9.1. Intransitive motion verbs in series
Models
| 1) | YÁ¸ OX̱ ŦȽO. | ‘Go down (toward water).’ |
| 2) | YÁ¸ OX̱ ŦOṈ. | ‘Go up (away from water).’ |
| 3) | YÁ¸ OX̱ W̱IL¸EṈ¸. | ‘Go downward.’ |
| 4) | YÁ¸ OX̱ ŚELEṈ. | ‘Go upward.’ |
| 5) | YÁ¸ OX̱ HEḴILEṈ. | ‘Go underneath.’ |
| 6) | YÁ¸ OX̱ DÁȻEL. | ‘Go across.’ |
| 7) | YÁ¸ OX̱ NEU¸ILEṈ. | ‘Go in.’ |
| 8) | YÁ¸ OX̱ SḴILEṈ. | ‘Go out.’ |
| 9) | YÁ, LE¸ SEN DÁȻEL TOOL DOQ. | ‘I went across over (water) to go home.’ |
‣ 1 Each of the model sentences has the verb YÁ¸ ‘go, leave’ and the verb OX̱ ‘go to.’ Neither of these verbs is really necessary. You could get the same English translation with only the last verb in each sentence. The English translation does not give the fine meaning distinctions that SENĆOŦEN does. The YÁ¸ adds the notion that the subject is leaving or going away from some place; the OX̱ adds the idea of moving in a particular direction or going to some place. The last word is the one that specifies the direction. New words in the models have the stressed vowel underlined.
‣ 2 Notice that models 1 and 2 specify a direction with respect to the water. Several verbs in SENĆOŦEN have a water orientation. Traditionally, the salt water has been the most important means of transportation and source of food for the SENĆOŦEN people. This importance is reflected in the language. Here are more water-oriented verbs. The stressed vowel in each of the words in this list is in red to help you remember the correct pronunciation:
ȽĆELIḰ ‘go along the edge of the water’
KTOŦEN ‘go along the beach’
X̱EL₭ILEṈ ‘go downstream’
ḴES ‘go into water’
SḴOŦEṈ ‘go out into open water’
ṮĆILEṈ ‘go under water’
TÍYEL ‘go upstream toward the head of a bay
X̱EL¸₭ ‘go with the flow of the water’
‣ 3 Model 9 shows that several verbs can be combined in series. The order is generally flexible. That is, the verbs in the model can be shifted around, and you will still get basically the same meaning. However, there are some words that have restrictions as to which can come first.
‣ 4 The final model has four verbs in series. This seems to be the acceptable limit. Two or three verbs is common; four verbs occur occasionally; five in series is not acceptable.
‣ 5 The verb YÁ¸ can come first or anywhere later in the series. It can even occur twice in a sentence, as in YÁ¸ SEN YÁ¸ OX̱ ‘I left to go over (there).’ This and other motion verbs will be covered in detail in §26 and §27.
‣ 6 As is always the case, the subject and the other speech act modifiers follow only the first word in the sentence. This is shown in the final model sentence with LE¸ and SEN following the first verb.
‣ 7 Although there are several verbs in each model sentence, they really work together in describing one event with one subject. This can be seen clearly when we look at transitive and passive verbs in series, which is the subject of the next section.
9.1A. Which of these sentences is ungrammatical? If it is ungrammatical, explain why it is. If it is grammatical, translate the sentence. If you see a word you do not know, look it up in the SENĆOŦEN dictionary.
1. YÁ¸ OX̱ SEN DÁȻEL.
2. YÁ¸ SEN OX̱ DÁȻEL.
3. YÁ¸ SEN OX̱ DÁȻEL ¸E Ṯ PÁSTEN.
4. YÁ¸ SEN OX̱ TŦE NE Á¸LEṈ.
5. YÁ¸ SEN OX̱ ¸E TŦE NE Á¸LEṈ.
6. OX̱ SEN YÁ¸ DÁȻEL.
7. ŚTEṈ SEN YÁ¸ OX̱.
8. ŚTEṈ YÁ¸ SEN OX̱.
9. YÁ. SEN ŚTEṈ OX̱.
10. YÁ. TŦE NE SĆÁ¸ĆE¸ ŚTEṈ OX̱.