Nepalese Linguistics Volume 23 November, 2008 Chief Editor: Jai Raj Awasthi Editors: Ganga Ram Gautam Bhim Narayan Regmi Office Bearers for 2008-2010 President Govinda Raj Bhattarai Vice President Dan Raj Regmi General Secretary Balaram Prasain Secretary (Office) Krishna Prasad Parajuli Secretary (General) Bhim Narayan Regmi Treasurer Bhim Lal Gautam Member Bal Mukunda Bhandari Member Govinda Bahadur Tumbahang Member Gopal Thakur Lohar Member Sulochana Sapkota (Bhusal) Member Ichchha Purna Rai Nepalese Linguistics is a Journal published by Linguistic Society of Nepal. This Journal publishes articles related to the scientific study of languages, especially from Nepal. The views expressed therein are not necessarily shared by the committee on publications. Published by: Linguistic Society of Nepal Kirtipur, Kathmandu Nepal Copies: 500 © Linguistic Society of Nepal ISSN – 0259-1006 Price: NC 300/- (Nepal) IC 300/- (India) US$ 6/- (Others) Life membership fees include subscription for the journal. TABLE OF CONTENTS Tense and aspect in Meche Bhabendra Bhandari 1 Complex aspects in Meche Toya Nath Bhatta 15 An experience of translating Nepali grammar into English Govinda Raj Bhattarai 25 Bal Ram Adhikari Compound case marking in Dangaura Tharu Edward D. Boehm 40 Passive like construction in Darai Dubi Nanda Dhakal 58 Comparative study of Hindi and Punjabi language scripts Vishal Goyal 67 Gurpreet Singh Lehal Some observations on the relationship between Kaike and Tamangic Isao Honda 83 Phonological variation in Srinagar variety of Kashmiri Aadil A. Kak, Oveesa F. Panzoo 116 Nazima Mehdi Case system in Maithili: from semantic perspective Sajan Kumar Karn 126 Sound system for standardization of the Bhojpuri language Gopal Thakur Lohar 144 Aspects: evidences from Dura language Kedar Bilash Nagila 157 Ghale language: a brief introduction Krishna Paudel 168 Agreement patterns in Darai: typological study Netra Prasad Paudyal 186 Grammaticalization of clause combining in the inscriptional Nepali Madhav P Pokharel 208 Dhankute Tamang adverbs Kedar Prasad Poudel 221 Modality in Manipuri Tikaram Poudel 235 Computational analysis of Nepali basic verbs (written forms) Balaram Prasain 262 Causatives in Raji Purna P. Rai 271 Case system in Koyee Tara Mani Rai 281 Notes on the typology of T-B KirAnti languages Lal-Shyãkarelu Rapacha 289 Personal pronouns in Kaike Ambika Regmi 322 Converb clauses in Bhujel Dan Raj Regmi 334 Personal pronouns in Dhangar/Jhangar Suren Sapkota 343 Thakali language: A phonemic overview Narayan P. Sharma (Gautam) 355 Inventory of Sherpa Phonemes Gelu Sherpa 371 The intensifiers in Nepalbhasha Shrestha 381 Tamang: a sociolinguistic scenario Rajendra Thokar 391 Kiranti people and languages of Nepal Govinda Bahadur Tumbahang 408 Bhujel “Direct–Inverse” David E. Watters 429 Dan Raj Regmi The relative clause formation in Maithili: a Functional-Typological study Dev Narayan Yadav 437 Kiranti-Rodung compounding Bag-Ayagyami Yalungcha 450 Presidential address: 28th Annual Conference Jai Raj Awasthi 461 List of the Members of Linguistic Society of Nepal 466 TENSE AND ASPECT IN MECHE1 Bhabendra Bhandari [email protected] 1. Introduction The Meche language genetically belongs to Tibeto-Burman branch of the Sino-Tibetan language family. It is spoken by the Meche, an indigenous nationality inhabiting particularly in Jhapa district, in the Eastern Nepal. They are also scattered in small number in different places of neighbouring districts- Morang and Sunsari. According to the population census 2001, the total population of the Meche is 3,763 and the total number of the speakers of this language is 3,101. The Meche of Nepal and the Bodo of Asam, India seem to have a very close connection. They are closer to the Bodos in civilization, too. The Meches of Nepal identify themselves as Bodo. Outside Nepal, they are found in Sikkim, West Bengal, Asam and Bhutan (Dahal 2000). Though the census 2001 shows 82.40% of the population speaks the language, our experience is - most of the young Meche people do not use this language in their day-to-day life. Because of this, they are gradually forgetting it. Yadava (2004) keeps the Meche language under the category of endangered languages.2 1 This is the revised version of the paper presented at the 28th International Conference of the Linguistic Society of Nepal held at CEDA Hall, Tribhuvan University, Kirtipur, Kathmandu on 26-27 November, 2007. 2 He categorizes the languages of Nepal into seven levels of endangerment, viz. safe languages, almost safe languages, potentially endangered languages, endangered languages, seriously endangered languages, moribund languages and extinct/nearly extinct languages. According to the criteria he follows, the Nepalese Linguistics, Vol. 23, 2008, pp. 1-14. 