A Grammar of Tamashek (Tuareg of Mali)

348 7 Verbal morphology

d. nominalization

VblN a-bsrej a-kaykay a-zalbsbbay

a-baraj a-kaykay a-zslbsbbay

Some features are shared by the paradigms in (350) and (351). The PerfN

is always identical to the PerfP, unlike the case with light stems. The Resit

shows apparent insertion of i after the first C-position, representing underlying

short Ivl subject to χ-pcl and to the Η part of the <HL> perfective melody.

The long imperfectives all have a -t- prefix, and show the lengthening feature

χ-f in the final syllable. The LoImpfP also shows χ-pcl which lengthens the

first postconsonantal V; χ-pcl is presumably also at work but is overridden by

Default Accentuation. The productive VblN is masculine, begins with a-

prefix, shows marked penultimate accent, and has <H> melody in the stem

itself, with optional shift of a to α in the final syllable.

Although the VblN (and of course the LoImpfN) have a standard <H>

stem melody in both cases, the vocalic melodies are different in perfective and

some imperfective stems. In the perfectives, it may be possible to reduce the

surface stem-wide <L> melody in (350) to the composite <H L> melody that is

audible in (351). However, the short imperfectives and the LoImpfP have

stem-wide <H> in (350) but stem-wide <L> in (351).

7.3.1.3 Light non-augment V-final -v(C)Cu- (α/ι subclass)

Having covered light and heavy verbs with only short V's, we are now in the
first of a long series of sections describing verbs that have at least one full V.
In §7.3.1.3-6 I cover verbs whose only full V is the stem-final V. In §7.3.1.7 I
turn to verbs whose only full V is the medial V. §7.3.1.8 covers non-adjectival
verbs whose only full V is the stem-initial V. The verbs described in §7.3.1.9-
16 have two full V's in at least some stems. In some cases these complex cases
simply combine the vocalic alternations already seen in the different classes
with just one full V, but there is also a large set including many adjectival
verbs that have special idiosyncrasies.
There are three typical patterns for bisyllabic stems of basic shape
-v(C)Ci> ("υ" is a full V or, in some classes alternating with an underspecified
vowel). All verbs of this shape are non-augment, since the large class of verbs
with Augment -t- requires that the core stem be heavy.
In the predominant all subclass, which includes a number of very high-
frequency verbs (e.g. 'eat', 'give', 'drink', 'go', 'go to', 'laugh', 'hear', 'kill',
'say', 'do', 'have', 'be in') the diagnostic stem shapes are PerfP -a(C)Ca- and
Shlmpf /-ae(C)Ci-/. The Shlmpf ends in a deletable high vowel 111, arguably
equatable with hi, that appears word-finally as zero and before a C-initial
subject suffix as a. The verbs of this subclass can have any of the shapes
-vCi>, -vPQi>, or (with geminate cluster) -vPPi>.