7 The Small Adjective Class in Jarawara 181mati > mai > mee. (The form mai is used in the Jamamadi dialect and in Jarawara
songs, while mati is an allomorph of mee in clause-final position for Jarawara.)
3 Word classes
Jarawara has two large lexical classes, verbs and nouns. Besides the small lexic-
al class of adjectives, there are small grammatical classes of pronouns (as in Table
i), demonstratives and locatives, interrogatives, clause-final modifiers (e.g. 'also',
'again'), time/discourse markers (e.g. 'then'), and postpositions. We can briefly pro-
file the open classes.
3.1. VERBS
Verbs occur as the head of a predicate. They are classified in terms of two inde-
pendent parameters:
(a) Transitivity. Some verbs only occur in intransitive clauses, others only in tran-
sitive clauses. Many verbs can occur in either clause type and are labelled 'am-
bitransitive'. Some of these are of type S = A, where the S of the intransitive
corresponds to the A of the transitive; for example, haa -na- 'call (intransitive),
call to (transitive)'. Most are of type S = O, where the S of the intransitive cor-
responds to the O of the transitive; for example, hiri -na- 'catch fire (intransi-
tive), set fire to (transitive)'. There is also a small class consisting of two copula
verbs, ama- 'be' and (to-)ha- 'become'. (The copula -ha- and the homophonous
auxiliary -ha- always take prefix to- 'away', unless this is displaced by isg o-, isg
ti-, or O-construction marker hi- within the first prefix slot.)
(b) Inflecting or non-inflecting. About one-third of verbs are inflecting, and
themselves take prefixes and suffixes; for example, -wina- 'lie in a hammock'.
The remainder are non-inflecting and are followed by an auxiliary (-ha- for
about a dozen verbs, -na- for the remainder) to which affixes are attached; for
example, amo -na- 'sleep'. Compare:
(4) {o-wina-bana}
isgS-lie.in.hammock-FUTURE:f
'I'll lie in a hammock'
(5) {amo o-na-habana}
sleep lSgS-AUXILIARY-FUTURE:f
'I'll sleep'
In (4) the isg S prefix o- and feminine future suffix -bana are added to the inflect-
ing verb root -wina-, whereas in (5) prefix and suffix are added to the auxiliary -na-
which follows the non-inflecting verb root amo. (Feminine future has allophone
-habana when two moras precede it in the phonological word, and -bana when
three moras precede.)