Transcript
Page 1: Declension and Nasalization in Hindustani

Declension and Nasalization in HindustaniAuthor(s): Henry M. HoenigswaldSource: Journal of the American Oriental Society, Vol. 68, No. 3 (Jul. - Sep., 1948), pp. 139-144Published by: American Oriental SocietyStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/595777 .

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Page 2: Declension and Nasalization in Hindustani

LESLAU: Supplementary Observations on. Tigre Gramnzar LESLAU: Supplementary Observations on. Tigre Gramnzar 139 139

dEhab rnan tahaybanns wa'acca 'at7ca 'i'azabbiyya "even if you give me much gold I will not sell my cow to you."

h ) WISH:

The unreal wish (' if only t ") is e2rpressed by the participle qatal followed by rnan gabbi': malX masi>' man gsbbs' "if only he came yesterday!2'; r,abbi woro hasan hayabya marw gabbi " if only God gave me a boy ! ".

§ ST. Conjunctions of coordination

a ) ALTERNATIvE:

The two elements of the alternative are sepa- rated by lagba' ma: 'ana lagba' ma h?6yo 'a9a1 namsa'kum 'ikon "neither I nor my brother will come to you "; 'ana saga lagba' rna 'Jngera 'i'aballa' "I do not eat either meat or bread"; 'ancl 'af; Stlq

yom layba' ma f«igar 'i'agayyas " I shall not go to the market either today or tomorrow"; ba'al bet layba' ma gana "be it the owner or a stranger.2'

b ) OPPOSITION:

a) "Not only . . . but also2' is expressed by leta followed by the verb in the negative in the

dEhab rnan tahaybanns wa'acca 'at7ca 'i'azabbiyya "even if you give me much gold I will not sell my cow to you."

h ) WISH:

The unreal wish (' if only t ") is e2rpressed by the participle qatal followed by rnan gabbi': malX masi>' man gsbbs' "if only he came yesterday!2'; r,abbi woro hasan hayabya marw gabbi " if only God gave me a boy ! ".

§ ST. Conjunctions of coordination

a ) ALTERNATIvE:

The two elements of the alternative are sepa- rated by lagba' ma: 'ana lagba' ma h?6yo 'a9a1 namsa'kum 'ikon "neither I nor my brother will come to you "; 'ana saga lagba' rna 'Jngera 'i'aballa' "I do not eat either meat or bread"; 'ancl 'af; Stlq

yom layba' ma f«igar 'i'agayyas " I shall not go to the market either today or tomorrow"; ba'al bet layba' ma gana "be it the owner or a stranger.2'

b ) OPPOSITION:

a) "Not only . . . but also2' is expressed by leta followed by the verb in the negative in the

" not only " sentence, and the conjunction -ma in the " but >' sentence: huhu leta 'zkon 'abqxhql-ma 'atta qabar 'imvsa "not only h;s brother but also his father failed to come to the burial"; haddas bet leta 'isarha la-ma 18 bet gandabit 'afrasa <' not Only did he fail to build a new house but he (even) destroyed the old one."

4s) dA'am " but." To illustrate the use of da'am a complete sentence is added to Sketches § 61cy: dib masniya'agal 'igts hazzGig'stlko da'am hamamko " I wanted to go to my friend, but I was sick."

y) manna ta " but ": manna ta 'ab 'ab lamayyat latw&rrus vc but when the father dies he is in- herited."

§ 58. ATOCATIVE AND INTERJECTIONS

In addition to the vocative form of Sketches § 62 note: masc. yaha " O thou," fem. yahay; pl. masc. yahaw " O you," fem. yahayaf;.

For " take," the following forms are used: masc. sg. 'anka, fem. 'fnki; pl. masc. 'ankum, fem. 'ankan.

[I wish to express my thanks to Col. G. R. N. Trevaskis whose help enabled me to accomplish my work on Tigr6.]

18 la is the demonstrative element, -ma conjunction of w . .

Inslstence.

