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Prepositions and postpositions
Prepositions: preposition – noun. English:
count for me
prep noun
Postpositions: noun – postposition. Witsuwit’en:
[s- pe c’otw]
me for you (sg.) count
noun postposition
‘count for me’
Affixation to postpositions
[spe]
‘for me’
[mpe]
‘for you (sg.)’
[nxwpe]
‘for us, you (pl.)’
[ppe]
‘for him, her, it’
[hppe]
‘for them’
Morphological analysis
-pe
‘for’
s-
‘me’
m-
‘you (sg.)’
nxw-
‘us, you (pl.)’
p-
‘him, her, it’
hp-
‘them’
Morphological analysis (revised)
Prefixes to nouns/postpositions:
1 person
sg
s-
pl
2 person
n/m-
nxw-
3 person
p-
hp-
Affixation to verbs

Unusual features


Position class morphology: (prefix order
restrictions)
prefix-prefix-prefix-...-verb root-suffix
Discontinuous morphemes
Some verbs (dictionary entry)
-jin 'sg./du. stand'
 -tseq ‘be lightweight’
 -/as ‘du./group goes, walks


O-u-jin ‘pick O (berries) while stationary’
Some verbs (actual words)
Minimally: dictionary form of verb+‘tense’
 [sa n/a] ‘the sun/moon is going’





sa ‘sun, moon’
-/a 'sun, moon goes'
n- continuative (‘round-trip’)
[sa i/a] ‘the sun/moon is moving'

i-...- progressive
Position class morphology
Verb prefix positions: postposition/adverbial – iterative – multiple plural
– negative – incorporated root – inceptive – distributive plural –
pronominal object/subject – qualifier – tense/neg – subject – valence
Root
Suffix positions: negative - tense
[sa i/a] ‘the sun/moon is moving'
i- tense + -/a root + -  tense
Some more verb words
1. [tci ujin]
'he/she is picking huckleberries'
O-u-jin
'pick O (berries) while stationary‘
O(object required)
- imperfective
u
- jin
qualifier –root
(tense position)
  0 / u ___
Prefix positions: postposition/adverbial – iterative – multiple plural –
negative – incorporated root – inceptive – distributive plural –
pronominal object/subject – qualifier – tense/neg – subject – valence
Root
Suffix positions: negative - tense
2. [c'ojin]'he/she is picking'
c'- unspecified object (pronominal object/subject
position)
(c’ + u  c’o)
Prefix positions: postposition/adverbial – iterative – multiple plural –
negative – incorporated root – inceptive – distributive plural –
pronominal object/subject – qualifier – tense/neg – subject – valence
Root
Suffix positions: negative - tense
6. [wec'onthzisjit]
things)‘
'I won't pick (round
th future (qualifier position)
i(tense position)
-
(tense position)
// + /  t
/n/  0 / ___ C]syllable
Prefix positions: postposition/adverbial – iterative – multiple plural –
negative – incorporated root – inceptive – distributive plural –
pronominal object/subject – qualifier – tense/neg – subject – valence
Root
Suffix positions: negative - tense
Morphological structure
'I'm not going to pick (round) things'
negative
round
1 sg. subject
[we- c‘- o- n- th- [] z- i- s- ji -t
]
unspecified object
‘pick (berries)
while stationary’
future
-