Suyá language

Kĩsêdjê preserved the consonants of Proto-Tapajós almost intact, with the exception of the sound change *t̪ʰ > s.{{cite journal |last1=Nikulin |first1=Andrey |last2=Salanova |first2=Andrés Pablo |title=Northern Jê Verb Morphology and the Reconstruction of Finiteness Alternations |journal=International Journal of American Linguistics |date=October 2019 |volume=85 |issue=4 |pages=533–567 |doi=10.1086/704565|s2cid=204369114 }}{{rp|560}}

The following table lists some of the possible onsets of Kĩsêdjê;{{rp|126}} in addition, most of these can further combine with /w/ or /ɲ/ (in words whose Proto-Northern Jê etyma contain one of *wa, *wə̂, or *jê, which are analyzed as complex nuclei). Underlying nasals acquire an oral phase preceding an oral nucleus.{{rp|127–8}}

The vowel inventory of Kĩsêdjê is shown below (the orthographic representation is given in italics; the characters in slashes stand for the IPA values of each vowel).{{rp|125}} Nonato (2014) reports that there is no allophonic variation.{{rp|127}} By convention, the tilde, which is part of the graphemes that denote nasal vowels, is left out in the orthography following , , and (but not ), as in [mɔ̃] ‘to go (plural)’. In addition, the vowels /ɘ̃/ and /ã/ are not differentiated in the orthography (both are written as <ã>).{{rp|130–1}}

Kĩsêdjê has a phenomenon whereby an echo vowel is obligatorily inserted in utterance-final words whose underlying form ends in a consonant;{{cite thesis|last=Nonato |first=Rafael |date=February 2014 |url=http://etnolinguistica.wdfiles.com/local--files/tese%3Anonato-2014/nonato_2014_clause_chaining.pdf |title=Clause Chaining, Switch Reference and Coordination |type=Ph.D. dissertation |location=Cambridge, MA |publisher=Massachusetts Institute of Technology}}{{rp|128–30}}{{cite book |last=Beauchamp |first=Jérémie |editor-last1=Reisinger |editor-first1=D. K. E. |editor-last2=Lo |editor-first2=Roger Yu-Hsiang| title=Proceedings of the Workshop on the Structure and Constituency of Languages of the Americas 23 |publisher=University of British Columbia |date=2019 |pages=26–39 |chapter=Echo and default epenthesis in Kĩsêdjê |url=https://lingpapers.sites.olt.ubc.ca/files/2019/07/Beauchamp_WSCLA23.pdf}} that way, all utterances end in vowels on surface in Kĩsêdjê. Vowel epenthesis often causes the underlying coda to lenite. The resulting alternations are represented orthographically, as in thep [ˈt̠ʰɛp̚] / thewe [ˈt̠ʰɛwɛ] ‘fish’, wit [ˈwit̚] / wiri [ˈwiɾi] ‘only’, ngrôt [ˈŋgɹot̚] / ngrôrô [ˈŋgɹoɾo] ‘the Pleiades’, khẽn [ˈkʰɛ̃n̚] / khẽne [ˈkʰɛ̃nɛ̃] ‘stone’, hwysysôm [hʷɨsɨˈsom̚] / hwysysômy [hʷɨsɨˈsomɨ] ‘mosquito’. In words that end in an underlying rhotic coda, echo vowels are inserted regardless of whether the word is in the utterance-final position, as in ngõrõ [ˈŋɔ̃ɽɔ̃] ‘to sleep’ (forms such as *[ˈŋɔ̃ɽ] are unattested).{{rp|128–30}}

As in all other Northern Jê languages, verbs inflect for finiteness and thus have a basic opposition between a finite form (also form B{{cite thesis |type=Ph.D. dissertation |last=Santos |first=Ludoviko Carnasciali dos |date=1997 |title=Descrição de aspectos morfossintáticos da língua Suyá (Kĩsêdjê), família Jê |url=https://repositorio.ufsc.br/xmlui/bitstream/handle/123456789/77195/144769.pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y |location=Florianópolis |publisher=Universidade Federal de Santa Catarina}} and main form) and a nonfinite form (also form A and embedded form). Finite forms are used in matrix clauses only, whereas nonfinite forms are used in all types of subordinate clauses{{rp|140}} as well as in some matrix clauses. Nonfinite forms are most often formed via suffixation and/or prefix substitution. Some verbs (including all descriptives with the exception of katho ‘to leave’, whose nonfinite form is kathoro) lack an overt finiteness distinction.

The available nonfinite suffixes are /-ɽ/ (the most common option, found in many transitive and intransitive verbs, with its allomorph /-j/ after the vowel /a/), /-n/ (found in some transitive verbs), as well as /-k/, /-m/, and /-t/ (found in a handful of intransitive verbs which take a nominative subject when finite), as shown in the table below.

