 -
0
I I
MA IN TRANS A.P.
3-1
2 -
1 -
ent
Object
" 1
MA IN TRANS A.P.
persistence show the inverse relation in which all the Object NP's
have a high value for persistence in both passive constructions and
move to almost no persistence in the antipassive. The curves for the
Agent NP show that the average referential distance is lowest in tran-
sitive constructions and highest in passive clauses and the reverse
obtains for the values of persistence, i.e., the Agent of the syntacti-
cally transitive clause has a higher value for persistence than the
Agent in a passive construction. The Agent in the antipassive has a
fairly low value for referential distance and a fairly high one for per-
sistence; however, neither values are as low or as high the ones for
the Agent in the transitive construction. I will come back to this
observation below.
Since low values for referential distance and relatively high ones
for topical persistence characterize highly topical or highly continuous
elements in the discourse, and the inverse correlation characterizes
less topical referents, these results show that Object NP's are highly
continuous in passive constructions and become less continuous (i.e.,
less topical) as one approaches the antipassive on the scale where one
finds a majority of indefinite, non-referential Objects. In the two
active constructions, i.e., the transitive and the antipassive, it is the
Agent which has by far the highest degree of topicality.
These quantitative results are very significant and suggest strongly
that the choice of one construction over the others to code a similar
semantic proposition is to a large extent pragmatically controlled by
the discourse structure as it is reflected in the relative degree of topi-
cality of the arguments in the proposition, notably the Agent and the
Object.
As is the case in other languages (see Givon 1979c, (Ed.) (1983c),
among others), we may observe that in Chamorro the most
continuous/most topical referent in the sentence will tend to be
selected as the grammatical subject, i.e., that NP with which the verb
shows morphological agreement. In the syntactically transitive con-
structions (i.e., ergative and its irrealis counterpart) and the antipas-
sive clauses it is the Agent which performs the function of the syntac-
tic subject, while in the passive constructions it is the Object which is
highest in topicality and is coded as the syntactic subject.
Discussion 67
by which they are coded in the sentence reveal the results shown in
Table 7 (see also Tables 2-5). 6
As one can read off from Table 2, the Object of an antipassive, when
present, is always very low in topicality. What Table 2 does not
reveal is t h a t the majority of antipassives in Chamorro narratives
occur with indefinite Objects, which by definition automatically
receive the value 20 for referential distance. Of all the overt Objects
found in the d a t a base in an antipassive construction, only 4 (i.e.,
6.3%) were not indefinite. The majority of antipassives (i.e., 93.7%)
were accompanied by indefinite Objects. In general then, Objects of
antipassives are new in the discourse and the fact that the value for
topic persistence is close to zero shows that on the whole these
Objects also tend to be non-referential, non-specific. I found only one
instance in the d a t a in which the indefinite Object of an antipassive
showed any persistence at all:
20 for referential distance and almost always the minimum value 0 for
persistence. One would thus expect the informational value coded in
these propositions with regard to the rest of the discourse to be fairly
low. W i t h informational value I mean the degree to which the infor-
mation presented in the proposition is necessary for the development
of the narrative. Some propositions such as descriptions and digres-
sions are not necessarily immediately relevant to the narrative as a
whole and thus their informational value is considered low.
This expectation is borne out by the fact t h a t antipassives have a
strong tendency to occur in backgrounded clauses, i.e., in general they
are not involved in the thematic development of the story. T o decide
whether a clause is foregrounded or backgrounded I relied on two
basic principles outlined and exemplified in Hopper and Thompson
(1980):
Transitives Antipassives
foregrounded clauses 46 46.0% 17 26.6%
backgrounded clauses 54 54.0% 47 73.4%
Total 100 100.0% 64 100.0%
Since the distinction between the IN-passive and the MA-passive will
be discussed in more detail in the next chapter, this section will
remain short and cover only the more general characteristics. As
Tables 3 and 4 and figures 1-6 show, both passive constructions code
propositions in which the Object is more topical than the Agent.
Both constructions occur with equal frequency in foregrounded and
backgrounded clauses so that on the thematic level of the narrative
there seems to be no marked difference between the two (see Table
Discussion 73
11). As with the transitive clauses, only the first one hundred cases of
IN-passives were considered for comparison.
MA-passives IN-passives
foregrounded clauses 16 45.2% 45 45%
backgrounded clauses 19 54.8% 55 55%
Total 35 100.0% 100 100%
4. Preliminary conclusions
Notes
8. There is only one case in which most speakers judge that the MA-
passive must be used in which the overt oblique Agent is singular.
These cases involve an embedded complement clause which is pas-
sivized so as to keep the subject of the embedded clause identical
to the subject of the main clause. For example:
The IN and MA-passives share the first and in part the third charac-
teristic. They both take the plural agreement prefix m a n - / f a n - with
plural subjects, which identifies them as syntactically intransitive sen-
tences. In addition, the MA-passive codes function 2 as well, so that
presumably it is the more prototypical passive of the two. The fact
that it is the MA-passive which is used as an agentless passive should
not be surprising given the fact that plural referents are not always
uniquely identifiable and not as topical as singular referents. They
are also typically non-referential. In English, active clauses with
third person plural subjects often serve the function of impersonal
82 5. Functional analysis of passives in Chamorro
si Juan.
UNM John
'The swordgrass brushed against John.'
b. R-in- aspa et Juan
PAS- brush against UNM John
nt cha'guan.
OBL swordgrass
'The swordgrass brushed against John./John was
brushed against by the swordgrass.'
(6) a. *Ha- galuti gue' i taotao.
E.3s- hit A.3s the man
'The man hit him.'
b. G-- aluti gue' nu
PAS- hit A.3s OBL
taotao.
the man
'The man hit him./He was hit by the man.'
S.l. Number
topic
persistence 0.8 1.7
topic
persistence 0.8 1.4
topic
persistence 1.7 1.4
topic
persistence 1.6 2.1
S.2. Animacy
Animates Inanimates
topic
persistence 1.8 0.2
Inanimates Animates
Inanimates Animates
Animates Inanimates
Inanimate Agents 34 4%
Animate Agents 800 96%
very much like the grammatical coding devices 0-anaphora and verb
agreement. The referential values for distance and persistence are
roughly the same in all three categories.
