TADATAKA NAGAI

University of Alaska Fairbanks, Fairbanks, Alaska

tuni/runi forms in Iñupiaq

Iñupiaq has one adverbial form marked by the ending -tuni (after consonants) / runi (after vowels), for which corresponding forms are apparently not found in other Inuit dialects nor other Eskimo languages. It indicates habitual conditions: thus, in Niqi una tamuqtuni nakuuruq ‘This meat (niqi una) is good (nakuuruq) to chew (when you chew it) (tamuqtuni),’ tamuqtuni has this ending. One of the characteristics of this form is that it doesn’t index any NP. So, like the contemporative mood, which doesn’t index all of its arguments and has coreference condition on its subjects, there are some coreference conditions between the arguments of the -tuni/runi clause and those of its main clause. This presentation examines the semantics and syntax of this adverbial form.