4 The Adjective Class in Tariana 115(18) ilfiri hanuhite
game big:APPR:NCL.ANiM
'a biggish animal'In (18), -iha is a typical suffix: it does not get a secondary stress, boundary fusion
processes apply (underlying hanudhadte becomes hanuhite), and iha is followed
by the animate noun class marker, -ite.
When the approximative morpheme surfaces as an enclitic, it implies compari-
son with some other object. An example is under (19). Here, the approximative
=iha behaves as a typical enclitic: it follows the agreement marker on the adjective,
acquires a secondary stress, and vowel fusion processes do not apply.
(19) ilfiri hanu-ite-iha
game big-NCL.ANiM-APPR
'a biggish animal' (bigger than another one)
To explain the difference between dimension adjective plus classifier =iha and ad-
jective plus iha plus classifier, Jose Luis Brito drew the illustration in Fig. 4, show-
ing three circles: one big, one small, and one 'smallish' relative to the big one:
hanu-kwema tsu-kwema=iha tsu-kwema
big-CL.ROUND Small-CL.ROUND=APPR Small-CL.ROUND
'big circle' 'smallish circle as com- 'small circle'
pared to a bigger circle'Figure 3.Then he drew another small circle on a separate sheet of paper and indicated
that it could be called tsu-iha-kwema 'a smallish or not so big (round) one'. The suf-
fix -iha indicates that the circle is not being compared to anything else.
The form iha is used in a similar way with underived colour adjectives (under
E in §3.1). To describe a shade of colour blacker than another one on a drawing
made during the literacy workshop conducted among the Tariana in 2000, (20)
was used; the approximative marker is an enclitic.(20) kadite=iha
black:NCL.ANIM=APPR
'one that is blacker (than another one)'