Subjects Non-subjects
referential
distance
animate (444) 1.2 (28) 1.6 (9) 1.2
inanimate (21) 1.1 (12) 1.1
topic
persistence
animate 1.8 1.7
inanimate 0.4 0.2
S.S.2. First and second person pronouns. I have already pointed out
that the quantitative method can provide evidence for the status of
higher topicality of third person pronouns only as compared to full
NP's. (See Chapter 2.) The method cannot assess the value for
referential distance of first and second person deictic pronouns in
discourse with respect to other nominale in the clause by counting
sentences to the left. Both first and second person referents are
always given at any point in the discourse, and hence are always
5. Functional analysis of passives in Chamorro
Subjects Non-subjects
Accusative Dative Genitive
referential
distance
animate (19) 1.1 (4) 1.5 (3) 1.0 (49) 1.1
inanimate (4) 0.2
topic
persistence
animate 1.4 1.7 5.0 1.7
inanimate 4.2
Subjects Non-subjects
Accusative Dative Genitive
referential
distance
animate (239) 6.5 (53) 6.4 (13) 7.5 (26) 4.5
inanimate (40) 13.5 (62) 7.4
topic
persistence
animate 1.8 1.1 1.8 1.5
inanimate 0.2 0.4
Topicality and obligatory passives 95
highly topical by the very fact that there is a speaker and a hearer
(i.e., an ' and a 'you' referent) in every narrative situation.
Even though a quantitative analysis cannot provide evidence for
some of the restrictions imposed on grammatical patterns involving
first and second person referents in Chamorro, I will show that the
alternative account suggested by Chung (1980), based on the seman-
tic constraints stated in (7) and (8) above, lacks the predictive power
it purports to have and, in addition, has to make some counter-
intuitive claims about the pronominal vs. non-pronominal nature of
certain syntactic morphemes. There is some evidence based on per-
ceptual salience, which relates to the way referents in a given situa-
tion are seized on by humans as foci of attention (Comrie, 1981)
which suggests that first and second person pronouns are more topical
than third person pronouns. This relatively higher degree of topical-
ity of first and second person pronouns can explain some of the
phenomena observed in Chamorro.
With respect to the claim that pronominal direct objects cannot
be outranked by non-pronominal subjects, Chung (1980) expanded on
the notion 'pronominal.' She explains in a footnote that pronominal
referents include two categories:
(i) NP's that are realized as overt independent pronouns, and (ii)
those NP's whose reference is always determined by the speech
situation. Type (i) includes all N P anaphors except for inani-
mates and transitive subjects, which have no overt morphological
realization. Type (ii) includes all first and second person pro-
noun anaphors, whether or not they are realized overtly. Note
that 'overt realization' here means realization as an independent
pronoun; whether an anaphor triggers agreement is a separate
issue. (Chung 1980, footnote 6, p. 331)
This remark implies that all third person ergative and irrealis agree-
ment markers are considered non-pronominal, whereas first and
second person ergative and irrealis agreement markers are considered
examples of pronominal realization, a claim which I find counterintui-
tive and ad-hoc. Moreover, the differentiation itself would wrongfully
96 5. Functional analysis of passives in C h a m o r r o
Examples (12) and (14) in which the Agent is third person and the
Object second person singular or plural, areas Chung (personal com-
munication) rightly points outnot preferred renditions of the under-
lying semantic proposition. Many speakers would prefer a passive.
The fact that (13) may sound odd and may not be preferred by many
speakers is, I believe, due to the fact that not only inanimates, but
also animate third person anaphoric referents are not overtly
expressed in discourse, since their referential identity is clear from the
preceding discourse context. Morphologically overt anaphoric refer-
ence to third person Object referents is rare in Chamorro discourse.
Chung's data (1980) suggest that examples like (12) and (14) are
completely ungrammatical. Even though the majority of my native
consultants preferred a passive rendition over the active version in
(14), examples like it were not only volunteered as alternatives in
Topicality and obligatory passives 97
The fact that active clauses of this type are rare and that passive ver-
sions are preferred when the Object is a second person pronoun
(singular or plural) and the Agent is a third person referent suggests
that there is a hierarchy ordering second persons higher than third.
The fact that second persons are treated as being more topical than
third person referents should not be surprising. Pragmatically, the
'you' referent must be more perceptually salient to the speaker, and
hence more topical than a third person referent by virtue of its rela-
tion to the referent. There is direct contact (often in the form of
eye-contact) between 'you' and ' in the context of a cummunicative
interaction which necessarily lacks the link between and
'he/she/it,' even though both may be given in the discourse context.
Instead of the possible sentences (12) and (14), the passive clauses
(17) and (18) are preferred:
First and second person referents differ in that only second person
Objects can be and are preferred to be foregrounded into subject
100 5. Functional analysis of passives in Chamorro
hit ni i answer?
A.lPl(incl) OBL the answer
'Who told us the answer?'
First person referents seem to act like inanimate referents when func-
tioning as Objects. (See also Gibson, 1981.) That there is a
difference between first and second person referents on this level is not
immediately accounted for, though I would like to suggest a possible
explanation. Both referents are uniquely identifiable from the
discourse context but are given in different ways. 'You' and 'he' are
perceived by the speaker as part of the discourse environment. 'You,'
in its role as addressee, is closer and thus more perceptually salient to
the speaker (because of eye-to-eye contact) than a pragmatically given
third person referent (e.g., 'he, she, or it'). The ' (which is always
included in the 'we') is not an entity that is perceived within the
discourse environment since it refers to the speaker him/herself whose
reference never changes. Even though the ' referent is or may ulti-
mately be the most topical element in the discourse, since its identity
does not change with respect to the speaker, although that of the
'you' may, the speaker may not portray himself as being the most
important, most salient participant in the narrative. Culturally
based rules (e.g., based on modesty or politeness) may be reflected in
the languagealthough they may be synchronically opaqueresulting
in grammatical rules, as in Chamorro, so that in the judgement of
most speakers, first person singular and plural pronominal Objects
can not be promoted to subject position which would result in the
pragmatic backgrounding of the Agent referent in the discourse.
The possibility of two alternative versions of the same semantic
proposition, i.e., an active one and a passive one, as (26) a. and b.
seem to suggest, begs the question of whether or not certain discourse
contexts exist in which the preference of one over the other can be
predicted. As I shall show below, there is strong evidence that the
choice between a passive and an active construction, when both seem
equally plausible, is indeed predictable for third person Agent and
Object referents and there seems to be some (be it somewhat tenta-
tive) evidence that the same prediction may hold for the choice
between clauses like (26) a. and b. in which the Object is a second
person referent and the Agent third person.
Passives, topicality, and agentivity 13
4. P a s s i v e s , t o p i c a l i t y , a n d a g e n t i v i t y
4-1. Topic-shift
Proposition A Proposition
Agent Object Agent Object
R 1
R R R
J ,j i
This choice is not surprising since Agents on the whole are more topi-
cal than Objects in narrative discourse.
104 5. Functional analysis of passives in Chamorro
Situation 1
first clause second clause
a. active active
Agent =subj. Agent ,=subj.
Object .=d.o. Object =d. o.
b. passive active
Object =subj. Agent =subj.
Agent =obl.Agent Object ,=d.o.
Situation 2
first clause second clause
a. active passive
Agent =subj. Object =subj.
Object =d.o. Agent ,=obl.Agent
b. passive active
Object ,=subject Agent =subject
Agent ,=obl. Agent Object =d.o.
