outline

For instance, in

아이들이	김에게	빵을	많이	주었어요
ai tuli	kimuy key-0	ppang ul-0	manhi-0	cwue-ss-e-0
aideuri	gimege	bbangeul	manhi	jueosseo
child-pl-nom	Kim-to	bread-acc	a_lot	give-pret-int,

Tul could also occur at any of the 0's. If it did, it would not be redundant with the plural marking on the subject. For example, in,

Kala

phonology

Where ~ appears, it indicates free variation between phonemes.

consonants

	Labial	Alveolar	Palatal	Velar	Glottal
Stops	p~b (p)	t~d (t)		k~g (k)	ʔ (')
Fricatives		s (s)	ʃ (s)		h~ɦ (h)
Affricates		t͡ɬ (tl) / t͡s (ts)	t͡ʃ (ts)
Approximants	w (u)	l~r (l)	j (y)
Nasals	m (m)	n (n)	ɲ (ny)

vowels

	Front	Central	Back
Close	i (i)		u (u)
Mid	e (e)		o (o)
Open		a (a)

diphthongs

Both of the falling diphthongs as well as uai and yao only occur word finally.

falling

[aɪ~aɪ:] - ai
[aʊ~aʊ:] - ao

rising

[wa~wa:] - ua
[waɪ~waɪ:] - uai
[ja~ja:] - ya
[jaʊ~jaʊ:] - yao
[je~je:] - ye
[jo~jo:] - yo

allophony

/ʔ/ is not phonemic and only occurs between non-diphthong vowel pairs.
/h/ > [ɦ] when immediately preceded or followed by /e i/.
/s/ > [ʃ] except when preceded or followed by onset /tʃ/

phonotactics

Kala phonotactics does not allow the onsets of adjacent syllables to be identical, nor both to be labialized or palatalized.
Syllables beginning with /l/ do not occur as the first syllable of a morpheme.

syllable structure

(N)(C)V/D(F)
- N - nasal; prenasal; /n/ or /m/
- C - consonant
- V - vowel
- D - diphthong
- F - final; coda

The three codas are /k/, /m/, and /n/; these only occur as a final codas to negate, pluralize or adverbialize verbs and nouns, respectively.

stress

In Kala stress falls on the penultimate syllable with the exceptions of negatives and words that end with a syllable onset palatal approximant, in which case stress is ultimate.

prenasalized consonants

In Kala, almost every consonant can be prenasalized, but primarily the plosives /p/, /t/ and /k/ can be analyzed as prenasalized, while most other instances could be easily analyzed as cases of syllabic /n/ or /m/.

mp /ᵐp~ᵐb/

Example: mpaka /ˈᵐpa.ka/ - n - boundary; border; line

nt /ⁿt~ⁿd/

Example: ntama /ˈⁿta.ma/ - n - calf (a young cow or bull)

nk /ᵑk~ᵑ/

Example: nkapa /ˈᵑka.pa/ - n - alcohol; grog

nouns

plurality

A countable noun (or "count noun") can be modified by a number, and can accept the plural. Typical countable nouns represent objects that are clearly individual entities, such as houses, cats, and thoughts. For example:

	root	usage	example
-m	ma	general plural	tsakam houses
-mha	ma + -ha	indefinite abundance	tsakamha many/a lot houses
-mi	ma + -hi	indefinite insufficiency	tsakami few houses
tli-		collective plural	tlikuma sleuth of bears
-lo	ma	alternative to -m	yamalo mountains

When modified by a number, general plurals need not be marked. Example:

tsaka ta'o - Two houses.

gender

Nouns do not normally indicate their gender. To distinguish the sexes, the suffixes -ta and -na are used:

uma - horse

umata - a male horse, a stallion

umana - a female horse, a mare

noun phrases

pronouns

Kala generally distinguishes four persons, the fourth person indicating abstract and inanimate nouns – both in the singular and plural numbers.
There is also a distinction between inclusive (I/we and you) and exclusive (we but not you) forms of the first person plural.

	Nominative	Accusative	Possessive	Reflexive	Reciprocal
1sg	na	ena	nayo	na'i
2sg	ta	eta	tayo	ta'i
3sg	ha	eha	hayo	ha'i
4sg	tla	etla	tlayo	tla'i
1pl	nam	enam	namyo	nami	nanku
1pl.excl	na'am	ena'am	na'amyo	na'ami	na'anku
2pl	tam	etam	tamyo	tami	tanku
3pl	kam	ekam	kamyo	kami	kanku
4pl	tlam	etlam	tlamyo	tlami	tlanku

determiners

itla, itlam – this, these (near speaker)
uatla, uatlam – that, those (near listener)
yetla, yetlam – that, those (away from speaker and listener)
ua, uam – other, others
ula, ote – any, whichever, whatever
– each
iha – some
amha – much, many
ahi – little, few
maha – more, most
ohi – fewer, less, fewest, least
kua – all
yema – both

interrogative and relative pronouns

	query	proximal	medial	distal	indefinite	negative	ambiguous	universal	generalized
adjective	ote which	itla this	uatla that	yetla that (there)	iha some	-k none	ula any	kua every	ote whichever
person	ko who	iko this person	uako that person	yeko that person (there)	hyako someone	tlok no one	kola anyone	tlokua everyone	teko who(m)ever
thing	ke what	itla this	uatla that	yetla that (there)	hyano something	nok no thing	nola anything	nokua everything	ote whatever
time	ama when	ima now	uama then	yeme then (yon)	hyama sometime	amak never	tlama anytime	kuama always	tema whenever
place	mo where	hina here	uana there	yemo there (away)	hyamo somewhere	mok nowhere	mola anywhere	mokua everywhere	temo wherever
way	to how	yoto thus			hyato somehow	tok no way			heto however
amount	uku how many					ok none			teku however much/many
reason	nye why								tenye whyever

To form a question, the queries are placed at the begining of a phrase and ka is placed at the end. Example:

tam yala - 2PL go - You all are going.

ama tam yala ka - time 2PL go Q - When are you going?

User:Masako/nkala

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