418 Chapter 13 Anaphora
(4) a. Engko' ngennal-agi (aba'na) engko' dibi' ka Deni.
I AV.know-AGI I to Deni
‘I introduced myself to Deni.’
b. Engko' ngennal-agi aba' ka Deni.
I AV.know-AGI to Deni
‘I introduced myself to Deni.’
(5) a. Apa ba'na ella a-careta bab aba'na dibi' ka Jatim?
what you already AV-story about to Jatim
‘Have you told Jatim about yourself?’
b. Apa ba'na ella a-careta bab aba' ka Jatim?
what you already AV-story about to Jatim
‘Have you told Jatim about yourself?’
As indicated in (4a), first person singular reflexives can occur without aba'na
formed simply with the first person pronoun and dibi', sengko' dibi'. Dibi' can
be used with or without aba'na to mark reflexive possessors.
(6) Marlena a-jelling foto-na aba'eng dibi'.
Marlena AV-look photo-DEF
‘Marlena looked at a photo of herself.’
(7) Ina ta' sengaja mokol ana'-eng dibi'.
Ina not purposely AV.hit child-DEF
‘Ina accidentally hit her own child.’
In (6) aba'eng dibi' corefers with the subject Marlena and in (7) dibi' refers to
the subject Ina.
1.1 The uses of dibi'
The morpheme dibi' has multiple functions, many of which are related to uses
of reflexives in many languages. It is similar to what Gil (2001) describes for
Riau Indonesian sendiri. For one, dibi' can function as a ‘deagentive’, that is it
can indicate that the action described requires no sentient agent, as in (8).
(8) Bisa ngabber dibi'.
can AV.fly
‘It could fly by itself.’