" not only " sentence, and the conjunction -ma in the " but >' sentence: huhu leta 'zkon 'abqxhql-ma 'atta qabar 'imvsa "not only h;s brother but also his father failed to come to the burial"; haddas bet leta 'isarha la-ma 18 bet gandabit 'afrasa <' not Only did he fail to build a new house but he (even) destroyed the old one."

4s) dA'am " but." To illustrate the use of da'am a complete sentence is added to Sketches § 61cy: dib masniya'agal 'igts hazzGig'stlko da'am hamamko " I wanted to go to my friend, but I was sick."

y) manna ta " but ": manna ta 'ab 'ab lamayyat latw&rrus vc but when the father dies he is in- herited."

§ 58. ATOCATIVE AND INTERJECTIONS

In addition to the vocative form of Sketches § 62 note: masc. yaha " O thou," fem. yahay; pl. masc. yahaw " O you," fem. yahayaf;.

For " take," the following forms are used: masc. sg. 'anka, fem. 'fnki; pl. masc. 'ankum, fem. 'ankan.

[I wish to express my thanks to Col. G. R. N. Trevaskis whose help enabled me to accomplish my work on Tigr6.]

18 la is the demonstrative element, -ma conjunction of w . .

Inslstence.

DECLENSION AND NASATJT%ATION IN HINDUSTANI

DIENRY M. 1DIOENIGSWALD

UNIYER8ITY OF PENN8YLVANIA

DECLENSION AND NASATJT%ATION IN HINDUSTANI

DIENRY M. 1DIOENIGSWALD

UNIYER8ITY OF PENN8YLVANIA

1A descriptive study. 1-3: The noun and adjective inflec- tions are stated (morphemes and definitions; paradigms, alternations). 4-7: A study of the occurrence of nasaliza- tion shows that the seemingly aberrant nasalized case endings ( type daswan ) v which are found only after vowel (or 'semivowel') merely reflect nasalized stems. Excursus on gender syntas in fn. 6; on h in fn. 15.]

1. Hindustani 1 SUBSTANtIVES (subdivided below

1 Colloquial Urdu chiefly as recorded from Mr. Mirza Jaffer of Allahabad in 1942-5 under the auspices of the Intensive Language Program of the American Council of Learned Societies (J. Milton Cowan, Director). The pho- nemes, aside from the still unanalysed intonations, are # or space (word boundary); aeiou: ( vowels); pttokq b d d j g f s J w z 8 Frn n r) r r z ( consonants ); ^ ( nasaliza-

1A descriptive study. 1-3: The noun and adjective inflec- tions are stated (morphemes and definitions; paradigms, alternations). 4-7: A study of the occurrence of nasaliza- tion shows that the seemingly aberrant nasalized case endings ( type daswan ) v which are found only after vowel (or 'semivowel') merely reflect nasalized stems. Excursus on gender syntas in fn. 6; on h in fn. 15.]

1. Hindustani 1 SUBSTANtIVES (subdivided below

1 Colloquial Urdu chiefly as recorded from Mr. Mirza Jaffer of Allahabad in 1942-5 under the auspices of the Intensive Language Program of the American Council of Learned Societies (J. Milton Cowan, Director). The pho- nemes, aside from the still unanalysed intonations, are # or space (word boundary); aeiou: ( vowels); pttokq b d d j g f s J w z 8 Frn n r) r r z ( consonants ); ^ ( nasaliza-

into nouns and adjectives) are words which form paradigms consisting of a stem and one of three sets of endings. Consequently there are three genders of paradigms, masculine, feminine, and common-gender. These are the endings:

tion ) h ( breathing ) . e ( i ) o ( u ) when adjoining certain other vowels are non-syllabic; there is no need to set up ' iy n and ' w ' phonemes. : is ' vowel length.' t d are retroflex stops; r is a retroflex flap. Some features of the phonemic notation here used will be justified in the course of this paper.

