Morphosyntactic Analysis of the Pronominal System of Southern Alta

31st Pacific Asia Conference on Language, Information and Computation (PACLIC 31), pages 319–328 Cebu City, Philippines, November 16-18, 2017 Copyright c⃝2017 Marvin Abreu A Morphosyntactic Analysis of the Pronominal System of Southern Alta Marvin M. Abreu De La Salle University marvinabreu01@gmail.com Abstract Pronouns are one of the universal components of language and they provide information on the morphosyntactic characteristics of any languages such as Philippine languages. Past researches show various analyses on the mor- phosyntax of PLs, a recent typological study claims that Philippine languages (PLs) are er- gative. Another study shows a similar claim; however, this study utilizes the pronominal systems of major Philippine languages and uses an ergative-absolutive framework. This research examines the pronouns of Southern Alta language. It aims to contribute in the ty- pological studies of pronominal systems of Negrito and Non-negrito languages. This study employs an ergative-absolutive frame- work. The initial result shows that the pro- nominal systems of the Southern Alta language consist of absolutive, ergative, oblique, and genitive pronouns. The ergative- absolutive framework unravels the morpho- syntax of the pronominal system of Southern Alta. The framework helps describe the func- tions and characteristic of the different sets of pronouns. The study also reveals linguistic phenomena such as inclusivity/exclusivity, first person dual pronouns, homomorphy, clit- icization, hierarchy, person–deixis interface and portmanteau pronouns. In conclusion, the ergative-absolutive framework fits the mor- phosyntactic analysis of the Southern Alta language. This study also suggests to examine the clausal construction including the noun phrases (NPs) of Southern Alta. 1 Introduction The Philippines has over 150 languages (Reid, 2013, pp. 330-331). This large inventory excludes the Sama varieties spoken in the Sulu Archipelago and the South Mindanao languages. Although the- se varieties are spoken within the Republic of the Philippines; they differ morphosyntactically from other Philippine languages and are generally not included in generalizations about Philippine lan- guages (Himmelmann, 2005, p. 111). However, Reid (2013) made a distinction between the origi- nal settlers and migrants of pre-colonial Philip- pines. They are the Negritos and non-Negritos, respectively. Although both groups spoke Austro- nesian languages, the former was non- Austronesian not until the first Austronesian in- migrant the Negritos came in contact 5,000 years ago while the latter groups are the Austronesian- speaking peoples in the Philippines. Reid and Liao (2004, p. 435) conducted a typo- logical study of the syntax of most Philippine lan- guages and claim that Philippine languages are ergative. In support to the previous claim, Dita (2011) conducted a typological study anchored on ergative-absolutive framework by examining the pronominal systems of most of the major lan- guages of the Philippines. Dita (Dita, 2011, p. 1) explains that pronomi- nals are a universal component of human lan- guages and are considered basic vocabulary of any given language. In additon, she explains that per- sonal pronouns are generally closed-class and are unaffected by borrowing or code-switching (Dita, 2011). Pronouns exist together with other closed- class words such as prepositions, articles and con- junctions. Unlike open-class categories (e.g. verbs and …

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