Situation 3
first clause second clause
a. active passive
Agent ,=subject Object =subject
Object ,=d.o. Agent =obl.Agent
b. passive passive
Object ^subject Object subject
Agent ,=obl. Agent Agent =obl.Agent
In the second clause of each of these two examples both Agent and
Object have the same value for referential distance. (See Footnote 4.)
Yet, it is the Object of the new clause whose referent functioned as
Agent in the previous clause which is chosen to become the new sub-
ject.
As in English, the decision in Chamorro which referent should be
marked as highest topic in the second proposition of a clause sequel in
which a topic-shift of the sort described above has taken place is
based on semantic roles. Unlike English, however, the decision is not
clause-internal, but takes into account the semantic roles of the
referents in the previous proposition. In particular, it is the Agent of
the first proposition which is chosen as syntactic subject of the second
clause in the sequel.
108 5. Functional analysis of passives in Chamorro
Of 206 clauses in which both Agent and Object are of equal topicality
numerically and have animate referents coded by highly topical N P
coding devices, 165 clauses were ergative whereas 41 used the IN-
passive.
The rule which governs the choice between ergative constructions
and IN-passives when both the Agent and the Object have the same
value for referential distance can be stated in two parts, the second of
which I will specifically call the rule of topic-shift:
This sentence follows another one in which the second person referent
was the Object, the third person referent the Agent. Unfortunately, I
have found only one instance like (36) in the nearly 200 pages of nar-
rative text. The systematic choice which I have suggested in this
paragraph, parallel to the well-illustrated and substantiated one for
third person referents would be nice. However, since there are no
other examples of this sort available to corroborate the present
hypothesis, it seems necessary to explore alternative hypothetical
explanations as well.
As indicated in section 3.3.2. second person referents are con-
sidered highly topical and are preferably marked as the highest topi-
cal element in the clause, i.e., as the syntactic subject in a passive
construction. Their status as highly topical elements is pragmatically
Passives, topicality, and agentivity 111
based on the fact that they are always given, uniquely identifiable
within the discourse context.
In (36), however, the referent of hao is not uniquely identifiable as
the addressee, but serves as an indefinite pronoun, generic in sense,
similar to the generic use of the pronoun 'you' (as in 'You never can
tell') and the pronoun 'one' in English. (36) may be an exception to
the preferred use of passive constructions, precisely because the 'you'
referent is indefinite and hence not topical at all. This hypothesis,
like the previous one, is equally plausible within the pragmatic frame-
work of topicality presented in this dissertation.
A third possibility accounting for (36) is that the speaker may
have made a mistake, inadvertently slipped. It is not unusual for
speakers of any language to experience at one time or another that
they cannot plan ahead as fast as they speak with the result that false
starts occur or inappropriate constructions are used.
tattiyi gue
follow A.3s
'He asked me to follow him.'
* Ha- faisen yo' para u-
E.Ss- ask A.Ss IRR IRR.Ss-
t- in- attiyi gue' nu guahu.
PAS- follow A.3s OBL EMP.ls
Notes
1. Preliminaries
Total 48 100.0%
In (3), chule' affects the Object NP in that the picture actually comes
into existence through the action of the verb. In (4), offrest does not
change its syntactic Object in any way. The person who gets the
money offered to him does not change, he does not become richer
through the offer itself. The act of offering is not yet the act of giv-
ing, though it soon may follow. According to this analysis, one would
expect the verb 'to give' to belong to our Class 1 verbs which do not
allow the Demoting Antipassive. This is indeed the case:
(5) b is grammatical with the phrase para hagu only when its
intended meaning is 'He gave the book to someone for you.' This
interpretation with an indefinite, unidentified (dative) Object
classifies the clause as an Indefinite Antipassive. Similarly, in (3) c.,
the Locative case can only be interpreted as marking an indefinite,
partial Object.
Examples of Class 1 verbs which do not allow a Demoting
Antipassive include: na'ayao 'to lend to,' which like 'to give' implies
that the dative Object comes into possession of something he did not
have before; btndt 'to sell,' fahan 'to buy,' haksa 'to lift/to build,'
dulalak 'to chase away,' etc., which all imply movement of the
affected Object; lakse 'to sew,' fa'tinae 'to make/to cook,' tuge' 'to
write,' etc., which like chule' in example (3) imply the coming into
existence of the Object; fa'gasi 'to wash,' na'gasgas 'to clean,' yulang
'to break,' puno' 'to kill,' utot 'to cut, to chop down,' tongge' 'to set
on fire,' etc., all of which affect the quality of the Object in some way.
The following are examples of predicates which belong to Class 2,
i.e., those verbs which do not imply a lasting effect on the Object and
which allow the use of the Demoting Antipassive: fatten 'to ask,'
hongge 'to believe,' bisita 'to visit,' ayuda 'to help,' haeto 'to
remember,' chatge 'to laugh at,' mantieni 'to grasp, seize, keep,' galuti
'to hit,' guaiya 'to love,' atan 'to look at,' patek 'to kick,' kombida 'to
invite,' rikognisa 'to recognize,'etc... The verbs galuti 'to hit' and
patek 'to kick' may seem problematic at first sight. However, they do
not describe an action which necessarily affects the Object, e.g., one
can kick a wall without affecting it. Even though a person can be
hurt by being kicked or hit, the verbs themselves do not inherently
imply this effect on the Object. 4 When these verbs are used in the
antipassive form with a definite Object, the result is that a distance is
created between the action itself and the Object which is supposed to
124 6. A functional look at the antipassive
undergo the event. Thus, one can kick a t the cat, which may leave
open the question of whether one actually hit it or not. On the other
hand, even though in English one can say that one cut or hacked a t a
tree, in which the use of the preposition creates a syntactic distance
between predicate and Object, the tree is still affected by the activity,
even though only partially. T h e semantic distance between the predi-
cate and the Object, in the sense that the latter is potentially not
affected, cannot be obtained with verbs of Class 1.
T h e D e m o t i n g Antipassive then, which turns a transitive proposi-
tion into an intransitive one, should not strike speakers of English as
strange, since English has a similar process where the Object is
demoted into a prepositional phrase, making the sentence intransitive
as well. Compare the following Chamorro sentences with their
English translations:
4. Aspect
This aspectual meaning applies to both the Indefinite and the Demot-
ing Antipassive. When the activity is not seen as having a distinct
endpoint, the total effect of the action on the Object cannot be
described since the action transfer from the Agent onto the Object is
not completed. Hence, the semantic transitivity of the proposition is
lower than when the action is completely carried out. Thus, antipas-
sives are often used to describe habitual activities such as planting
sugar cane, raising animals, etc. These sorts of activities happened in
the past and are often implied to occur also after the point of refer-
ence in time with respect to which these habitual activities were
described.
