Jáhkarrá: Nouns
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Overview of the nouns
This public article was written by [Deactivated User], and last updated on 5 Dec 2018, 16:15. Editing of this article is shared with Conlanger.
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A Jáhkarrá noun inflects for case, number, possession and demonstrative location. Jáhkarrá also has a nominal category of postbases, suffixes which turn a noun into a verb and are comparable to light verbs of other languages.
The order of suffixes is as follows:
| Stem | Case | Number | Possessor | Demonstrative | Postbase |
As an example of a noun with all slots filled, consider eipinčanedai:
| eip | i | n | čan | e | dai |
| rabbit | plural | nominative | your | this | have-1.SG |
| I have these rabbits of you. | |||||
Jáhkarrá has twenty-two cases. Of these, seventeen fulfill the role that adpositions take in other languages, while the other five are grammatical.
For more information, see here: Jáhkarrá noun cases.
Jáhkarrá has no possessive pronouns. Instead, suffixes on nouns are used. The equivalent of English mine, yours etc. are semantically empty nouns like álgu "thing" with the appropriate suffix.
The possessive suffixes are:
| Number | Suffix |
|---|---|
| 1SG | čai |
| 2SG | čan |
| 3SG | ča |
| 4SG | čas |
| 1DU | čii |
| 1DU.EX | čid |
| 2DU | čin |
| 3DU | či |
| 4DU | čis |
| 1PL | čái |
| 1PL.EX | čáid |
| 2PL | čáin |
| 3PL | čá |
| 4PL | čás |
Their common element is -č-, with the individual endings mostly duplicating those of the present intransitive conjugation.
The third person singular possessive suffix is increasingly used to express a definite noun, akin to a postfixed article.
Demonstrative pronouns are noun suffixes in Jáhkarrá. There is a three-way distintion between -e (proximal, close to speaker), -o (medial, close to listener) and -u (distal, far from both). If the suffix follows a vowel, /j/ is inserted.
The anaphoric and cataphoric usage of the demonstratives, and also their local one, is determined at least as much by the speaker's cognitive distance to the noun phrase in question. NPs the speaker has a positive attitude to or that they consider easy to locate on their mental map are much more likely to receive proximal marking; conversely, distal marking often encodes dismissal, distancing or a shaky grasp on a concept.
Postbases are nominal suffixes that replace common verbs, turning a noun into a complete sentence. The noun to which they attach is the direct object (or, in the case of hea "to be", the predicate) and the phrase is treated as a verb, with all inflectional capabilites available to verbs.
Postbases inflect like transitive verbs, but their object reference is fixed to the third person singular. This effectively means that their person/number inflection is the same as with intransitive verbs (since the 3SG object ending is a null morpheme).
Some postbases realted to consumption (like raŋaid "eat", viemaid "drink) also occur as separate verbs. The main difference is that their postbase form always assumes an indefinite quantity, while the full verb can either be interpreted as referring to a clearly defined amount or take suffixes that specify this.
The following postbases are found in Jáhkarrá:
| Postbase | Meaning | Example |
|---|---|---|
| heaid | be X | álli "girl", állihai "I am a girl" |
| hoaid | have X, want X | njeanná "cat", njeannáhoai "I have a cat", njeannáhoažái "I want [to have] a cat (desiderative)" |
| šaid | become X | orgŋo "man", orgŋošavva "he became a man" |
| raŋaid | eat X | deannja "fish", deannjaraŋavvá "they ate fish" |
| viemaid | drink X | áska "water", áskaviemade "someone will drink water" |
| eraid | need X, seek X | váhpa "boat", váhparravvirea "I did not need a boat" |
| čizzaid | cause X, lead to X | urkŋos "death", urkŋohčinčizzadan "you will be the death of me [cause my death]" |
A postbase is always the last element of an inflected noun. If a vowel precedes it, /j/ is inserted.
The postbase heaid is irregular: heaid ~ hai, han, hea, has ~ hii, hiid, hiin, heai, his ~ hái, háid, háin, há, hás. All tense/mood inflections and participles are based on the stem hi-, with the same suffixes as above.
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