1SgSubj now go.Out-Perf.SgSubj

‘I have gone out now.’ (TgK)

b. péjú nɛ́:-wⁿɔ́ⁿ gò-è

sheep now go.out-Perf.SgSubj

‘The sheep-Sg has gone out now.’ (TgK)

c. nɛ́:-wⁿɔ́ⁿ pàrá gò-è

now cloudy.weather go.out-Perf.SgSubj

‘The cloudy weather has gone out now (= it is autumn).’ (TgK)

The noninitial immediately preverbal position of temporal/meteorological nouns in such collocations, systematic in TgK but also frequent in other Dogon languages, makes it impossible to position QuotSubj particles after them. QuotSubj particles are added to clause-initial subjects, reflecting a sharp subject/VP split, and when the (candidate for) subject follows other constituents, this binary split is not possible. In fact, we have a textual example from Ben Tey (41) where low-referentiality ‘rain’ (pseudo-subject) is passed over for QuotSubj marking in favor of a clause-initial, normally nonsubject spatial PP.

(41) [[sùmóy wó] má:] bǒl sí‑yé‑m̀‑ǹdò

[[ground in] QuotSubj] rain(n) go.down-MP-Impf-ImpfNeg

gì:ⁿ‑bɔ̀ wà

say.Perf-3PlS say

‘They said that the rain wouldn’t come down on the earth, it is said.’ (Ben Tey)

It is possible to combine pairs of temporal/meteorological collocations (38) into biclausal constructions that allow us to test same-subject relations when the same pseudo-subject occurs in both clauses. The data are clear: same-subject (SS) subordinators are used, in both Nanga (42a) and TgK (42b).

(42) a. [yàrí dɔ̌: ŋ́] bìndé-ɛ̀rɛ̀-

[clouds arrive Past.and.SS] go.back-Perf-3SgS

‘The cloudy weather (rainy season) came and went back.’ (Nanga)

b. [pàrá nú-ɛ̀:] gò-è

[cloudy.weather go.in-Past.and.SS] go.out-Pfv

‘Cloudy weather (=rainy season) came in and went out.’ (TgK)

However, as pointed out in §1.4 above, the same-subject requirement for such subordinators is not rigorous, the main requirement being that the two clauses in question do not have referentially disjoint subjects. The nouns in the collocations (38) satisfy this even though they are low in referentiality.

3.2. Pseudo-subjects in partonym collocations.

There are also some noun-verb combinations resembling those of the preceding section but with partonyms instead of ‘rain’, ‘cloudy weather’, ‘morning’, and the like. A few Nanga examples are in (43).

(43) Partonym collocations (Nanga)

noun verb gloss of collocation

a. co-occur with a true subject NP

kɛ́ndɛ̀ bàrⁿá ‘get angry’ (lit. “heart¹⁶ turn red/blaze”)

kìrⁿè-dɛ̀rⁿí gǒ: ‘have a bloody nose’ (lit. “nosebleed go out”)

b. take a possessor NP

nɔ̌: dùgó ‘be unable to eat’ (lit. “mouth be disgusted”)

In the type (43b), the partonym is the head of the subject NP. The human patient is expressed as a possessor (44), so the issue of subjecthood does not arise.

(44) [nɔ̌: nɔ̀] dùgó-ɛ̀rɛ̀-

[mouth 3SgPoss] be.disgusted-Pfv-3SgSubj

‘He/She was unable to eat.’ (due to sickness) (Nanga)

(lit. “his/her mouth was disgusted”)

By contrast, the collocations in (43a) require a true subject denoting the human experiencer or patient. The result resembles what have been controversially analysed as possessor-raising to subject constructions in certain languages.¹⁷ For discussion see Gavruseva (2000) and Szabolsci (1984). In Chickasaw, for example, both a raised possessor and an original subject can have unambiguous morphological subject marking in the same clause (Munro & Gordon 1982:95-96).

Nanga examples of literal “heart turn red/blaze” meaning ‘get angry’ are in (45). In (45a), the verb agrees with the human subject (1Sg), not with ‘heart’.

(45) a. kɛ́ndɛ̀ bàrⁿá-só-y

heart turn.red-Pfv-1SgSubj

‘I got angry.’ (Nanga)

b. á:mádù kɛ́ndɛ̀ bàrⁿá-só-

Amadou heart turn.red-Pfv-3SgSubj

‘Amadou got angry.’ (Nanga)

There is no morphological or tonosyntactic indication of possession (‘my heart’, ‘Amadou’s heart’) in these examples. A nonpronominal true subject NP like ‘Amadou’ is clause-initial. It happens to be adjacent to ‘heart’ in (45b), but this is accidental. Possessive ‘Amadou’s heart’ has different tones, since possessed nouns are {L}-toned in Nanga when following a possessor that ends in a L-tone. Contrast the unmodified lexical /HL/ melody of kɛ́ndɛ̀ in (45a-b) with{L}-toned possessed kɛ̀ndɛ̀ in (46).

(46) á:mádù ^Lkɛ̀ndɛ̀

Amadou ^Lheart

‘Amadou’s heart’ (Nanga)

Replacing á:mádù kɛ́ndɛ̀ in (45b) by possessive á:mádù ^Lkɛ̀ndɛ̀ ‘Amadou’s heart’ produces a sentence that can be interpreted literally: ‘Amadou’s heart turned red (or blazed)’. It is not idiomatic in the sense ‘Amadou got angry.’ This makes it difficult to derive (45b) by possessor-raising.

Collocations like ‘get angry’ readily occur in clause sequences. They have same-subject marking when the human referent (not the body part as such) is coindexed with the subject of the other clause (47). As explained earlier, “same-subject” is applied flexibly in Dogon switch-reference, but (47) does show that the two subject NPs are not clearly disjoint.

