(1) Miinawaa noomaya wiin igo ingikendaan i'iw onadinangid a'aw goon. (2) Mii ezhi-nishkaadizid a'aw mindimooyenh, "Gego, o-niigwa'ok wewiib a'aw." (3) "Aaniin danaa, aaniish," indinaa. (4) "Mewinzha giiwenh abinoojiinyag onadinaawaad, mii iniw goonan. (5) Mii giiwenh ezhi-gichi-gisinaag. (6) Mii awiiya ezhi-wiindigoowid. (7) Miish iko gaa-igooyaang, 'Gego onadinaakegon a'aw goon.'"
(8) Geyaabi go noongom, mii enindwaa abinoojiinyag gego ji-mazinadinaasigwaa iniw goonan. (9) Mii giiwenh ezhi-bazigwiid a'aw, wiindigoowid amogowaad.
John Nichols's translation is:
(1) Then again not long ago I remembered about the time we were making snowmen. (2) The old lady [Kegg's grandmother] got mad, "Don't, go break it up quick!" (3) "But why, why?" I said to her. (4) "Long ago some children were making snowmen. (5) Then it got very cold. (6) Someone became a windigo.* (7) They used to tell us, 'don't make snowmen!'"
(8) Today children are still told not to make an image from snow. (9) It could stand up, so the story goes, become a windigo, and eat them.
*A windigo is a cannibalistic ice monster.
Breaking it down some more:
Code: Select all
[1] Miinawaa noomaya wiin igo ingikendaan i'iw onadinangid a'aw goon.
Also recently CONTRASTIVE EMPH 1-know:TI-INAN that(INAN) mold/shape:TA-1PL.EXC:CJ-3:CJ that(AN) snow.
[2] Mii ezhi-nishkaadizid a'aw mindimooyenh, "Gego, o-niigwa'ok wewiib a'aw."
DSQ thus<IC>=be.angry:AI-3:CJ that(AN) old.lady, "don't, go.and=break.up:TA-{2PL>3}:IMPER quickly that(AN)."
[3] "Aaniin danaa, aaniish," indinaa.
"How come, why," 1-say.to-DIR.
[4] "Mewinzha giiwenh abinoojiinyag onadinaawaad, mii iniw goonan.
"Long.ago it's.said child-PL mold/shape:TA-DIR-3PL:CJ, DSQ that(OBV) snow-OBV.
[5] Mii giiwenh ezhi-gichi-gisinaag.
DSQ its.said thus<IC>=very=cold.weather-INAN:CJ.
[6] Mii awiiya ezhi-wiindigoowid.
DSQ someone thus<IC>=windigo-be:AI-3:CJ.
[7] Miish iko gaa-igooyaang, 'Gego onadinaakegon a'aw goon.'"
DSQ=so HABITUAL PAST<IC>=say.to-PASSV-1PL.EXC:CJ, 'don't mold/shape:TA-DIR-{2PL>3}:NEG.IMPER that(AN) snow.'"
[8] Geyaabi go noongom, mii enindwaa abinoojiinyag gego
Still EMPH today, DSQ say.to<IC>-PASSV:CJ-3PL:CJ child-PL don't
ji-mazinadinaasigwaa iniw goonan.
CMPLTZR=make.image-DIR-NEG-3PL:CJ that(OBV) snow-OBV.
[9] Mii giiwenh ezhi-bazigwiid a'aw, wiindigoowid amogowaad.
DSQ it's.said thus<IC>=rise.up-3:CJ that(AN), windigo-be:AI-3:CJ eat:TA-INV-3PL:CJ.As I said, there's a number of interesting things here. For one, there's a good example of how the animacy-based gender system doesn't always correspond to actual biological animacy: "snow", goon, is animate. Thus, it is marked with an animate demonstrative a'aw, it's the object of TA verbs like onadin, and it's obviated (suffixed with -an) when it appears in the same clause as another (proximate) third person argument (the children).
Another interesting thing is the verb for "say to someone", izhi. Ojibwe has almost no irregular verbs, but this is easily the most irregular, with a number of different allomorphs, from -in- (as in indinaa, "I say to him/her", in sentence 3), to -izh- (not represented here), to zero! That is, in some cases, the root for "say to someone" is a null root, e.g. indig "s/he says to me" (= ind-(Ø)-ig = 1-(say.to)-INV). There is an example of this in our story: in sentence 7, gaa-igooyaang is: gaa-(Ø)-igoo-yaang = PAST<IC>-(say.to)-PASSV-1PL.EXC:CJ, "we were told".
The discourse sequencing use of mii is quite evident here: it appears at the beginning of essentially every narrative-advancing sentence of Kegg's report, as well as each narrative-advancing or "explicational" sentence of her grandmother's reported speech (in both cases, it is not used in the opening sentence, as might be expected, nor with verbs which report speech acts). Another morpheme that's acting essentially as a discourse sequencer in this story is the relative preverb izhi-, whose basic meaning is something like "thus, in such a way". Here it serves partly in that function (e.g. in sentence 2, where the grandmother's anger is being described as resulting from the previously reported action of building a snowman), but partly as a general narrative-advancing device.
The direct/inverse alignment can be seen in several verbs here, e.g. indinaa in sentence 2 (1-say.to-DIR = I say to him/her) and amogowaad in sentence 9 (eat-INV-3PL:CJ = s/he/they (obv) eats them (prox)).
Now, conjunct verbs are generally described, in Ojibwe at least, as basically being subordinate clause markers and only appearing in subordinate clauses (or with certain particles, like mii), while independent verbs are used elsewhere (except for commands, where imperative verbs are used). But this description is actually very overly-simplistic and not really correct. Note that in this story, there are only two independent order verbs: ingikendaan in sentence 1 and indinaa in sentence 2. Instead of marking subordinate versus matrix clauses, a better characterization of the use of conjuct vs. independent verbs in running narratives would be along the lines suggested by Brendan Fairbanks: independent verbs are used for stating background and orienting information, while conjunct verbs are used to describe in-focus events which advance the narrative. This is especially clear in the last two verbs of the final sentence, where the verbs are not in subordinate clauses, and there is no "predicative" particle like mii which could be argued to be forcing conjunct inflection of the verbs -- yet both verbs are still conjunct! The use of the conjunct here seems to give a sense that the verbs are tightly integrated into the narrative, and also seems to serve to mark the verbs as appearing in quick succession to one another(?) (or perhaps as aspects of the same single action? I'm not really sure here...)
Finally, the use of proximates/obviatives here is interesting. When there's only one third person referent (e.g., the old lady in sentence 2), there's no need for the proximate/obviative distinction, and the third person is proximate by default. As soon as there's a clause with two animate third persons (sentence 4), one must be marked as obviative, as expected. And, as is generally the case, the obviative is the noun which serves as the object of the verb. However, one thing a number of people probably don't realize is that "obviative shifts" -- changing which referent, if any, is obviative -- are quite common in many Algonquian languages, including at least some dialects of Ojibwe, like Kegg's. So, for instance, in sentence 8, the "children" are proximate, and the "snow" is obviative; in the next sentence, 9, the snow they are molding has become proximate (ezhi-bazigwii = "s/he/it (prox) thus rises up"; a'aw = a proximate demonstrative). It remains proximate for the second verb in the sentence, wiindigoowid ("s/he/it (prox) becomes a windigo"), but in the final verb, the roles have suddenly switched: now the windigo is obviative and the children are again proximate (amogowaad = "s/he/it/they (obv) eats them (prox)"). But (rather unusually), there's no overt noun or demonstrative or any sign of a clause boundary, to mark that such a shift has taken place.
Neat, huh?