The correlation with the Indefinite Antipassive is obvious here
since in habitual activities the specific identity of the Object is often
less crucial, since the Object most often refers to a whole class of pos-
sible referents (i.e., is generic):
giya Saipan.
LOC Saipan
'The Japanese used to plant sugar cane on Saipan.'
So far, the use of the Demoting Antipassive has been linked with two
different interpretations. I discussed the marginal and somewhat
strained interpretation of 'partial Agent' and I also indicated that
both the Indefinite Antipassive and the Demoting Antipassive can be
used to imply a repetitive, habitual, or distributive activity.
Above, I gave the semantic condition which predicates must fulfill
in order to occur in a Demoting Antipassive, i.e., only those predi-
cates which do not necessarily imply a lasting effect on the definite
Object can occur in a Demoting Antipassive construction. However,
nothing was said about what the actual usage of such an antipassive
entails in discourse. I have not given any reason why Chamorro
speakers would want to use a Demoting Antipassive in discourse when
the intention is not to indicate a "partial Agent" interpretation or the
repetitive, habitual, or distributive aspect of a particular state-of-
affairs.
On the basis of the analysis presented so far, one would expect the
syntactic intransitivity of this particular construction to be due to a
decrease in importance of the Object of the proposition. This is
exactly what we find. The Demoting Antipassive is used to
emphasize the action or state-of-affairs depicted in the predicate. As
a result, the identity of the Object becomes less important, since it is
the activity itself which is highlighted. A number of examples will
illustrate this point.
(21) b. in contrast to (21) a., which merely asserts the intention of the
speaker to go and visit Rosa in the hospital, can be used to answer a
question like Why are you going away?. Questions like this emphasize
the activity expressed in the predicate. In this case the fact that the
Agent is going to visit somebody is more salient than who that some-
body might be. The speaker him(her)self may still attach some
importance to the identity of the Object and as a result will mention
it in the proposition, although pragmatically it is not of importance
in view of the question the antipassive clause intends to answer.
Consider a third example:
Notes
1. The two cases are not interchangeable. The Locative case seems
to be more widespread and acceptable than the Oblique one. If
there is a pattern to the distribution and preference of one over
the other, I have not yet been able to detect it.
2. Object can be antipassized while accompanied by an Object
modified by a definite demonstrative as in a) below. However,
these Object NP's do not have referential definite interpretations,
rather, they are short forms of a longer phrase exemplified in b):
3. Both na'i 'to give' and offresi 'to offer,' are bitransitive verbs, i.e.,
they take both a patient and dative Object in the clause. The
patient Object occurs with the Oblique case marker in the transi-
tive clause whereas the dative is marked as the syntactic direct
Object. In the antipassive version, both semantic roles are marked
as being Oblique, either by the Locative or the Oblique case
marker as shown in (5) b.
4. Outside of this class of verbs are two more verbs which follow this
pattern. Both li'e' 'to see' and tungo' 'to know' are verbs which
do not seem to affect the Object, yet they do not allow the Demot-
ing antipassive. I have no explanation for these counterexamples.
In this chapter I will deal with two specific coding devices which are
used in a restricted number of complex clause patterns. The first of
these two coding devices involves the use of the ergative infix -UM- as
a replacement for ergative agreement markers; the second one
involves nominalization of the proposition (either with or without the
nominalizing infix -IN-). (See Chapter 3.)
These particular devices are used in a number of different environ-
ments, i.e., in certain sentential complements, in relative clauses,
WH-questions, focus constructions and clauses containing indefinite
quantifiers (e.g., none, some, all, many). The question arises whether
we can uncover a set of constraints which warrant the use of the same
coding device in these different environments. As I shall show in the
course of this chapter, there are syntactic, semantic and pragmatic
similarities which these different constructions may in fact share.
Whereas syntactic and semantic similarities between relative clauses,
WH-questions and focus constructions have been noted and discussed
before by various linguists (e.g., Keenan and Hull 1973; Schachter
1973; Harries-Delisle, 1978; among others), they have not been com-
pared with sentential complements or propositions containing
indefinite modifiers.
In the first section of this chapter, I will discuss the constraints
governing the use of the the ergative infix - UM- each of the complex
clause patterns separately before discussing the syntactic, semantic
and pragmatic functions which they share. First of all, I will look at
the conditions which operate on the appearance (obligatory and
optional) of the ergative infix in sentential complements. I will show
that there is a strong correlation between the use of this particular
coding device and the degree to which the state of affairs described in
the complement is implied. In addition, the categorization of senten-
140 7. Complex sentence constructions
The first type of complex clauses in which the ergative infix -UM- can
and sometimes must appear is a complement clause (see also Chung,
1982; Safford, 1904-06). There are two types of complement clauses
in which one may find this particular construction: (a) complements
of manipulative or control verbs whose Agent exerts some influence
on the action performed by the Agent in the proposition of the
embedded clause, and (b) complements of modality or self-
manipulation verbs where the action of the embedded proposition is
self-induced by the Agent of the main clause. The choice of comple-
ment coding is directly related to the notion of logical implicativity
and the notion of degree of control on the part of the Agent of the
main verb over the action in the complement. The more control the
Agent of the matrix clause has over the event in the complement, the
less the complement will be coded as an independent main clause.
This correlation between the semantics of the verb and the choice of
coding device for the embedded complement has been suggested previ-
ously by Givon (1980a). As I will show below, the Chamorro data
provide further evidence for his "Hierarchy of Binding."
The ergative infix -UM- 141
Verbs of the second class take only those complements which are
separated from the main clause by a complementizer and in which the
embedded verb is marked for irrealis. Verbs belonging to this
category include malago' 'want,' kombida 'invite,' ekspekta/angokko
'expect, trust,' sangani 'tell,' stdi 'allow,' prohibi 'forbid,'
afuetsas/obligao 'force, oblige, compel,' otden 'order,' etc. Examples:
the apple, it is logically necessary that Mary, as a result, did not eat
the apple.
This condition does not apply to the second class of manipulative
verbs. If Mary is ordered to pick the coconut, she can ignore this
order, not pick the coconut, and the whole sentence could still be true.
Verbs which are implicative in English do not always correlate
with implicative verbs in Chamorro. Notice t h a t for most speakers of
English the verb 'force' is implicative. Yet in Chamorro it seems not
to be. (There are possibly cultural differences involved.) The choice
of complement type under the verb afuetsas clearly shows the correla-
tion of the ergative infix with logical implicativity. Under normal cir-
cumstances afuetsas only allows the second type of complement.
When the -UM- construction is used nevertheless, we end up with a
rather forced interpretation which is implicative:
The selection of -UM- here explicitly grants more control to the Agent
of the manipulative verb. Mary has no choice in this case but to eat
the apple or choke.
