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===Articles=== | ===Articles=== | ||
There are no definite articles, but there is an indefinite article clitic. It occupies the demonstrative syntactic "slot" and has the allomorphs / | There are no definite articles, but there is an indefinite article clitic. It occupies the demonstrative syntactic "slot" and has the allomorphs /tí-/ before a consonant and /ít-/ before a vowel e.g. | ||
/ | /tí=dô̰k/ | ||
INDEF=dog | INDEF=dog | ||
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/ | /ít=ˈḛ̂nèm/ | ||
INDEF=enemy | INDEF=enemy | ||
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Kämpya nouns are not inflected for singular or plural, but when they take the indefinite article, they are only ever singular, so the above examples could never mean "some dogs" or "some enemies". | Kämpya nouns are not inflected for singular or plural, but when they take the indefinite article, they are only ever singular, so the above examples could never mean "some dogs" or "some enemies". | ||
It is important to distinguish the indefinite article from the word for one / | It is important to distinguish the indefinite article from the word for one /tìʔ/. The indefinite article is a clitic, which has no stress and is phonologically part of whatever word follows it i.e. it will have plain High Pitch no matter whether it is followed by a noun or (restrictive) adjective. On the other hand, the numeral /tìʔ/ - "one" is phonologically a separate word. In terms of the tonal morphology, it (like all other numerals) belongs to category 2, and is thus pronounced with Low Pitch. | ||
Compare: | Compare: | ||
/ | /tí=dô̰k/ | ||
INDEF=dog | INDEF=dog | ||
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with | with | ||
/ | /tìʔ dô̰k/ | ||
one dog | one dog | ||
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The numeral for "one" (or any other numerals) cannot be used with the indefinite article, so */ | The numeral for "one" (or any other numerals) cannot be used with the indefinite article, so */tí=tìʔ dô̰k/ is ungrammatical. | ||
However, (restrictive) adjectives can intervene between the indefinite article and the noun e.g. | However, (restrictive) adjectives can intervene between the indefinite article and the noun e.g. | ||
/ | /tí=ˈjḛ̀láu dô̰k/ | ||
INDEF=yellow.REST dog | INDEF=yellow.REST dog | ||
a yellow dog | a yellow dog | ||
===Demonstratives=== | ===Demonstratives=== |
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