Chapter 10 Adverb

10.1 Introduction
Adverbs in Zauzou are not morphologically marked. This class of words is a functional
category that serves to modify either adjectival or verbal predicates. In addition to several closed
classes of canonical adverb categories, some adverbial expressions can also take the forms of
adjectives, Wh-words, and even post-verbal adverbials that have properties of verbs. Zauzou has
a grammaticalized syntactic position for adverbs, which is the preverbal position. Closed classes
of adverbs presented in this chapter involving degree adverbs, frequency adverbs, interrogative
adverbs and the negative adverb ʔa31 are mostly found in this syntactic position. Exceptions
include the degree adverb xã13 and the focusing adverb ta33kẽ33, which favors the post-verbal
position. Open classes of adverbs, such as manner adverbs, often allow free word order with
respect to the predicate. Adverbs in Zauzou can be contiguous to the predicate they modify (e.g.,
negative adverb ʔa31) or can occur in the left-periphery of the verb phrase as a phrasal adverb
(e.g., degree adverbs xo53ɕi13/lo53ɕi13, manner adverbs, and frequency adverbs). An optional
dependency marker (i.e., adverbializer) xo53/mo53/tə31 can be inserted between an adverb and
predicate, which is often used to promote a post-verbal adverb such as xã13 and post-verbal
manner adverbs to the preverbal position (see §10.2 and §10.4 for relevant discussion).
Degree is a robust semantic domain that is encoded by a diversity of degree adverbs in
Zauzou. In this chapter, I include a lengthy discussion on Zauzou degree adverbs. Data on
syntactic properties and semantic distinctions among various degree expressions have been
collected from Zauzou native speakers by using a list of adjectives and verbs containing 400
lexical items.
Seven major types of adverbs in Zauzou will be discussed in this chapter: the post-verbal
degree adverb xã13 and four additional degree adverbs sa53, lo53ɕi13, xo53ɕi13, and
ka53(tɕi55) (§10.2 and §10.3), manner adverbs (§10.4), frequency adverbs (§10.5), interrogative
adverbs (§10.6), a focusing adverb ta33kẽ33 (§10.7), and the negative adverb ʔa31 (§10.8).

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 10.2 Degree Adverb xã13
xã13 is a multi-functional degree word in Zauzou. It applies to many kinds of predicates
to denote a high degree on the inherent scale of the predicate. The “high degree” meaning
encoded by xã35 is a vague scalar category, ranging from standard-raising in adjectives to
argument quantity, force, and frequency in verbs. It is canonically a degree adverb, which
modifies gradable adjectives and verbs, and serves as an intensifer that increases the standard of
comparison. Forthermore, modifying degrees in verbs are extended from this adjectival domain.
For this reason, throughout this chapter, xã35 is glossed by “very”. In the domain of adjectives,
this degree adverb can freely occur with any gradable adjectives, including degree achievement
verbs (Kennedy & Levin, 2008) with an adjectival core. As a verb modifier, xã13 is a versatile
adverb that can occur with a large variety of gradable/non-gradable verbs, serving distinct
functions. Verbs that are compatible with xã13 involve modal verbs, state verbs, and dynamic
verbs, which may or may not entail a scalar property in the verb per se. Functions of the resultant
V/Adj- xã13 phrases include: (a) raising the standard of comparison; (b) denoting the maximal
value on an upper closed scale; (c) raising the degree of change; (d) denoting incremented
volume/extent of participants and path; (e) denoting incremented force; and (f) denoting the
relatively high frequency of the event. The description below presents the distribution of xã13 in
two types of predicates, adjective phrases and verb phrases, and covers the above six semantic
functions of xã13 phrases. xã35 has two distributions in a verbal/adjectival phrase that include
the predominant postverbal xã35 and the less frequent preverbal xã35. Postverbal and preverbal
xã35 will be discussed separately in the sections below.
10.2.1 Postverbal xã13 Modifying Gradable Adjectives
One of the primary functions of the degree modifier xã13 is to raise the degree to which
the adjective holds its subject. As an adjectival modifier, this adverb must appear after
adjectives, as shown in (10.1):

(10.1)

a. nə33-mõ53 jɛ5̃ 5 læ33 ka55 xã13 zo31

2SG;2POSS-PL house CL:inani good INT1 FP:assr
“Your house is very good”

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 b. tɰ33 ta55kẽ55 ma33 xã13 zo31
3SG only old INT1 FP:assr
“Only he is very old.”

c. ja53 ʔɛ31 ja53 tɕʰə33 xã13 zo31, tə55 zo31 ʔa55

grow also grow ugly INT1 FP:assr 3PL:3POSS child PROX
ja55
CL:human
“this son of his is very ugly”

The appearance of the degree adverb xã13 in the sentences in (10.1) raises the relative
standard of comparison (Kennedy, 2012; Kennedy & McNally, 2005) of the adjectives ka33
“good”, ma33 “old”, and tɕʰə33 “ugly”, indicating that the degree of these properties on the
corresponding intensity scales are higher than average. In this sense, xã13 in an adjectival phrase
that serves to raise the standard of comparison.
xã13 can co-occur with another degree adverb, such as lo53ɕi13 and xo53ɕi13, in the
same adjectival phrase and serves the same standard-raising function. The only requirement is
that lo53ɕi13/xo53ɕi13 must precede but xã13 must always follow the adjective. For example:

(10.2)

ŋu55 ʔa55 lo53 nɛ33 lo53ɕi13 ni55kʰə31 xã13

1 PROX night TOP INT1 upset INT1
‘I was very sad on that night.‘

(10.3)

kə31ɳã33-pa31pa13 və13 nɛ33 xo53ɕi13 ɛ31 a55 tɕʰã31 xã13

sticky_ri ce-cake CL:versatile TOP INT1 also NEG difficult INT1
‘sticky rice cakes are not very hard to cook.‘

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 Either lo53ɕi13/xo53ɕi13 or xã13 in the above cases can be eliminated without affecting
the meaning of the adjectival phrase. It seems that the pre-adjectival degree adverbs are not so
closely attached to adjectives as xã13, as other elements may be inserted between the adverb and
the predicative adjective, which is not possible for xã13.
It should be noted there is a category of gradable adjectives in Zauzou that take the same
forms as plain adjectives but can meanwhile express the gradual change of the property denoted
by the adjectival core in addition to their basic adjectival meanings. Such adjectives are claimed
as a verbal category called “degree achievement verbs (DA verbs)” in Kennedy and Levin (2002,
2008). xã13 can modify DA verbs as well but with some restrictions. Different meanings will be
generated for the resultant phrases when xã13 is combined with different DA verbs.
The first type of degree achievement verbs in Zauzou are exemplified by words such as
tɕʰɔ33 “cool/become cool” and me13 “ripe/ripen”. All of these verbs have an inherent maximal
point in common. After the degree adverb xã13 is added to the DA verbs, the resultant meanings
are ambiguous, as illustrated by the examples in (10.4).

(10.4)

a. ʔã31 və13 tɕʰɔ31 xã13 zɔ31

dish CL:versatile cool INT1 FP:assr
“this dish is very cold/this dish is cooled completely”

b. ɕyi13li33 læ31 me13 xã13 zɔ31

pear CL:inani ripe INT1 FP:assr
“this pear is very ripe/this pear is ripened completely”

The adverb xã13 in the above two examples can either serve the standard-raising function
“very” for adjectives or quantize the maximal degree of change for DA verbs, which could be
translated as “completely”. As a result, tɕʰɔ31 xã13 in (10.4a), when understood as a DA verb,
implies that the temperature of the dish has decreased to an understood endstate of being cool
(i.e., a contextually specified temperature that is accepted by the speech community as “cool”).

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In this sense, xã13 in (10.4a) serves as a scalar adverb that quantizes the maximal degree of
change. A similar analysis can apply to me13 xã13 in (10.4b).
The second type of DA verbs, involving words such as tsʰə33 “warm” and nõ33 “sick”,
show different semantic properties from the first type of DA verbs after combining with xã13.
Those words do not have an inherent maximal/minimal point and, thus, are “open-scale”
adjectives in terms of Kennedy and McNally (2005). Specifically, the maximal degree reading
“completely” is prohibited in the xã13 phrases headed by adjectives such as tsʰə33 and nõ33. For
example:

(10.5)

a. ʔã31 və13 tsʰə33 xã13 zɔ31

dish CL:versatile warm INT1 FP:assr
“the dish is very hot/? The dish has warmed a lot/* the dish is completely warmed up”

b. tɰ33 nõ33 xã13 zɔ31

3SG sick INT1 FP:assr
“he is very sick/? he becomes very sick/* he is completely sick”

xã13 can only be taken as an intensifier in the above two sentences, encoding either the
high degree on the property scale of the predicative adjective, shown as a state verb in (10.5b) or,
arguably, the final status of the DA verb.
For the third type of DA verbs, as exemplified by pʰo13 “open” in (10.6), xã13 is
restricted to express high frequency of the corresponding event, and both “very” and
“completely” readings are not allowed. The adjectival bases of these verbs are “closed-scale”
adjectives in terms of Kennedy and McNally (2005), which have no inherent scalar properties.

(10.6)

kʰɛ31 pʰo13 xã13 zɔ31

door open INT1 FP:assr
“the door opened a lot of times”

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 In (10.6), xã13 in pʰo13 xã13 refers to neither the maximal nor high degree of change on
the scale of openness. This is not due to the lack of scalar property of the predicate per se, as
there are also sentences such as (10.7) in which the same function of denoting maximal degree is
expressed by a distinct lexical form— the adverb tɕa53:

(10.7)

kʰɛ31 pʰo13 tɕa53 /* xã13

door open completely INT1
“the door is completely opened”

This DA verb is also compatible with the paucal quantifier tə31 ti33 ɳã33 “a
little/slightly”, denoting the door is slightly opened. However, both maximal and high degree
readings are ruled out in the verb phrase pʰo13 xã13. Consequently, the scalar function of xã13
is only applicable to the entire opening event, which quantizes the frequency of this event.
Hence, cool/ripen, hot/sick, and open are subsumed to different sub-classes of gradable
adjectives (along with the corresponding DA verbs) in Zauzou, and each subclass shows distinct
semantic properties when combined with xã13.

10.2.2 Postverbal xã13 Modifying Verbs

In addition to gradable adjectives and degree achievement verbs, plain verbs can also take
the adverb xã13. Verbs that are allowed to occur with xã13 involve scalar verbs that have
lexically specified scales, such as modal verbs, state verbs, incremental theme verbs, directed
motion verbs, and non-scalar verbs that do not lexicalize a scale, such as verbs of exerting force
and weather verbs. Those verbs plus the degree adverb xã13 create four classes of meanings: (a)
raising the standard of comparion; (b) denoting incremented volume/extent of the participants or
path; (c) denoting incremented force; and (d) denoting the relatively high frequency of the event.
The following description is based on these four types of meanings encoded by the V- xã13
phrase.
10.2.2.1 Raising the standard of comparison
The first function of xã13 in a VP is to raise the standard of comparison entailed in the
property scale of scalar verbs. These verbs include modal verbs and state verbs. Modal verbs in

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Zauzou can be modified by xã13, giving rise to the standard-raising meaning as adjectives.
Examples are shown in (10.8):

(10.8)

a. ta31pɛ3̃ 3 tʰo53 xã13 zɔ31

dress_up MOD:capable INT1 FP:assr
“very good at dressing up”

b. ŋu55 suẽ55 ʔẽ55 xã35 ze55

1 think MOD:capable INT1 FP:assr
“I am very good at thinking”

When modifying a modal verb, such as tʰo53 and ẽ55 in the above two cases, the degree
adverb xã13 increases the degree of the ability possessed by the subject. It should be noted that
modal verbs, which usually denote notions such as possibility, necessity and obligations, all have
lexicalized multi-point scales (Rappaport &Levin, 2005, Rappaport 2008). As a result, the
standard of comparison for modal verbs, including tʰo53 “good at” and ʔẽ55 “MOD:capable” as
examples, could be defined as the degree above a contextually-dependent average level of having
a skill. The addition of xã13 raises the standard to a degree much higher than the average level,
such as mastering this skill or achieving an advanced level.