This measure of control correlates with another syntactic observa-
tion. Notice that in all the examples above the Agent/subjects of the
complement clauses function as direct object of the main clause. The
first class of manipulative verbs, i.e., those which require the ergative
infix -UM-, also require the Agent/subject of the embedded clause to
serve as the drect object of the main clause. Compare (5) with (9):
Verbs of control
C l a s s 2: Non-implicative Verbs:
Group 1: These verbs require direct control by the matrix
Agent over the complement Agent.
Examples: obligao 'oblige, compel,' afuetsas 'force,'
sangani 'tell'
Syntactic characteristics: a. complement takes finite
irrealis verb following a complementizer
b. Agent of complement must be direct object of the
main clause
Group 2: These verbs allow direct control by the m a t r i x Agent
over the complement Agent.
(14) a.
a Ha- le-letke t asagua- hu
E.3s- RED-avoid the spouse- ls.POS
f-um- agasi t kareta-n- mami.
E.I.- wash the car- N- 1P1.POS
'My husband has been avoiding washing our car.'
b. *Ha- le-letke i aeagua- hu
E.3s- RED-avoid the spouse- IsPOS
na/para u- fagast t kareta-n- mami.
COMP IRR.3s-wash the car- N- 1P1.POS
Verbs like angokko 'expect, trust' and ekspekta 'expect' belong to the
second subcategory. They do not allow the non-finite complement.
Compare (2) with (19) and (20) a with (20) b:
Self-manipulation Verbs
one can hierarchize these verbs on a scale where the verbs on top of
the scale are semantically most binding, i.e., the Agent of the main
clause exerts a strong influence on the Agent of the complement
clause so that the latter is not entirely capable of acting indepen-
dently. Syntactically, the higher the main verb is ranked on the
scale, the less the complement clause will be coded as an independent
main clause. Semantically, the higher the main verb on the binding
hierarchy, the more likely the event in the complement is to take
effect and the stronger the influence exerted over the action in the
embedded clause by the Agent of the main verb.
The Chamorro data provide additional evidence for Givon's bind-
ing hierarchy. In addition, the language is a representative of the
Austronesian language family, which was not included in the sample
on which he based his typological analysis. The observations made
above in connection with manipulative and self-manipulation verbs
are part of a larger system which confirms Givon's "Hierarchy of
Binding." With respect to the manipulative verbs, it needs to be
added that there is one more class of implicative verbs which were not
included in the survey above. The English verbs make, have, cause,
and let have a Chamorro correlate in the form of a causative mor-
pheme which is prefixed to the verbal root of the intended comple-
ment.
separated from the main clause and the embedded verb contains
(irrealis) subject agreement markers.
Finally we may add that in the case of cognition-utterance verbs
(such as tungo' 'know')--which we have not discussed in this chapter-
-the complement clause takes on more aspects of an independent main
clause. It is introduced by the complementizer na, and the verb is not
restricted to irrealis mood marking. Two examples have been given
in footnote 4. It may be of interest to add that in narrative discourse,
utterance verbs like 'say' and 'tell,' which rank lowest on Givon's
hierarchy of binding, often do not take sentential complements, but
are instead followed by pieces of direct discourse comprising of one or
more independent main clauses.
We can summarize all these observations as follows:
T y p e of predicate T y p e of coding
(23) a. and (24) a. are examples of basic clauses which transmit new
information and adhere to the unmarked, basic VSO word order.
Both show ergative agreement on the transitive realis verb. The
emphatic constructions in the b. sentences are clearly complex.
Syntactically, they deviate from the unmarked basic word order
pattern in that the underlying subject does not appear adjacent to the
right of the predicate but has been extracted out of the clause, and
secondly, whereas one would have found the ergative agreement
marker in the unmarked realis clause, the ergative infix -UM- has
taken its place.
Semantically, the use of the infix -UM- in emphatic constructions
is restricted to propositions in which the Agent/subject has been
focussed. (See also Topping, 1975.) Compare:
As (28) and (29) a. show, the -UM- construction can never be used to
question the Object. Whereas a nominalization using the nominaliz-
ing infix -IN- is preferred for such WH-questions, example (29) b.
shows that the unmarked ergative clause pattern is acceptable as well.
All questioned native speakers ruled out an interpretation in which
the identity of the Agent was requested in WH-questions employing
ergative agreement markers as in (29) b.
The ergative infix -UM- 161
Thirdly, relative clauses are used to help the hearer identify the refer-
ence of one of the participants in the proposition. 7 As such, the
speaker assumes that the hearer is familiar with the propositional con-
tent of the modifying clause.
However, noun phrases containing a relative clause as modifier are
usually part of a piece of new, asserted information. They cannot be
highly topical since highly topical referents are easily identifiable and
are referred to by much simpler devices such as 0-anaphora, pronouns,
or verb agreement. (See Givon, 1982.) This fact has been evidenced
in a number of languages (e.g., in Spanish, see Bentivoglio, 1983).
162 7. Complex sentence constructions
(33) does not contain the existential presupposition that someone has
travelled faster than the speed of light. However, this does not mean
that relative clauses modifying non-referential NP's (or even referen-
tial indefinites as in You will meet a man who will give you a newspa-
per) are not in some way pragmatically marked. The speaker still
wants the hearer to be able to identify the intended referent of the
modified NP or the class of elements to which the non-identified may
belong. Thus, even though the propositional content of the relative
clause is not presupposed, the speaker still assumes the hearer to be
familiar with it. To give one more example:
(34) I would like to eat a fish that has just been caught.
Even though in (34) there is no existing fish that has just been caught
with which the hearer is already supposedly familiar (through
discourse context), the speaker still assumes that the addressee could
possibly identify such a fish. Hence, the speaker assumes familiarity
with the propositional content on the part of the hearer based on
prior discourse context or on general knowledge of the world.
There axe two plausible explanations for the use of the special,
marked -UM- construction in the three Chamorro clause types
exemplified above. First of all, synchronically since the basic word
order pattern is disturbed and since subjects and objects coded as full
The ergative infix -UM- 163
Even though (39) a. is preferred over (39) b., the latter is still accept-
able to most speakers of Chamorro. The reason for this may be prag-
matic or based on knowledge of the world. Since the only possible
interpretation for this sentence is for the man to leave the country
and not the other way around, the use of the ergative agreement
marker is not confusing and the need for disambiguation not as press-
ing as in clauses like (35).
A second explanation for the use of the ergative infix -UM- in
complex constructions is diachronic in nature and reflects the princi-
ple of "syntactic conservatism" proposed by Givon (1979c, 83-86).
Givon observed that in many languages older syntactic patterns tend
to be preserved in constructions which are pragmatically more marked
than the basic clause which is affirmative, main, active, and declara-
tive. The -UM- construction in Chamorro in which the ergative infix
replaces the ergative agreement markers of the basic clause type is
more than likely an older syntactic pattern, reminiscent of the so-
called "actor-focus" constructions found in many of the Philippine
languages (e.g., Tagalog, see Schachter, 1976, Topping, 1973, among
others) and occurs obligatorily in pragmatically highly marked con-
structions such as Actor relative clauses, WH-questions, and focus
constructions. As the name used for this construction in Philippine
languages suggests, it is intimately correlated with the semantic role
of Agent. Similarly, the -UM- construction in Chamorro is closely
tied to the semantic role of Agent and can only be used to mark con-
structions in which the Agent has been extracted out of the clause.
