Zero copula outside of present tense

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StrangerCoug
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Zero copula outside of present tense

Post by StrangerCoug »

So I'm working on a grammar for a conlang, and I've decided that I don't want a word for "to be". Seems easy enough in the present tense: since adjectives normally precede nouns, have it follow the noun instead and you've got a valid sentence that means "__(noun)__ is __(adjective)__." English-language newspaper headlines are also giving me the idea to just plain not translate it when it would come between two noun phrases in English. (I'm still trying to work out the exact details I want here—articles are effectively optional, and they're not really a distinct category from adjectives, so I really don't feel like forcing their presence. The other obvious solution is simple case marking: just two patientive noun phrases in sequence since I have an active-stative language?)

But in other tenses than the present is where it gets tricky, and I'm having trouble finding good ideas. I tried looking at the Kebreni grammar at the back of the LCK. (I like its idea of a verb for "to be called", though.) By "I don't want a word for 'to be'," I mean "I don't want a word for 'to be'" in any tense whatsoever (so nothing like the Russian быть where you don't normally use the third-person singular present form, есть). How might I handle the cases above if there's no word that can be used as a copula?
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Re: Zero copula outside of present tense

Post by alynnidalar »

In Tirina, I've used an adverb to indicate tense:

Ahu anada. Ahu araha.
1.SG.FEM baker | 1.SG.FEM happy-FEM
I am a baker. I am happy.

Idar ahu anada. Idar ahu araha.
previously 1.SG.FEM baker | previously 1.SG.FEM happy-FEM
I was/used to be a baker. I was/used to be happy.

Idar is an adjective that means "past/previous", an adverb meaning "previously", and an adposition meaning "ago", to give you an idea of how the word is used in other contexts. Similarly, you can use ilen ("in the future", "later", "after", etc.) for the future tense.

Although I'm not thoroughly satisfied with this solution and have explored other options. In some contexts I've just left it as-is and not worried about tense at all; sometimes context makes up for an explicit marking.
I generally forget to say, so if it's relevant and I don't mention it--I'm from Southern Michigan and speak Inland North American English. Yes, I have the Northern Cities Vowel Shift; no, I don't have the cot-caught merger; and it is called pop.

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Re: Zero copula outside of present tense

Post by StrangerCoug »

I like it, though :)
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Re: Zero copula outside of present tense

Post by Nortaneous »

Amqoli has zero copula and adverbs for optional tense-marking (there's no morphological tense and aspect is marked with a clitic that attaches to the topic), so:

Zha chxem. Mgre bgul, ham charxlyu chxeme tkuluts.
1S.M tree || previously man | but wizard tree-PRE NON1.M.S-become-CAUS-1.M.ABS
I am a tree. I used to be a man, but a wizard turned me into a tree.
Siöö jandeng raiglin zåbei tandiüłåd;
nää džunnfin kukuch vklaivei sivei tåd.
Chei. Chei. Chei. Chei. Chei. Chei. Chei.

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Re: Zero copula outside of present tense

Post by gach »

You can mark tense like this completely separated from the verb but a language might also allow the use of bound tense morphemes directly on nominals. Forest Enets allows past tense marking on nominal predicates, compare

uu kursi enči-d
SG2 what.kind.of person-SG2
"What kind of person are you?"

and

to d'od'igun kasa äči-d-
that period man youngster-SG2-PST
"In those days you were a young boy."

I use this strategy for Kišta. The basic TAM paradigm of the language is perfective-imperfective-irrealis, so you don't get pure tense marking on either verbs or nominal predicates, but nominal conjugation can still drag some verbal morphology onto nouns along with the personal conjugation endings. The unmarked TAM form is the perfective, with the imperfective marked by an originally derivative suffix. There's no reason for using extra imperfective marking on nominal predicates, so the perfective-imperfective opposition is neutralised on them. On the other hand, it is possible to use irrealis marking on nominal predicates in the case of counterfactuals or remote future reference,

(Naa) ündö-n.
(SG2) old-SG2
"You are old."

(Naa) üntö-ńi-n.
(SG2) old-IRR-SG2
"You will/would be old."

Nominal predication in Kišta also uses the standard verbal negation and interrogative morphology,

(Naa) üntö-me-n.
(SG2) old-NEG-SG2
"You are not old."

(Naa) üntö-lö-n?
(SG2) old-Q-SG2
"Are you old?"

There's also the phenomenon of nominal tense which I remember being more derivational in its use but which you could still employ as predicative tense marking with a zero copula,

This is my ex-house. = This was my house.

It's been ages since I've read anything on nominal tense, though, so feel free to correct any errors.

