Otseqon

Otseqon (/oʊˈtseɪkɑn/; Otseqon: ucheqonyashii [ɯᵝʨʰe̞qɤ̞ᵝɲjaɕiː]) is a cluster of 5 dialects spoken by the Otseqon people living on 5 city-sized boats.

Phonology
Dialects differ somewhat in their phonology. Described here is the standard dialect, spoken on Toqo. See Otseqon phonology for discussion on dialect differences.

Vowels
/e o/ are only found contrastively in interjections, sentence-final particles, and the preposition /e=/. Elsewhere they occur as allophones of /i u/ when adjacent to the ‘emphatic’ consonants /tsʶ tsʶʼ sʶ q qʼ/.

In most dialects the back vowels /u o/ are compressed [ɯᵝ ɤᵝ] rather than rounded.

Consonants
/n t tʼ/ are laminal denti-alveolar, while /tsʶ tsʶʼ sʶ/ are laminal dental and /ts tsʼ s/ are laminal alveolar.


 * N Q| are coda archiphonemes that assimilate to the place of the following consonant.

/ʔ/ has a limited distribution, occurring word-initially and in the clitic /=ʔaj/.

The aspiration on the aspirated plosives is fairly mild, with a VOT on the order of 60-70ms. The Hatuma dialect is notable for strong aspiration on word-initial consonants; this aspiration carries over through the whole syllable, devoicing the vowel and any coda sonorants. Otseqon speakers consider this a very salient characteristic of that dialect.

Some other phonemes occur marginally:


 * /q͡p/ occurs in one lexical item, /q͡piː/ ‘mayonnaise’.
 * /ᵑʇ/ occurs in two basic roots, /ᵑʇuᵑʇu/ ‘breasts’ and /ᵑʇiː/ ‘saliva’. It also occurs in around a dozen ideophones, such as /miᵑʇa/ ‘sound of smacking one's lips’.
 * /tɕ/ is normally occurs as allophone of /ts/ before /i/, but occurs before other vowels in ideophones.

Tone
TODO; there are high and low tones, tones are sparsely specified and behave more like a pitch accent/word-tone system.

Syllable structure
Syllables are CV(C); the coda consonant can be one of /ɾ j w/ or the archiphonemes |N Q|. Word-initially the onset may be /ʔ/. Coda /ɾ j w/ do not occur after long vowels, but |N Q| do.

Other coda consonants are found in ideophones, such as /tustustus/ ‘repeated sound of running fast’ and /kutɕkutɕkutɕ/ ‘chugging; sound of swallowing a liquid’.

Words must be at least bimoraic. Onsets do not count towards moraic weight. Vowels count for one, long vowels count for two, and a coda consonant counts as a mora. Thus /turu/, /kiː/, and /san/ are valid words, but /ta/ is not.

Allophony
For the realization of /ɾ/, see.

Vowel lowering
Short /i u a/ are realized as [ɪ ωᵝ ɐ] in closed syllables. /i iː u uː/ are realized as [e̞ e̞ː ɤ̞ᵝ ɤ̞ᵝː] before or after an emphatic consonant /tsʶ tsʶʼ sʶ q qʼ/.

Palatalization
Most consonants are palatalized before /i/: /ħ/ remains unchanged. /ɾ w j/ do not occur before /i/, and emphatic consonants lower it to [e̞] instead of palatalizing.
 * /m p pʼ β/ → [mʲ pʲ pʲʼ βʲ]
 * /n ts s/ → [ȵ tɕ ɕ]
 * /k kʼ x ɣ/ → [c cʼ ç ʝ]

Postnasal voicing
Most consonants voice after the coda nasal |N|. Some additional changes occur:
 * N + /m n/ → [mm nn]
 * N + /p pʼ β/ → [mb]
 * N + /t tʼ/ → [nd]
 * N + /tsʶ tsʶʼ sʶ/ → [nʶzʶ]
 * N + /ts tsʼ s/ → [nz], or [ȵȡʑ] before /i/
 * N + /k kʼ x ɣ/ → [ŋg], or [ɲɟ] before /i/
 * N + /q qʼ/ → [ɴq]
 * N + /ħ/ → [ɴħ]
 * N + /ɾ j w/ → [nn ɲj mm]

Gemination
Geminate consonants occur due to several morphological processes in Otseqon. Gemination de-ejectivizes ejectives and fortifies some fricatives.
 * /m n/ → /mm nn/
 * /p pʼ β/ → /pp/
 * /t tʼ/ → /tt/
 * /tsʶ tsʶʼ/ → /ttsʶ/
 * /ts tsʼ/ → /tts/
 * /sʶ/ → /sʶsʶ/
 * /s/ → /ss/
 * /k kʼ x ɣ/ → /kk/
 * /q qʼ/ → /qq/
 * /ħ/ → /ħħ/
 * /ɾ/ → /nn/
 * /j/ → /jj/ [ɲɟʝ]
 * /w/ → /mm/

Vowel devoicing
High vowels devoice between a non-emphatic voiceless sounds. [e̞ ɤ̞ᵝ] lowered as a result of emphatic consonants do not devoice. The sequences /si su/ may optionally devoice to [ɕi̥ su̥] even when followed by a voiced sound unless the vowel is followed by a coda other than |Q|.

