Fedden. A Grammar of Mian, a Papuan Language of New Guinea.pdf

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A Grammar of Mian, a Papuan Language of New Guinea
Olcher Sebastian Fedden
Submitted in total fulfilment of the requirements of the
degree of Doctor of Philosophy
May 2007
Department of Linguistics and Applied Linguistics
The University of Melbourne
Produced on archival quality paper
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To my parents
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Abstract
This thesis is a descriptive grammar of the Mian language of Papua New Guinea. The
corpus data on the basis of which I analyzed the structures of the language and their
functions was obtained during nine months of field work in Yapsiei and Mianmin,
Telefomin District, Sandaun Province, Papua New Guinea.
The areas of grammar I cover in this thesis are phonology (ch. 2), word classes (ch.
3), nominal classification (ch. 4 and 5), noun phrase structure (ch. 6), verb morphology
(ch. 7), argument structure and syntax of the clause (ch. 8), serial verb constructions and
clause chaining (ch. 9), operator scope (ch. 10), and embedding (ch. 11).
Mian has a relatively small segmental phoneme inventory. The tonal phonology is
complex. Mian is a word tone language, i.e. the domain for assignment of one of five
tonemes is the phonological word and not the syllable.
There is hardly any nominal morphology. If a noun is used referentially, it is
followed by a cliticized article. Mian has four genders. Agreement targets are the article,
determiners, such as demonstratives, and the pronominal affixes on the verb.
The structure of the NP is relatively simple and constituent order is fixed. The
rightmost position in the NP is reserved for a determiner; e.g. an adnominally used
demonstrative or emphatic pronoun.
A sizeable subset of Mian verbs shows an aspectual stem distinction with formally
distinct perfective and imperfective stems. The majority of Mian verb stems are trans-
aspectual and do not have a formal perfective-imperfective distinction. Mian is a
nominative–accusative language and head-marking at clause level. It is agglutinating
and mildly polysynthetic. Arguments are cross-referenced on the verb by pronominal
argument affixes. In addition to these, there is a set of verbal classificatory prefixes
which are obligatory for some verbs, most of which involve the handling or
manipulation of objects. These prefixes classify a verbal argument according to
semantic criteria, such as sex, but also shape and function.
Verbs are inflected directly for some tense and aspect categories, but have to be
compounded with an auxiliary stem for others. Auxiliary-compounded verbs follow the
inflection patterns of the existential auxiliary.
Mian makes pervasive use of chaining constructions. Verbs can be serialized at the
core and the nuclear level of the clause. Clause chaining structures are very common.
Verbs can be medial and function as the predicate of a medial clause or function as the
predicate of an independent sentence or the last clause in a clause chain. Medial verbs
show switch-reference morphology indicating whether the subject of the succeeding
clause is co-referent or disjoint in reference.
Adverbial clauses with temporal, locative or conditional meaning—like head-internal
relative clauses—are nominalizations and function as referring expressions in Mian.
Like NPs, they are followed by an article or a determiner. Other embedded structures
are embedded questions and quotatives.
Unmarked word order is Subject-Object-Verb. Due to the head-marking
characteristics of the language, constituent order is relatively free with the restriction
that the verb is clause-final.
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Declaration
This is to certify that
(i) this thesis comprises only my original work towards the PhD
(ii) due acknowledgment has been made in the text to all other material used.
(iii) the texts is less than 100,000 words in length, exclusive of tables, maps,
examples, bibliography and appendices.
_________________________
Sebastian Fedden
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Acknowledgments
I would like to sincerely thank the following people for providing help and support
during my PhD, which could not have happened otherwise. All mistakes are, of course,
my own.
A great debt of gratitude is owed to the people of the Mianmin communities in
Mianmin and Yapsiei for sharing their language, culture and lives with me during my
stay in Papua New Guinea. In particular, thanks to the whole Milimab family, especially
to Kasening Milimab, for great patience and interest in this project and for taking me in
as one of the family.
Special thanks go to my language consultants: Kasening Milimab, who had an
immense knowledge and was very concerned that I learn good Mian, Asuneng Amit,
who has the gift of telling wonderful stories, Liden Milimab, whose superb command of
English was helpful in many ways, and Raymond Dawai, who taught me basic Mian
tonology by indicating pitch movements with his hands. Thanks also to Beitab Fenobi
and Ibalim, from whom I was able to record historical accounts and description of
traditional Mianmin initiation rituals and to: Umsin Maseiab, Wentak Milimab, Awaseb
Oblib, Selem Kasening, Milsen (aka Mandat) Milimab, Eron Jung, Dawai Milimab,
Wils, Headmaster Nontlin Dab, Ray Waniab from MAF in Tabubil, Jeremia (aka Bagi)
Jung, Ebel Yangsin, Aiben, and the pastors Uneiab and Maikas.
I am grateful to my supervisors Nick Evans and Rachel Nordlinger for steady
guidance and support throughout this project.
Thanks to Nick for always challenging me intellectually in our supervision meetings,
for never being satisfied with the second best, but also for steady encouragement along
the way. He not only made me be critical towards my work and sharpen my analyses of
Mian linguistic structure but also made me aware how important it is to have the reader
in mind when writing a grammar. Thanks also for many valuable tips concerning field
work and equipment (especially the ‘dead-dog’ bag). I am most grateful for the financial
support from the ARC Discovery Project “Reciprocals across languages”.
Thanks to Rachel who was always there for spontaneous meetings in which we
discussed various topics of my thesis and brought some sense into the complicated Mian
verb morphology. Also for being a great moral support throughout the time of my PhD.
And also thanks to both of them for reading the final draft in record time.
Special thanks go to Don Gardner who interested me in working on Mian. Don has
been working as an anthropologist with the West Mianmin for the last 35 years and I
was lucky to be able to profit from his knowledge and connections in Papua New
Guinea. Don accompanied me on my first trip for a couple of weeks, introduced me to
the people and was generally an invaluable help for me to adjust to the unfamiliar
environment.
The first one and a half months of my first field trip I spent in Yapsiei station. I
would like to thank Tesinab Balabe, with whom I worked there, and Atupe, Father Ben
and Father Albino, Milan Janda and the kiap of Telefomin District Ricky Yentop
Yaman.
Thank you also to the following people in the linguistic community for information,
comments, and discussion of various aspects of this thesis: Bernard Comrie, Mark
Donohue, Janet Fletcher, William Foley, Alice Gaby, Geoffrey Haig, John Hajek, Mark
Harvey, Larry Hyman, Barb Kelly, Nicole Krupse, Robert Lagerberg, Debbie Loakes,
Robyn Loughnane, Tim McNamara, Felicity Meakins, Ulrike Mosel, Nick Nicholas,
Andrew Pawley, Nick Piper, Ger Reesink, Eric Round, Bella Ross, Antoinette

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