24 establishing background information. Topicalized constituents may or may not be the
topics of sentences see 2.1.4.
2.2.2.1 The ngaoq topicalizer
As noted in 2.1.4, points of departure in Hani are placed initial in a clause or sentence to provide the topic or starting point for the assertion which follows. These
constituents, whether NPs or entire clauses, are often followed by the postposition ngaoq. This postposition makes it clear that the preceding information is setting the stage or
providing the starting point for the comment to follow. 16a ‘[It’s said that] long ago, there were two brothers like this.’
16b ‘After their parents died, the two brothers made a home by themselves. [It was] that way,’
16c
algo ngaoq zuqyil daov meeq naolngaoq maq niv
naol, ... o.bro TOP thinking very good only
NEG move willing
‘as for the older brother, [he] was only very smart but not willing to work; ...’
The Older and Younger Brothers 1-3 In 16c, the older brother is both the point of departure and the topic. While the sentence
without ngaoq would be grammatically acceptable, the marking of the referent of “older brother” signals a switch of attention from the two brothers to the one about whom the
comment is to be made. The usage of the topicalizer ngaoq is not limited to following NPs, but in any
context it serves to inform the listener that what precedes is a point of departure for what follows.
14
14
See Appendix B, sentence 13 for an example in which ngaoq follows an adverbial clause.
25
2.2.2.2 The aq contrastive topicalizer
Like ngaoq, aq indicates that the constituent preceding it is both a point of
departure for the assertions to follow and a topic about which the following comment is to be made. The difference aq and ngaoq is that aq indicates contrast between the
previous topic and the one to follow. This can be seen in 16d, the continuation of example 16, above:
16c ‘As for the older brother, [he] was only very smart but not willing to work;’
16d
aqnil aq jilhevqnei aolzaq
hovqdol movq.
y.bro CT honest work
get.water like.to
‘the younger brother, in contrast, was honest and liked to work and get [his own] water provide for self.’
The Older and Younger Brothers 3 The effect of aq in 16d is to encourage a search for a point of contrast between two
topical constituents, in this case, between the younger and older brothers.
15
In the text corpus used for this study, aq does not co-occur with the accusative marker yaol, so that an undergoer marked with aq is not also marked with yaol. This is
illustrated in 17b:
15
The differences between contrastive topics and contrastive foci are treated in detail in Lambrecht 1994:291-95.
