Date of Award
12-1-2021
Document Type
Thesis
Degree Name
Master of Arts (MA)
Department
Linguistics
First Advisor
Linda Humnick
Abstract
Klon is a typologically SOV Timor-Alor-Pantar (Papuan) language, spoken by around 10,000 people on the islands of Alor and Pantar in eastern Indonesia. Like most SOV languages, Klon has postpositions, possessor before possessed, and sentence-final question particles. NPs are left-headed, with attributive modifiers, numerals, quantifiers, relative clauses, and demonstratives following the head noun. Klon has both pre-verbal and post-predicate verb modifiers. Preverbal modifiers can only modify verbal predicates. The language is aspect-prominent, with no grammatical tense. Like many SOV languages, Klon has clause-final standard negation, often occurring as bipartite negation.
Klon syntax pivots around the Undergoer. Only Undergoers are indexed on verbs. There are multiple sets of Undergoer pronouns, proclitics and prefixes. Some associations are lexically specific. Some show semantic contrast with the same verb root. Undergoer proclitics may mark: object of a transitive verb, reflexive, or optionally mark intradirective verbs of motion, posture, bodily function or experience.
Recommended Citation
Banamtuan, Johnny Marshel, "Klon pronouns in their typological and linguistic context within Wallacea, Eastern Indonesia" (2021). Theses and Dissertations. 4157.
https://commons.und.edu/theses/4157