Interrogative Constructions in Mayrinax Atayal

Abstract

詢問是人類心智的特徵之一，是故疑問句結構之探究亦是語言研究重要課題之一。根據Comrie（1984:18-24）所提，疑問句結構可分兩大類：「一般問句」（general question）和「特殊問句」（special question）。前者包括「是非問句」（yes-no question）和「選擇問句」（alternative question），後者即通稱的「訊息問句」（information question），相當於英文的wh-問句。 本篇論文所要探討的是泰雅語的疑問句結構。泰雅語是臺灣原住民語言之一，主要包括兩個方言群：賽考利克（Squliq）和澤敖利（C? uli?）；本文中所探討的苗栗縣泰安鄉汶水泰雅語即屬澤敖利方言。汶水泰雅語的「是非問句」是由相對的直述句和疑問助詞quw所組成的，「選擇問句」則由疑問助詞quw和主題標記Ya□共同表徵之。至於「訊息問句」的結構可分成兩類：名詞句（nominal sentence）或稱「等同句」（equational sentence），和動詞句（verbal sentence），而「訊息問句」中所出現的疑問詞則可分為三類：疑問名詞（interrogative nouns）、疑問副詞（interrogative adverbs）和疑問動詞（interrogative verbs）；這不同於大部份語言中僅有疑問名詞和疑問副詞兩類，是臺灣南島語言結構的特徵之一。

The present paper attempts to investigate the interrogative constructions in Atayal, an Austronesian language spoken in Taiwan which consists of two major subgroups: Squliq and C? uli?. The dialectal variant examined here is that of Mayrinax, a C? uli? dialect spoken in Chinshui Village, Taian Hsiang, Miaoli Prefecture. In Mayrinax, the yes-no questions are formed with their corresponding statements and the question particle quw, without changing the intonation pattern. The alternative questions are characterized by the presence of both the question particle quw and the Topic marker Ya?. Yet the structures of alternative questions vary; they can either be nominal/equational or verbal/non-equational sentences. As for special questions (or so-called whquestions) in Mayrinax Atayal, there are two kinds of construction, namely, nominal/equational and verbal/non-equational. Concerning the wh- words appearing in special questions, they can be categorized into three types: (i) interrogative nouns like ima? 'who', nanuwan/nanu? 'what', ainu? 'which' and humicuwa? 'what kind' (i.e.wh-words manifesting participants and functioning as pronouns/nouns which can be preceded by case markers, and thus can be further catergorized into common and personal proper nouns); (ii) interrogative verbs like humicuwa? 'hwo', micuwa? 'why', hanu? an 'why' and piya? 'how many; how much' (i.e. wh-words functioning as verbs which can be affixed with focus and/or tense/aspect markers, or partially reduplicated); and (iii) interrogative adverbs like humicuwa? 'when', kanuwan 'when', makapi? a? 'how often' and inu? 'where' (i.e. wh-words designating adjuncts and functioning as adverbs).