tagmeme and reconstructing the phrase level

THE PHRASE LEVEL
A prhrase is any structured word group that does not contain both a subject and predicate (as is typical of clause level word group) and that functins as a unit in manifasting one or more tagmemes. Phrase level syntagmemes are typically of three types: head-modifier, multiple head, or relator-axis.
Head-modifier phrases have an obligatory heas tagmeme around which certain subordinate modifiers revolve, these usually being optional. Sometimes however, a modifying tagmeme will also be obligatory. This is the case in barai with the deictics of certain phrase, the verb phrase and the item-possesor phrase are all head-modifier phrases in Barai.
Multiple head phrases are phrases structures that exhibit more that one head.these may be single words or embedded phrases. They are obligatory and may or may not require an intervening connector. Temporal, locative and nominative phrases are all multiple heas phrases in Barai.
Relator-axis phrases are composed of two tagmemes: a relator and an axis. Both are obligatory so that neither can alone fill the slot that the unit does. Typically, relator-axis phrase are quite similar in internal structure. Concequently, a differense of relators combined with a distributional difference may be the only distinctions between relator-axis syntagmemes. The possesive and accompaniment phrases are both example of Barai relator-axis phrases.
 The Modified Noun Phrase
The tagmemic formula for the noun phrases is the following:
F29. N = + Hd ± Mod : num/adj/poss. Pro ± det: dei
The modified noun phrse consist of an obligatory head manifested by a noun, an optional modifier filled by either a numeral, an adjective, or possesive pronoun, and an optional determiner filled by a deictic. Thye set of fillers manifesting the head tagmeme, (n), are to be distinguised from kinship nouns, (kn), as the letter require an entirely different construction. Numerals, adjectives, and possesive pronouns all occur with these non-kinship nouns and with the deictics, but they do not co-occur with each other so that together they comprise a single set. Note the example:
Vua fuone ije mavua ireobo
Talk his that box big
That talk of his a big box

Are ige e inokoro ije
House this perason two that
This house those two people

 The modified verb phrase
Another phrase syntagmeme is the modified verb phrase.
F29. V = ± mod : adv + Hd : v
The verb phrase consists of an optipnal modifier manifested by a set of adverb and an obligatory head filled bt a set of verbs. The class of advebs always occur immediately preceding the verb with no intervening elements and no changes of linear ordering so that the pair are considred a word group.
Difuri va saroroba tavua
Fast go suddenly explode
Goes fast suddenly explodes

Kuke re mauki fi
Again do quietly sit
Does (it) again site quietly

 The modified kinship phrase
The structure of the modified kinship phrase can be represented in the following formula.
F30. KN = + Hd ± num: -ki/-rafa + poss: p.m. ±det: dei
The modified kinship phrase consist of an obligatory heas manifested by a kinship noun, an optimal number slot manifested by the singular morpheme, -ki, or the plural morpheme, -rafa, an obligatory possesion slot manifested by a set of person markers, and an optional determainer slot manifested by a deictic. While this three tagmemes are phnologically bound in one phnological word, they are similar to the tagmemes occuring at the phrase level wuth other nouns and so are analysed with the kinship nouns as phrase level constituens. The following are modified kinship phrases.
Asie –ki –no asoe –rafa –fuo
Mother eg let father pl seg
My mother his fathers



Asoe –o asae –rafa –nuvuo
Father 2eg grandparent pl 1pl
Your father our grand parents


The modified kinship phrase is distinct from the modified noun phrase in numerous respect. First, the fillers of the head slot are mutually exclusive in the two syntagmemes. Number and possesion are two tagmemes rather than one, each with fillers distict from the modified noun phrase. And finally possession is obligatory in the modified kinship phrase.
The item-possesor phrase
Note the following phrase structures
e ig –afuo asoe
person this –poss.p. father
this person’s father

are ij –afuo tarome ije
house that –poss.p. roof that
that roof of that house

e ireobo gar –aduo mave
person big that –poss.p. pig
a pig belonging to that big person

are none ij –afuo tarome ije
house my that poss.p. roof that
that roof belonging to that house of mine



ame inokoro gar –aduo juvuave
boy two that poss.p. spear
a spear belonging to those two boys