Similarly, state verbs can also be freely modified by the degree adverb xã13 in Zauzou.
xã13, as a modifier of state verbs, serves the same function of raising the standard of comparison
as in adjectival phrases. In this regard, the ability to take the degree adverb xã13 can be used as
evidence for the homogenenity of gradable adjectives and state verbs in this language. Examples
of a state verb plus xã13 are given below:

(10.9)

a. nõ55 wu13 ʔa31 ku55 tə33 ʔa55 ja55 nɛ55 ka53

hear COMPL NEG EXP LINK PROX CL:human TOP afraid
xã13 zo31 pe55

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 INT1 FP:assr FP:assr
“People who haven’t heard about this will be scared a lot.”

b. nõ55 xã13 to53 ja33 tɕõ55 kʰə55 ʔa31 ŋæ53

sick INT1 COMPL SEQ soul call NEG COP
“To call back one’s soul is not because he is very sick”

State verbs, such as ka53 “afraid” and nõ55 “sick” in (10.9), also have lexicalized multi-
point scales at the word level. Unlike dynamic verbs, which entail state change, the gradability of
state verbs is irrelevant of state change but rather is only related to degree change, which is
identical to gradable adjectives in this sense. The verb nõ55 in (10.9b) is potentially ambiguous.
One interpretation is a gradual change from the status of “being slightly sick” toward “being
seriously sick” and, thus, nõ55 acquires an accomplishment interpretation, which assumes the
existence of an end state of the sick event. The other interpretation, in contrast, does not include
a state change but only describes the degree of sickness as higher than the average, which
corresponds to the state verb reading of nõ55. However, in this particular case, the first
interpretation is ruled out. Thus, as a state verb, nõ55 is a scalar verb entailing a lexicalized scale
that forms the basis for comparison, and xã13 serves to raise the degree of sickness in this case.
Gradable adjectives, modal verbs, and state verbs discussed above can be grouped
together as they are gradable in nature and can be modified by xã13 in Zauzou.
10.2.2.2 Denoting incremented volume/extent of participants or path
Scalar verbs plus xã13 may increase the degree on scales other than those entailed in
verbs. The two classes of verbs that have lexically specified volume/extent/path scales are
directed motion verbs ta33 “run”, la13 “ascend”, and kɔ13 “descend”, and incremental theme
verbs u13 “win”, tsu33 “eat”, and yɛ̃53 “sweep”. When appearing with these verbs, xã13 will
increase the degree on the scale of volume/extent associated with the participants of the event or
increase the distance covered on a path that is entailed in a motion event.
In beginning with verbs of directed motion, this type of verb describes events in which
one participant undergoes some sort of gradual change in location along a path (Kennedy &

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Levin, 2002). ta33 “run” is a typical verb of this type in Zauzou, which entails a multi-point path
scale. An example is provided in (10.10)：

(10.10)

tɰ33 ta55 xã13 zɔ31

3SG run INT1 FP:assr
“He has run for a long distance/a long time duration”

ta33 “run” can take xã13 to encode the relatively long distance along the path during the
time of running. This path scale associated with ta33 is also lexically specified, as a running
event with an internal duration must have a distance. It should be noted that the degree adverb in
this case measures the running event by virtue of measuring a distance in a homomorphic
relation (Krifka, 1998) to the temporal trace of the event. In other words, there is a one-to-one
mapping between the distance along a path and the time being consumed. As a result, (10.10)
may receive an alternative reading of “he has run for a long time”. However, the distinction
between time and path scales of directed motions verbs are not morphologically encoded.
la13 “ascend” and kɔ13 “descend” also entail a lexicalized multi-point path scale but
behave slightly differently from ta33 “run”:

(10.11)

a. ŋu33 la13 xã13 zɔ31

1 ascend INT1 FP:assr
“I am very tired to climb up/?it took me a long time to climb up/? I climbed up a long
distance”

b. ŋu33 kɔ13 xã13 zɔ31

1 descend INT1 FP:assr
“I am very tired to descend/?it took me a long time to descend/? I descend a long
distance"

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 Identical to ta33 “run”, xã13 in the above two cases also measures the degree of change
over time. Nevertheless, unlike ta33 xã13, it is almost impossible for la13 xã13 and kɔ13 xã13 to
relate themselves to a long distance nor long time reading, even though both verbs entail a path
scale. As a matter of fact, they are more prone to quantize the degree of affectedness (i.e.,
tiredness) of the theme argument that is related to the change-of-location event. In (10.11), it
refers to the high degree of tiredness of the first person subject. To be more precise, though xã13
always denotes a time duration that is longer than average when modifying a verb of directed
motion (i.e., the run time of a particular motion event is longer than average), this adverb does
not always relate to a degree change on the time scale but rather increases the degree of
affectedness (i.e., tiredness) on the participants.
In terms of the so-called incremental theme verbs (e.g., Kagan 2016; Kennedy & Levin
2002, 2007; Rappaport, 2005), such as eat, read, and build, this verb class is usually associated
with an increase in the degree on the scale of volume/extent associated with the object (Kagan,
2016). In other words, this scale is not directly encoded in the verb but rather provided by the
entity in the denotation of the object of the verb (Rappaport, 2005, p.17). A typical Zauzou
incremental theme verb is u13 “win” in (10.12), in which xã13 denotes the relatively large
quantity of the object (i.e., money):

(10.12)

ji33 tsʰã31 ka33 liã33 kʰuɛ33 kẽ33 tsʰo31 wu13 ʔɛ31 wu13
one CL:round LOC two CL:Yuan only extract COMPL also gain
xã13 to53 zo31 pe33
INT1 COMPL FP:assr FP:assr
“He can win as much as two dollars in one game”

However, without a proper context, verbs of this type allow two semantically distinct but
closely related readings, as shown in (10.13):

(10.13)

a. tɰ33 tsu33 xã13 zɔ31

3SG eat INT1 FP:assr

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 “he ate a lot/? has been eating for a long time”

b. tɰ33 ŋæ33 xã13 zɔ31

3SG see INT1 FP:assr
“? he saw a lot of things/he has been watching for a long time”

It is important to note that with incremental theme verbs, there is a homomorphic

mapping between the progress of an event and the increase in the volume/extent associated with
the object (Kagan, 2016; Rappaport, 2005) In Zauzou, this homomorphic relation applies to all
incremental theme verbs. Specifically, the longer duration of the event is proportionally related
to the larger volume/extent of the object consumed/created. Both interpretations are shown in
(10.13a) - (10.13b). However, different verbs may have a preference for one reading over the
other. For example, in (10.13a), the volume/extent scale of the object of tsu33 “eat” is more
prominent than the time scale of the eating event, whereas the “long duration” interpretation is
not completely excluded by the context. (10.13b), by contrast, seems to favor the “long duration”
reading, as it is conventionally more difficult to quantize the volume of the object of a perception
verb such as ŋæ33 “see”1 than that of the action verb tsu33 “eat”. (10.13a) and (10.13b) show
that the degree adverb xã13 can encode the degree of change for either an event property (i.e.,
the degree of change on the time scale of an event) or an object property (i.e., the degree of
change on the volume/extent scale of an object). This is in contrast to the claim in Rappaport
(2005), which assumes the volume/extent scale occurring with scalar verbs is provided by the
referent of the direct object and not by the verb itself (Rappaport, 2005, p.21). Instead, V-xã13
constructions in the Zauzou data seem to suggest the opposite. As shown in (10.13), none of
these examples explicitly express the direct object, indicating the scale is not lexicalized in the
object. Moreover, if xã13 is used as a diagnostic to test whether a volume/extent scale is
lexicalized in the verb, then all Zauzou incremental theme verbs will pass this test, suggesting
the incremental theme verbs entail such a lexicalized scale. One would further assume that the
degree change on the volume/extent scale of the object is derived from the degree change on the

1
Krifka (1998) points out that in the case of see a picture, it is assumed that Mary sees a picture p during an event e,
and so it may be concluded that she sees p during every part of e, and that she sees every part of p that is visible
from the same perspective.

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time scale of the verb via pragmatic inference, but not the other way around. Specifically, a time
scale (i.e., duration) is always involved in incremental theme verbs but the volume/extent scale
of the object is not always explicit as this type of verb does not always carry a direct object (see
also Rapapport, 2005). Thus, it is more plausible to assume that in Zauzou, the volume/extent
scale of the object is rested on the time scale lexicalized in incremental theme verbs, which leads
to the homomorphic relation between the two scales.
Though the reading of “win a large quantity of money” is more salient than the reading of
“having been winning for a long time”, as discussed above and shown in (10.12), the latter
cannot be ruled out. In fact, the time scale must be lexicalized prior to the volume/extent scale,
since the increase in the run time of the winning event would likely guarantee the increase in
quantity of the money won by the subject. There are environments in which the second reading is
completely excluded, as shown in (10.14):

(10.14)

tɰ33 wu13 xã13 ja13və13 tə31 ti55 wu13

3SG gain INT1 SEQ one CL:small_quantity gain
“He has been winning money for a long time, while he only won a little amount of (money)”

In (10.14), the interpretation of “win a lot of money” for u13 xã13 is ruled out, as it
contradicts the proposition expressed in the second clause tə31 ti55 u13 “win a little”.
Consequently, xã13 in this example only denotes the relative lengthy expansion of the winning
event.
However, I also found counter-examples that only allow the reading of incremented
volume/extent in the object, as illustrated by the semantic anomaly in (10.15):

(10.15)

# ŋu33 tsu33 xã13 ja13və13 tə31 ti55 tsu33

1 eat INT1 SEQ one CL:small_quantity eat
“Intended: I have been having the meal for a long time, but only ate a little”

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 The incremented time reading is prohibited in the above example. A possible explanation
is that tsu33 xã13 only denotes incremented volume of the object of eat, which causes a
contradiction with the subsequent clause tə31 ti55 tsu33 “eat a little”.
Verbs of incremental theme in Zauou may also entail a degree change of the affectedness
on its subject, as in the example in (10.16):

(10.16)

tə55 və13 ʔa55na53 ŋu55 yɛ5̃ 3 xã13 la31

DIST CL:versatile previously 1 sweep INT1 FP:assr
“Just now it makes me so tired to sweep the floor.”

In (10.16), the degree adverb xã13 is preferably interpreted as measuring the degree of
change on the first person subject, where it encodes the high degree of tiredness caused by a
sweeping event. In this example, the incremental theme is no longer a direct object, as in (10.12)
- (10.13), but is the volume/extent scale associated with the subject, which can still be converted
to the time scale associated with the verb yɛ̃53 “sweep”. The logic behind such a homomorphic
relation is that the longer the sweeping activity lasts, the more tired the subject will be.
To summarize, the readings of the incremental volume/extent/affect on the participants
(subject or object of the incremental theme verbs) and the long distance on the path scale are all
associated with the time scale entailed in directed motion verbs and incremented theme verbs.
10.2.2.3 Denoting incremented force
In Zauzou, it is also very common for the degree adverb xã13 to modify certain types of
non-scalar verbs and increase the extent of force involved in the action. Two kinds of verbs are
subsumed to this type: verbs of exerting force and weather verbs (Levin, 1993). What these verbs
have in common is that they all contain the feature of [+force] that can be quantized. The force
per se can be lexicalized as a scale and, thus, makes these non-scalar verbs available for
modification by xã13. The following is the verb pẽ53 “push” as an example:
(10.17)

tɰ33 pẽ53 xã13 zɔ31

3SG push INT1 FP:assr

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 “He pushed someone severely [Implication: pushed someone down to the ground]”

In the above example, the combination of pẽ53 xã13 entails a causing event and a
resulting event; the actor exerts a high degree of force to the undergoer, which causes the
undergoer to fall. Here the degree adverb specifies the intensity of force exerted in the action of
push, and the resulting event, fall down to the ground, is directly related to the high intensity of
force exerted in the causing event. The scalar reading of pẽ53 xã13 is not provided by the
resulting event but is confined to the first subevent. A similar example is given in (10.18):

(10.18)

sɛ3̃ 1 na33 tə55 ja33 =ze33 və13 na55 xã13 zɔ31

three finger DIST CL:human =GEN CL:versatile flip INT1 FP:assr
“Three fingers flip the coins severely [Implication: The way of using three fingers to flip coins
makes them spin very fast]”

(10.18) exemplifies a caused-motion event in which the causing event, flipping the coin,
causes the coin to spin fast. It can also be posited that a force scale for the verb na55 “flip” and
the high speed associated with the resulting event, the coin spins fast, is due to the increased
extent of force exerted to the coin in the causing event.
As shown in (10.17) and (10.18), a force scale specified for the verb is usually entailed in
a causing event, as signaled by the degree adverb xã13. However, the resulting event is implicitly
encoded and the interpretation of the resulting event is most often contextually dependent. For
example:

(10.19)

tɕyɛ31kã55 ŋa̠53 nɛ33 ŋa̠53 xã35 zɔ31

mosquito gnaw TOP gnaw INT1 FP:assr
“As to the mosquito biting, it bites severely [Implication: it bites extremely painfully]”

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 In (10.19), the causing event is that mosquitoes bite people and there is an unexpressed
resulting state, which is that people feel pain. There are two competing analyses for (10.19). In
the first analysis, xã13 denotes the upper end on the scale of the degree of pain, which is a
property of the undergoer in the biting event and the same participant in the resulting painful
state. In the second reading, xã13 is modifying the verb ŋa̠53 “bite” in the causing event and
encodes the high intensity of force exerted in the biting event. The resulting state, under the
second analysis, is directly associated with the causing event. Intuitively, high intensity of force
will most likely bring about a high degree of pain.
In addition to the cases involving two subevents, as shown in (10.17) - (10.19), verbs of
exerting force plus xã13 can also apply to structures that contain a single event. For example, in
the phrase iɛ̃13 xã13 “laugh out loud”, xã13 can directly modify the intransitive verb iɛ33
“laugh” to denote the high intensity of force exerted in the action of “laugh”.