The author is much indebted to Ernest Bender and Bernard Bloch who gave an earlier draft of this article the benefit of their corrections and suggestions.

into nouns and adjectives) are words which form paradigms consisting of a stem and one of three sets of endings. Consequently there are three genders of paradigms, masculine, feminine, and common-gender. These are the endings:

tion ) h ( breathing ) . e ( i ) o ( u ) when adjoining certain other vowels are non-syllabic; there is no need to set up ' iy n and ' w ' phonemes. : is ' vowel length.' t d are retroflex stops; r is a retroflex flap. Some features of the phonemic notation here used will be justified in the course of this paper.

The author is much indebted to Ernest Bender and Bernard Bloch who gave an earlier draft of this article the benefit of their corrections and suggestions.

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Page 3: Declension and Nasalization in Hindustani

MASCULINE

adjectival nominal

indiferent

nom -a: zero zero

8G

voc, obl -e: zero zero

140 HOENIGSWALD: Declension alld Nasatization in Bindustani

TABLE 1

FEMININE COMMON-GENDER

zero -e: a: zero -°: zero -°:

zero

zero zero

nom voc

obl PL

-o:

-o:

- o *

-o:

In all three genders, then, there are special nominal forms in -o: and -o: for the voc and obl pl respectively, contrasting with adjectival forms. FEMININES (ort ' woman,2 khsrki: s window ' be: ti: ' daughter,' Cchi: v good,' gin: ' fallen, fell ') are distinguished by the presence of such a contrasting nominal form for the nom pl also.2 MASCULINES (paes-a: ' money,' be: t-a: ' son,' acch-a: (good,' gir-a: Cfallen, fell') take inflec- tional endings (-a: for the nom sg, -e: for the other cases) even in their ad,jectival and indiferent forms. The remaining substantives are COMMON-GENDER substantives (do: st ' friend,' lo: g pl ' people,' ra: ja: ' prince,' xu: bsu: rat ' beautiful ').3

The choice between the three cases tnomtinative),

a See three paragraphs below for the three alternant forms of the suffix (-e:, -a:, - ). In accordance with dictionary practice, paradigms are identified by their nom (sg) forms. Hyphen is used in morphological dis- cussion to indicate boundary between stem and case ending, and for no other purposef

8 PRONOUNS are here left out of account. They are really common-gender substantives characterized by the absence of a vocative, the presence of at least two addi- tional case categories, and extensive stem suppletion. a: p ';you (polite) ' is not a pronoun but, true to its history (cf. Skt. atman-), a regular common-gender sub- stantive. It occurs in the singular only (has no suffixed forms ) but always shows that quasi-plural agreement ( including, in the informantns speech, the distinction between a: p gsrs: ';you one female person fell ' and

voc(ative), obl(ique) ) and the two numbers (s(in)g(ular), pl(ural) ) rests on the enviroIl- ment; it is a matter of syntactic function and meaning. The further choice, in those particular plural case categories which provide the distinc- tion, between an adjectival and a nominal form is likewise syntactical in nature In certain con- structions, I (e. g. as modifiers in be: ti: [lo: g] ' daughters-[people], daughters,' acchi: [orat-e :]

' good [women] '), all words appear in their adjec- {ival or, where the distinction does not exist, indifferent form. In certain other constructions, II (e. g. as head of the subject in be: ti: -a:

'daughters,' acchi:-a: 'good ones (fem.)'; or as predicates in gtri: - -gir: ' they fell (fem.)'; or preceding particles as in aorat-o: Aco: v to women,2 acchi:o: ko: (to good ones (fem.),2 be:t-o: ko: ' to sons,' acch-o: ko: ' to good ones (masc.),' ra: ja: -o: ko: ' to princes '), all words appear in their nominal (or indifferent) forms. In still another construction, III (as a predicate comple- ment with a verb immediately following), some substantives appear {ypically in adjectival (or in- different form (acchi: Zlo: 'ye are good (fem.),> giri: ho: 'ye are fallen, have fallen (fem.)'), while

a:p giri: syou several females fell') which is more or less optionally characteristic of other honorifics.