In the item-possessor phrase, there are three layers of phrase level embedding. A relator-axist phrase is manifested by the possessor slot where the exist itself is a noun phrase so that the noun phrase is embended in the axis of a relator-axis phrase that is embeddaed in the possesor slot of an item-possessor phrase. Note the formula for the item-possesor phrase.
IP = + Poss: possRA + it: N/kn
An item possessor phrase consist of an obligatory possassor slot filled by a possessive a relator-axis phrase, an obligatory item slot filled by a noun phrase or a kinship noun. Notice that, when modified, kinship nouns differ from other nouns in their resulting constructions, but kinship nouns and modified noun phrase comprise a set that function together in the item possessor phrase. Since the possessive relator-axis phrase does not occur with modifiers, it is tempting to combine this phrase type with the modified noun phrase where the set of modifiers would include not only numerals, adjectives, and possessive pronouns but possessive relator-axis phrases as well. Then a permutation rule would be required to account, for the movement of the possessive relator-axis phrase to the left of the head noun. However in addition to the difference in the order of the tagmemes, the item-possessor phrase is further distinguised by its grouping of kinship nouns with modified noun phrase as one function-set unit. Hence the item-possessor analysis.
Now consider the noun phrase manifesting the item slot. It is structurally distinct from other modified noun phrase since only a deictic and never an adjective may co-occur with the head noun. This, plus the distribution of this construction only in the item slot of item-possessor phrases, yields the criteria necessary for defining a phrase level syntagmeme. If we label this structure N2, then N2 can be represented by F32.
F32. N2 = + Hd ± Det : dei
A modified noun phrase sub-two consist of an obligatory head filled by a noun and an optional determiner filled by a deitic.
 The possessive phrase
The possessive phrase, then is a relator-axis phrase that fills the possessor slot of item-possessor phrases. They alsooccur on the clause level manifesting the distination tagmeme of intransitive clauses. c
F33. possRA = + Ax: N + Rel :-afuo/ -aduo
The possessive phrase is a relator-axis phrase composed of an obligatory axis manifested by a noun phrase and an obligatory relator manifested by one of two possessive postpositions, -afuo or –aduo. The concord symbol “c” represents agreement between the deitic in the noun phrase and the postposition in the relator. The stem of the deitic determines which postposition will occur.
The noun phrase manifesting the axis is structurally very similar to other noun phrases. One difference is significant, however. Note that the deitic occurs in each example of the embadded phrase. This deitic is in fact obligatory to the embadded construction. The difference in the obligatory nature of the final determiner tagmeme plus the difference in distribution comprise the two-fold criteria for identifying a syntagmeme so that the ambadded nopun phrases is an emic pattern that can be represented as N3.
F34. N3 = + Hd Mod : num/aj/poss.pro+ Det : dei
Noun phrase sub-three consists of an obligatory head manifested by a noun, an optional modifier filled by a numeral, an adjective, or a possessive pronoun, and an obligatory determiner filled by a deictic. This deictic is an example of an obligatory subordinate tagmeme mentioned above.
Now observe a further example.
Asoe –no ig –afuo u
Father my this poss.p. hair
The hair of this my father
It is also possible for a modified kinship phrase to manifest the possessorslot of an item-possessor phrase in Barai. This kinship phrase is distinct, however, since a deictic occurs with the head and possession tagmeme. Again, this one internal structural difference plus its external distribution constitute the criteria necessary for identifying a constrastive syntagmeme.
F35. KN2 = + Hd ± Num: +-ki/-rafa + poss:p.m. + det : dei
That is, a modified kinship phrase sub-two consist of an obligatory head filled by a kinship noun, an optional number tagmeme filled by –ki/ -rafa, an obligatory possession slot filled by a set of person markers, and an obligatory determiner filled by a set of deictics.
 The accompaniment phrase
The accompaniment phrase is also a relator-axis phrase.
c
F36. accRA = + Axis : N2 + Rel : acc.p
And the formula reads as follows: the accompaniment relator-axis phrase has an obligatory axis slot manifested by a noun phrase sub-two and an obligatory relator slot manifested by an accompanient postposition. Like the possessive phrase, the noun phrase embedded in the axis has an obligatory deictic. There is concord between this noun phrase and the postposition filling the relator tagmeme. In this instance, however, the concord is between the head of the embadded noun phrase and the postposition and indicates its number and wether it is humanor non-human. That is, there are three accompaniment postpositions: -akuma, non-human; -aki, human singular; and –ena, human plural.
Fu fari fuone ij –aki va
He son his that aoo.p. go
He is going with his son

Do boeje ij –akuma i-ne
Water much that aoo.p. eat-imp
Eat(it) with a lot of water

Fu a fuone ij –ena va-e
He person his that aoo.p. past
He went with these his own people

 The location phrase
The location phrase is also a relator-axis phrase. Note the following example.

