Proximate/Obviative question

[dhok]

A couple of things.

One, what are some languages that have that distinction? Just a list- I'm thinking of including it in my next conlang and I'd like to look at their grammars.

Two, are there any languages that make this distinction more than two ways, thus allowing the speaker to mark three different third-person referents differently?

[Bob Johnson]

do you mean in verbal persons specifically?

otherwise english: this, that

[dhok]

Sorry, should have specified. Yes, I mean in verbal conjugation.

[Bob Johnson]

Tlingit has proximate, neutral, obviative: all 3 in possessive pronouns, but obviate absolutive and proximate ergative can't occur for some reason, and neutral abs/erg is null ("expected").

Hopefully some other Dene-Yeniseian languages would be similar

[qiihoskeh]

Algonquian languages in general have proximative-obviative marking on verbs and other things.

[Hakaku]

Cree makes this distinction, though the obviate is more obvious than the proximate, as it tags on as a bound morpheme (-a, -wa), whereas the proximate is either assumed to be unmarked or is explicitly marked by demonstrative pronouns, seen below.

Code: Select all

Plains Cree

(proximate singular)
            animate      inanimate

proximal    awa          ôma
medial      ana          anima
distal      nâha         nêma

(proximate plural)
            animate      inanimate

proximal    ôki          ôhi
medial      aniki        anihi
distal      nêki         nêhi

(obviative)

proximal    ôhi
medial      anihi
distal      nêhi

Here, the plural and singular forms are regrouped under the proximate umbrella, by opposition to the obviate, which makes no distinction between animate, inanimate, singular or plural (other varieties like Southern East Cree do). It should also not be confused with the notion of spatial reference, since that distinction also exists in demonstratives.

In terms of pronominal morphemes in verbal constructions, then, besides the regular ones and the obviate, there's also an inclusive/exclusive distinction on the first-person plural, and a very minor distinction exists between the pronominal prefixes for regular conjugations and the possessive paradigm. I believe some other languages like to complicate all of this with an added distinction between singular, dual and plural (+inc/excl, etc.).