Notation of entries in MOFO

Here follows a brief explanation of the notation used in the MOFO dictionary. For further details see An Introduction to West Greenlandic.

Join markers and morpheme types

Morphemes are written in curly brackets, i.e. {morph}. Outside of the curly brackets, we furthermore add join markers (*, N, V) indicating the type and joining capabilities of the morpheme. A join marker written on the left-hand side of a morpheme indicates the type of stem it can join onto, and a join marker written on the right-hand side of a morpheme indicates the type of stem of the morpheme itself. We have the following types of morphemes:

• {morph} is a particle, i.e. a complete word of its own, which can neither take affixes nor endings. It can only optionally be followed by enclitics. Example: {aamma}.
• {morph}N is a nominal base, i.e a noun stem. It can be followed by an N{morph}V or N{morph}N affix, or a nominal ending. Example: {aqnaq}N.
• {morph}V is a verbal base, i.e. a verb stem. It can be followed by a V{morph}V or a V{morph}N affix, or a verbal ending. Example: {ajuq}V.
• N{morph}N is a noun-extending affix. It attaches to a noun stem, and yields a noun stem. Example: N{ŋŋuaq}N.
• N{morph}V is a verbalising affix. It attaches to a noun stem and yields a verbal stem. Example: N{-qaq}V.
• V{morph}V is a verb-extending affix. It attaches to a verbal stem and yields a verbal stem. Example: V{ðaq}V.
• V{morph}N is a nominalising affix. It attaches to a verbal stem and yields a noun stem. Example: V{nəq}N.
• N{morph} is a nominal ending. It attaches to a noun stem and yields a complete word (a noun), which can only optionally be followed by enclitics. Example: N{-a}.
• V{morph} is a verbal ending. It attaches to a verbal stem and yields a complete word (a verb), which can only optionally be followed by enclitics. Example: V{vuq}.
• *{morph} is an enclitic. It can attach to any complete word (particle, noun, verb, optionally with other enclitics attached), and yields another complete word. Example: *{lu}.
• *{morph}V is a verbal derivational enclitic. It attaches to a complete word (often a noun with a specific case ending) and yields a verbal stem. Most of these are so-called verbalisations of the prepositional cases. Example: *{-kaq}V.
• *{morph}N is a nominal derivational enclitic. It attaches to a complete word (often a noun with a specific case ending) and yields a noun stem. Example: *{-uq}N.

Sandhi symbols

Morphemes with a join marker symbol on the left-hand side are bound morphemes; i.e. they can only be used when joined onto a stem of the appropriate type, as indicated by the join marker. When a bound morpheme joins onto a stem (or, in the case of enclitics, a complete word), it can either be additive or truncative:

• Additive morphemes join directly onto the final phoneme of the stem; or, in the case of enclitics, onto the final sound in the word. Most bound morphemes are additive, so we do not use any symbol to indicate additivity.
• Truncative morphemes only join onto vowels, so if final phoneme of the stem is a consonant, it is removed. The syllable structure dictates that there can never be more than two consonant phonemes in a cluster, so bound morphemes beginning in a double consonant are necessarily truncative, and since this can be observed directly from the form of a morpheme itself, we do not use any symbol to indicate truncativity of double-consonant initial morphemes either.

Only in cases where truncativity is not obvious from the form of the morpheme do we use a special symbol, because these are the cases where it must be explicitly learnt, along with the other features of the morpheme. We indicate truncativity with a minus/dash. Thus, in summary:

• morph is an additive morpheme, because it does not have a minus, or begin with a double consonant. Example: V{ðaq}V.
• mmorph is a necessarily-truncative morpheme, because it begins with a double consonant. Example: V{tqu}V.
• -morph is a sandhi-truncative morpheme; it is not obvious from the form alone, so it is indicated with an initial dash. Example: N{-qaq}V.

Geminating morphemes

Some morphemes can cause gemination of a single consonant in the preceding stem to which it is attached. There are two different types of this phenomenon:

• Consonant-initial nominal endings can cause gemination in noun stems that decline with gemination. This is a property of the stem and is noted under inflection sandhi for the stems in question; not a property of the ending. Thus we do not use a special symbol on these endings to indicate that they may cause gemination. For example, {amaruq}N declines with gemination, so e.g. amaqqut, amaqqumi etc.
• A few affixes (and even fewer endings) can cause gemination of a single consonant in the preceding stem. These affixes are seldom productive, or only marginally productive. For this type of gemination, we indicate it with a single quotation mark, i.e. '-morph. For example, V{'-vik}N may cause gemination in the preceding verbal stem.

Parenthetical segments

Many morphemes contain segments (usually only a single phoneme) which is only present in some contexts, but absent in others. We indicate these segments with parentheses, e.g. mo(r)ph. Such a segment can in principle occur anywhere in a morpheme, but we use some conventions for some particularly common types of segments:

• An additive bound morpheme, having a single initial consonant in parentheses, indicates that the morpheme is sandhi epenthetic; e.g. (m)morph. This denotes that the morpheme always wants to attach to a consonant, so if the preceding stem ends in a vowel, the extra consonant is inserted. This extra consonant is almost always either a /q/ or the same as the initial consonant of the attaching morpheme. For example, V{(v)vik}N will inject the extra (v), if it is attached to a vowel stem.
• A truncative, vowel-initial bound morpheme, may need to inject a separating sound at the boundary between itself and the preceding stem to prevent a triple-vowel sound (which is not permitted by phonotactics). Often, the separating sound to be injected follows the standard rule (/v/ before /u/, otherwise /j/), and in these cases we do not write the consonant explicitly as a parenthetical segment; but some affixes have a preference for injecting a different sound, and in these cases we write the separating sound as an initial, parenthetical segment, i.e. -(m)orph. For example, V{-(g)innaq}V will inject the (g) whenever this affix is added to a stem ending in [ii] or [aa].
• A nominal stem, having a parenthetical single-consonant segment as its third-to-final phoneme, indicates that this consonant is not written in non-geminating contexts, but does appear in geminating contexts (where it geminates). For example, {pu(g)uq}N is written pooq in absolutive singular (a non-geminating context), but puggut in plural (a geminating context). Note that the geminating context can both be before consonant-initial endings, which trigger regular gemination, and also before affixes that cause gemination.

For other cases, a parenthetical segment will be injected according to some special sandhi rules, which will be indicated in the relevant sandhi section in the entry. For example, V{(gi)jaqtuq}V has a special left-sandhi rule which says that the segment (gi) is injected on consonant stems, but omitted on vowel stems.