Foreign inflections of Arabic, Persian, and English loanwords are also disregarded in the present article.

adjectival nominal

indiferent

adjectival nominal

indifferent

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Page 4: Declension and Nasalization in Hindustani

[IOENIGSWALD: Declension and Nsalization in EIindustani 141

the rest show only nominal (or indif3erent) inflec- tions (be: ti: -a: ho: 'ye are daughters '). Since only nominatives occur in III, the difference is llot apparent except where a feminine pl is involved. Those feminines whose plural is found in adjec- tival form in construction III are FEMININE ADJECTIVES (acchi:, giri:); those feminines whose plural is found in nominal form in III are FEMLI- NINE NOUNS (be: ti:, khirki:, aorat). As the £re- quency of feminine nouns vs. feminine adjectives in constructions I and II respectively is studied, it is found, furthermore, that most feminine adjectives occur in I and most feminine nouns in II, the reverse being more or less confined to se phrases. It follows that nominal forms of feminine ad- jectives (acchi:-a: acchi:-o: girz:-o:) and ad- Jectival forms of feminine nouns ( be: ti: [lo: g] ) are relatively or absolutely rare.4

All feminine adjective stems (acchi:-, girz:-) and some feminine noun stems (be: fi:-, but not khirki:-) are derived from masculine stems by the addition of i: -.5 Masculines from which £eminine adjectives are thus derived are MLASCULINE ADJEC- TIVES (acch-a:); all others are MLASCULINE NOUNS (paes-a :, be: t-a: ) . The relative frequency of masculine adJectives vs. masculine nouns as among constructions I and II parallels that of £eminine nouns and adJectives. A feminine adjective may be said to form with its underlying masculine a TWIN adjective paradigm. (In a sentence, the mas- culine part of it will agree with a masculine or common-gender word: acch-e: paes-e: s good monies,' acch-e: ra: ja: s good princes,' acch-e: do: st 'good (male) friends'; the feminine part with a feminine or common-gender word: acchi: be: ti: -a:

' good daughters,' acchi: aorat-e: s good women,' acchi: do:st 'good (female) friends.')6 In the

4 Participles in the nominal nom occur typically as predicates; see two paragraphs below. Otherwise they are distributed much like adjectives in general.

5 Conversely, some masculine stems ( acc^- ) underlie feminine adjectives; others ( be: t-) underlie feminine nouns; still other (paes-) lack a feminine counterpart.

6 More explicitly, ( 1 ) the nominal ( or indifferent ) forms of MOST common-gender NOUNS may require mascu- line or common-gender adjectival ( or indifferent ) sub- stantives as modifiers, predicate complements, etc. Eence words like do: st are traditionally called masculine. Some of these same common-gender nouns occur, how- ever, ALSO with feminine adjectival modifiers etc. (and of course, feminine nominalr indifferent- forms of participles as predicates ) mostly with the meaning 'female . . .' as in the above example (S. Boekman has called this to the author's attention). Io: g and, above all, pronouns (fn. 3 ) like 140: ' that, those,' tum ' ye '

case of the common-gender substantives a distinc- tion between nouns and adjectives can be based only on their frequency in constructions I and II respectively: those more often found in I are COMBION-GENDER ADJECTIVES (Xt: bsu: rat), those more often found in II, COMMON-GENDER NOUNS (ra: ja:, do:st, lo:g).

Twin adjectives are PARTICIPLES if the mascu- line stem equals a verb stem (past participle), or a verb stem followed by t- (present participle) (gir verb stem ' fall ': gir-a :, giri: past participle masc. and fem. ' fallen, fell '; girt-a :, girti: present participle masc. and fem. ' falling, would have fallen'). The nominal nom pl of the feminine participles shows the sufh alternant - (girw: 'they fell (fem.),' girtt: 'they would have falle (fem.)'); the other feminine stems in i: show alter- nant -a: or, stylistically less favored, -e: (cchi: -a [acchi: -e:] 'good ones (fem.),' be: ti:-a: [be: ti: -e :] ' daughters '); the remaining femi- nines show -e: only (aorat-e: ' women '; there are no adjectives of this type).

