Kalaw Lagaw Ya - Pronouns - Linguistic and Historical Comparison

Linguistic and Historical Comparison

A comparison of the Kalaw Lagaw Ya, Meriam Mìr, Kiwai and Urradhi personal pronouns show similarities and differences in typology. In comparison to Urradhi, Kalaw Lagaw Ya has an archaic typology - or, rather, Urradhi has innovated. Kiwai, in comparison to the East Trans Fly languages, is aberrant in not having 1-2 pronouns, while Meriam Mìr is aberrant to itself in not having a dual and trial/paucal set of pronouns which correspond to its verb system. The Kalaw Lagaw Ya system in itself is essentially Australian:

Note that most of the Trans Fly languages also have two-gender masculine-feminine systems, though not marked on the pronouns themselves. Wurm 1975:333-334.

However, even though the system has no real surprises for Australian linguistics, it is clear that Kalaw Lagaw Ya has innovated in the 1st and 2nd pronouns, which appear to have the following CA origins:

CA *ngali > ngœy we, not you; and with stem extensions ngalpa you and I/we (old-style singing ngalipa/ngalepa), ngalbai/ngalbe we two (not you), (old style singing ngalebai/ngalibai)

CA *ngana+pulV > ngœba you and I.

The 2nd person dual and plural pronouns are clearly based on forms that literally mean you-two (ngipel) and you-they (ngitha), in the same way as the demonstratives similarly mark the dual and plural (see further below in Nominal Morphology).

The Kalaw Lagaw Ya pronouns and their Australian origins: