15.2. Focus pronouns in questions and answers to ‘Who?’
Models
| 1) | SÁN SEN OĆE? | ‘Who am I?’ |
| 2) | ESE OĆE SÁN? | ‘Who am I?’ |
| 3) | SÁN SW̱ OĆE? | ‘Who are you?’ |
| 4) | NEȻE OĆE SÁN? | ‘Who are you?’ |
| 5) | SÁN SW̱ OĆE HÁLE? | ‘Who are you folks?’ |
| 6) | NEȻI¸LEYE¸ OĆE SÁN? | ‘Who are you folks?’ |
| 7) | SÁN ȽTE OĆE? | ‘Who are we?’ |
| 8) | ȽNIṈEȽ OĆE SÁN? | ‘Who are we?’ |
| 9) | SÁN OĆE? | ‘Who is/are he/she/it/they?’ |
| 10) | NIȽ OĆE SÁN? | ‘Who is he/she/it?’ |
| 11) | NENI¸ȽEYE¸ OĆE SÁN? | ‘Who are they?’ |
| 12) | SÁN OĆE Ȼ EN¸ SNÁ? | ‘What is your name?’ |
| 13) | SÁN OĆE Ȼ SNÁS? | ‘What is his/her name?’ |
‣ 1 The italics are meant to indicate extra stress on the English translation of the word. This indicates the focus of the sentence. That is what the speaker wants the listener to focus their attention on.
‣ 2 The models show three ways of asking who someone is. One way is shown in the first model sentence. Here SÁN is an intransitive verb meaning ‘to be who.’ It is followed by the subject and the OĆE question particle. A more literal translation of the first model would be ‘I am who?’ With focus in the English on ‘who.’
‣ 3 The second way is shown in the second model sentence. This uses the SENĆOŦEN focus pronoun ESE ‘to be I/me.’ Here the focus is ‘I,’ not ‘who.’ Here is a complete list of all the SENĆOŦEN focus pronouns (with the stressed vowel in red):
ESE ‘It is I.’
ȽNIṈEȽ ‘It is we.’
NEȻE ‘It is you.’
NEȻI¸LEYE¸ ‘It is you folks.’
NIȽ ‘It is he/she/it.’
NENI¸ȽEYE¸ ‘It is they.’
‣ 4 The first and second person focus pronouns, ESE, LNIṈEȽ, NEȻE, and NEȻI¸LEYE¸ in are not often used. These pronouns cannot generally be used as subjects or objects in sentences. They are typically used only when the speaker wants to put special emphasis on the ‘I,’ ‘you,’ or ‘we’. The most common use is in questions and in answers to questions. More will be said about the use of these in later sections.
‣ 5 Note that the members of each pair of questions in the models differ only in the focus. Putting the word first in the sentence makes it focused. We will see in §47.2 that this is a general rule in SENĆOŦEN.
‣ 6 Answers to SÁN questions normally use the appropriate focus pronoun. Study the following sets of questions and answers:
| Q: | ESE OĆE SÁN. | ‘Who am I?’ | |
| A: | NEȻE Pat. | ‘You are Pat.’ | |
| Q: | NEȻE OĆE SÁN. | ‘Who are you?’ | |
| A: | ESE Sam. | ‘I am Sam.’ | |
| Q: | NEȻI¸LEYE¸ OĆE SÁN. | ‘Who are you folks?’ | |
| A: | ȽNIṈEȽ EN¸ SĆÁLE¸ĆE¸. | ‘We are your friends.’ | |
| Q: | NIȽ OĆE SÁN. | ‘Who is he/she?’ | |
| A: | NIȽ Alex. | ‘He/she is Alex.’ | |
| Q: | SÁN OĆE TŦE SWIU¸LES. | ‘Who is that boy?’ | |
| A: | NIȽ John. | ‘He is John.’ | |
| Q: | SÁN LE¸ OĆE ȻSE ȻONEṈET. | ‘Who ran?’ | |
| A: | NIȽ Jane ȻŦE ȻONEṈET. | ‘It was Jane that ran.’ |
‣ 8 Answers to questions provide new information to the person asking the question. In English when we give new information, we sometimes add a phrase like ‘for your information,’ ‘you know,’ ‘don’t you see,’ or ‘don’t you know.’ In SENĆOŦEN, when you are giving new information to someone, it is polite to include the little word ȻE, which means something like ‘just so you know.’ So all of the answers in point 6 can have the ȻE¸ as in ESE ȻE¸ Sam.
‣ 9 This little word ȻE¸ is another speech act modifier, which were introduced in §3. There are lots of little words like this in SENĆOŦEN. You’ll be finding out about all of them in §48.
‣ 10 Some speakers use an article with names as in NIȽ TŦE Alex or NIȽ ȻSE John.
‣ 11 The third way of asking who someone is can be seen in the last two models (12 and 13). These each have a Ȼ clause and can also be translated ‘What are you named?’ or awkwardly but more literally ‘Your being named is who?’ Note that SÁN here is translated as ‘what’ in English.
‣ 12 In English, ‘who’ is usually used only referring to the name of a person. In SENĆOŦEN, SÁN is used to refer to the name of a person, but it can also be used to refer to the name of a place. Model 13 could be used if you are asking about a place name. If, for example, you are asking about the name of an island, you could say SÁN OĆE Ȼ SNÁS ȻSE ṮEṮÁĆES? It looks like ‘Who is the name of the island?’, but it is best translated ‘What is the name of the island?’
‣ 13 Here is a new word (with the stressed vowel underlined): ṮEṮÁĆES ‘island.’
 | SÁN OĆE ŦÁ¸E KÁ¸ṈI¸? | ‘Who is that girl?’ |
 | NIȽ ȻE¸ ŦE NE HÁ¸EĆ. | ‘It’s my younger sister.’ |
| NEȻE OĆE SÁN? | ‘Who are you?’ |
| ESE ŚÍYEȽ ¸E ŦÁ¸E KÁ¸ṈI¸. | ‘I’m that girl’s older brother.’ |
| 15.2A. Answer each of the following in SENĆOŦEN. 1. SÁN OĆE ȻSE MÁN? 2. SÁN OĆE? 3. SÁN SE¸ ȽÁU¸? 4. SÁN OĆE Ȼ S¸IȽENS ¸E TŦE SEPLIL? 5. SÁN LE¸ OĆE TŦE QENNEW̱? 6. STÁṈ OĆE TŦÁ¸E? 7. STÁṈ OĆE TŦE WITEṈ? 8. STÁṈ OĆE Ȼ EN, SQENNEW̱? 9. STÁṈ SE¸ OĆE IȽEN? 10. STÁṈ OĆE NEḴEṈ? | 15.2B. Translate and answer each of the following in SENĆOŦEN. 1. Who laughed? 2. Who is this boy? 3. Who will go? 4. Who saw it? 5. Who is your mother? 6. What is this? 7. What dove? 8. What hit it? 9. What ran away? 10. What is that? |
| 15.2C. Make answers for the SÁN sentences you made up for 15.1C. | |