28 20 ... ngaqdeil
xil mol
lolbaq a pieiq puvq
miq fish
this CL
river DAT
put in.water out
hhuvq al.
return CRS
‘...[Alli] went back to put this fish in the river.’
V:72
21a ‘Where are you sleeping tonight?’ 21b
Yiuvq -duq halgei jav, halgei yiuvq.
sleep place
where exist
where sleep
‘Wherever there is a place to sleep, there [I will] sleep.’
elicited In 18, the locative phrase “[on the] road” is sentence-initial. In 19, the locative is in
the comment of the sentence but not in the immediately pre-verbal position. In 20, it is in the immediately pre-verbal position, and in 21b, it is left-dislocated, with a pro-
adverb in the immediately pre-verbal position of the main clause. The principles governing the positions of these constituents are considered in the next sections.
2.3.1.1 Points of departure are placed sentence-initially
Because points of departure function as bridges between known information and the information to follow see 2.1.4, it is appropriate that they occur at the beginning of
sentences. In 18, above, the function of the sentence-initial locative is to provide a bridge between the previous scene and the one to follow. In contrast, in 22, the locative
forms part of the comment of the sentence:
29 22
Navhaoqnei aoqqivq qiq
yavq, aqyo
mavq
loqbeqssaq
black night
one TCL
3 PL
rich.man
qiq hhaq e
laqhyul hhoheiq a lal hev.
one HCL LNK house door
DAT come.up arrive
‘One black night, they arrived at the door of a rich man’s house.’
Not Just Me 3 In 22, the locative phrase, “at the door of the rich man’s house” occurs in the comment
of the sentence and as such is to be interpreted as part of the focal domain. This is in contrast to the role of the locative in 18, in which the phrase “on the road” occurs at the
beginning of the sentence, to the left of the topic, and is to be interpreted as a point of departure, providing a spatial link between this new event and the previous context.
Temporal phrases can also occur either sentence-initially as a point of departure or as part of the comment, as seen in 23 and 24.
23 Aqyoq
niq hhaq
xeivq la.siq xilgei lal ma
leil. 3
two HCL
eight month
here come
INT QUO
‘The two of them [my parents] plan to come here in August [they] say.’
elicited 24
Naolhao qiq
huvq e ceil
la.siq,
after one
year LNK
ten month
hulbu alzil aoqtav nei biaol xa
yiv al.
cuckoo bird
sky ABL
fly down
come.down CRS
‘The next October, the cuckoo bird came flying down from the sky.’
I:37 In 23, the temporal reference is placed in the comment of the sentence and as such is to
be interpreted as part of the focal domain of the sentence. In 24, in contrast, it is placed at the beginning of the sentence, to the left of the topic. Thus, it is to be interpreted as a
30 point of departure, providing a temporal bridge between this new event and the previous
context. By comparing sentence 22 with 18 and sentence 23 with 24, it is clear that
the position of temporal and locative phrases is determined by their functions in the discourse. Each of these four sentences has topic-comment articulation. In 22 and 23,
the constituents in bold are parts of the comments of the sentences and are within the focal domain, pertaining to what is being asserted in their propositions. Given that topic-
comment sentences have predicate focus, these constituents are placed in the predicate position following the topic. In contrast, the situational references in 18 and 24 are
points of departure, setting the background for the assertion to follow and relating it to what has preceded. Therefore, they are placed at the beginning of their sentences.
The application of this principle applies also to those points of departure which refer to arguments in the clause. As described in 2.2.2, above, the topicalizers aq and
ngaoq are placed after topics which are also points of departure. In such cases, the point of departure also functions as the topic of the sentence. Although the canonical position
for topic is already sentence-initial, these structures also follow the principle of sentence- initial placement of points of departure. In contrast, focal referents are placed later in the
sentence.
2.3.1.2 Topics precede comments