In Proto-Northern Jê, several verbs derived their finite forms by means of leniting the stem-final consonant (*-t, *-c, *-k → *-r, *-j, *-r).{{rp|544}} In Kĩsêdjê, at least three verbs retain this pattern, though the relation between the finite and nonfinite forms has been obfuscated by a series of regular sound changes, including *-ôj > -wâj (-âj after a labial), *-c > -t.

In Proto-Northern Jê, a small set of verbs formed their nonfinite forms by employing one of the aforementioned processes and a morphophonological process whereby the onset of the stressed syllable became palatal, and the nucleus of the stressed syllable was raised (if possible); this has been attributed to the influence of an underlying palatalizing nonfinite prefix. In Kĩsêdjê, some of these verbs still follow the archaic pattern, though the relation between the finite and nonfinite forms has been obfuscated by a series of regular sound changes.

In addition to the aforementioned processes, the finiteness inflection may involve prefix substitution or loss. For example, the valency-reducing prefixes are a(j)- (anticausative) and a- (antipassive) in finite verb forms, but wi- and tá-/tu-, respectively, in the nonfinite forms.{{rp|541, 544}} In addition, some verbs which denote physiological activities or movement have a prefix (i- and a-, respectively) in their finite forms but not in the nonfinite form. Some examples are given below.{{cite book |last1=Nonato |first1=Rafael |last2=Suyá |first2=Jamtô |last3=Suyá |first3=Kawiri |title=Dicionário Kĩsêdjê-Português |date=December 6, 2012 |publisher=Museu do Índio |location=Rio de Janeiro |url=http://prodoclin.museudoindio.gov.br/images/conteudo/kisedje/dicionario_kisedje1.pdf |access-date=4 August 2020}}

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Future, progressive, continuous, completive, and negated clauses in Kĩsêdjê show a cross-linguistically rare morphosyntactic alignment pattern, known as the nominative–absolutive alignment.{{cite journal |last1=Gildea |first1=Spike |last2=Castro Alves |first2=Flávia de |title=Nominative-absolutive: Counter-universal split ergativity in Jê and Cariban |journal=Typological Studies in Language |date=2010 |volume=89 |pages=159–200 |doi=10.1075/tsl.89.07gil |url=https://amerindias.github.io/curso2015/referencias/gilque10ergativityamazonia.pdf |access-date=8 August 2020}}{{rp|191}}

Kĩsêdjê has also been considered unusual in the literature because of its unexpected (from a cross-linguistic point of view) distribution of ergative and nominative marking of transitive agents in certain types of clauses, such as future and negative clauses.{{cite book |last1=Gildea |first1=Spike |last2=Castro Alves |first2=Flávia de |editor-last1=Barðdal |editor-first1=Jóhanna |editor-last2=Gildea |editor-first2=Spike |editor-last3=Luján |editor-first3=Eugenio R. |title=Reconstructing Syntax |publisher=Brill |date=2020 |pages=47–107 |chapter=Reconstructing the Source of Nominative-Absolutive Alignment in Two Amazonian Language Families |url=https://brill.com/view/book/edcoll/9789004392007/BP000010.xml |doi=10.1163/9789004392007_003 |isbn=978-90-04-39199-4|s2cid=225704728 }} More specifically, transitive agents expressed by a full noun phrase are nominative (marked by the subject marker ra in the examples below), whereas pronominal transitive agents are ergative, as in the following examples:{{rp|86–7}}

{{interlinear|indent=3

|Ludo ra thep khu-ru mã.

|Ludo SM fish eat.PL-NF FUT

|‘Ludo will eat fish.’}}

{{interlinear|indent=3

|Ro-txi ra mĩ-txi pĩ-rĩ khêrê.

|anaconda-AUG SM caiman-AUG kill.SG-NF NEG

|‘The anaconda did not kill the caiman.’}}

{{interlinear|indent=3

|I-re hwĩ-sy rẽ-n mã.

|1SG-ERG tree-seed throw.PL-NF FUT

|‘I will pick fruit.’}}

{{interlinear|indent=3

|I-re hwĩ-ngrá jantô-rô khêrê.

|1SG-ERG tree-dry hang.PL-NF NEG

|‘I didn't hang the firewood.’}}

Such split has been previously considered to be impossible by R. M. W. Dixon:{{cite book |last=Dixon |first=R. M. W. |title=Ergativity |publisher=Cambridge University Press |date=1994}}

Cross-referencing systems are thus basically pronominal (with the affixes having developed from free-form pronouns, in some earlier stage of the language). We would expect them to be on a nominative-accusative pattern, since this characterizes pronouns at the extreme left of the hierarchy … What we can predict is that, if there is a ‘split’ of this kind, then bound prefixes will be accusative and case-marking on free forms will be ergative. This is exactly what is found.

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