166 7. Complex sentence constructions
This is not only true for relative clauses, WH-questions and focus con-
structions, but also for the complement clauses discussed in the first
section of this chapter and the constructions involving an NP
modified by an indefinite quantifier (see below).
A normal assertion like (48) does not necessarily exclude other indivi-
duals from participating in the same activity of following the woman.
The addition of the adverb 'also' makes this even clearer. The two
children also followed the woman may mean that in addition to other
people the two children followed the woman, or that in addition to
doing something else the children followed the woman. In contrast,
adding the same adverb to a clause like many people also followed the
woman cannot mean that in addition to others, many people followed
The ergative infix -UM- 169
These kind of assumptions on the part of the speaker are shared not
with other clauses in which the Agent/subject is modified by an
indefinite quantifier, but with other negative clauses. All negations
assume some prior acquaintance with the affirmative of the proposi-
tion. (See also Givon, 1979a, 103-105.)
Three types of constraints will be dealt with: (a) syntactic, (b) seman-
tic, and (c) pragmatic.
(54) F O C (NP, x, S)
In (61) the new information does not include the identity of the
Agent/subject, but rather the negation of the predicate. The new
information or focus in sentence (62) involves the identity of the
Agent/subject whereas the content of the predicate remains in the
background. Again, the close relation between the ergative infix
-UM- and the Agent/subject is exhibited. These two examples illus-
trate t h a t the -UM- construction cannot be characterized by the prag-
matic constraint alone, but must also be seen in terms of the other
two constraints discussed earlier.
2. N o m i n a l i z a t i o n s
-IN- are restricted to the syntactic case role of direct object which gen-
erally overlaps with the semantic role of Object (Patient or Dative, as
defined in the introductory chapter of this manuscript), whereas the
bare nominalization is used for any kind of oblique case such as
instruments, comitatives, oblique objects of intransitive verbs with
transitive meaning, etc. (See also Chung, 1982; Lindner, 1979.)
Syntactically, both coding devices are used when an element is
extracted out of the sentence. In the case of the nominalization with
the infix -IN-, the syntactic function of this item is the direct object.
This direct object may be the result of a promotional process (indi-
cated on the verb by means of the promotional suffix -) or it may be
a demoted direct object. (See also Chung, 1982.)
equivalents to all, many, some and none give the entire range of ele-
ments to which the characterization given in the nominalization
applies. The preposing of direct objects modified by these quantifiers
is not always obligatory. Modification by all and many allows the
regular ergative clause pattern as well. However, modification with
some and none requires the extraction of the modified NP to pre-
clausal position:
The fact that the ergative clause pattern is not allowed for taya' and
guaha is probably due to the fact that these morphemes are really
predicates in the Chamorro language and should therefore be placed
in predicate position in the clause.
As with the ergative -UM- constructions, the propositional content
of the nominalizations, both with and without the nominalizing infix
-IN-, is pragmatically assumed to be familiar to both hearer and
speaker. Again, this does not apply to the clauses involving the set of
quantifiers which often induce the appearance of such nominaliza-
tions.
180 7. Complex sentence constructions
Notes
3. A third category of examples which does not comply with the gen-
eral rule of topicality comprises two ergative clauses. Again, it is
the thematic unity of the paragraph which is the deciding factor
as to which of the participants is chosen as syntactic subject in the
clause. The two clauses which make up this class each close off a
paragraph, repeating the main point or main event in the para-
graph. Again, the Agents in these clauses are not higher in degree
of topicality than the Object, but they are more important at the
level of the paragraph, providing thematic continuity. Both
clauses are introduced by an adverb puts, 'so, thus, then.' Exam-
ple:
yuhi no balutan t
that LINK package the
'out of that bundle which'
na um- a- tangan g*
COMP SING- REC- tell LOC
'to talk to each other in the'
In the last clause of (2) the referential distance of the subject they
is 2. The referential distance of child, is only 1, so again we would
expect that according to the general rule an IN-passive should be
used indicating the higher degree of topicality of the Object child.
However, the couple and their experience is the main theme of this
paragraph and the organizational principle of thematic continuity
prevails in the concluding clause over topic continuity and this
pragmatic discourse organizing principle is coded syntactically by
selecting the thematic participant(s) as the syntactic subject of the
clause.
4. The fourth category of counterexamples to the rule of topicality is
based on only one clear example. The paragraph in which this
example was found contained a double theme: two brothers-in-law
Ngusuletao and Agurop. They are looking for the son of one of
them who has disappeared. The theme is about the separate ways
they go in order to find the lost boy. The first part of the para-
graph deals with the actions Ngusuletao takes, the second part
deals with what Agurop does. We get two parallel constructions
X did r and Y did with a number of clauses intervening. When
the second of the two parallel constructions appears in the narra-
tive, we actually return to the paragraph theme of the two broth-
ers, concentrating on what happened to the second one. Again,
the thematic participant is coded as the syntactic subject.
5. The last category contains a number of clauses, i.e., 3 transitives
(2 ergatives and 1 irrealis clause) and 3 IN-passives, which do not
fit under any of the aforementioned categories. Only one of these
counterexamples to the topicality rule is ultimately explicable in
terms of an obligatory focus construction using an IN-passive
Thematicity and subject coding 189
In the first part of the sentence the Agent is less topical in the
immediate narrative environment so a passive is used. However,
the participants, Agent and Object, or the governor and the child
respectively, have the same value 1 for referential distance in the
second proposition. One expects, according to the rule of topic-
shift, that the referent which functioned as Agent in the first pro-
position be coded as syntactic subject in the second. Thus an erga-
tive construction with the referent of the governor coded as
highest topic would be more appropriate. However, it is the ehild
which maintains its status of highest topic in the second clause
precisely because of the tight conjunction with the previous clause,
forming one single intonation unit in which the syntactic role of
the referents is maintained.
l.S. Conclusions
From the previous two subsections it has become clear that syntactic
coding devices do not only reflect discourse organization in terms of
topic continuity, involving information at the level of the clause, but
also in terms of thematic continuity found in larger units of discourse
such as the paragraph. Thematic continuity contributes more to the
continuity of the narrative as a whole than topic continuity, yet it is
still the case that the rule of topic continuity correctly predicts the
syntactic coding of most propositions in the narratives.
