374 Chapter 11 Complex sentences
9. Clefts
Cleft structures in Madurese take the same morphology as relative clauses and
are subject to most of the same restrictions.^8 Examples of well-formed clefts
are:
(165) Ita se maca buku-na Hasan.
Ita REL AV.read book-DEF Hasan
‘Ita is who read Hasan’s book.’
(166) Buku-na Hasan se e-baca Ita.
book-DEF Hasan REL OV-read Ita
‘Hasan’s book is what Ita read.’
(167) Hasan se buku-na e-baca Ita.
Hasan REL book-DEF OV-read Ita
‘Hasan’s is whose book Ita read.’
The cleft structures consists of the NP focus of the cleft, e.g. Ita in (165), fol-
lowed by the relative particle se, which introduces a clause with a gap in the
position that would otherwise be occupied by the focused element, just as with
relative clauses. With a few exceptions, like the head of a relative clause, the
focus of the cleft must be the subject or possessor of the subject of the clause.
Thus, to cleft the actor of a transitive verb, the actor form must be used, as in
(165), where the verb is maca, the actor voice form of baca ‘read’. In order to
cleft the theme of a transitive verb, the object voice is required, as in (166).
Also, to cleft the possessor of the theme, object voice is required (167). The
theme and the possessor of the theme cannot be directly clefted; thus (168) and
(169) are ungrammatical.
(168) *Buku-na Hasan se Ita maca.
book-DEF Hasan REL Ita AV.read
(Hasan’s book is what Ita read.)
(169) *Hasan se Ita maca buku-na.
Hasan REL Ita AV.read book-DEF
(Hasan is whose book Ita read.)
(^8) The sole restriction the structures do not share is the fact that for some speakers ad-
juncts can be clefted under certain circumstances (section 9.3). This is never possible
with relative clauses.