2. The following paradigms result (A adjec- tive; N noun; ajl adjectival; idt indiffer- ent; nl nominal. Ptelatively rare forms (as defined above) are given in parentheses. acch-a:

acch: and gir-a: girt: are twin adjectives. gtr-a: giri: are participles):

are constant examples. ( 2 ) Nominal ( or indifferent ) forms of common-gender ADJECTIVES will have either masculine (or common-gender) or feminine (or common gender ) adjectival modifiers etc. according to meaning (male, or general, vs. female): htdusta: n ki: wu: bsu: rat-o: 'India belonging-to (fem.) beautiful ones!,' i.e. 'beautiful (women) of India!.' (3) Some nominal (or indiSerent ) forms of common-gender adjectives with specialized meanings call for masculine ( or common- gender), others for feminine (or common-gender) agree- ment as a matter of lexicon; e.g. gujra: ti: 'Gujerati, belonging to the Gujerat country,' but nominal form with feminine (or common-gender) agreement 'Gujerati lang- uage ' as in acc^t: gujra: ti: ' good Gujerati.' See fn. 9. To the extent that its meaning is specialized ( and especially where it has outlived, historically, its basic adjective paradigm; I have no examples) such a nominal (indiSerent) adjective is simply a common-gender xourf ( see end of preceding paragraph ) with masculine ( or common-gender) or feminine (or common-gender) agree- ment, as the case may be; hence the stricture (' most ') under ( 1 ) .

None of these instances must be confused with feminine nouns (nom pl nominal in -e:) the stems of which are identical with those of common-gender nouns: acchi:

me: z-e: 'good tables' alongside acc^-e: me: Z, same meaning; contrast acchz: lo: g 'good people (ref. to women) ': acc^-e: lo: g 'good people (ref. to men, or general ) .'

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Page 5: Declension and Nasalization in Hindustani

EOENIGSW&LD: DecIension and NBalization in Bindustani 142

COMMON- GENDER MASCULINE FEMININE

acchi: giri:

h *

aconz: g ,:

* * *

acchz: gTrz:

(acchi: <:) girX:

* * .

accht: gTrz:

xu: bsu: rat

Xtb: bsu: rat

xu: bsu: rat

xq: bsu: rat

-

nom sg idt

voc, obl sg idt

nom pl ajl iat

nl A

voc pl ajl idt

nl

oblplajl idt

nl

acch-a:

acch-e:

gtr-a:

gl,r-e:

accZl-e: gir-e:

acch-e: gir-e:

(acch-o: ) (gir-o: )

acch-e: gir-e:

(acch-o: ) (gir-o: )

(acchi: -o: ) (giri: -o :) (xu: bsu: rat-o: )

acchi: gtri:

(acchi:-o:) (giri:-o:)

xq: bsu: rat

(xu: bsu: rat-o:)

nom sg idt

voc, obl sg idt

nom pl ajl idt

nl N

voc pl ajl idt

nl

oblplajl idt

nl

be: t-a:

be: t-e:

be: t-e:

aorat

aorat

khirki: .

khirki: be: ti:

be: ti:

do:st

do: st

do:st

(do: st)

do:st-o:

(do:st)

do:st-o:

paes-a:

paes-e:

paes-e:

(aorat) (khirki:) (be: ti:)

aorat-e: khirki:-a: be:ti:-a:

(aorat) (khirki:) (be: ti:)

aorat-o: khirki: -o: be: ti: -o:

(aorat) (khirki:) (be: ti:)

aorat-o: khirki:-o: be: ti:-o:

(Paes-e ) (be:t-e )

paes-o: be: t-o:

(paes-e:) (be: t-e:)

paes-o: be: t-o:

3. The sound pattern of Hindustani entails cer- tain automatic alternations of sTEx-final phonemes. Before any of the (socalic) suffises the sequence non-initial consonant plus single vowel loses its vowel under certain conditions 7 (sarak nom sg ' street,' but sark-e: nom pl nominal) and e, o are lost from the groups ahe, aho (tahe nom sg 'fold,' but taho: obl pl nominal). Before the endings -e:

7When preceded by a single (short) vowel. When a sowel cluster precedes, the loss seems to be optional (aorat-e: and aort-e: both occur) When a consonant

precedes, the treatment varies according to the consonant, cluster which results or would result.

and -e: 8 an e preceded by vowel is lost (ga: e nom sg. ' cow ' and ga: e-o: obl pl nominal, but 9a: -e: nom pl nominal). Before the endings -o: and -o: an o preceded by vowel is lost (baca:o nom sg ' rescue ': baca: -o: obl pl nominal ) . Furthermore, there are a few instances of suppletion (ciri:a:

8And before i:- in deriving feminine from masculine stems. The further loss of stem-final i: before this i:- (ki:-a nom sg ' (was) done (masc.),' but k: 8g fem.) is perhaps not entirely automatic.

In rapid speech geminates are simplified and stops that are accompanied by h are replaced by plain ones before zero suffix (gidd^-o: obl pl nominal vs. gid(d^) nom sg etc. ' vulture ' illustrates both) .

TABLE 2

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Page 6: Declension and Nasalization in Hindustani

HOENISSWALD: Declension and Nasalization in Hindustan1, 3

noln sg ' bird ' with pl nolninal cases from a stem . . . * * - .

etrt:- as ln ct7X:-a: noln p llomlna .

4. Only in one respect does there seem to be an irregularity that affects the infleetional ENDINGS.9 The manuals list, or at least mention, certain substantives in which all endint,s, including the derivative i:- of feminine stems, are nasalized: " daswan " nom sg (other ad jectival case forms " daswen "), a masculine adjective ' the tenth ' and its feminine twin " daswlti "; or " bayan (baen),° baln'' 'left,' another twin adjective; or the masculine noun " dhuati (dhuen)" 'smoke ', or the feminine noun "siwaln (pl siwalnan) " ' Indian vermicelli; holiday gift.' In our pre- liminary notation these words appear as daso-a: daso-e: daso:; ba: e-a: ba:-e: ba:t:; dhu:-a: dhu:-e:; sioa: sioa:-a:. Writing -a:, -e:, z:- ete., when eontrasted with the transliterations from Urdun " an, e;, ln," does away with the oddity of having to add, after the case endings,1l an element " . . .n" common to the entire paradigm. It is moreover supported by the status of nasalization ( , " n ") in the language as a whole, quite asicle from the paradigms under investigation: a nasal- ized vowel not only differs in sound from the sequence vowel plus nasal consonant (n, qn, ), but is characteristically shorter, its nasal com- ponent not counting, for the purposes of the auto- natie word stress, as a consonant (as n, m, P do). dhaka: ' covered, was covered ' shares the stres3 pattern of pata: 'trace,' with weak stress on the first vowel which is short (single) and unchecked, whereas laeka: ' Ceylon ' and ttnka: < mote, straw '12 have the louder initial stress of checked syllables7 comparable to that of dhakta: ' being covered,

90f eourse the phonemie shape of the nom sg (fn. 2) is not sufficient to prediet gender: accha: is masculine, ces: a: feminine, ra: ja: eommon-gender (although this partieular word does not happen to be used with femi- nine eoncord; see fn. 6 ); aorat is feminine, lo: g eommon- gender; mo: t: 'pearl and gujra: ti: are eommon- gender (fn. 6) while ro: ti: 'bread' is feminine.

10 See seetion 3. Cp. e. g., J. T. Platts, A Grammar of theXtndtistaqwt or EJrdu Language7 (Oxford 1941) 42, 43 45, and fn. 17 below.

Or rather case infixes. 12 There is no .. ar] .., .. an .. distinet from .. c ..,

..a..; see next section. Incidentally, a contrast such as larJka: vs. t1,nka (the latter vith apical [n]) makes it necessary for the dialect in question to set up a pho- neme z1. See J. R. Firth in A. iEI. Harley Golloquial SIindustans ( London 1944 ) siii.

would have been covered.' In short, vowel ai is on the same footing as vowel . The nasality of the former should not be represented on the line as a segment in the syllabic makeup of Hindustan;.