A second semantic class of non-scalar verbs that also quantize force is the weather verbs
in Levin (1993), such as blow, rain, freeze, gust, and hail. In Zauzou, weather verbs are free to
occur with xã13, denoting that the intensity of the natural force is higher than average. Examples
are given in (10.20):

(10.20)

a. mə3̃ 1 læ33 xã13 ja13və13, ʔo55zu31 ja55 ʔa13 kʰo13 zɔ31

sky blow INT1 SEQ man CL:human collapse down FP:assr
“The wind is very strong, and then a man fell to the ground.”

b. tə31 tɕʰã13 tɕʰã13 nɛ55 mə̃33 læ55 xã13 nɛ55

one VCL:occasion VCL:occasion TOP sky shine INT1 TOP
“Sometimes the sun is very strong”

c. mə̃31-ʔe53 və13 nɛ33 vɰ55 xã35

sky-water CL:versatile TOP rain.fall INT1
“The rain is very heavy”

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 In the above examples, the weather verbs læ33 “blow/shine” and vɰ55 “(rain) fall”
contain lexicalized force scales denoting different kinds of natural forces. The degree adverb
xã13 can apply to these scales to increase the intensity of natural force.
Although verbs of exerting forces and weather verbs are seldom modified by degree
modifiers in other languages, in a strict interpretation, they should be classified into scalar verbs,
as they have lexicalized scales associated with the force of the action denoted by the verb and
can be modified by xã13 in Zauzou.
10.2.2.4 Denoting high frequency of event
The last function of the degree adverb xã13 in Zauzou is to increase the frequency of the
entire event. Verbs that fall into this class are basically achievement verbs that denote punctual
and telic events, such as directed motion verbs entailing a two-point path scale (e.g., enter, exit,
leave, and reach). For verbs that will only generate the “high frequency” reading in the resulting
xã13 phrase, no gradual change is possible between the onset and the endpoint of the event.
Verbs of this type are exemplified by tʰɰ53 “exit”, tsẽ53 “encounter”, and pʰo13 “open” in
(10.21):

(10.21)

a. tɰ33 tʰɰ53 ji55 xã13 zɔ31

3SG exit go.away_from_DC INT1 FP:assr
“He exits (the room) a lot of times.”

b. tɕĩ33 ʔa55 pɛ5̃ 5 nɛ55, tɕʰyi33 nɛ55

thing PROX CL:pile TOP encounter TOP
tɕʰyi33 tsẽ53 xã35 to53 zo31
encounter encounter INT1 COMPL FP:assr
“I've encountered these things a lot of times”

c. kʰɛ31 pʰo13 xã13 zɔ31

door open INT1 FP:assr
“the door opened a lot of times”

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 tʰɰ53 “exit”, tsẽ53 “encounter”, and pʰo13 “open” are all typical achievement verbs in
Zauzou, which are telic and do not have a duration. So, the degree adverb xã13 cannot be used to
encode change on a time scale nor the incremented volume/extent/affect/path. These verbs are
also non-scalar; no gradable properties, including force, are involved in the action denoted by
them. Consequently, the degree word xã13 applies to the telic event as a whole and raises the
frequency of the event. It is a scalar property related to the event, creating the meaning of “an
event X occurs repetitively with a frequency that is much higher than the average”, and is still
consistent with the core function of this degree adverb.

10.2.3 Preverbal Degree Adverb xã35

xã35 may also appear in front of the main verb to encode the degree of the action in the
verb. The text frequency suggests that xã35 most often appears as a postverbal modifier; the
preverbal use is very rare. In the example of (10.22), the preverbal xã35 renders the manner of
the action wu13 “gain” is to “gain a lot” but does not express if a large amount of money is
actually gained eventually. The resultative degree must be encoded by a postverbal xã35, as in
wu13 xã35 “gain a lot”. Also, the preverbal adverb xã35 must be linked with the verb by the
linking device xo53.

(10.22)

tʰã31 tə55 tə13 tə31 sua33 kẽ33 xã35 xo53 wu13 na55
greedy DIST CL:PL.ani one VCL:occasion only INT1 LINK gain MOD:like
“The greedy people want to win a lot of money in one bet”

Additional examples of preverbal xã35 and the contrast with postverbal xã35 are
presented in (10.23). The preverbal xã35 does not indicate the resulting state and is often used in
imperatives as a manner adverb, while the postverbal xã35 describes a high degree of the
resulting state.

(10.23)

Ex. Gloss

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 Pre-V: xã35 xo53 tsu31 “(Imperative) to eat a lot”
Post-V: tsu31 xã35 “eat a lot”
Pre-V: xã35 xo53 ta55 “(Imperative) to run a lot”
Post-V: ta55 xã35 “run a lot”
Pre-V: xã35 xo53 tsa55 “(Imperative) to pick off a lot”
Post-V: tsa55 xã35 “pick off a lot”

10.3 Other Degree adverbs: lo53ɕi13, xo53ɕi13, ka53(tɕi55)

xã13 is the most widely used degree adverb in Zauzou but is not the only degree
expression. In this section, I introduce the alternative forms of xã13, namely lo53ɕi13 and its
allomorph xo53ɕi13, which basically convey the same high degree in Zauzou predicates but are
syntactically restricted to the preverbal position (§10.3.1). There is another degree adverb
ka53tɕi55 and its reduced form ka55 that are often used to denote the degree of “a little”, which
will be presented in §10.3.2.
10.3.1 Degree Adverbs lo53ɕi13/xo53ɕi13
Syntactically, xã13 is a non-canonical adverb in Zauzou as it normally occurs in the post-
predicate position, which is the dominant position for serial verbs and coverbs in SVCs. The
degree adverbs lo53ɕi13 and its allophone xo53ɕi13, by contrast, are canonical degree adverbs
that appear at the pre-verbal position for adverbs. Similar to xã13, lo53ɕi13/xo53ɕi13 are also
commonly used to raise the standard of comparison for gradable adjectives and verbs, as
illustrated in (10.24) - (10.25):

(10.24)

a. tə31 ja53 la53tɕɛ35 tɰ55 tʰe35 xo53ɕi35 lo13 wɔ13

one CL:human all 3SG COMIT INT1 good RECP
“Everyone is nice to each other”

b. wu33 tɕɰ33 tə13 lo53ɕi33 lo13 wɔ33

village human CL:PL.ani INT1 good RECP
“people from the village are very nice to each other”

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(10.25)

a. ʔo53-mu55 zo31 tɛ13 ŋu55 lo53ɕi13 ʔa31 na55 le13

pig-F child CL:PL.ani 1 INT1 NEG MOD:like come.towards_DC
“I don't like little sows at all.”

b. tso55 pʰɰ33 ʔe31 lo53ɕi35 ʔa31 pʰɰ31 tɕʰã55

rice price also INT1 NEG price expensive
“The price of grain is not very expensive”

In (10.24), both lo53ɕi13 and xo53ɕi13 denote that the degree of goodness is higher than
average. Unlike xã13, the text frequency of lo53ɕi13/xo53ɕi13 suggests that these two adverbs
favor negative environments. When modifying a negative predicate, these two degree adverbs
may take a wide scope over the negation, and increases the standard of comparison for the
property denoted by the predicate along a negative scale, as in (10.25a). It may also apply within
the scope of the negation, which negates the increase of degree, as in the case of (10.25b). These
two adverbs can also modify non-scalar verbs, denoting the high frequency of the event as xã13.
Examples are given in (10.26):

(10.26)

a. ʔa31ji13 xu33 nɛ55, xo53ɕi35 ʔa31 tso55

other meat TOP INT1 NEG eat
“(we) rarely eat other meat”

b. tə55 tɕã33 tɰ55 lo53ɕi13 ve31 ʔa31 ku55 ma33

up;front VCL:time 3SG INT1 buy NEG EXP FP:assr
“He rarely bought pigs previously.”

In a negative environment, as in (10.26a) and (10.26b), lo53ɕi13 and xo53ɕi13 actually

give rise to the polar negative reading “rarely” on the scale of frequency, indicating the event of

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eating in (10.26a) and the event of buying in (10.26b) rarely happen. It is unclear if there are any
semantic associations between the event frequency and the volume/extent of the objects of the
verb tso55 and ve31. However, it may be plausible that the low frequency of the eating and
buying events in (10.26) will necesssarily lead to low volume/extent of the object being eaten
and bought. If this view is taken, the function of these two degree adverbs would be identical to
xã13 when modifying incremented theme verbs, such as tso55 and ve31. Otherwise, one would
need to account for the selective constraints of these two classes of degree adverbs.
The functions of lo53ɕi13/xo53ɕi13 and xã13 seem to overlap considerably, and the
discriminative criteria between these two classes of degree adverbs are far from clear except for
their distinct syntactic positions. lo53ɕi13/xo53ɕi13 can even co-occur with xã13 in the same VP,
as illustrated in (10.27):

(10.27)

tə55 və33 ɳɔ33 tsɛ53 tə33 tɕʰã35 lo53ɕi55 tɕĩ55 xã35

DIST CL:versatile 2SG still one VCL:occasion INT1 busy INT1
ŋa55ta55nɛ55
COND
“If you are very busy then…”

In the above example, the co-occurrence of two degree adverbs, lo53ɕi55 and xã35, does
not generate extra meaning than the VPs that only employ one degree adverb. It is assumed here
that lo53ɕi13/xo53ɕi13 are phrasal adverbs that apply to the entire verb phrase. Thus, the
predicate and the postverbal adverb xã13 form a closer block, and the unit Adj/V-xã35 is
conjoined with lo53ɕi13/xo53ɕi13. This claim is also supported by the fact that
lo53ɕi13/xo53ɕi13 and the main predicate (including xã35) can be interrupted by other elements,
such as negative adverbs, as shown in (10.25) - (10.26), but the predicate and xã35 cannot. As a
result, the negative form of lo53ɕi13 tɕĩ55 xã35 “very busy” in (10.27) will be lo53ɕi13 ʔa31
tɕĩ55 xã35 “very not busy” rather than *lo53ɕi13 tɕĩ55 ʔa31 xã35.
10.3.2 Attenuative Degree Adverbs ka53tɕi55/ka53
Compared to the intensifiers xã13, lo53ɕi13, and xo53ɕi13, adverbs that express
attenuated degree are much less productive in Zauzou. Only two lexical forms, namely ka53tɕi55

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and its reduced form ka53, function as degree adverbs that are used to attenuate the standard of
comparison for gradable adjectives/verbs. As shown in the examples below, ka53tɕi55/ka53 are
most commonly used as adverbs modifying gradable adjectives:

