dialect of Olo are given in table 4.1. The first six, sungoi, sungoi sungoi liye, nempis, nempis liye, and nomul are not normally used in a narrative story after the first setting of the time for the story. The
word fei ‘todaynow’ is used frequently, as well as nolowi ‘tomorrow’. The day and night are divided up by some inexact temporal divisions. These are given following fei in table 4.1.
Table 4.1. Olo temporal divisions sungoi
‘a long time ago’ The time before the speaker was born is automatically in
this time. sungoi sungoi liye
‘a time before sungoi’ roughly equates with an ancestral time.
nempis ‘the day before yesterday and before’
nempis liye ‘a time before nempis’ has a sense of
psychological distance nomul
‘yesterday’ fei
‘today’ if ili
‘dawn’ mul
‘morning’ epli nimin
‘noon’ ningli
‘afternoon 4–6 PM’ mulpou
‘night’ wem tangu
‘middle of the night’ nolowi
‘tomorrow, the next day’ nolowi nenpe
‘the day after tomorrow’ Because of the problems, both theoretical and practical, in dealing with temporal boundaries, I have
adopted a simple approach to determining if a boundary occurs. If one of the time words that are given in table 4.1 occurs, then a boundary is said to have occurred. If an event, like sleeping, or the position
of the sun i.e., the sun goes down, occurs in a text, a boundary is also considered to have occurred.
4.3.2 Spatial locations
The second major change that is an indicator of episode boundaries is shift in spatial location. This change logically lends itself to a need to identify the participants at the new location, since there is no
assurance of having identical participants in a new location. Spatial locations in Olo are a little more complicated than temporal expressions. In Olo, people can be somewhere, leave somewhere, travel,
arrive, and again be somewhere. This makes for a fairly wide boundary between two locations. It is theoretically unclear as to what points belong to which scene. Should “leaving” go with “being” or
“travel”? The same question applies to “arrival” vis-á-vis “travel” or “being”. For this reason each of these different stages in the journey are treated as separate for coding purposes. There are verbs that
mark the stages of a journey. They are not all obligatory, but each often occur. In table 4.2 the different verbs marking these stages are given.
Table 4.2. Olo primary spatial verbs ratei
‘be, live, stay’ ato
‘stay temporarily’ usa
‘leave’ e
‘go’ au
‘come’ fale
‘arrive’
4.3 Dividing the Text 65
There are a few verbs that commonly occur in travel situations besides the words for go and come. They are given in table 4.3.
Table 4.3. Olo secondary spatial verbs ulsi
‘follow someone’ ingi
‘follow a trail, river, or natural feature’ itipi
‘go down’ unwei
‘go up’ The likelihood of a change being related to an episode boundary is the amount of disjunction be-
tween locations. What is common in Olo narratives is the gradual shift from one location to another. This shift in location can be viewed as a boundary phenomenon. In this analysis, the degree of spatial
change is assigned according to a specific formula. The higher the number, the more likely a change of location has occurred. When a precise location is specified as a location for a significant temporal du-
ration, one of the existential verbs like ratei ‘be, live’ or ato ‘stay temporarily’ are used. This is consis- tent with the setting of a time for a discourse. Clauses with such verbs are given a value of 4 for spatial
location. The next most likely setting of a new location involves arrival at a new place. Clauses that in- volve arrival at a specific place will have one of two verbs, either fale ‘arrive’ or naro ‘come out’. This
clause will be assigned a 3 for spatial location. Motion verbs encode the intermediary step from one place to another; they are part of the boundary between two settings. The use of a pure motion verb e
‘go’ or au ‘come’ or a motion verb involving direction, like itipi ‘go down’ or unwei ‘go up’, are assigned a value of 2. The start of a border involves the leaving of a place. Once a participant has left a place he
is no longer in the same spatial location, but his location has not been specified yet, so inception of travel, if marked, will be given a value of 1. Inception is marked by verbs such usa ‘leave’. In this way I
have attempted to quantify the degree of change from one location to another and look at how firm the boundaries are between the two settings.
4.3.3 Punctuation
