MOFO - Details

Details

General

Morphemic form:	{apə}V
New orthography:	apivoq, apivaa
Old orthography:	apivoĸ, apivâ
Sources:	[MFSJLK10], [SK71], [CWSL58], [JP67], [CBBJRPIKJR97]
Combinations:	View list
Right sandhi:	Default/none
Inflection sandhi:	Default/none
Stem type:	ə-stem
Diathesis:	Agentive (NPP)
Valency:	Avalent, Monovalent

Description and behaviour

Form and usage:

This stem can be used either transitively or intransitively, although intransitive usage is the most common nowadays:

Transitive usage: 'it has snowed on Patient'. This usage is described in Kleinschmidt [SK71] and Schultz-Lorentzen [CWSL58]. Note that there is no Agent in the meaning, so there cannot be an explicit subject (in a sense, it is 'the weather' or 'the snow' itself that has covered the Patient). Thus, the Agent will always only be bound by an impersonal 3sg (or 4sg) person in the ending.
Intransitive usage: 'it has snowed'. This usage is impersonal, with no explicit subject, so it can only be used with a 3sg (or 4sg) ending.

Due to this peculiar usage, we describe it as agentive, since the Patient role can be dropped without the use of a HTR-morpheme, but the valencies of these meaning are either monovalent or avalent.

Meanings and examples

The subject (Agent) is impersonal, so when used transitively only the Patient can refer to an explicit object.

immaralaarsuaq apivoq, it has only snowed a little bit; there has not fallen much snow [CWSL58]
qaqqaq apivaa, it has snowed on the mountain [CWSL58]

Note the transitive usage here: qaqqaq (the mountain) is the object, referring to the Patient.

Search the corpus for further examples.

References

[MFSJLK10] Michael Fortescue, Steven Jacobson, Lawrence Kaplan (2010): Comparative Eskimo Dictionary (2ED).
[SK71] Samuel Kleinschmidt (1871): Den grønlandske Ordbog.
[CWSL58] C.W. Schultz-Lorentzen (1958): Den Grønlandske Ordbog.
[JP67] Jonathan Petersen (1967): Ordbogêraĸ.
[CBBJRPIKJR97] Christian Berthelsen, Birgitte Jakobsen, Robert Petersen, Inge Kleivan & Jørgen Rischel (1997): Oqaatsit.