(10.28) ka53tɕi55-Adj:

a. xe55tɕʰi33vɰ13 ka53tɕi55 ɕã55 nɔ13 zo31, ka53tɕi53 wɰ̃55

yeast INT2 put too_much FP:assr INT2 spicy
to33 zɔ31
DUR FP:assr
“I put in a little bit more yeast, so it is a little strong”

b. ʔa55 və13 ka55 ʔa55 læ31 nɛ33 ji55lã33 ka53tɕi55 mi53

PROX CL:versatile LOC PROX CL:inani TOP stuff INT2 INT1
“Here the stuff this refrigerator stores is a little too much”

c. tə55 və13 nɛ31 ka53tɕi55 ji33 lə33 tɕa13

DIST CL:versatile TOP INT2 big FP:assr FP:assr
“if so, perhaps it is a little big”

(10.29) ka53-Adj:

a. ʔa33 ka55 ka53 ji33 zo33 tə33 ʔõ55 næ53

PROX LOC INT2 big LINK one CL:animal Q.tag
“(Here is) a relatively big one (pig), right?”

b. tə55 kʰɔ33 kua33kua33 mi33 kə55 ka53 yi55 xo53 tə55

DIST side vest clothes CL:clothes INT2 yellow LINK DIST
ja31
CL:human
“The one standing next to him and wearing a vest that is a little yellow”

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 ka53tɕi55 and its reduced form ka53 in (10.28) - (10.29) appear in the canonical pre-
predicate position for adverbs and deliver the general meaning of an attenuated, moderate degree
of manifestation of a propery, such as the measurements for spiciness, quantity, and size in
(10.28) and the measument for color in (10.29b). For instance, in (10.28a) and (10.29a), the
attenuative adverb indicates that the size of the theme does not exceed the average size that can
be denoted by i33“big”by too much.
ka53tɕi55 and ka53 can serve the same attenuative function for scalar verbs. For
example:

(10.30)

ʔa55 ka55 tə55 su35 mɔ35 tʰe13 ka53tɕi35 kʰo55

PROX LOC 3PL;3POSS uncle CL:PL.ani COMIT INT2 lie
wu35
PROG;INCH
“Here (the boy’s life) slightly relies on the family of his uncle”

In (10.30), ka53tɕi55 means that the subject does not completely rely on the the family of
his uncle as the degree of dependency is a lexicalized scale in the verb kʰo55. More complex
examples are illustrated in (10.31) in which the attenuative adverb ka53tɕi55 is syntactically
ambiguous. They can be either understood as degree adverbs modifying VP or an argument of
the verb, as both verb object and the degree adverb occur in the same preverbal position in
Zauzou.

(10.31)

a. wu55 ka55 vɰ55kɔ55mɔ13, tə55 mõ53 ka53tɕi55 tse55 ʔõ55

DIST LOC gut_oil DIST CL:PL.inani INT2 cut enter
“oil in the gut, you chop some of these into the gut/chop these gently into the gut”

b. ŋue55 ka53tɕi33 kæ55 tsu33 tɕã55 xe31

665
 silver INT2 share eat PURP FP:assr
“(I) planned to share a little silver with others/slightly share silver with others.”

c. tsa53-me̠13, tsʰə33, ji33, ka53tɕi33 pʰɰ53

pepper-powder salt alcohol INT2 spray
“Spread a little pepper powder, salt and wine/slightly spread pepper powder, salt and
wine”
The context is insufficient to distinguish the two syntactic structures that apply to the
above sentences, depending on the role of ka53tɕi55. In the first analysis, ka53tɕi55 is taken as
an attenuative adverb modifying the subsequent verb. In that case, the verb in question should be
classified as incremental theme verbs and ka53tɕi55, accordingly, plays the same role as xã13 in
specifying the volume/extent of the object. Hence, the object of tse55 “cut” in (10.31a), which is
encoded by the preceding NP, should have a reduced volume than its initial state. Likewise, the
volume of the object of kæ55 “share” in (10.31b), which is the silver, must have a reduced
quantity by the time it is shared with others. Similarly, in (10.31c), the volume of the mentioned
seasonings involved in the spraying event is kept to a small portion of the total amount. In the
second analysis, however, the same word ka53tɕi55 is taken as a quantifier with its referent
coreferential with the preceding topic. In this regard, ka53tɕi55 becomes an argument of the
verb, which denotes a small portion of the entity encoded by the topical phrase. Both analyses
are acceptable in Zauzou.
ka53tɕi55 can also modify non-scalar verbs, but the text frequency of this attenuative
degree adverbs modifying non-scalar verbs is much lower than that of intensifiers in Zauzou. See
the example in (10.32):

(10.32)

ŋu55 =ze55 ʔɛ13 tə55 və13 ʔa55-sə3̃ 3 tə31

1 =GEN other DIST CL:versatile PROX-? one
tɕã55 pɛ55 nɛ55 ka53tɕi55 te13 lo13 le13
VCL:time uncover TOP INT2 stir MOD:can come.towards_DC
wu55 zɔ31
PROG;INCH FP:assr

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 “Other (wine) of mine, I can take away the lid and stir it a little (in order to drink)”

ka53tɕi55 in the above example is more likely to denote the short time duration of the
activity of stirring, which is also consistent with my analysis of the intensifier xã13 in §10.2.2.2.
Consequently, one may infer that only a small portion of mass is involved in the stirring event
due to the relatively short duration of this action.
The last point is that ka53tɕi55/ka53, as with the preverbal intensifiers lo53ɕi13 and
xo53ɕi13, are phrasal adverbs that modify the entire VP rather than the single predicate. In the
examples below, the adverb ka53tɕi55 scopes over the entire VP, involving the verb resultative
in (10.33a-b), and the intensifier phrase in (10.33c).

(10.33)

a. tə55 tɕã33 xe33 ʔa55-tɕi53 ʔa55 tsu33 nɛ55 tɕʰa33

DIST VCL:time AGT;INS;ABL PROX-time PROX kind TOP COP
ka53tɕi33 [ve55 kʰə33]
INT2 buy difficult
“Since a long time ago, the fabrics of this kind are a little hard to find”

b. xe55tɕʰi33vɰ13 ka53tɕi55 [ɕã55 nɔ13] zo31

yeast INT2 put too_much FP:assr
“I put a little bit more yeast”

c. ka53tɕi55 tɕĩ55 xã35

INT2 busy INT1
“We are even busier”

The attenuative adverb ka53tɕi55 is added to the phrase boundary in the above three
sentences. For those VPs, this degree adverb is not directly applied to the verb ve55 “buy”, ɕã55
“put”, and tɕĩ55 “busy” in (10.33) but rather to the entire VP ve55 kʰə33 “difficult to buy”, ɕã55
nɔ13 “put too much”, and tɕĩ55 xã35 “very busy”. ka53tɕi55 in those VPs serves to attenuate the

667
degrees involved in the corresponding VPs. If the verb resultative is encoded by a gradable
adjective, then this attenuative adverb is used to lower the standard of comparison lexicalized in
this adjective, as in the case of (10.33a). If the post-verbal adverb expresses an inverse ordering
of ka53tɕi55, as in the case of (10.33b-c) where nɔ13 “too much” and xã35 “very” both raise the
value on a scale, then the increased value is expected to be attenuated by ka53tɕi55.

10.4 Manner Adverbs

Adverbs expressing manners of actions are encoded by manner adverbs in Zauzou, which
typically appear in the preverbal position. Unlike manner serial verbs in serial verb
constructions, manner adverbs do not have verb roots. Manner adverbs are often marked by a
class of adverbializers that link adverb and main predicate, which involve xo53, mɔ33, and tə31.
The employment of those optional adverbializers singles out manner adverbs from other
traditional classes of adverbs in Zauzou. The selection of adverbializer is lexically specified.
Table 10.1 summarizes the manner adverbs that are widely used in Zauzou.
Table 10.1
Common Manner Adverbs in Zauzou

Class of Manner adverbs Lexical form Gloss

Class 1 tɕã55 “full”
lo13 “good”
tʰõ31 “smoothly”
kə33 “tightly”
tsɿ55 “tightly”
mia33/kʰa33ma53/kʰa31mia55 “quickly”
Class 2 a31ŋæ33tɕʰo55 “unknowingly”
le13 “casually”
fu53 “deliberately”
pa53i55sɿ33 “deliberately”

Two types of manner adverbs should be differentiated syntactically in Zauzou on the

basis of their syntactic behaviors. The first class (Class 1) includes manner adverbs such as

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mia33 “fast” (and its variants kʰa33ma53/kʰa31mia55), tɕã55 “full”, lo31 “good”, and tʰõ31
“smoothly”. Those adverbs all have adjectival bases as they can be modified by degree adverbs
and can appear post-verbally as adjectival complements of the main verb to denote the result
state of an action. The second class (Class 2) consists of adverbs, such as a31ŋæ33tɕʰo55
“unknowingly”, le13 “casually”, and fu53“deliberately”, which are not allowed to occur post-
verbally and do not allow modification of degree adverbs. However, when the two classes of
adverbs appear in front of the verb, they share the function of characterizing manners of verbs.
Examples of the two classes of manner adverbs are given below:

(10.34) Class 1 Manner Adverbs:

a. tɕã55 xo53 tsu33

full LINK eat
“eat in a way that can make you full”

b. lo13 xo53 ɳa53miɛ13

good LINK sleep
“sleep in a way that can make you sleep well”

c. tʰo33~tʰo33 mo53 ji̠ 55 zɔ31

smooth~smooth LINK flow FP:assr
“flow smoothly”

d. tʰa31pu55 tə55 ma33 kə33~kə33 ti55 ʔõ55

outside DIST CL:PL.ani tightly~tightly push enter
“those who are outside tightly pushed each other to enter (the forest)”

e. ɳɔ33 kʰa31mia55 wa53mi55 xu55

2SG quickly bury disappear
“you should bury them quickly”

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 As shown in (10.34), xo53 or mo53 as a linking device is optionally used in order to mark
the dependency between a manner adverb and the main verb. The base adjectives, such as tʰõ31
in (10.34c) and kə33 in (10.34d), can be reduplicated to create adverbs. The same class of
manner adverbs exhibits distinct syntactic properties as well. For instance, some adverbs can be
moved to the postverbal position and serve as a serial verb, such as tɕa55 and lo13 in (10.35a) -
(10.35b):

(10.35)

a. tsu33 tɕã55 zɔ31

eat full FP:assr
“eat full”

b. ɳa53miɛ13 lo13
sleep good
“sleep well”

However, for adverbs in (10.34c-e), those preverbal adverbials take different forms from
their postverbal counterparts. The disyllabic tʰõ31-tʰõ31 “smoothly”, kə33-kə33 “tightly”, and
kʰa53mia55 “quickly” in (10.34c-e) become the monosyllabic tʰõ31 “smoothly”, tsɿ55 “tightly”,
and mia55 “quickly” in (10.36c-e).

(10.36)

c. tə33 xã13 xã13 nɛ55 suẽ55 tʰõ33 ʔa31

one VCL:occasion VCL:occasion TOP think smoothly NEG
tʰo53
MOD:capable;can
“sometimes I can‘t figure out.”

d. ʔa55 ka55 tə55-pʰɔ33 pʰɔ33 jɛ5̃ 5 tsɿ55

PROX LOC NMLZ-CL:lid CL:lid twist tightly

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 “here twist the lid tightly”

e. tə31 næ13 tə13 xã13 xã13 su31 tɕã55 nɛ55

one day one VCL:occasion VCL:occasion walk PURP TOP
mə̃13 lɛ33 ʔõ55 mia33
sun CL:inani enter quickly
“The sun falls down fast if we go out once every day.”

