Chukchi (Chukotko‑Kamchatkan)

Some portions of the Chukchi transitive verb paradigm correspond morphologically to the antipassive.

1 Background

Chukchi has two antipassive paradigms, one formed with affix -ine- ,which is suffixed to the root, and one formed with -tku- (which is prefixed to the root in some forms and suffixed in others). These affixes are added to the regular intransitive paradigm for each TAM.

Chukchi has a number of different TAM paradigms, which inflect for person-number according to two patterns. One pattern, represented below by the present 2 (present imperfective) involves nominal suffixes, i.e. the same suffixes which mark possession on nouns, and serve as copulas in nominal predication. The other pattern is exclusively verbal. Both take antipassive affixes in the same way, though.

Note that -tku- also serves as a denominal suffix, e.g. rəpe-tku- 'hammer (verb)' from rəpe- 'hammer (noun)' (Skorik 1977: 219).

2 Deponency in Chukchi

The affixes of the transitive paradigm are listed below. The surprising fact is that a number of them are drawn from the antipassive paradigm; these are highlighted in red. Two patterns are found, one represented here by the past 1, the other by the present 2:

The distribution of antipassive forms in the transitive paradigm is as follows:

• For all TAM values,² 2SG>1SG, 2PL>1SG and 3SG>1SG forms are those of the corresponding -ine- antipassive, agreeing with the subject.
• For all TAM values, 2SG>1PL and 2PL>1PL forms are those of the corresponding -tku- antipassive, agreeing with the subject.³
• In the present 2, all transitive forms with a 1st or 2nd person subject are those of the corresponding -ine- antipassive, agreeing with the subject. 3rd singular forms with a 3rd person object are likewise -ine- antipassives, and show number agreement with the object. The morphological particulars of this paradigm are examined below.
  

3 Excursus on the nominal conjugation (present 2, past 2)

Thus, for the past 2 and present 2, the transitive paradigm consists entirely of intransitive forms: the morphologically antipassive forms agree with the subject and the other forms agree with the object. Syntactically, though, all these forms are transitive, taking ergative subjects and absolutive objects. Note that in closely-related Koryak, the corresponding nominal-type paradigms lack antipassive forms altogether (Skorik 1977: 284).

Notes

¹ Skorik (1977: 126) notes that both allative and instrumental-ergative are found. In the latter case, this leads to a reversal in the case marking between subject and object (and for this reason, tends to be avoided in constructions where the patient is animate, since this conflicts with the default intepretation of an animate argument in the ergative-instrumental case as an agent).

² The values are past 1 &2, present 1 &2, future 1 & 2, imperative 1 & 2, and subjunctive 1 & 2.

³ Spencer (2000: 210, fn. 5) notes the following discrepencies between forms Skorik (1977) gives for the transitive paradigm and the antipassive forms they should correspond to:

However, neither one seems to represent a systematic distinction between transitive and antipassive morphology. In the first case, the alternation between ‑tək and and ‑ɣətək appears to be independent of the distinction between transitive and antipassive. Recall that the person-number inflection of the antipassive is simply that of any ordinary intransitive verb; antipassives simply add -ine- or -tku-. On p. 76 Skorik gives sample paradigms for intransitive imperative 1 verbs, which show that this same alternation occurs within ordinary intransitives: q‑aleqat‑ɣətək 'go bathe/wash!' versus qə‑rʔe‑tək 'what can you do?', qə‑nike‑tək 'do the same thing!'. It is not clear what conditions this alternation, and Skorik does not discuss it (there are some approximate phonological correlations: -gətək only follows C-final stems, and all V-final stems have -tək). Since ony one example of a 2nd plural -ine- antipassive is given (q-ine-wiriŋ-ɣətək 'defend (them)!'), it's not clear whether this alternation obtains within the antipassives too. In any event, the variation does not appear to be correlated with the difference between transitive and antipassive.

In the case of the 2PL>1PL imperative 2 form, the discrepancy appears to be the result of a mistake in Skorik's text: for the transitive imperative 2 there is a discrepancy between the sample paradigms given on p. 87 and the list of affixes given on p. 91, whereby the 2PL>1PL as given in the latter does correspond to the antipassive (q-...-tku-rkəni-tək).

References

Skorik, Piotr Ja. 1977. Grammatika čukotskogo jazyka (Part 2: Glagol, narečie, služebnie slova) . Leningrad: Nauka.

Spencer, Andrew. 2000. Agreement morphology in Chukotkan. In: Wolfgang Dressler, Oskar Pfeiffer, Markus Pöchtrager and John Rennison (eds) Morphological analysis in comparison. Amsterdam and Philadelphia: John Benjamins. 191-222.