Skip to content
Licensed Unlicensed Requires Authentication Published by De Gruyter Mouton September 5, 2014

Ėven nominal evaluatives and the marking of definiteness

  • Brigitte Pakendorf EMAIL logo and Ija V. Krivoshapkina
From the journal Linguistic Typology

Abstract

Languages vary as to whether they overtly mark the referential status of noun phrases as well as the manner in which they do so. This article discusses a hitherto undescribed means of marking the (un)identifiability of referents found in Ėven, a North Tungusic language spoken in Siberia. Narrative data from two geographically and linguistically divergent dialects show that in this language (in)definiteness is expressed with sets of diminutive and augmentative suffixes which are in complementary distribution. One member of each set occurs with identifiable referents and one member occurs with unidentifiable referents; the dialects differ with respect to possessive-marked nouns.

Received: 2013-9-9
Revised: 2014-3-24
Published Online: 2014-9-5
Published in Print: 2014-9-1

©2014 by Walter de Gruyter Berlin/Boston

Downloaded on 28.3.2023 from https://www.degruyter.com/document/doi/10.1515/lingty-2014-0012/html
Scroll Up Arrow