A preverbal manner adverb appears to prefer a disyllabic word. Ways of creating

disyllabic adverbs involve adding a dependency marker such as xo53, reduplication, and adding
an extra syllable to the adjectival root, as in (10.34a-c), (10.34c-d), and (10.34e), respectively.
However, their postverbal counterparts do not have such constraints as the postverbal adverbs in
(10.36c-e) are all monosyllabic words and postverbal disyllabic forms are not found. The same
tendency is also found in other preverbal adverbials. Hence, the adverbializer xo53 in (10.37a-b)
is required, as eliminating this word will lead to ungrammaticality:

(10.37)

a`. *tɕã55 tsu33  tɕã55 xo53 tsu33

full LINK eat
“eat one’s fill”

b`. *lo13 ɳa53miɛ13  lo13 xo53 ɳa53miɛ13

good LINK sleep
“Have a good sleep”

However, adverbializer is completely optional for disyllabic manner adverbs in (10.34c-

e), as seen in the alternation between Adv-ADVL-V and Adv-V for disyllabic manner adverbs in
(10.34c-d).

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 Class 2 manner adverbs, unlike Class 1 adverbs, cannot be used as verb complements.
Thus, they cannot appear post-verbally to denote the resulting state of the event encoded in the
verb. For example:

(10.38) Class 2 Manner Adverbs:

a. sɿ33-mi31 ja33 ʔɛ13tʰã13 ʔɛ31 ʔa31ŋæ33tɕʰo55 pẽ53 le13

human-F CL:human back also unknowingly push come.towards_DC
“the woman pushes a (table) backward without paying attention”

b. le55 pæ53 le55 pæ53 xe31nɛ55, le55 zã33 le55 zã33

casually play casually play SEQ casually learn casually learn
nɛ33...
SEQ
“after playing and learning these casually...”

c. ʔo53vɰ31 ja33 pa33i33sɿ13 pe31tsɿ31 kua33 ɕa33 kʰo13

man CL:human deliberately cup CL:large_quantity hit down
zɔ31
FP:assr
“the man deliberately hits the cups down”

Manner adverbs of Class 2 generally cannot denote a resulting state and, thus, they are
restricted to express the manner of acting out an action. According to the examples in (10.38), a
linking adverbializer is not required for Class 2 manner adverbs, even if the adverb itself is a
monosyllabic word, as shown in (10.38b), while adverbializers such as tə33 can still be freely
added to these adverbs, as illustrated in (10.39):

(10.39)

a. ʔa33 ja33 xe31 fu31 tə33 pẽ53 le13

PROX CL:human AGT;INS;ABL deliberately LINK push come.towards_DC

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 “This one pushes it deliberately”

b. tɰ33 pa53i55sɿ31 tə33 kɔ13 kʰo13 ji33 wu13

3SG deliberately LINK descend down go.away_from_DC COMPL
“He deliberately causes (the cups) to drop”

Manner adverbs are also phrasal adverbs that are added to the VP rather than as the core
of predicate. This is supported by the fact that verb argument, such as the object of ɕa33 “hit” in
(10.38c), can be inserted between the manner adverb pa33i33sɿ13 and the main verb ɕa33 in that
sentence. Additional examples are given below:

(10.40)

a. kʰa31ma53 ʔo55tu33 læ33 ʔɔ31 ɕa55 pi13 jɔ35

quickly head CL:inani PAT hit APPL;AFF IMP:towards_DC
“beat my head quickly!”

b. tə55 tə13 nɛ33 fu31 tə31 tse13mɰ13 ʔa33-sə3̃ 1

DIST CL:PL.ani TOP deliberately LINK Spring_Festival PROX-?
va33 tõ55tɕã55wu13
gamble PROG
“During the Spring Festival, they deliberately gamble around like this”

In the above examples, the main verbs and the manner adverbs kʰa31ma53 “quickly” and
fu31 “deliberately” are interrupted by an overtly marked object in (10.40a) and the time
adverbial tse13mɰ13 in (10.40b), which are consistent with the phrasal adverb assumption.

10.5 Frequency Adverb

Frequency adverbs in Zauzou form an independent class that are used to express the
frequency of events. Syntactically, they behave as typical adverbs in Zauzou, which normally
occupy the position immediately preceding the verb. Several lexical forms and their allomorphs

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in Zauzou can express various categories of frequentative meanings including often/ frequently,
always, and sometimes. A few representative examples employing frequency adverbs are given
in (10.41) - (10.43):

(10.41) often/frequently:

a. tʰi31 ŋə55 tʰɰ53 xu33 ji55

often say exit disappear go.away_from_DC
“(he) often told other people about this.”

b. tɕʰa33pa55 tʰi55 pi13

money often give
“(they) often gave him money”

c. nõ55 le13 tɕi31 ŋu55 ʔɛ33 ʔa55-sə3̃ 3 tʰə55 lua55 mə33

sick come.towards_DC time 1 also PROX-? often move do
“when it hurts I often move it like this”

d. ʔa55 næ53 næ13 ma33 ŋu55 tʰe55 ŋæ55 tɰ13

PROX two day COP 1 often see up
“I often look upward in these days”

(10.42) Always:

a. sɔ55 ʔõ55 nɛ33 la53tɕa55 mõ53 ka55 kẽ55 su33

blue_sheep CL:animal TOP cliff CL:PL.inani LOC always walk
“Blue sheep always walk in places near the cliff.”

b. ɳɔ31 ʔõ53ʔõ55ʔa31wu13 tə55 mu53 ka55 kẽ55 tə31

2SG meaningless DIST CL:PL.inani LOC always PROH
ŋæ53 ji55

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 see go.away_from_DC
“Don't always go to these places to listen to nonsense.‘

(10.43) Sometimes:

tʰɰ53 lo33 xo53 ʔɛ31 tə31 tɕʰã13

exit ascend.towards_DC NMLZ;LINK also one VCL:occasion
tɕʰã13 tɕʰi13
VCL:occasion have(inani)
“they occur sometimes”
On the basis of the above examples, different frequentative categories are encoded by
distinct stems, such as tʰi31/tʰə55/tʰe55 for “often” and kẽ55 for “always”. They may also
involve a morphological process, such as using reduplication to encode frequency. In (10.43), for
example, the verb classifier tɕʰã13 “VCL:occasion” can be reduplicated to form a frequentative
adverbial phrase tə31 tɕʰã35 tɕʰã35 “sometimes”. Also, it is important to note that frequency
adverbs are syntactically more closely associated with the core verb as they are always placed
closer to the verb than time, as in (10.41d), and locative, as in (10.42a), adverbials in Zauzou.
One exception is (10.42), in which the frequency adverb kẽ55 and the main verb are interupted
by a prohibitive marker tə31.

10.6 Interrogative Adverb

Interrogative adverbs in Zauzou are a closed class of adverbs that are canonically used to
create content questions. In general, there are two morphological strategies in Zauzou that create
interrogative adverbs. One is compounding. This strategy is employed by the adverb sẽ55iã13-
pə13tə13 “why”, which consists of a noun root sẽ55iã13 “what” and a subordinator pə13tə13
“because”. The meaning of the entire compound adverb is the sum of its two components. The
second strategy is much more productive and involves making use of the derivational
interrogative morpheme xu55- to derive various kinds of interrogative adverbs. The following
discussion will start with the single compound interrogative adverb sẽ55iã13-pə13tə13 “why”
and then move on to the more productive xu- interrogative adverbs.

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 To begin with, sẽ55iã13-pə13tə13 “why“ is the only word I found in the dataset that
employs the compounding strategy. An example is shown in (10.44):

(10.44)
ɳɔ31 sẽ55jã35-pə13də13 ʔa31 kə33 ?
2SG What-because NEG happy
“why are you unhappy?”

In (10.44), the meaning encoded in sẽ55iã13-pə13tə13 can be paraphrased as “for what”,

which is a semantic equivalent of “why”. sẽ55iã13-pə13tə13, as one unit, consistently appears in
front of the verb involving the negative adverb, as in (10.44), and serves as an adverb.
The majority of interrogative adverbs in Zauzou are created by the second strategy. The
interrogative morpheme xu- can basically be added to any classifiers to create the question word
“which”. It can also attach to a temporal noun, such as tɕi33 “hour”, næ13 “day”, lɔ33 “month”,
and tɕʰã13 “time” to derive interrogative adverbs of time, as illustrated in (10.45). It can further
combine with a locative noun to create interrogative adverbs of location, such as xu55-
ka33/xu55-ɕi31 “where” in (10.46). It may also apply to the bound morphemes -sə̃31/-tiɔ33 in
the demonstratives a55sə̃31 “this”/tɕo55sə̃31 “that” and a31tiɔ33 “this”/tə55tiɔ33 “that”,
producing the interrogative adverb denoting “how” and “how come”, as shown in (10.47). The
interrogative adverbs of quantity in Zauzou also consist of the same interrogative morpheme –xu
plus the morpheme –ua13; the resultant form xu31ua13 (xuɛ13) denotes “how many” or “how
much,” as illustrated in (10.48).

(10.45) Adverbs of time:

a. xu55-tɕi33 mu53 tʰɰ53 lo31 tɕɔ13 ?

Wh-time CL:PL.inani exit ascend.away_from_DC MOD:need
“what time (we) should leave?” or “should this be what time should (we) leave?”

b. xu55-lɔ31 kə55 xu55-na13 ?

Wh-month LOC Wh-day
“which day in which month?”

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 c. ɳɔ31 xu55-tɕʰã13 na53pĩ53 lo31 ?
2SG Wh-CL:occasion PN.Lanping ascend.away_from_DC
“when will you go to Lanping?”

(10.46) Adverbs of location:

a. ŋu55 mæ55 xu55-ka33 la53 zɔ31 ?

1 mother Wh-LOC go.away_from_DC FP:assr
“where does my mother go?”

b. tə55 və13 ɳɔ31 xu55-ɕi55 ni55 to53 ?

DIST CL:versatile 2SG Wh-side have(ani) DUR
“that, where are you living now?”

(10.47) Adverbs of manner:

a. tə55 pə31mə̃33zo31 ja13 ʔa33 ja53 tɕʰə33, xu55-sə3̃ 3

3PL;3POSS daughter CL:human NEG grow ugly Wh-?
ja53 tɕʰə31 xã13
grow ugly INT1
“her daughter is good looking, how come he is so ugly?”

b. tʰõ33 nɛ33 xu55-sə3̃ 3 tʰõ33 ni55 ?

pestle TOP Wh-? pestle Q
“as to pestling, how do you pestle rice?”

c. pʰiɛ3̃ 3kuɛ3̃ 1 nɛ33 ʔa31-tɕi53 ʔa33- pe33 zo33-pu31 xe31

The_judge TOP PROX-time 1PL-PL[INCL] Zauzou-language AGT;INS;ABL
xu33-tiɔ33 ŋə55 xɔ13 ?
Wh-? say MOD:can;should

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 “how to translate 'the judge' into Zauzou?”

(10.48) Adverbs of Quantity:

xuɛ13 nə̃55 nɛ55, xuɛ13 ja13 ʔõ31 kʰu13 tʰo53

how_many MOD:need Q how_many SEQ sell down MOD:can;capable
nɛ55 ?
Q
“how much do you want, what's the number you would sell it?”

The above examples illustrate the use of xu-type interrogative adverbs in content
questions. In fact, those interrogative adverbs are often used in declarative sentences, rendering
indefinite adverbial meanings such as “anytime” and “anywhere”, as shown in (10.49). The same
interrogative adverbs may appear in an interrogative clause that is embedded in a declarative
matrix, as exemplified in (10.50):

(10.49)

a. tə55 tɕã33 nɛ55 ɕɛ3̃ 3tsʰə̃53 xu55-ka33 ʔɛ33 su33 tõ55wu35

up;front VCL:time TOP county Wh-LOC also walk PROG
lə31
FP:assr
“Previously, he travelled a lot in the county and anywhere else.”

b. ŋu55-pe55 læ53yi33 ʔa55 pɔ55 nɛ33 xu55-va53 ʔɛ31 tʰa55

1-PL[EXCL] swing PROX CL:rode TOP Wh-year also erect
wu33 ŋə55
PROG;INCH say;CAUS
“bless us to have our ZhuanZhuanQiu (a kind of swing) erected there every year”

(10.50)

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 xuɛ13 kua55 tə55 və13 nɛ55, wu13 və13 ʔa55
how_many CL:large_quantity DIST CL:versatile TOP DIST CL:versatile PROX
kue31tĩ55
predetermine
“How many gifts (should be given) are not predetermined”

The interrogative meanings in xu55-ka55 and xu55-va53 are absent in (10.49). To the
contrary, these two interrogative adverbs, when placed in a declarative sentence, function like an
indefinite/universal quantifier, indicating that the denotation of the verb applies to “anywhere” in
(10.49a) and “every year” in (10.49b). The adverb xuɛ13 in the topic phrase of (10.50), however,
still encodes the interrogative meaning while the embedded question is negated in the matrix.
It is also very common in Zauzou that interrogative adverbs appear in pairs in
decalarative sentences. This kind of construction usually consists of a conditional clause and a
matrix, and each clause contains the same form of a particular interrogative adverb. In those
cases, the semantics of interrogative adverbs overlap with indefinite adverbs and the two adverbs
echo each other. Examples of this kind of conditionals are shown in (10.51).