There seem to be two reasons for this observation. First of all,
topic continuity is often an integral part of thematic continuity in
that the theme of a given paragraph often involves one or more cen-
tral characters. That thematic unity is of a higher order than topic
continuity can be seen in the fact that the predictions made by the
general rule of topic continuity can be overruled if the less topical
participant in the immediate discourse environment happens to be
(part of) the paragraph theme. Examples were given in the two pre-
vious subsections. There is evidence that the correlation between topic
continuity and thematic continuity is indeed very high. Both gen-
erally lead to the same choice of referent as the syntactic subject in
the sentence. Scrutinizing all (i.e., 100) clauses in the data in which
Agent and Object were animate and in which they both had the same
value for referential distance, lead to the following results: In 86
clauses the subject was also the most important participant in the
thematic paragraph. Five of these clauses contained an Agent and an
Object which were both equally important to the paragraph theme, in
which case the referent which last functioned as the Agent was
selected as the subject of the new clause. Of the 14 remaining clauses
in which the subject did not coincide with the paragraph theme, 9
occurred in background clauses which did not contribute to the
development of the theme or story as a whole. In these nine cases,
the choice of syntactic subject was entirely based on clause level infor-
mation, i.e. predictable by the rule of topic continuity. Three clauses
were part of a tightly conjoined syntactic clause chain in which the
same referents were kept in the same syntactic roles across clause
192 8. Discourse organization and thematicity
In Chamorro, even though the basic word order is VSO, SVO is not
uncommon in narrative texts. In this section I will explore the prag-
matic function of the two different word order patterns. There is sug-
gestive evidence from a number of languages (such as Ute [Givon,
1983a], Spanish [Bentivoglio, 1983], Biblical Hebrew [Fox, ., 1983],
and Tagalog [Fox, B., 1985]) that the use of different word order pat-
terns involving the position of the subject in the clause correlates with
differing degrees of topicality of the subject referent. In these
languages placing the subject before the verb marks its referent as
being discontinuous in the narrative, whereas subjects in postverbal
position code highly continuous subjects. In addition, the same
languages provide evidence for a correlation between the type of word
order used and its position in the thematic paragraph. As such, sub-
jects in preverbal position do not only correlate with topic discon-
tinuity but also with thematic discontinuity. SVO word order is
more commonly found at major paragraph breaks, either introducing
a new paragraph or interrupting one in the middle. VSO is com-
monly found in paragraph medial and final position. Whereas there
is no support for the first hypothesis in the Chamorro narratives,
there is good evidence that word order in Chamorro codes thematic
continuity.
In order to evaluate both hypotheses, I performed a number of
tasks on the 200 pages of narratives which provided the data base for
this manuscript. First of all, in anticipation of the second hypothesis,
I divided all clauses with SVO and VSO word order respectively into
two separate categories according to their position in the paragraph. 1
One category contained those clauses, SVO2 or VSO, appearing in the
middle or at the end of the paragraph, continuing the main line of
thematic development within the paragraph. The second category
contained those clauses which either initiate a new paragraph or pro-
vide a break in the middle of one, often in the form of an interjection
194 8. Discourse organization and thematicity
taiguini na taya' ti u-
like this COMP nothing NEG IRR.Ss
'like this that there is nothing'
tungo' ya taya' ti u-
know and nothing NEG IRR. Ss-
'to know, and nothing one does not'
ate na kuentoe...
this LINK speech
'this speech...' (139;8-11)
There is a major break between the last clause and the previous
ones. The underlined clause which shows VSO word order starts a
new paragraph. There is no continuity with the action or the par-
ticipant of the previous set of clauses.
196 8. Discourse organization and thematicity
Ya- ha at Rosa na
like- Ss.POS UNM Rosa LINK
'He liked the girl Rosa.'
The theme of this paragraph is Joaquin and Rosa and their bud-
ding love for each other. The SVO clause further develops the
thematic line by giving more information about the situation of
both the thematic participants.
4. SVO at paragraph break.
st Juan.
UNM John
'with John.' (78;67-7l)
The theme of this paragraph is the pitiful state the child is in.
The underlined SVO clause does not provide more information
about the child, it does not add to the description of his fate,
rather the speaker comments on the feelings of the mother con-
cerning her son. The shift of attention from the child to the
mother causes a break in the thematic development of this partic-
ular paragraph.
para uma- n o --
na neste
neete t
IRR IRR. 3 PI- CAUS- adorn the
'adorn the'
Ya ti apman i tinaotao
and NEG long the people
'And before long the people'
I heffi at Tagaanat
the hero OBL Taga' when
'So the hero, Taga', when'
t tret na bitita nu
the three LINK visitor OBL
'the three visitors about'
200 8. Discourse organization and thematicity
na puengt.
LINK night
'that night.' (21;23-29)
VSO SVO
Initial/ Medial/ Initial/ Medial/
Break Final Break Final
referential (19) (57) (57) (25)
distance 11.05 8.16 8.07 8.40
topic
persistence 2.05 1.04 1.32 0.96
Initial/Break Medial/Final
referential distance = 1 25 32.9% 28 34.1%
referential distance = 20 25 32.9% 25 30.5%
referential distance =
between 1 and 20 26 34.2% 29 35.4%
Total 76 100.0% 82 100.0%
* laht-n- hiha.
the son- N- 3P1.POS
'their son right there.' (85;178-179)
The referential distance of both the mother and the father is 1 since
the topic of the previous clause, i.e., mother, is continued as part
of the reference. However, the referential identity is expanded to
include the father and needs to be indicated explicitly. This is
done by means of a definite NP.
2. The topic may have been narrowed:
ha so i lahi ya tlek-ha...
think the man and say-Ss.POS
'thought of something and said...' (77;55-57)
The subject of the last clause in this example was indirect object
of the previous clause. There is a shift in topic from someone (i.e.,
the subject in the first two clauses) to the old lady. Without the
Thematicity and subject inversion 205
of the second clause could be, since in essence the information of the
first clause is repeated in the second. Yet, the speaker chooses to code
this unambiguous subject as a definite NP.
Comparing the clauses with highly continuous subjects (i.e., those
with a value of 1 for referential distance) in paragraph initial (or
break) position with those in paragraph medial or final position, a
remarkable correlation comes to light: of the 25 clauses at the start or
break of a paragraph, 16 clauses contained a definite NP subject
without apparent reason judging from the immediately preceding
discourse, whereas 9 involved some ambiguity as to the possible iden-
tity of the highest topic in the new clause. On the other hand, of the
28 clauses in paragraph medial or final position, only 8 seemed to be
without reason and 20 involved some kind of potential interference or
ambiguity as to the referential identity of the subject (see Table 31):
Initial/Break Medial/Final
potential ambiguity of Subj. 9 36% 20 71.4%
no ambiguity of Subj. 16 64% 8 28.6%
Total 25 100% 28 100.0%
paragraph final position (see Table 32). VSO was more common
among the clauses in paragraph medial/final position, i.e., 20, than at
a paragraph start or break, i.e., 8. Similar results are obtained across
the board for all clauses in SVO order compared to all clauses in VSO
order regardless of the value for referential distance of their respective
subjects. (See Table 33.)