This still leaves an extra set of nasalized endings paralleling oral ones after certain stems. The irregularity woul(l obviouslr disappear if by sorlle valid analysis the nasalization were moved baek even further; that is, from the ending into the stem.

5. Two statements deserile the distribution of nasality and orality in ITindustani arowels. First, a vowel or sequence of s-owels within a word i S either entirely oral or entirely nasalized. Secondly, only nasalized vowels or vowel sequences occur immediately before or after tn, , or 13; there is, ill other words, contrast betwecll . . ba: o. .? . *aw ob. . and what might be written . . ba . <) . .: . .a . ()b . ., but there is only . . qrla: (} . . n . .+x . ()qrlt . . .13 Pho- netically, the nasalized vowel s3equences seem to be rather evenly nasalized after m, or n; 14 under all other conditions the velum appears to be lowered increasingly so that the nasal timbre is strongest toward the end. To indicate this we have put over the last vowel symbol (other than: ) of a sequence to identify the sequenee as nasalized.15

13 For sequellces with h see fn. 15. It is possible that long vowels and perhaps other vowel sequences following a nasal consonant and precedillg a eonsonant in very slow speech, are uttered with two contrasting de(trees of nasalization ( thus seeming after all to show contrast between phonemic nasalization alld a mere vowel allo- phone after nasal consonant): ma: da: C(was) rubbed' with the stronver variety of, say, " a: k(h)" ' eye,' t:3. " na: k ' ' nose ' (in our terms, ma: da:, : k(^) and n: k). The informant'6 consistency in this respeet is hard to judte, and mere spelling pronunciation hard to rule out. The diEculty does not, at any rate, affeet our furtller discussion which is based on word-final vowel sequences S. G. M. Qadri, Bindustani Phonettes (Ville- neuve St.-Georges and London, 1930) does not help. For pertinent material from other varieties of the language see G. Bailey in BSOS 6. 937.

14 t1 does not occur before vowel. 15 , then, is a prosodic phoneme whicll has a scope of

more than one segmental phoneme. A nzore comples and for the present purpose, less servieeable definition of could be found to ineorporate its affinity to qn, n, n and to make such writings as s?hna: ( with two ) appear overdetermined; see Z. S. iEIarris in Lang. 20.181- 205.

Several facts suggest a similar analysis for the various instances of phonemie breathing: aspiration (voieeless or voiced) after stops, voicelessness of vowels (as in [tsee] tohe 'fold'), voiceless glottal spirant before vowels (^o:

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Page 7: Declension and Nasalization in Hindustani

144 I4OENISSWALD: Declension and Nasalization in Hindustani

The limitation of works important, if simple, inflectional changes. If two nasalized sowel se- quences come into contact within a word, the phonetic pattern of increasing or even nasality is automatically adopted. If one oral and one nasalized sequence come together (regardless in which order ) the entire resulting sequence is nasalized (la: + u:-- la: u: ' I may bring '; ma: + o: = ma: a: ' mothers ! '). Vocalic suffises are replaced by their nasalized counterparts after stems ending in qn or t (sun + :=suna: ' heard ' ) .

6. The last-mentioned process is not ordinarily recognized in traditional spelling (or grammar).lo In both TJrdu and Hindiwe find the equivalent of *suna: rather than suna: . Yet in the dialect described here there is no difference between the final vowel of suna: and that of dasoa: (" daswan ") . sun-a:, sunt:, and the many masculines and femi-