(10.51)

a. ŋu55 xu55-tɕʰã35 ŋə55 nɛ33,

1 Wh-VCL:occasion say;CAUS TOP
xu55-tɕʰã35 tə55-pe33 ʔɛ33 tɕã35ɕi31
Wh-VCL:occasion 3PL;3POSS-PL also bring
lo33
ascend.towards_DC
“whenever I said (I want to visit them), they will bring me there [Lit: when I said, when
they will bring me]”

b. xu33-ɕi31 na55 xu33-ɕi31 tẽ13

Wh-side MOD:like Wh-side bet
“they bet on either side as they like [Lit: they like which side, they bet on which side]”

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 c. ʔa55-tɕi53 ŋə55 xu33-sə3̃ 1 sue55 ʔɛ33 xu33-sə3̃ 1 mə̃55
PROX-time 1 Wh-? think also Wh-? do
“now I do whatever I think [Lit: Now how I think is how I do]”

d. xuɛ13 tso33 tʰo53 ja33 xuɛ13 tso33

how_many eat MOD:can;capable SEQ how_many eat
“eat as much as you can [Lit: how much you can eat, how much you eat.]”

As the example in (10.51a) shows, the same interrogative adverb xu55-tɕã13 “when”
appears in the conditional clause and the main clause separately. The interrogative meaning
denoted by this adverb can also be understood as the specific but indefinite time “anytime”. The
actual value of the second xu55-tɕã13 is completely dependent on the value that xu55-tɕã13
takes in the conditional clause. The conditional clause and the matrix clause on their own must
be analyzed as standard interrogative clauses but when they are juxtaposed in one larger unit, the
interrogative meaning involved in each subpart is sort of replaced by indefinite readings.
Another peculiar property of Zauzou interrogative adverbs that is worth mentioning is the
co-existence of those adverbs and a subsequent cataphoric noun phrase, as illustrated below:

(10.52)

a. xu55-næ13 tə31 næ13 ʔa31- pe55 jɛ31mə5̃ 5

Wh-day one day 1PL-PL[INCL] marry
“Which day is the wedding ceremony”

b. xu33-ka33 tə31 ka33 tɕʰi33 tə1̃ 3 lo53 tə1̃ 3 wu33 ni55

Wh-LOC one LOC foot hit hand hit COMPL TOP
“if they don't know where they hurt their hands and legs”

c. ...xu55-sə3̃ 1 tə31 və13 pa55 tə13 xu31-tɕi55

Wh-? one CL:versatile release realized Wh-?

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 tɕi33 ?
Q;QUOTE;HEARSAY
“(that one is a tiger,) how come you released it?”

In the above three sentences, the adverb xu55-næ13 “which day” is followed by a numeral
phrase tə31 næ13 “one day” in (10.52a), xu33-ka33 “where” is followed by tə31 ka33 “one
place” in (10.52b), and xu55-sə̃31 “how come” in (10.52c) is followed by tə31 və13 “one thing”.
It should be noted that all of these noun phrases in the above sentences are semantically
redundant, as the same noun has already appeared in the preceding xu- adverbs and the topic in
question has been invoked by the noun in the xu- adverb. In other words, it is illogical to employ
those cataphoric NPs to denote the referent that has already been expressed by the interrogative
adverb although this structure is still widely used in interrogative adverbials. A possible reason is
that the noun root in an interrogative adverb is in the process of losing its semantic content and
the corresponding xu- adverb has grammaticalized into a pure interrogative marker without
specifying the subcategorization information in its lexical form. As a result, the subsequent NP
becomes necessary to provide the semantic information of the topic that is being questioned.

10.7 Focusing Adverb

Zauzou has a focusing adverb ta33kẽ33 “only” and its reduced allomorph kẽ33. These
two multifunctional focus markers are not as typical as other adverbs in Zauzou that appear
preverbally. ta33kẽ33 and kẽ33 are primarily used as general focus markers that apply to any
word classes in Zauzou, giving rise to the meaning of “only” to the focal element. For instance,
they may immediately follow a verbal or nominal predicate, as shown in (10.53):

(10.53)

a. ɳɔ31 tə31xu33 ta33kẽ33 tsʰa33pɔ13 yi31 tsɿ31 tɕɛ13 mə3̃ 1 tə33

2SG same only letter four CL:letter all sky up;front
to13 to53 tə55 və13 tɕʰa31 tɰ13pə13
flip COMPL DIST CL:versatile COP all_white
“Only when all of the four characters flipped over and are exactly the same, they can be
(called) 'all white'”

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 b. liã33miɛ3̃ 3 tɛ13 ʔɛ31 tə55- pʰɰ31 ta33kẽ33 zo31
two_faces CL:PL.ani also NMLZ- white only FP:assr
“both sides of it are white”

Though ta33kẽ33 in both examples of (10.53) are placed next to the predicates, they are
actually a phrasal focusing adverb that applies to the entire VP. ta33kẽ33 in (10.53a) is adjacent
to the predicate tə31xu33 “same” in a conditional clause. This adverb implies that the assertation
expressed by the matrix is true only when the condition in the conditional clause is satisfied.
However, it does not focalise any single element within the focal domain of this adverb. One
cannot tell whether this adverb exclusively focalizes the predicate and denotes “only same” or
involves the quantity of its subject in its focal domain and denotes “only four”. It is the same for
(10.53b), where ta33kẽ33 focalizes the entire VP “both sides are white” rather than any single
element of the VP.
Sometimes the predicate being focalized is nominalized first, as in (10.54):

(10.54)

a. ji55 tɔ55, la53ʔɔ55 tɔ55, sẽ55jã13 ji55lã33 ʔɛ33 tso33 =ɕi33

alcohol put rice_wine put what stuff also eat =NMLZ;FP:assr
tɔ55 xo53 ta55kẽ55
put NMLZ;LINK only
“To store wine, rice wine, all kinds of food are placed in this room.”

b. ni53ʔɔ33 tə31 ʔɔ31 pi31 tə55 və13 ta55kẽ55, tə55-sə̃33

cigarette one CL:cigarette give DIST CL:versatile only DIST-?
zo31 pe55
FP:assr FP:assr
“Only give (the guest) a cigarette, that's all”

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 Two distinct nominalizers xo53 and tə55və13 are used respectively in (10.54a) and
(10.54b) before the focal marker ta33kẽ33. ta33kẽ33 serves as the same phrasal focusing adverb
as in (10.53), licensing the entire nominalized VP as the predicate focus.
Very occasionally, ta33kẽ33 can be promoted to precede the predicate, as shown in
(10.55), in which ta33kẽ33 focalizes the subsequent verb ɕɔ13 “rest”.

(10.55)

sɿ31-ɳã55 mə35 ʔa33 ʔɛ5̃ 5 tə55 ja33 ʔɛ31 ta55ke̠55 ɕɔ13

human-small do NEG MOD:capable DIST CL:human also only rest
to53
DUR
“children, and people who are unable to work, they only have nothing to do”

The word order of ta33kẽ33-V employed in (10.55) is peculiar in Zauzou. One possible
account could be that the Adv-V order is affected by the word order of the corresponding focus
construction in Mandarin, which employs the Adv-V order for the focusing adverb zhi “only”.
In addition to serving as a phrasal focusing adverb, (ta33)kẽ33 is more commonly used as
a multifunctional focus marker in NPs to focalize its preceding nominals. Examples are given in
(10.56):

(10.56)

a. ɳa53miɛ13 tɕi31 tæ55kẽ55 ɳa53miɛ13 wu53 tʰo53

sleep time only sleep COMPL MOD:can;capable
“I can only sleep during the sleep time”

b. tə31 ʔe13 ta55kẽ55 tɔ55 to13 ʔɔ31

one CL:bowl only put COMPL FP:IMP
“To put them only in one bowl”

c. tɕã31mɔ13 tə31 wu55 tɕa13 nɛ31 sɿ13lɔ13 tɕã31 ke55

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 PN.Jiangmo one village all TOP sixteen CL:family only
nɛ55, jo55niõ33nɰ53 tə33 xõ53 kẽ55 tɕʰi33
TOP cattle one CL:pair only have(inani)
“There are only 16 families in Jiangmo, and there is only one pair of cattle”

Though (ta33)kẽ33 often occurs between a NP and a verb in the same clause, as
illustrated in (10.56a) - (10.56c), this word is unlikely to be a phrasal adverb of the entire VP.
Rather, ta33kẽ33 always follows the focal nominals in the above cases. The position precedes
(ta33)kẽ33, which is the default locus of narrow focus in Zauzou. Evidence provided in (10.57)
shows that this focus marker is sensitive to the syntactic position of focal elements.

(10.57)

a. wu13 tə55 tə13 tə33-ɕi33 kẽ33 tɕã31 tõ33wu13

gain DIST CL:PL.ani up;front-side only add PROG
“The winners calculate their money only in the front”

b. wu13 tə55 tə13 kẽ33 tə33-ɕi33

gain DIST CL:PL.ani only up;front-side
“only winners are in the front”

Following the analysis for (ta33)kẽ33, the locus of focus in (10.57a) is the locative word
tə33ɕi33 “front”, which is the nominal that is most adjacent to the focus marker ta33kẽ33.
However, if this focus marker is moved to the front of tə33ɕi33, as in (10.57b), the resulting
interpretion of this sentence becomes “only winners are in the front”, as the focus shifts to u13
tə55 tə13 “the winners”, suggesting that focus in Zauzou always falls on the element
immediately preceding the focus marker ta33kẽ33.

10.8 Negative Adverb ʔa31

Negation in Zauzou is expressed by an independent word ʔa31 that consistently appears
preverbally as a negative adverb. This negative adverb is very widely distributed in many kinds

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of syntactic constructions in Zauzou. In addition to negating the main verb in declarative clauses,
ʔa31 is also used in negation of subordinate clauses, as well as clauses employing copular,
existential, and non-verbal predicates, among others. Only one type of negative construction,
namely prohibitive (negative imperative) sentences, is not negated by ʔa31 but rather by a
distinct prohibitive morpheme tə31. In standard negation, it negates the main verb of matrix
clauses, and the presence of the adverb ʔa31 does not affect the word order or the structure of the
corresponding affirmative clause. Thus, according to the classification in Matti (2013), Zauzou is
a language of symmetric negation.
10.8.1 Negation of Main Verb
In Zauzou, the negative adverb ʔa31 is only allowed to appear preverbally. Predicates
that can be negated by ʔa31 include common action verbs and verb phrases, as in (10.58) -
(10.59), and the negation of existential verb ni55, the possessive verb tɕʰi13, and the copula
predicate. These will be discussed separately in the section below. In general, ʔa31 negates the
verbal elements that immediately follow it, which is the default focus domain of this negative
adverb in Zauzou.
The first structural type that involves a negative adverb is ʔa31-VP. Sentences in which
ʔa31 directly modifies a common action verb, negating the denotation of the verb, are illustrated
in (10.58) - (10.59).