(47) [ŋ̀gú yǐ: ŋ́] [kɛ́ndɛ̀ bàrⁿá-ɛ̀rɛ̀-y]

[that.Inan see Pfv.and.SS] [heart turn.red-Pfv-1SgSubj]

‘I saw that and (I) got angry.’ (Nanga)

We switch briefly from Nanga to Ben Tey to make a similar point using quotative particles. Recall that Ben Tey has QuotSubj ma: after the subject of a quoted sentence. In the ‘get angry’ collocation parallel to Nanga (43a), Ben Tey allows ma: after the true subject NP denoting the human being, but not after the pseudo-subject ‘heart’ (48a-b). Likewise, collocations with just a pseudo-subject, like ‘rain fall’, are not attested with QuotSubj ma: (48c).

(48) a. [ú ^HLbɔ̂: (mà:)] kɛ́lɛ̀ bàrⁿá:-rɛ̀- wà

[2SgP ^HLfather (QuotSubj)] heart turn.red-Pfv-3SgS QuotPred

‘(They) said that your-Sg father got angry.’ (Ben Tey)

b. [ú má:] kɛ́lɛ̀ bàrⁿá:-rɛ̀- wà

[2Sg QuotSubj] heart turn.red-Pfv-3SgS QuotPred

‘(They) said that you-Sg got angry.’ (Ben Tey)

c. bòlú mìrⁿɛ́:-rɛ̀- wà

rain(n) rain.fall-Pfv-3SgS QuotPred

‘He/She said that it rained.’ (Ben Tey)

So the partonyms in (43a) fail the syntactic tests for subjecthood when a better candidate for subject is present. Still, the partonym rather than the human subject subcategorizes for the verb stem. In [X heart turn.red/blaze], the image is of the heart (not the human subject X) turning red. Nanga verb bàrⁿá and cognates have concrete associations that the gloss ‘turn red’ fails to convey, in spite of the obvious connection with the adjective bárⁿí ‘red’. The verb occurs in contexts like ‘(mango) ripen’, ‘be the hot dry season’ (with typical daily maximum temperature as high as 45 C. = 112 F.), and ‘beat (tomtoms)’. A gloss ‘blaze’ better captures the associations with heat and heightened activity level as well as with vibrant color.

An even clearer example of verb subcategorization is ‘have a bloody nose’ (43a), in the version with verb gǒ: ‘go out, exit, go away’ as the verb. It is obviously blood rather than the person who exits. Yet here too the human protagonist is the syntactic subject for purposes other than verb subcategorization. In (49), for example, the verb is marked for 1Sg subject.

(49) kìrⁿè-dɛ̀rⁿí gǒ:-só-y

nose-bleed(n) go.out-Perf2-1SgSubj

‘I had a bloody nose (a nosebleed).’ (Nanga)

4. Summary.

In indicative main clauses, Dogon languages have a subject versus nonsubject opposition reflected in linear order, case-marking, verb agreement, antecedent/anaphor relationships, switch-reference, and the placement of quotative particles. However, further analysis leads to the conclusions in (50).

(50) a. Main-clause imperatives have addressees but not full-fledged subjects; quoted imperatives have subjects.

b. Hortatives have addressees and subjects, only the latter including the speaker.

c. Some collocations have pseudo-subjects and no true subjects.

d. Some collocations have both pseudo-subjects and true subjects.

We close with some observations about modeling, though our presentation to this point has not assumed any specific theory. First, the coexistence of subject and addressee marking, most conspicuously in Dogon hortatives, shows that semantic representations must simultaneously include a model of speech-event structure (including speaker and addressee) and one of an event or state with a predicate and its arguments. It is not clear that the two models need be, or can be, integrated into a single hierarchical model, in the fashion of early generative semantics or that of current generative treatments that incorporate higher functional projections of a “pragmatic” nature. It suffices that the two coexist, and that correspondences can be made between them.

Second, the striking inability of Dogon covert imperative subjects to bind even fully productive transpersonal reflexives raises the question whether “imperative” is the same category in Dogon as in languages like English. We can detect no illocutionary difference. There is no Japanese-style indirectness about speech-acts or second-person reference in Dogon discourse. So we leave this question open.

Third, Dogon true subjects and pseudo-subjects can be profitably modeled in terms of an external/internal distinction. True subjects are clause-initial, while pseudo-subjects stay close to the verb. In Dogon languages with QuotSubj phrases, a quoted clause divides cleanly into two parts, the true subject and everything else. Within current generative grammar, the obvious solution is that true subjects undergo raising, while pseudo-subjects fail to raise. This leads to two further questions. First, if a true subject (‘Seydou came’) and a pseudo-subject (‘rain rained’) both originate in the same syntactic position (specifier of the verb), what motivates the raising of ‘Seydou’ but not that of ‘rain’? Second, in sentences with both a true subject and a pseudo-subject (literal “Seydou heart turn red” and “Seydou nosebleed go out”), where does ‘Seydou’ originate? There is no evidence that ‘Seydou’ is a dative at any stage. In a generative model, this leaves us with no alternative but to model ‘Seydou’ as the possessor of ‘heart’ and of ‘nosebleed’, and to recognize obligatory possessor raising to subject. However, ‘[Seydou’s heart] turn red’ is not identical semantically to ‘Seydou get angry’, and

‘[Seydou’s nosebleed] go out’ is even worse as a paraphrase of ‘Seydou have a bloody nose’. This generative approach would also sharply distinguish two classes of true subjects, a base-generated subject like ‘Seydou’ in ‘Seydou come’ and a possessor-raised subject as in literal “Seydou heart blaze” (‘Seydou get angry’). Aside from the useful general idea of degrees of externality, it is not clear that generative grammar has the machinery to elucidate the Dogon data.