98 ROBERT D. VAN VALIN, JR.
(87) a. $ ki igmú wq yaxtáke.
dog the cat a bite
"The dog bit a cat."
b. Ё ki igmú wq yaxtáka he?
"Did the dog bite a cat?"
c. ki táku yaxtáke.
what/something
"The dog bit something."
d. § ki táku yaxtáka he?
"What did the dog bite?", or "Did the dog bite something?"
WH-words in Lakhota occur in situ, as (87d) shows, and they are in fact
ambiguous between a question word and an indefinite pronoun interpreta
tion, as the contrast between (87c,d) exemplifies. He overtly instantiates
the IF operator over the clause, and the element questioned must be focal.
In (87d), the actual focus domain may be either ki "the dog", táku
"what/something", or yaxtáka "bite" (or combinations thereof), and where
the focus falls determines the interpretation of the question; if it is on táku,
then it is interpreted as a WH-question, whereas if the focus falls on either
ki or yaxtáka (or both), then it is construed as a yes-no question. The
contrast in focus structure between two of the possible readings of (87d) is
represented in Figure 25. (Lakhota is a head-marking language; see Van
Valin 1985, 1987a.)