(10.58)

ʔa55 və13 nɛ55, ʔa33 sa53 tɕã55

PROX CL:versatile TOP NEG know FP:Q
“I don't know this either”

(10.59)

a. me̠13 kʰɔ31 ʔɛ31 ʔa33 tsu55 xe31

hoecake CL:piece also NEG eat FP:assr
“the hoecake has not been eaten”

b. sa31mõ35 na53nu53 nɛ55 ɳɔ31 tsu55tsʰɛ33 ʔa33 tsu55 tsu31

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 tomorrow morning TOP 2SG breakfast NEG rice eat
ka53mia53 lɔ31
quickly ascend.away_from_DC
“tomorrow morning you quickly go (to have a look), don't eat breakfast”

The sentence final particle tɕã55 is optionally used in negative declaratives, as shown in
(10.58). This particle is restricted to negative sentences and serves to mark the negative
declarative mood. The negative adverb ʔa31 in the above sentences are required to appear before
the main verb or precede the OV, as demonstrated in (10.59b). ʔa31 is not sensitive to
grammatical categories, such as tense and mood. For example, in (10.59), ʔa31 negates either the
present/realis eating event in (10.59a), or a future/irrealis eating event in (10.59b).
For serial verb constructions that consist of at least a major verb and a minor verb (i.e.,
serial verb or coverb), ʔa31 preferably negates the whole verb complex, including the minor
verb. Distinct from the cases in which ʔa31 is placed between the main verb and the resultative
verb (see §10.7.2), ʔa31 as a negator of the entire verb complex denies the truth value of both
components. For example:

(10.60)

a. ʔa35 tə33 ka55 ʔa33 pa53 kʰɛ33

other DIST LOC NEG hit open
“(the pipe of) a different location was not open yet”

b. ʔa55 næ53 ɕi55 ʔa33 pã13 tɛ5̃ 5 lo13 zo31

PROX two CL:kind NEG take arrive ascend.towards_DC FP:assr
“(if you) do not bring the two things here”

In (10.60a), the adverb ʔa31 is preceding the entire the verb complex pa53 kʰɛ33, which
not only indicates that the state of opening is not achieved but also implies that the action of open
has not been performed. Likewise, ʔa31 in (10.60b) does not simply indicate that the direct

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object of pã13 “take” has not been received by the recipient but also that the action denoted by
pã13 has never been initiated.
However, there are exceptions. A few types of SVCs may allow the negative adverb ʔa31
to appear between the main verb and the minor verb (see chapter 8). Those SVCs include cause-
effect SVCs, as in (10.61a), most modal SVCs, as in (10.61b), and tense-aspect SVCs denoting
experiential aspect and completive aspect, as in (10.61c-d).

(10.61) V1-ʔa31-V2:

a. cause-effect SVC:

tɕa55sɿ55 ja55 la55 ʔa31 ʔa13

people CL:human blow NEG collapse
“the person is blown (by the wind) but doesn‘t fall to the ground”

b. modal SVC:

tɰ55 nõ55 ʔa31 ʔẽ55

3SG hear NEG MOD:capable
“he listens but doesn‘t understand”

c. experiential aspect ku55 “EXP”:

tə55 tɕã31 ʔɛ31 va33 ʔa31 ku33 ŋu33-pe33

up;front VCL:time also gamble NEG EXP 1-PL[EXCL]
“Previously we've never gambled.”

d. completive aspect wu13 “COMPL”:

ŋu55 ʔo53 tə31 kẽ55 tɕɔ31xɔ55 ja13və13 kẽ55 ʔa31 wu13 xe31
1 pig CL:PL.ani only take_care SEQ pick_up NEG COMPL FP:assr
“I only take care of the pigs, so I won't be able to reap (the corn)”

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 It is rather exceptional that ʔa31 is often found in constituent negation as well. The
following example shows that ʔa31 is used in constituent negation, negating the constituent
before it:

(10.62)

ʔa55tɕʰo53 læ33 xe31 ʔa31 lõ13 zɔ31

basket CL:inani AGT;INS;ABL NEG enclose FP:assr
“Stop using a basket to take (APK)”

In (10.62), ʔa31 still precedes the main verb lõ13 “keep”, while one tends to interpret the
instrument argument a55tɕʰo53 læ31 “a basket” of the verb lõ13 “enclose” as the object of
negation. Syntactically, ʔa31 is still an adverb modifying the main verb in this sentence, while
semantically only the instrumental argument is being negated but not the event itself.
The above examples exemplify the use of the negative adverb ʔa31 in a verb complex
with the structure of ʔa31-VP, and this VP is headed by an action verb. The example below
shows that main predicates that can be negated by ʔa31 also include existential verbs, such as
ni55 in (10.63) and the possessive verb tɕʰi13 “have”, as illustrated in (10.64):

(10.63)

ŋu55 ka13 tə13 mã31 ja33 kə55

1 younger_sibling 3PL;3POSS CL:PL.ani home LOC
ʔa33 ni55, tə31nɰ53 ka55 kõ33tsɔ13 ja13,
NEG have(ani) front LOC work SEQ
tə55-pe33 tɕɔ31xɔ13 ʔa31 tɕɛ33
3PL;3POSS-PL take_care NEG realized
“My brother, they are not at home, (they) work at the frontier, they cannot take care (of the
parents)”

(10.64)

ʔa33 kʰɰ53 xo53 tə31 na13 ʔa31 tɕʰi13

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 NEG work_hard NMLZ;LINK one day NEG have(inani)
“There is not a single day that people are not working hard”

10.8.2 Negation of Minor Verb

In Zauzou SVCs, the negative adverb ʔa31 is usually placed before the entire multi-verb
predicate that is the focus of negation. This is, generally speaking, unexceptional for most
symmetrical SVCs and a subset of asymmetical SVCs, as illustrated in the sequential SVC in
(10.65):

(10.65)

ʔa35 tə33 ka55 ʔa33 pa53 kʰɛ33

other DIST LOC NEG hit open
“(the pipe of) a different location was not open yet”

However, in some subtypes of SVCs, the negative adverb ʔa31 must be placed
immediately before the corresponding serial verb or coverb. Serial verbs and coverbs that can
directly take the negative adverb ʔa31 contain, but are not restricted to, coverbs denoting
modality, cause-effect serial verbs, aspectual coverb, etc. The linear structure of minor verb
negation is displayed as V-(Serial verb/Coverb)- ʔa31-Serial verb/Coverb, in which the final
minor verb represents the focus of negation.
The first subclass of negative minor verbs are coverbs denoting modality, such as na55
“MOD:like” in (10.66a), ʔẽ55 “MOD:capable” in (10.66b), and tɕɔ13 “MOD:need” in (10.66c):

(10.66)

a. ja31 tə55-pe33, ʔa55 mɔ53 ka55 ni33 ʔa33 na55

SEQ 3PL;3POSS-PL PROX CL:PL.inani LOC have(ani) NEG MOD:like
“They (my daughters) don't want to stay in those areas.”

b. mi55 tʰɰ53 tə31 ti55 suẽ55 ʔa33 ʔẽ55 tɕa53

miss exit one CL:small_quantity think NEG MOD:capable perhaps

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 pe55
FP:assr
“As for missing someone, (others) should not be able to miss someone at all”

c. ʔa33-pe55 sɿ55jã13 ʔɛ33 mə5̃ 5 ʔa33 tɕɔ13 tə55 tɕʰã13

1PL-PL[INCL] what also do NEG MOD:need DIST VCL:occasion
nɛ55...
TOP
“when we have nothing to do...”

ʔa31 in the above three sentences unexceptionally negates the modal coverbs na55, ẽ55,
and tɕɔ13, denoting the meaning of “don‘t like”, “unable to”, and “no need to”, respectively.
The same adverb can also be attached to a coverb encoding some aspectual categories,
such as the experiential aspect ku55 and the completive aspect wu13, as shown in (10.67):

(10.67)

a. ʔa31 ŋa53 nɛ55, xo55-tɕʰa35 ʔɛ33 ʔã31 ve55 ʔa33 ku55

NEG COP TOP Wh-VCL:occasion also dish buy NEG EXP
“Otherwise, we haven‘t bought any vegetables at any time”

b. ʔa55 ka55 tə55 na35 kõ33tsuɔ55tsu33 ja55=ma55 ŋu55

PROX LOC DIST day working_group CL:human=F1 1
ʔɔ33 ŋə55 tə55 mõ53 ɳɔ31 nõ55 ʔa33
PAT CAUS;say DIST CL:PL.inani 2SG hear NEG
wu13 xe31
COMPL FP:assr
“Here, you didn't hear what the woman of the working group said to me on that day”

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 Obviously, the focus of negation in the above cases falls on the aspectual coverbs ku55
and wu13, which denies the past experience of buying vegetables in (10.67a) and the realization
of the hearing event in (10.67b).
The third type of minor verbs that can take ʔa31 and be directly negated by this adverb
are cause-effect coverbs in symmetrical SVCs, which denote the resulting status of the event
encoded by the main verb. The serial verb may express a result, as illustrated in (10.68a), or a
subjective evaluation of the event in the main clause, as in (10.68b).

(10.68)

a. ʔa33 ŋa53 nɛ55 tə33 tɕã55 ʔɛ31 ni55 ʔa33 tɕɛ55

NEG COP TOP one VCL:time also sit NEG realized
“Otherwise, one cannot even sit for a second.”

b. ŋɛ33 tə55 ja33 mã31 ni55 ʔa33 lo13 tsʰa53uɔ55

small DIST CL:human COP have(ani) NEG good marry
ʔa33 lo13
NEG good
“The youngest (daughter) didn't live well, she didn‘t marry well.”

The negation of a minor verb is different from the negation of the whole predicate, as
discussed in §6.7.1. The latter by default involves the main verb in the negative focus, while this
is not the case for negation of minor verbs. This is most clearly seen in (10.6), where the
negation of cause-effect serial verbs does not necessarily entail the negation of the main verbs.
ni55 ʔa31 tɕɛ55 in (10.68a) shows that there is no such condition that allows one to sit (i.e., a
sitting state cannot be realized) when a sitting posture that has been initiated or attempted is not
specified. Similarly, the evaluative VPs ni55 ʔa31 lo13 “didn‘t live well” and tsʰa53uɔ55 ʔa33
lo13 “didn‘t marry well” only indicate that the result lo13 “good” is false but does not indicate
that the living event and marrying event did not happen. In fact, the events denoted by the main
verbs must have happened given that one can provide an evaluation on their results.
Negation of minor verbs in Zauzou allows more complex structures of SVCs, and the
negative adverb ʔa31 may occur between two distinct minor verbs in order to negate the second

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minor verb. I will only introduce two subclasses of minor verbs that commonly appear in the
Serial verb2/Coverb2 position, which is the focus of negation in the structure of V-Serial
verb1/Coverb1-ʔa31-Serial Verb2/Coverb2.
The first subclass of V-Serial verb1/Coverb1-ʔa31-Serial Verb2/Coverb2 contains a
secondary modal coverb, as exemplified by the word tʰo53 “MOD:can;capable” in (10.69):

(10.69)

a. ʔa33-pe55 ʔa33 tse13mɰ31 nɛ55 kə33ɳã33-pa31pa13 tso33 tu13

1PL-PL[INCL] NEG Spring_Festival TOP sticky_rice-cake eat up
ʔa31 tʰo53
NEG MOD:can;capable
“we don't eat sticky rice cake until the Spring Festival”

b. ʔa33 tɕɔ55 pi35 nɛ55, tɰ55 tɕʰã31 mə̃55 tso33 ʔa33

NEG cook APPL;AFF TOP 3SG COP do eat NEG
ʔɛ5̃ 5 tso33 wu35 ʔa33 tʰo53
MOD:capable eat COMPL NEG MOD:can;capable
“If (I) don't cook for him, he cannot make food and eat”

In (10.69a), the negative adverb ʔa31 appears after the verb sequence tsu33 tu13 “be able
to eat” and precedes the second modal coverb tʰo53 that evaluates the situational possibility (i.e.,
allows by condition) of the proposition denoted by tsu33 tu13. The negative form of this modal
coverb indicates that there is no conditions that allow one to eat sticky rice cake in the normal
days. Similarly, the proposition of “he has the ability to cook” in (10.69b) is rejected by virtue of
negating the modal coverb tʰo53. The proposition evaluated by tʰo53 is a verb resultative
complex tsu33 u13 “eat successully”. Hence, the whole negative verb phrase could be
paraphrased as “the condition doesn‘t allow him to eat successfully”.
The second subclass of coverbs that often appear in the Serial verb2/Coverb2 position are
stative serial verbs, such as mi55 “be free” in (10.70):

(10.70)

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 ʔa31 ŋa53 nɛ55, tæ55 le35 ʔa31 mi55 xe33
NEG COP TOP return come.towards_DC NEG free FP:assr
“Otherwise, I won't have time to come back.”

mi55 is a stative verb in Zauzou, and it is demoted to the secondary serial verb position in
the cause-effect SVC in (10.70). The negation of this serial verb simply states that “there is no
free time to [proposation in V-Serial Verb/Coverb1]”.
Zauzou has a robust system of serial verb constructions. Many verbs serving as the main
verb in a single verb construction can be used as a minor verb in a serial verb construction. If one
accepts the assumption that the negative adverb ʔa31 is restricted to negate predicates involving
verbs, predicative adjectives, and minor verbs, then ʔa31 will become a useful diagnostic to test
verbhood in Zauzou SVCs. Specifically, a verb that is not grammaticalized must be able to be
negated by ʔa31 while those that cannot be directly negated by ʔa31 are usually subjected to
some degree of grammaticalization.
10.8.3 Negation of Subordinate Clause and Copula
The negative adverb ʔa31 often occurs in nominal predicate clauses and complex
sentences containing a subordinate clause together with an affirmative copula word ŋæ53. The
negative copula word ʔa31 ŋæ53 is widely attested in Zauzou, which negates the proposition
encoded by the entire sentence and renders the meaninig of “it is not the case that...” The
following examples illustrate the use of ʔa31 ŋæ53 in a nominal predicate clause, as in (10.70a)
and a complex sentence, as in (10.71b).