Initial/Break Medial/Final
SVO 22 88.0% 8 28.6%
VSO 3 12.0% 20 71.4%
Total 25 100.0% 28 100.0%
Initial/Break Medial/Final
VSO 19 25.3% 57 68.7%
SVO 56 74.7% 26 31.3%
Total 75 100.0% 83 100.0%
Notes
Conclusions
In this last chapter I would like to recapitulate the major issues dis-
cussed in the present work. The goal of my research was to provide
an adequate analysis of all the syntactic constructions which express
transitive propositions in the Chamorro language, i.e., those proposi-
tions which contain both an Agent and an Object and a verb which
describes an action transfer from the Agent onto the Object.
The Chamorro speaker has a choice among seven different con-
struction types to realize such propositions. In spoken narratives the
most frequently used construction is active and syntactically transi-
tive, i.e., the ergative construction or its irrealis counterpart. For this
reason, I have considered it as the norm with which the other sentence
types should be compared.
Besides the syntactically transitive construction there are three
syntactically intransitive clause types which also occur in affirmative,
main, or what I have called basic clauses. These are the antipassive
construction and two distinct passives named the IN-passive and the
MA-passive for the affix on the verb with which they are formed. In
addition to these four finite constructions there are three non-finite
sentence types which can only be found in complex clauses, i.e., in
WH-questions, relative clauses, certain sentential complements,
emphatic constructions, and propositions in which the Agent or the
Object is quantified by an indefinite quantifier. The first of these
non-finite constructions contains a verb in which the ergative agree-
ment markers have been replaced by the infix -UM-, which I have
called the ergative infix since it cannot replace irrealis or intransitive
agreement markers. The other two non-finite constructions are nomi-
nalizations which can be differentiated on the basis of the presence or
absence of the nominalizing infix -IN- on the verb.
Conclusions 211
1. First of all, the proposition must contain at least two major parti-
cipants, i.e., an Agent and an Object.
2. Both the Agent and the Object must be clearly identifiable. The
presence of a partially identified Agent potentially results in the
use of an antipassive while an indefinite Object necessarily requires
the choice of this particular construction. An unidentified Agent
leads to the obligatory use of the MA-passive.
3. Pragmatically, the Agent must be more topical, more important
than the Object in the narrative. When the Object acquires the
status of highest topic, becomes more continuous than the Agent
in the discourse, one of the passive constructions must be used.
4. The predicate in the proposition prototypically describes an action
transfer from the Agent onto the Object which is complete.
5. The predicate preferably is punctual and is not marked for con-
tinuous or habitual aspect, otherwise an antipassive may be used.
6. The activity described in the predicate must have a lasting effect
on the Object. When this is not the case an antipassive construc-
tion is optional.
The constraints above characterize the prototypical transitive clause.
They also provide evidence for the scalar nature of syntactic transi-
tivity in that some constraints are more binding than others. For
instance, the syntactically transitive construction can be used even
though the Agent is only partially identified or the activity described
in the predicate is not punctual or does not have a lasting effect on
the Object.
Appendix A : S a m p l e story
na'an- ha si Mata'pang.
name- Ss.POS UNM Mata'pang
'and his name was Mata'pang.'
si pale' ni i sertmonias ya ti
UNM priest OBL the ceremonies and NEG
'by the ceremonies and didn't'
Sample story 221
familia- ha.
family- 3s.POS
'his family.'
na i ha 'ant- mu ti u- atman
COMP the day- 2s.POS NEG IRR.3S- long
'your own days were counted and'
A.P. antipassive
CAUS causative
CL classifier
CMP comparative
COMP complementizer
DIR directional particle
. ergative
E.I. ergative infix
EMP. emphatic pronoun
HYP hypothetical marker
INT intensifier
IRR irrealis
LINK linking particle
LOC locative
epenthetic
NOM nominalizer
OBL oblique
PAS passive
PI plural
POS possessive
PRM promotional suffix
REL relative marker
RED reduplication (imperfective)
REC reciprocal marker
SING singular
UNM unmarked
Is first person singular
2s second person singular
3s third person singular
1P1 first person plural
2P1 second person plural
3P1 third person plural
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Index
Inuktituk, 5. See also Eskimo Object, 2n, 18n, 26, 31, 49n,
irrealis, 1, 34n, 38n, 50, 61, 80, 57n, 60, 62n, 80n, 116n, 159,
89, 141n, 180, 201, 210n 167n, 183n, 191, 210n
object incorporation, 117
Johnson, D., 56 Oblique, 18, 26, 31, 48n, 53, 57,
Johnson, M.R., 138 73, 78, 81, 98, 106, 119, 125n,
136, 177n, 181
Kalmar, 1., 5, 36
Keenan, E.L., 56, 139, 157, 170n paragraph, l l n , 15, 21, 77, 109,
Kirsner, R.S., 14 182-209, 211; paragraph posi-
Klatzky, R., 14 tion, 192-208; paragraph
thematicity, 182-209
Lakoff, G. 167 partitive, 121
Latta, F., 23, 56 passive, 1, 6, 47, 49n, 61, 66,
Li, C.N., 13 71n, 75n, 80-115, 163, 172,
Lindner, S., 157, 164, 177 183n, 210n; agentless passive,
Longacre, R.E., 11, 192 80n; -IN- passive, 49n, 57,
71n, 75n, 81n, 201, 210n;
Malion, T.S., 138 MA-passive, 49n, 57n, 62,
manipulative verbs, 43, 140-148, 71n, 75n, 81n, 119, 201, 210n
155n. See also verbs of con- passivization, 98, 100
trol Perlmutter, D., 56
metathesis, 37-38, 49 Philippine, 82, 165
modality verbs, 43, 140n. See phonology, 22-25
also self-manipulation verbs plural nouns, 28, 73n, 79n, 83,
modification, 29, 166n, 179 86n, 112, 212
morphology, 25-56 Postal, P., 56
pragmatic constraint, 174, 181,
nasal assimilation, 28, 38, 51 211n. See also pragmatic
Naylor, P.B., 82 function
Nez Perce, 128 pragmatic function, 1, 2, 5n, 11,
nominalization, 1, 30, 33, 46-49, 50, 57, 72, 75, 77, 85, 89, 110,
77, 139n, 159n, 167, 176-179, 112, 116n, 128n, 139, 169.
210; bare nominalization, See also pragmatic constraint
176n presupposition, 162n, 174n, 209
non-finite constructions, 1, 148, promotion, 128; promotional
151, 155, 210n. See also erga- suffix, 51, 56, 177
tive infix pronoun, 3, 31, 35, 59, 77, 83,
non-referential, 66, 69, 71, 75, 85n, 89, 92n, 161, 212; absolu-
117n tive, 31; emphatic, 31-32;
indefinite, 111; independent,
244 Index