Vowels and sonorants always devoice utterance-finally.

Devoicing is somewhat unpredictable, and some vowels may not devoice even when expected. Devoicing is less likely when the previous vowel was devoiced. Otseqon dialects differ in the extent of their devoicing.

Lexical suffixation
When a lexical suffix is attached to a root, the initial consonant of the suffix undergoes one of the following alternations, conditioned by the root:


 * Glottalization: Aspirated stops become their ejective equivalents. In dialects with /mˀ nˀ/, /m n/ become /mˀ nˀ/. /sʶ s/ become /tsʶʼ tsʼ/. Other consonants are unchanged. If the initial consonant is already an ejective, it remains ejective.
 * Gemination: The initial consonant of the lexical suffix is geminated. Some additional sound changes occur; see.
 * Insertion of -n: A coda nasal is appended to the root. This causes voicing and other changes to the initial consonant of the lexical suffix; see.

These are termed the glottalization, gemination, and n-grades. Roots that end with -n always trigger the n-grade, but no additional -n is inserted. Roots that end with -r turn the final -r into an -n and trigger the n-grade. Roots that end with -j -w always trigger the glottalization grade. Subsequent lexical suffixes always trigger the gemination grade.

Grassman's law for ejectives
Otseqon obeys a variation of [Grassman's law] that applies to ejectives. If an ejective is followed by another ejective in the next syllable, the first becomes the corresponding aspirated stop. This process can block the glottalization grade of lexical suffixation if the second syllable of the lexical suffix has an ejective.

Word classes
Words with concrete lexical meaning (i.e. non-grammatical) in Otseqon are divided into three main classes and three minor ones.

Roots
Roots are the primary and by far the largest class of words in Otseqon. Otseqon draws no distinction between nouns and verbs (see ), and in fact all roots in Otseqon are unaccusative verbs. Roots are inherently specified only for a single internal argument of an patient-oriented nature. This is the case even for verbs that strongly imply real-world agency, such as ‘hit’, ‘throw away’

Lexical suffixes
Otseqon has a very large class (several hundred items) of suffixes with concrete meanings (such as body parts, locations, etc), termed ‘lexical suffixes’. There is significant overlap between lexical suffixes and roots, but very few lexical suffixes are transparently related to standalone roots. Skilled speakers use lexical suffixes to background information and direct the listener's attention. The use of lexical suffixes instead of independent roots tends to denote routine, customary actions or states.

Classifiers
Classifiers are a large class in Otseqon, sharing some properties of both open and closed classes. The number of classifiers is fairly large, on the order of 200-300 words. It is mostly closed, but new words are occasionally introduced as ‘repeaters’ and may undergo semantic bleaching to widen their scope. However, like an open class, most Otseqon people do not know or use all of the classifiers regularly, and choice of classifier can be a stylistic matter like word choice.

Adverbs
Adverbs in Otseqon are a small closed class. Many of these have expressive meanings or otherwise add not-at-issue content (in the sense of Potts 2005, 2007). The location of adverbs within a clause is somewhat free, but they tend to occur immediately after the predicate, or after the final part of complex predicates.

Auxiliary verbs
Auxiliary verbs primarily express aspect (see ). They invariably come immediately before the main predicate.

Secondary predicates
Secondary predicates are predicates that only occur linked to another predicate with the linker morpheme /=ga/. They are all strong quantifiers.

One Nominal Interpretation rule
TODO update examples

Otseqon syntax follows the One Nominal Interpretation rule: if a transitive verb is followed by a single DP, that DP must be interpreted as the object of the verb. This rule is very strong, and applies even in cases where it would be pragmatically ruled out.

an-∅-qʼazu      wa   ti=hira
 * 1) anqʼazzu wa ti hira

3ᴇʀɢ-3ᴀʙꜱ-bake<ᴄᴀᴜꜱ> ᴘʀᴏɢ ᴅᴇᴛ=woman

? ‘He is baking the woman.’ (cannot mean ‘The woman is baking it.’)

For the DP to be the agent, the verb must be antipassivized:

anqʼazzuhasi wa ti hira an-∅-qʼazu-hasi    wa   ti=hira

3ᴇʀɢ-3ᴀʙꜱ-bake<ᴄᴀᴜꜱ>-ᴀᴘ ᴘʀᴏɢ ᴅᴇᴛ=woman

‘The woman is baking it.’

Thus the antipassive is commonly used for topic tracking because of this constraint.