(10.71)

a. ʔa55 və13 tə31 ʔõ55 ʔa31 ŋa53

PROX CL:versatile one CL:animal NEG COP
“This one is not an animal.”

b. nõ55 xã13 to53 ja33 tɕõ55 kʰə55 ʔa31 ŋæ53

sick INT1 COMPL SEQ soul call NEG COP
“It is not the case that people call one's soul back only when (s)he is seriously sick”

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 Zauzou is a language of zero copula. An optional copula word ŋæ53 is used to express
the emphatic meaning for affirmative nominal predicate clauses. However, in a negative nominal
predicate clause, this copula word is required as the negative adverb ʔa31 but cannot be directly
added to a nominal constituent. This is illustrated by (10.71a) in which the nominal predicate
tə31 õ33 “one (animal)” is negated by the negative copula a31 ŋæ53. (10.71b), alternatively,
exemplifies the negation of the entire span of a complex sentence. The sentence in (10.71b)
involves a temporal adverbial clause, “when (s)he is seriously sick”, and a matrix. The negation
scopes over the entire sentence. Not a single constituent, predicate, or a subordinate clause is the
focal element of the negation in this sentence. ʔa31 ŋæ53 in both cases of (10.71) are restricted
to the sentence final position.
Moreover, in Zauzou, there is no way for a negative morpheme to directly negate a
constituent of the predicate2. Thus, the common way for constituent negation to negate the entire
sentence is by employing the negative adverb ʔa31 plus the affirmative copula ŋæ53. The
following are examples:

(10.72)

ʔa55 və13 tɰ33 mə̃55 to53 ʔa31 ŋæ53 zɔ31

PROX CL:versatile 3SG do COMPL NEG COP FP:assr
“This cannot be done by him.”

(10.73)

ʔa55 və13 nɛ33 ʔo55vu13 jɛ3̃ 3 mõ55 kə55 mə̃55, su55-mi33

PROX CL:versatile TOP man home CL:PL.inani LOC do human-F
jɛ3̃ 3 mõ55 ka55 ʔa33 ŋa53
home CL:PL.inani LOC NEG COP
“This (the wedding) is held in the groom's home, not in the bride's home.”

2
Counter-examples are displayed in §10.7.1. A number of cases show that constituent negation can be achieved in
the structure of NP-ʔa31-V. However, those are considered as exceptional cases in Zauzou negation, which are
different than the general pattern exhibited in the domain of negation.

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 (10.72) illustrates the negation of the focal argument tɰ33 “3sg”, indicating the event
encoded in the predicate is not done by him but rather by someone else. This can only be
achieved by adding the negative copula ʔa31 ŋæ53 in the sentence final position. The sentence in
(10.73), instead, represents the negation of an adjunct argument, which is the location of the
wedding event. In this sentence, the locative phrase su55mi33 jɛ̃33mõ55 ka55 “the girl’s place”
in the negative ʔa31ŋæ53 clause constitutes a contrastive focus to the locative phrase ʔo55vu13
iɛ̃33mõ55 kə55 “the boy‘s place” in the preceding affirmative clause. In both cases, although
ʔa31 ŋæ53 is associated with nominal constituents, this negative copula is syntactically confined
to the sentence final position as a sentential negative marker.
10.8.4 Word Order of Negative Adverb and Degree Expressions
The negative adverb ʔa31 can co-occur with either a preverbal degree adverb, such as
xo53ɕi13 and lo53ɕi13, or a postverbal degree coverb, such as sa53le13. However, preverbal
degree adverbs are statistically favored by Zauzou in a negative environment. Before discussing
negation containing a preverbal degree adverb, I will first examine negation involving a post-
verbal degree coverb sa53le13, as illustrated in (10.74):

(10.74)

kua13tɕyɛ5̃ 3 mæ55 ŋə55 tə13 ma55 kə33lɛ5̃ 5 tə55 ja33

PN.GuoQuan mother CAUS;say LINK lower_part PN.Guoli DIST CLːhuman
=mæ55 ʔɛ33, ni55 ʔa33 tʰo53 sa53le13 zo31
=F1 also sit NEG MOD:can;capable INT1 FP:assr
“Guoquan's mother said, the old lady living in Guoli is very reluctant (unable) to stay at home”

In (10.74), the degree coverb sa53le13 denotes a relatively high degree of the inability to
sit. Thus, this degree word actually scopes over the entire negative phrase ni55 ʔa31 tʰo53
“unable to sit”, which increases the degree along a negative scale.
In the case of negative clauses containing a preverbal degree adverb, examples in (10.75)
and (10.76) illustrate negative sentences headed by gradable predicates involving adjectives and
modal coverbs. The negative sentences in (10.75) and (10.76) take the same structure of Deg-

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Neg-Adj/Coverb. However, the degree word takes a wider scope over the negation in (10.75),
rendering “a very high negative degree”, whereas the negator ʔa31 scopes over the degree word
in (10.76), rendering “a not very high degree”. Both readings are encoded by the same Deg-
Neg-Adj/Coverb construction.

(10.75)

a. lo53ɕi35 ʔa31 tɕĩ55 xe31

INT1 NEG busy FP:assr
“(they) are very free [Lit: (they) are very much not busy]”

b. ʔɛ13 nɛ55 tɕɰ55 ʔɛ33 xo53ɕi13 zɛ3̃ 1 ʔa31 tɕɔ13

other TOP 3SG also INT1 use NEG MOD:need
“It is barely used to serve other (functions). [Lit: as to other (functions), it is very much
not needed]”

(10.76)

a. tso55 pʰɰ33 ʔe31 lo53ɕi35 ʔa31 pʰɰ31 tɕʰã55

rice price also INT1 NEG price expensive
“The price of grains is not very expensive”

b. ʔa55 ku55 nɛ55, ʔã31 ʔa55 və13 nɛ55 xo53ɕi35

PROX CL:season TOP dish PROX CL:versatile TOP INT1
ʔa31 tʰo53
NEG MOD:capable
“At this season, the vegetables are not so good.”

For sentences in (10.75), the degree adverb scopes over the negative adverb and, thus
increases the negative value entailed in the predicate whereas in (10.76), it is the negative adverb

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that takes a wider scope over the degree adverb, which denies the assertion that “X has a very
high degree on the scale of Y”.
The same structure of Deg-Neg-Predicate also applies to gradable verbs, such as the
incremental theme verb tso33 “eat” in (10.77):

(10.77)

ʔa31ji13 xu33 nɛ55, xo53ɕi35 ʔa31 tso33

other meat TOP INT1 NEG eat
“(we) rarely eat other meat.”

The verb tsu33 “eat” in the above sentence has a lexicalized scale in its object and, thus,
allows modification by a degree adverb such as xo53ɕi35 in (10.77). As discussed earlier (§10.2),
xo53ɕi35 tsu33 means “eat a lot of food” or “eat for a very long time” in affirmative sentences.
Thus, in the negative environment, the two degree interpretations can be negated simultaneously.
Depending on whether a wide scope or narrow scope is taken by xo53ɕi35, two negative
readings, “do not eat a lot of food/eat for a very long time“ (narrow scope) and “eat very little
food/a very short time” (wide scope), will be obtained. However, this kind of ambiguity cannot
be distinguished in a given context.
10.8.5 Negation in Question
The negative copula ʔa31 ŋæ53 is often combined with a sentence final interrogative
marker la31, creating a distinct question word ʔa31-ŋæ53-la31. This question word is only
allowed to appear in the sentence final position, signaling a rhetorical question. See examples in
(10.78) - (10.79):

(10.78)

ʔa55 ja55 tɕã55 tæ13 tɛ5̃ 5 kɰ13 nɛ55, tə33 jɛ5̃ 5 tɛ13
PROX CL:human invite return arrive offer_sacrifice TOP one family all
tso31 wu13 zɔ31 ʔa31-ŋæ53-la31?
eat COMPL FP:assr NEG-COP-Q
“If they invite this person to hold the ceremony, it is possible the whole family can eat
(chicken), isn‘t it?“

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(10.79)
ʔa55 ka55 ŋu55 to13 le13 nɛ55, ŋu55 mi33 kʰa53 nɛ55
PROX LOC 1 up come.towards_DC TOP 1 fire burn TOP
tɰ55 ʔɛ33 to13 tɛ1̃ 3 zɔ31 ʔa31-ŋæ53-la33 ?
3SG also up arrive FP:assr NEG-COP-Q
“Here when I get up, I light up the fire in the stove, and it is possible that he goes to the stove
as well, isn‘t it?“

The above questions can be analyzed as containing a rhetorical question tag ʔa31-ŋæ53-
la31, which encodes the meaning analogous to the tag question, “Isn‘t it?” in English. ʔa31-
ŋæ53-la31 is usually added after a declarative sentence. Questions of this kind in Zauzou serve
to emphasize that the proposition denoted in the preceding declarative sentence is true.

10.9 Summary
In this chapter, I discussed six classes of commonly used adverbs in Zauzou. Adverbs
typically appear preverbally in Zauzou but there are a few words that express adverbial meanings
yet are restricted to the post-verbal position. The first class of adverbs is degree adverbs, which is
a closed class containing three preverbal adverbs, lo53ɕi13, xo53ɕi13, and ka53(tɕi55), and a
post-verbal adverb xã13. The intensifiers sa53 and xã13 are serial verbs when they modify verbs
in SVCs but are adverbs when they follow adjectives. xã13 “very” is one of the most versatile
adverbs in Zauzou. It not only raises the standard of comparison when it is a degree modifier of
relative adjectives but can also modify many kinds of verbs and generate different meanings
when combined with different types of verbs. The second class of adverbs is manner adverbs,
which all have adjectival bases and are often marked by the adverbializers xo53, mɔ33, and tə31.
A subset of manner adverbs can appear as post-verbal complements, while others can only
appear as preverbal adverbs. Reduplication of adjectives can also generate the same function as
manner adverbs. The third class of adverbs is frequency adverbs, involving tʰi31/tʰə55/tʰe55
“often”, kẽ33 “always”, and tə31tɕʰã13tɕʰã13 “sometimes”. Zauzou employs a closed set of
interrogative adverbs that express an array of wh-adverbs such as “when”, “where”, “why”,

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“which”, “how”, and “how many/how much.” The wh-morpheme xu33- is consistently used to
derive wh-adverbs from nouns and other word classes. Finally, I described a focusing adverb
ta55kẽ55 and the negative adverb ʔa31. ta55kẽ55 is used to focalize the constituent preceding
this adverb. The negative adverb ʔa31 can immediately precede a main verb or a serial
verb/coverb in SVCs to negate the verbal element following this adverb. ʔa31 can also conflate
with the copula ŋæ53 to form the compound negative copula word ʔa31 ŋæ53, which is retained
in the sentence final position and negates the proposition encoded by the entire sentence.

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