19.
Joe chıe súq báq
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Conversation
A: Fı akımı ké haqrıaq ꝡo. Ma buo súq, lá soa já ké choaq kọshı?
B: Rạnho… Chum sho gẹfeao jí ꝡeı.
A: Feao súq môı hí raı?
B: Deq baı jí báq haq, kéo… juoq hıo jí báq poq châ hí raı móq?
A: Leo sı súq kú, ꝡá shue nhame súq côm chóaq ba.
B: Ina. Taı tua jí séu hú nha.
A: Tíu mıu le jí, ꝡá jıa gı tú raı. Aıka!
| Word | Meaning |
|---|---|
| buo | ▯ is ready to lá |
| juoq | ▯ should lá |
| leo | ▯ tries to lá |
| shao | ▯ wants to lá |
| sho | ▯ becomes such that they lá |
| shue | ▯ keeps lá-ing |
| taı | ▯ succeeds at lá-ing |
| soa | ▯ helps ▯ |
| choaq | ▯ is a guest |
| kọshı | ▯ is first |
| feao | ▯ is anxious |
| châ hí raı | how? |
| nhame | ▯ smiles |
| com | ▯ happens at (audience) ▯ |
| séu | at least |
To-clauses with lá
The word lá introduces a lá-clause. This is a subclause without a tense and with a “gap” subject já, corresponding to a to-clause in English:
lá feao já
to be anxiouslá bua já Súomıgua
to live in Finland
In the table above, we see that shao means “▯ wants to lá.” The object is a lá-clause:
Shao jí, lá bua já Súomıgua.
I want to live in Finland.
A lá-clause describes a property. To be anxious is a property, and to live in Finland is a property. A property is like a content clause with a “gap” in it, marked by já.
In a Toaq dictionary, if a verb has “satisfies property ▯” in its definition, it means you can put a lá-clause there. In this textbook, we’ll just write lá instead.
The gap pronoun já
The pronoun já doesn’t have an English equivalent. In English, there’s just a gap between to and the verb where já would go. But in Toaq, já being an actual word means it doesn’t have to be the subject of the lá-clause. It can go somewhere else:
lá maı sá poq já
to be loved by someoneShao nháo, lá maı sá poq já.
She wants to be loved by someone.
It can even be a prepositional object.
lá marao súq gâq já
to be danced with by you
What are properties?
A property is a function from entities to statements. When we define P(x) as the statement x lives in Finland, then P is a property, and P(Mary) is the statement Mary lives in Finland.
In semantics, we often use a notation from lambda calculus to describe a property without giving it a name. In this notation, our P would be written as λx. x lives in Finland.
Toaq’s grammar for lá-clauses is a bit similar to this notation: we can think of lá as meaning λj. and já as a reference to this variable j.
The simplest Toaq verb that relates an entity to a property is ıq, which means “▯ satisfies property ▯.” Symbolically, ıq a P means P(a).
lá bua já Súomıgua
λx. x lives in FinlandIq Méarı, lá bua já Súomıgua.
(λx. x lives in Finland)(Mary)Bua Méarı Súomıgua.
Mary lives in Finland.
Serial verbs: lá means merge
We saw that putting verbs side-by-side makes adjectives: haq noqgı means tasty food.
When the first verb’s definition ends in a lá slot, however, we get a different behavior: the definitions of the two verbs merge.
buo
▯ is ready to lá
nuo
▯ sleeps
buo nuo
▯ is ready to sleep
This buo nuo is called a serial verb; the first verb is the head and the second verb is the tail.
When merging, the lá-clause slot of the head and the subject of the tail both disappear. But if the tail has other slots, they’ll be present in the serial verb:
buo
▯ is ready to lá
soı
▯ fights ▯
buo soı
▯ is ready to fight ▯
Essentially, Buo soı jí nháo is short for Buo jí, lá soı já nháo. The tail’s subject gets turned into já.
Serial verbs: ꝡá means stack
There’s another way verbs can form serial verbs. When the first verb’s definition ends in a ꝡá slot, the definitions stack.
dua
▯ knows that ꝡá
nuo
▯ sleeps
dua nuo
▯ knows that ▯ sleeps
The difference compared to merging is that with stacking, the tail’s subject doesn’t disappear.
dua
▯ knows that ꝡá
cho
▯ likes ▯
dua cho
▯ knows that ▯ likes ▯
Essentially, Dua cho jí nháo Tóaqzu is short for Dua jí, ꝡá cho nháo Tóaqzu.
The head can have just one slot:
du
it seems like ꝡá
cho
▯ likes ▯
du cho
it seems like ▯ likes ▯
Complex serial verbs
The tail of a serial verb can itself be a serial verb. This means that three or more verbs can form one big serial verb, merging from right to left:
leo baı
▯ tries to make ▯
shao (leo baı)
▯ wants to try to make ▯
sho (shao (leo baı))
▯ starts to want to try to make ▯
In lesson 8, we saw that a verb can be followed by adjectives. The whole truth is that a serial verb can be followed by serial adjectives. Thus, we can replace every verb in
sá gıaqche zaomıa bomıa
some musician (who is) famous (and) wealthy
some wealthy, famous musician
with a serial verb, resulting in:
sá leo gıaqche shao zaomıa shao bomıa
some tries-to-be-musician (who is) wants-to-be-famous (and) wants-to-be-wealthy
Each “simple” verb, without a trailing lá or ꝡá slot in its definition, marks the end of one of these little sub-serials, as it can’t act as a head to serialize with the next verb.
Serials and scope
There is a subtle but important difference between these sentences:
The first sentence means “I want to be such that there is nobody that I meet” (I want to be alone). The scope of sía is limited by the lá-clause.
But the second sentence means “There is nobody that I want to meet.” When we use a serial verb, there’s no inner scope island, and sía scopes over the whole sentence.
A similar pitfall is adverbs: in a clause with a serial verb, the adverb applies to the whole serial.
In the first sentence, I cause that “she is happy, smilingly” (so she smiles). But in the second sentence, nhâme applies to tua jaı and therefore to the subject jí: my cheering-her-up happens with me smiling.