2 / Tense and aspect in Meche This language is one of the least studied languages of Nepal. Bhattarai (1998), Bhatta and Rai (2005), Bhatta (2005), and Bhandari (2008) are a few studies to name. This paper is based on Bhandari (2008). 2. Tense Tense is a grammatical category, which refers to the way the grammar marks the time at which the action denoted by the verb takes place. Tense is ‘grammaticalized expression of location in time’ (Comrie 1985). Natural languages may have different ways of locating a situation in time such as temporal adverbs, pragmatic devices and tense. It is empirically claimed that tense is expressed by means of grammatical categories associated with verbs and it is also true that all natural languages may have no tense system. The speakers make reference point to locate the situation. The moment of speech usually serves as the reference point. Logically, a situation can be located prior, simultaneous and posterior to the moment of speech. This is the reason we think of the past, present and future tenses. Tense involves primarily, though not exclusively, an experience or concept of time as points in a sequence, and thus the notions of precedence and subsequence are important in the theory of tense (Givón 2001). The tense system reflects two fundamental features of our concept of time sequentiality and point of reference. The moment of speech is reference point and sequentiality either precedes or follows the time of speech. The time of speech is the time axis (Givón 2001). The time axis may be absolute or relative (Comrie 1985). The time languages in this group (endangered languages) ‘are confined to a very small size of elderly and sometimes adult speakers and are no longer spoken by their children, let alone their response to new domains and media and materials for language education and literacy’. Bhandari / 3 of speech is taken as reference point. Tenses, which take the time of speech as reference point, are called absolute tenses. So in principle, three absolute tenses are possible: past, present and future. Inflectionally, tense in Meche can be categorised into past, present and future. This section deals with the tense-system in the indicative sentences of the Meche language. 2.1 The past tense As discussed above, past tense simply locates the situation in question prior to the present moment, and says nothing about whether the past situation occupies just a single point prior to the present moment, or an extended time period prior to the present moment, or indeed the whole of the time up to present moment (Comrie 1985: 41). In this language, the past tense is marked by a morpheme -bai, which is suffixed to the verb stem, e.g., (1) ram-ma ŋkham za-bai Ram-ERG rice eat-PST ‘Ram ate rice.’ (2) gita-ja əŋkham tsoŋ-bai Gita-ERG rice cook-PST ‘Gita cooked rice.’ (3) bi gəwaŋgiŋ phərai-bai he/she a lot read-PST ‘He/She read a lot.’ The above examples (1-3) show the same past tense marker -bai is used for all person, number, gender, etc., i.e. there is no distinction of person, number, gender, etc. in the subject-verb agreement in the Meche language. 4 / Tense and aspect in Meche 2.2 The present tense Present tense indicates that the location of situation is contemporaneous to the present moment. In this language, the present tense is marked by -jə/ə, e.g., (4) sitha-ja phərai-jə Sita-ERG read-PR ‘Sita reads.’ (5) aŋ əŋkham za-jə I rice eat-PR ‘I eat rice.’ Due to morphophonemic change -jə may have different alternative forms, such as -nə, -wə, e.g., (6) nəŋ laizam liʈ-nə you letter write-PR ‘You write letter.’ (7) aŋ hu-hau haba mau-wə I farmland-LOC work do-PR ‘I work in the farmland’ From the above examples, it is clear that like the past tense suffix –bai, the same present tense marking morpheme -jə/-ə is used for all person, number, gender, etc. 2.3 The future tense Future tense suggests that the event or activity is subsequent to the moment of speaking. The invariant morpheme –nai is suffixed to the verb root to mark future tense in this language, e.g., (8) zəŋ iskul thaŋ-nai we school go-FUT ‘We will go to school.’ Bhandari / 5 (9) nəŋ laizam liʈ-nai you letter write-FUT ‘You will write a letter.’ (10) ram-ma həri-khəu bu-nai Ram-ERG Hari-DAT beat-FUT ‘Ram will beat Hari’ (11) jəi əŋkham tsoŋ-nai mother rice cook-FUT ‘Mother will cook rice.’ Similar to the past and present tense suffixes, the future tense suffix –nai remains same for all person, number, gender, etc of the subject NP. 3. Aspect Aspect defines the shape, distribution, or internal organisation of the event in time. Aspects are different ways of viewing the internal temporal constituency of a situation (Comrie 1981: 3). So, indicating ‘situation-internal time’ is in aspect and ‘situation-external time is in tense. Consider these examples: (11) Ram eats rice. (12) Ram ate rice. The difference between the above two sentences depends on tense, as it relates the time of the situation referred to some other time, usually to the moment of speaking.