Aspect
TODO examples need to be updated to the recent phonological changes

Aspect is marked by a pre-verbal auxiliary verb. Like adverbs, these auxiliary verbs have no morphological possibilities, but unlike adverbs they are restricted to pre-verbal position. Interestingly, they're all transparently related to non-auxiliary verbs. Some of the auxiliaries retain overtones of non-aspectual meanings.


 * wa < niwa ‘to be standing; to exist’. The only word that begins with [w]. Orthographically it is written 〈wa〉, but the vowel is lengthened to fill the two-mora constraint on prosodically independent words. It is rather high-frequency and denotes events that are currently in-progress at the topic time. It's not used with inherently stative predicates.

(1) ∅-suda ti gime za-∅-cii ni sara detta ga?
 * gime "excessive continuous" < gime ‘to live’. Has overtones of "all the time" or "to excess", for example in (1)

3ᴀʙꜱ-what ᴅᴇᴛ ᴇxᴄᴇꜱꜱɪᴠᴇ.ᴄᴏɴᴛ 2ᴇʀɢ-3ᴀʙꜱ-happen<ᴄᴀᴜꜱ> ᴏʙʟ ᴅɪꜱᴛ ᴍɪʀ ɪɴᴛ

‘What are you doing there all the time‽’


 * ttu < niitu ‘to be known’. One of a handful of words with an initial geminate. A rather general auxiliary that aspectually coerces events into states (which happens to generally give a habitual reading). May also be used for characteristic properties of something, even if that property is already a state.

(2) mode ∅-kuu Taru ni Aritta
 * mode < mode ‘to be thrown away’. Used for events or states someone/something experienced which happened at least once without respect to a particular location in time and is repeatable.

ᴘᴇʀꜰ 3ᴀʙꜱ-go Taru ᴏʙʟ Aritta

‘Taru has been to Aritta.’ (note: not ‘Taru has gone to Aritta’. The implication is that he isn't still there.)


 * kate "finality perfect" < kate ‘to be put away’. Has overtones of "got it over with", or the general involuntariness of what happened. Similar to the experiential perfect, but implies that the speaker would rather it not happen again.

Frame of reference
Otseqon prefers absolute and intrinsic frame of reference. There are no words that mean ‘left’ or ‘right’.

Back-channeling
These are conventionalized expressions that the listening party in a conversation interjects periodically. If you don't use these, the speaker assumes you're not paying attention.
 * 1) Often repeating the reportative evidential sai (with variants depending on formality register), with or without the demonstrative ka, and often with a key phrase that the speaker just said.
 * 2) sotohai (lit. “It IS understood”), using the =(h)ai polarity clitic.
 * 3) Just ai
 * 4) The adverb sira ("against expectations"), in this context meaning more or less “really?”
 * 5) ka ne “it is that?”

Conceptualization of time
The Otseqon conceptualize time as moving from east to west. Instead of the past being behind them and the future in front of them (or vice versa), the past is always to the east and the future is to the west. This is partly motivated by the direction of the sun during the day (rising in the east and setting in the west, like earth's) and partly because the Otseqon believe time is totally invariant with regard to humans, so one's orientation doesn't affect its path. The past = east future = west association extends to locations of things and the direction one faces during certain celebrations, ceremonies, traditional locations of things in the house, etc.

Additionally, in Otseqon, people and things don't move through time, time is what moves. So you'd say stuff like "The deadline is fast approaching" instead of "We're fast approaching the deadline" (English permits either, but the latter would be really unnatural in Otseqon). English also pervasively has the metaphor. Some of the time this is blatant like “How do you spend your time these days?” or “I've invested a lot of time into […]” or “You need to budget your time better” or “I saved some time by not brushing my teeth this morning”. More generally, however, we consider and understand and experience time as a thing that can be spent, wasted, budgeted, saved, have free time, etc. The Otseqon do not think like that. You don't spend time or save time. They don't say "hey, I have some free time, want to hang out?" rather, "hey, do you want to hang out?" because the justification of "I have some free time" is simply unnecessary because they don't think of having possession of time at all.

Metaphors
Like any language, Otseqon often uses words in a non-literal sense. For example, English has a somewhat pervasive metaphor of having control, force, or influence = up and being subject to control = down, e.g. ‘His power rose’, ‘His popularity is declining’, ‘He fell from power’, ‘I am on top of the situation’, ‘He's in a superior position’, etc. In Otseqon, the metaphor associated with power and influence is age: you'd say things like ‘His power aged’, ‘His popularity is like it was when it was new’, ‘I have experienced the situation before’, ‘He's in an older position’, etc. This is because in Otseqon culture authority is a product of age. You're supposed to respect elders and generally do what they ask. Being older is generally a good thing. This also extends to the popularity of things, and generally anything else associated with influence. In the US at least we seem to think of “new” as a feature, but the Otseqon are typically skeptical of anything new (which is expected to prove itself before it becomes widely popular).