' ye are ' ) initially, voiced glottal spirant between certain vowels or finally after certain vowels (sa: h ' shah,' obl pl £a: h o: ), voicelessness freely alternating with mur- mured voice in liquids (dul7lan ' bride ') . The aspiration does not ' make position ' ( see section 4 ) and would provide the only initial consonant clustersX if counted as a consonant. Unlike ordinary consonants, ' h is not geminated: ' shht h ' health ' is sehat. The voiceless vowel is part of, and the glottal spirant fails to inter- rupt, vowel sequences for the purpose of nasality vs. Orality ( i. e., the sequence . . mahab . . is just as auto- matically nasalized by the m as is ..maab..; on simul- taneous breathing and nasalzation see Firth, 1. c. xvi ) . The vowel combinatiolls which occur, and the appl osimate freqUellCy Witll which they occur, are the same whether intervenes (voicelexs vowel is involsTed) or llot; in most cases even xrowel allophones are unaSected by h ( tahe

with {ae] before {e] like [aee] ae ' hey!,' as against {X] ill most other environments ) . The scope of h ( as we write tentatively) seems to be ( 1 ) consonant cluster tthe plural of dul^n is dulhe: with the entire group In affected); (2) vowel cluster (the diminutive of cTz: ha: 'rat' formed like k¢tta: sdog': k¢tti: a: 'little dot,' al)pears as cu: i: hcl: ); given a vowel sequence, there ap)ears to be generally only one place in which the breathing may crop up depending on the configuration of the vowels in the sequence. But there remain a few troublesome cases like pai: he: 'wheels' vs. kahi: e: ' please say ' ( hardlv a spelling pronunciation ), aside from the fact that the scope of the breathing prosodeme ill ho: Wrould be the pre-initial #. Considerable variation ill the conventional spelling (of the type cu: hi: a: ) reflects this state of affairs. It should also be remem- bered that h in txmh&t: ; to you,' for instance has developed historically from s preceding, not following, m.

nines like them must be added to the list o£ nasalized paradigms.

The difficulties attending the original members of that list (daso-a:, dhu: -a:, sioat:, etc.) vanish as soon as one realizes the significant fact that in elrery one of them the masculine stem which pre- cedes the sufEses -a:, -e:, -o:, and t:- ends in a vowel, including, of course, 'semivowels,' as in daso-a: " daswan." 17 Hence their various case forms terminate with a nasalized vowel sequence of which the latter portion is sufEal. The source of nasality, descriptively speaking, is the portion belonging to the stem, since if daso-, dhu:-, (stoa-) are set up as stems, forms like dasoa:, dhu: e:, szoat: result regularly and automatically. The analogy with suna: is complete. In particular, the stem-forming suffix meaning '-thn (dasoa: from das ' ten ') must be listed as o-.

7* Thus, a study of Hindustani phonology leads to the conclusion that, except for a few cases of suppletion there is no need to set up irregular declensions. All alternations of phonemes ob- served in the paradigms of nouns and adjectives are automatic.

l6But in cases like "ma," "man" (both currexlt for

ma: Cmother') where no morphology is involved, spell-

ings are confused enough. " gaon, ganon, ganw " and

their prototypes (for ga: o 'village') are likewise mere

variants. 17 See fn. 1.

In addition to the forms cited (and to other instances

of o- in ordinal numerals) the informant had ku: a:

' well,' da: e-a ' right ( side ) ,' and ru: -a: ' fur ' in his

active vocabulary, although he stated his familiarity

with others. Cases like ban: -a: ' merchant ' must be

excluded; their nasalization, though it happens to be

recognized in conventional orthography, is automatic

after n. The small number of items is not surprising

considering the definitely Eindi (rather than Urdu; see

fn. 1 ) character of most of them. It is highly sifflnificant,

however, that among the 75 different substantives in

" al; " and " ln " (not counting the various ordinal

numerals) in J. T. PlattsX A Dictionary of Urd7i, (7lassr- cal Bind4, and Enplish5 (London 1930 ) there does not

seem to be one single instance of a phoneme other than

vowel (semivowel), h, or qn, preceding the final nasalized

vowel. The fact that a number of these entries are no

doubt common-gender words rather than have suffixes

a:, -i: does not of course detract from the importanee

of the remainder.

It is interesting to note in this eonneetion that the

stem-final . .o- thus posited is said to go back to m in a

number of eases (ep. Ap. v), as in ^.o-a: '-th (mase.) '

from Skt. ..maka7.1.

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