pa:ca |
‘kiug’ |
| bomo |
‘girl’ |
| phru |
‘child’ |
bila
|
‘cat’
|
|
3.1.2.2.
|
Plural |
In order to express plurality, the morpheme -un is added after the noun
stems. The plural morpheme has no positional variant.
|
bomo |
‘girl’ |
bomoun1 |
‘girls’ |
| phru |
‘child’ |
phrun |
‘children’ |
| garba |
‘blacksmith’ |
gorbaun |
‘blacksmiths’ |
si khan |
‘carpenter’ |
sikhanun |
‘carpenters’ |
skin
|
‘deer’
|
skinun
|
‘deer’
|
|
| The number suffix in the order of occurrence follows the gender suffix. |
bahmoun |
‘brides’ |
| byaphoun |
‘cocks’ |
baqphoun
|
‘bridegrooms’
|
|
3.1.3.
|
Pronouns |
| 3.1.3.1. |
Personal Pronouns
|
There are separate lexical items to denote all three persons: singular versus
plural distinction in all the three personal pronouns. The following are the
personal pronouns found in Purki.
|
|
a
|
‘I’ |
a a |
‘we
(incl.)’ |
|
|
ača
|
‘we (excl.)’
|
|
khera
|
‘you’ |
khenta |
‘you
(pl.)’ |
|
era
|
‘you(hon.)’ |
ena |
‘you (pl.hon.)’ |
kho
|
‘he/she/it
(animate)’ |
kho
|
‘they(animate)’
|
|
kho
|
‘he/she(hon)’ |
|
|
 iu
|
‘it(inanimate)’
|
ium
|
‘they(inanimate)’
|
|
The personal pronominal system in Purki makes not only the singular versus
plural distinction but also exclusive and inclusive plural in the first person.
The honorific versus nonhonorific distinction is maintained in both the second
and third person. In the second person, both singular and plural maintain the
honorific versus nonhonorific distinction. The pronoun kheran is used when the
hearer has a soical status lower than the speaker or is younger than the
speaker. The pronoun eran is used when the dhearer has a social status lower
than the speakerr or is younger than the speaker. The pronoun eran is used when
the hearer has the higher or same status in the society or is older dthan the
speaker. As far as third person is concerned in singular two forms are used. kho
denotes animate objects. It can be used to refer dto both human beings and
animals. Howerer, this form cannot be used to refer to inanimate objects. The
plural form in third person is khon. The plural form khon is used
fto refer to singular whenever the person referred to has higher social status
or older than the speaker. Otherwise the pronoun kho is used. It is necessary to
recognise not only the animate versus inanimate distinction but also human
versus non-human distinction under which the honorific versus non-honorific
distinction falls. The classification of the pronominal system may be shown as.
|
