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Work Papers of the Summer Institute of Linguistics, University of North Dakota Session

DOI

10.31356/silwp.vol34.03

Abstract

From the introduction: "Zapotec languages have sometimes been described as having two sets of (nonreflexive) personal pronouns: bound and free (Butler 1976), clitic and free (Jones and Church 1985, Marlett 1987), dependent and independent (Pickett 1960, Bartholomew 1983), inseparable and separable (Butler 1980), suffixes and pronouns (Briggs 1961), particles and pronouns (Pickett et al. 1965). The variety of terminology used indicates that the syntax of Zapotec pronouns requires further study. The goal of this article is to clarify the behavior of these pronouns across the Zapotec language family (using a subset of languages to illustrate), noting where these languages are alike or different. A major conclusion of this study is that the traditional division of pronouns used in descriptions of Zapotec is inadequate. Instead we must think in terms of three classes of pronouns, although it may be that only two of these are attested in a given language. For example, Yatzachi and Yalalag Zapotec lack one class entirely, while Xanaguia Zapotec lacks another class; Isthmus Zapotec has all three classes, but one class has only one member. I describe these pronoun classes by making reference to two separate parameters: prosodic independence and syntactic independence. Syntactically independent pronouns may be prosodically dependent or independent; prosodically independent pronouns are all syntactically independent."

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