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Re: Zero copula outside of present tense

Post by cromulant »

A strategy that just came to mind is to express tense with locatives.

John in doctor (pres)
John by doctor (recent past)
John beyond doctor (remote or emphatically no-longer-operative past)

These morphemes identical to those used to express physical location. Dunno, maybe that's too much like actual tense. Also, you could do the reverse: somehow use tense to encode physical location.

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Re: Zero copula outside of present tense

Post by vokzhen »

A few zero-copula examples I know of:

Nuu-chah-nulth: The morphological distinction between nouns and verbs is almost non-existent, and nouns can take tense, mood, and perfective marking just like verbs. Other examples of nouns taking the inflections include Salish, Guarani, and at least some varieties of Nahuatl.
Ik: There is a so-called copular case. It patterns as a case, but instead of normal case functions it marks out the subject of a cleft construction, marks the subject of a typical copular clause, or verbalizes a noun directly to stand as the head of an identity predicate and thus be available for tense marking and modification by adverbs.
Ket: Zero-copula, but possibly not always so. To mark the preterite in nonverbal predicates a particle is used; it has a form similar to a transitive verb in preterite tense, but is is now just an unanalyzable element.
Cho'l: The normal, otherwise-mandatory preverbal aspect words such as tyi PERF and mi IMPERF are completely absent in nonverbal predication. Nonverbal predicates are limited to other aspect-marking strategies like the clitics =ix ALREADY and =tyo STILL, aspect-marking adverbs, and a suffix that varies in meaning between a perfect and a passive participle/stative, which are all available for verbal predicates as well.
Sierra Popoluca: Nonverbal predicates can't take any morphological TAM and are limited to temporal adverbs.

Also do note that you might require a copula still. Cocoma is one where TAM information can be encoded directly on the noun (all past tenses, one of the two future tenses but only rarely, but only a single aspect), but still requires a copula for identity/equative constructions, a dummy 3rd person pronoun that links the subject and compliment. Makah is the same, identity/equative constructions inflect a dummy 3rd person pronoun.

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Re: Zero copula outside of present tense

Post by linguoboy »

cromulant wrote:A strategy that just came to mind is to express tense with locatives.

John in doctor (pres)
John by doctor (recent past)
John beyond doctor (remote or emphatically no-longer-operative past)
This reminds me of the Irish construction Tá John ina dhochtúir, lit. "Is John in-his doctor". In most dialects, using this instead of the copular construction implies recent change of state. And since the copula expresses only a simple past/non-past distinction, this construction also allows for more specific tense inflections, e.g. Beidh John ina dhochtúir faoin am seo arís be-3S.FUT John in-his doctor under-the time this again "John will be a doctor by this time next year".

But if you were planning to do without a "be" verb entirely (as opposed to simply without a copula), how were you planning to express tense in locative expressions?

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Re: Zero copula outside of present tense

Post by StrangerCoug »

I should have clarified that there's supposed to be no verb literally meaning "be". I decided I did want Kebreni's "to be called" (although with a slightly different construction to adjust to voice not being marked on the verb), and there's one for "to exist", too. I also said I liked alynnidalar's idea of using adjectives/adverbs to mark tense, and to answer your question, I'm most likely going to do that for the locative expressions.
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Re: Zero copula outside of present tense

Post by linguoboy »

StrangerCoug wrote:I should have clarified that there's supposed to be no verb literally meaning "be". I decided I did want Kebreni's "to be called" (although with a slightly different construction to adjust to voice not being marked on the verb), and there's one for "to exist", too. I also said I liked alynnidalar's idea of using adjectives/adverbs to mark tense, and to answer your question, I'm most likely going to do that for the locative expressions.
So a locative expression would work to express a copula, e.g. "John in-doctor next.year". I'll note the parallel to the Slavic use of the instrumental case for predicate nouns and adjectives.

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Re: Zero copula outside of present tense

Post by So Haleza Grise »

Another option would be verbs like "John stand doctor" for animates, or "John sit doctor" for inanimates etc.
Duxirti petivevoumu tinaya to tiei šuniš muruvax ulivatimi naya to šizeni.

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Re: Zero copula outside of present tense

Post by Linguist Wannabe »

Why not do what Japanese does and have adjectives inflect for tense? e.g.

/sema-i/
cramped-NONPAST

/sema-katta/
cramped-PAST


Also remember that copulas don't always need to be verbs, but can be other things such as affixes. So to say "A is B" in your conlang, you might say /A B-ki/, and to say "A was B" you might say /A B-su/ for example. Then you can have the affixes trigger some kind of umlaut or ablaut in whatever they attach to, and after which they are lost.

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