NEZ PERCE
SUMMARY
Possessors of primary objects in Nez Perce can control object agreement on the verb in the context of an additional applicative-like suffix. Possessors controlling object agreement can be external to the object noun phrase; external possessors have accusative case. Internal possessors controlling object agreement differ from these by bearing genitive and forming a constituent with the direct object as indicated by word order, for example.
In addition to object agreement, possessors of intransitive subjects can control predicate agreement. Possessive relations are not restricted to part-whole relations.
LANGUAGE PROFILE
EVIDENCE IN SUPPORT OF PIPS
- Evidence for the internal status of possessors comes from adnominal genitive case-marking on the possessor.
- This contrasts with case-marking on external possessors, which take on an argument function in the clause and are case-marked accordingly, for instance with accusative.
- Internal possessors of direct objects form a constituent with the head of the object phrase, as indicated by word order.
KEY SOURCES
Deal, Amy Rose. 2013. ‘Possessor raising’, Linguistic Inquiry 44(3): 391-432.
Rude, Noel. 1986. Discourse-pragmatic context for genitive promotion in Nez Perce, Studies in Language 10(1): 109-136.
