When the alienability contrast fails to surface in adnominal possession: bound nouns in Harakmbut

Abstract

Abstract This article investigates the nature and behavior of independent, bound and deverbal nouns at various levels of linguistic organization in Harakmbut (isolate, Peru), and assesses the explanatory potential of the alienability contrast for the data observed. While the distinction between bound and independent nouns is to a great extent motivated by the conceptual distinction between inalienably and alienably possessed items, the behavior of bound and independent nouns in adnominal possession is not. Whereas independent (and deverbal) nouns use a genitive-marked two-word construction, bound nouns can use the same one, when keeping their noun prefix, or they can use a genitive-marked one-word construction, in which they drop their prefix. It is thus argued that there is no alienability split in adnominal possession, that is, there is no coding split according to which bound nouns behave fully differently from independent nouns. This is supported by the finding that bound nouns (unlike independent and deverbal ones) also show the same choice between a two-word and a one-word coding strategy in non-possessive adnominal modification. In noun-noun compounding, the data merely reveal different preferences of bound and independent nouns for the N1 versus N2 position; here deverbal nouns behave identically to bound nouns in dropping their prefix in N2. In noun incorporation, finally, the relevance of the alienability contrast is similar to that for the two-way noun class system. Inalienable semantics (and morphological boundness) could be argued to determine the incorporability of nouns, but there are also exceptions.