Fu juare gam –ia va-e
He garden that loc.p. go-past
He want to that garden

Bu ij –ia kari
They that loo.p. sit
They are sitting there

No kofu gum –ia bied-ia-e
We coffe that loo.p. meet-3pl-past
We met them there at those coffe trees

Bu are nuvuone ig –ia usiae
They house our this loo.p. arrive
They arrived here at our house

Bu ij –ia nuj-a
They that loo.p. put-3eg
They put (it) there

In each cas –ia, the loctive postposition, occurs as the filler of the relator slot. And the embadded phrase manifesting the axis is again the naoun phrase, as in 56 for example, where the noun is followed by a possessive pronoun which is in turn followed by a deictic. But note that 54 and 57 do not follow that pattern. A deictic alone can manifest the axis as well as noun phrase.
F37. locRA = + Axis : N/dei + Rel: loc p.
The formula then reads as follows: the locative relator-axis phrase consist of an obligatory axis manifested by a noun phrase or a deictic and an obligatory relator manifested by the locative postposition, -ia. Selectional restrictions limit the head nouns that occur in the embadded noun phrase but considerable overlapis apparent between these and nouns functioning as heads of other modified noun phrase so that it is clear that location nouns do not constitute a closed emic class among themselves.

 The time phrase
Now observe the following time phrases.

Na suake uri
I early.morning aries
I got up early the morning

Ve be no mave kana-e
Time one we pig kill-past
One time we killed a pig

Bu iko dua uru
They first dance(n) dance (v)
First, they dance

Nituame fu unava
Day. After.tomorrow he go.back
Two days later, he goes back

Ve ije fu visi
Time that he sick
At the time, he was sick

Mu inokobeke bu ij –ia are-kidufuo
Night three they that loo.p. leave-die.fut.
They will leave (it) there for three nights

The time pjrase differs from other phrase level syntagmemes in several respects. First of all, time nouns do constitute a closed emic class, i.e., they occur only in the time phrase and only time noun nouns manifest the head of this phrase. Then, the only modifiers that occur are numerals. And finally, the deictic is optional and occcurs as it does in noun phrases manifesting subject/object tagmeme without a bound postposition. The following formula represents the structure of this syntagmeme.
F38. T = + Hd: tn ± Num : num ± det: dei
A time phrase is composed of an obligatory head slot filled by a temporal noun, an optional number slot filled by a numeral, and an optional determiner filled by a deictec. In addition to the internal structural differences noted above, the unit is distributed only in the time slot of clause level constructions.
 The nominative phrase
The nominative phrase is one of the multiple head phrase syntagmemes. It occurs only manifesting the subject tagmeme.
Note the following example:

Buki none ige fu –ka irufui
Book my thos it int. heary
This book of mine (it) is really heary

A none ige bu ig –ia kari
Person my this they this loo.p. sit
These people of mine (they) are sitting here

Vito fu na kan-ie
Vito he me hit-1st
Vito(he) hit me

Fu –te tavua
It dub. Explode
It might explode

Fu –me ij –ia mani
He cas. That loo.p stand
He is just standing there

The mood clitics are phnologically bound to the subject pronoun and do not occur apart from such a pronoun. Multiple head phrases are either coordinate or oppositive depending on wether the referent of the fillers of te head slots are the same or different. In this construction, they are the same. One head is the item slot manifested by a noun phrase (N), and the other is a pronoun phrase (pro). This modified pronoun phrase, as in 64, 67, and 68, consists of an oblogatory head filled by a pronoun and an optional modifier filled by a mood clitic. It can be represented in the following formula.

F39. Pro = + Hd: pro ± Mod: mo
This modified pronoun phrase is then embedded in the nominative phrase.
c
F40. Nom = + it : N + App: Pro

That is, the nominative phrase consist of an obligatory item slot manifested by a noun phrase and an obligatory opposition slot manifested by a noun phrase and an obligatoryopposition slot manifested by a pronoun phrase. Concord of person and number exists between the head tagmemes of the filler classes.
Note further that this syntagmeme does not account for 67 above, where the pronoun phrase occurs apart from the noun phrase. The noun phrase must then be one of a set of structures manifesting the subject tagmeme on the clause level along with the noun phrase and the above nominative phrase.
F41. C1 = ± S: Nom/N/ pro ±….
This is by no means an exhaustive analysis of the phrase level syntagmeme of Barai, but these structures should be sufficient to provide a base from which to discuss the relations between the tagmemic and transformational models.