nanzhelmal LCDD 14 Paya Kuna. LCDD 14 Paya Kuna

166 Communicating Community Togetherness ―Machergan‖ refers to people who have the social prestige of being men. -gan-kan is generally used only for people. It groups a class of people together, rather than describing a temporary grouping. b -mala is used to refer to a group of people or things as a unit. These people or things are grouped on a temporary basis for some reason or another and parallels the English construction, ―a group of ...‖ Examples 1. Tulegan noni. ‗People who are specialists in a field arrived.‘ 2. Tulemal noni. ‗A group of people arrived.‘ Exercise 10 . -mala versus -gan-kan selective choice drill The teacher says the sentence and the student adds the suffix -mala or -gan-kan to the subject of the sentence, as the sense of the sentence requires. Example Teacher: Machered noni. Student: Machergan noni. 1. Machered noni. ‗The man arrived.‘ 2. Tule noni. ‗The Kuna person arrived.‘ 3. Ome turwa mine. ‗The woman is throwing out the rubbish.‘ 4. Achu chule kas. ‗The dog caught a paca.‘ 5. Machi yannu amine. ‗The boy is going to hunt peccary.‘ 5 Use of - mala with -gan-kan Sometimes it is necessary to speak of a group of people who have a certain status, skill, or class. To form this construction, you add the short form of -gan-kan to the noun stem and then add -mala: noun + -gan-kan + -mala. Example Pay tolganmal pistagin arpananimal. ‗A group of Paya inhabitants are working on the airstrip.‘ In this case, the phrase Pay tolganmal refers to a group of people who qualify in the class of inhabitants of Paya. 6 Use of -mal with -mala Occasionally, it is neces sary to say, ―a group of groups.‖ This construction is formed by adding the short form of -mal to the noun stem and then repeating -mala. Examples 1. Tulemalmal pukwa. ‗Small groups of people from among the larger group of people were sitting around.‘ or ‗Small clusters of people from among the larger group were sitting around.‘ 2. Immalmalmal webal kagan mamal. ‗Clusters of animals are grazing over there.‘ Example 2 above is a very rare construction. Exercise 11 . -ganmal-kanmal frame drill The teacher says Sentence 1 and the student repeats it; the teacher says Sentence 2 and the student repeats it, etc. This exercise should be repeated several times. Example Teacher: Pay tolganmal pistogin arpananimal. Student: Pay tolganmal pistagin arpananimal. 1. Pay tolganmal pistagin arpananimal. ‗A group of Paya inhabitants are all working on the airstrip.‘ 2. Macherganmal kullubal taim takcha. ‗A group of men saw the alligator on the bank.‘ 3. Nuskanmal escuela magarbal tedomanimal. ‗A group of children are playing outside the school.‘