Grammatical Relations, Information Structure, and Constituency in Watam

Abstract

This language of the north coast of Papua New Guinea is typologically unusual in its structuring of information. On the one hand, it belongs to a class of languages that has been termed discourse configurational, in that the constituent structure of its clause may be determined largely by information structure considerations, rather than grammatical relations. Intertwined with this system, however, is a more syntacticized system signalled by the presence of a particular verbal prefix. This amalgam bears careful study in the typological theory of text cohesion and reference tracking. 1. WATAM AND ITS RELATIVES. Watam is a Papuan or Non-Austronesian language spoken on the north coast of Papua New Guinea between the mouth of the Sepik and Ramu rivers. It is a language of the Lower Ramu family, the westernmost language of that family, the other four languages being spoken along the lower stretches of the Ramu River and the coastal region to its east. The Lower Ramu family in turn is related as a whole to the Lower Sepik family, whose languages are spoken to the west and southwest of Watam. The family relationships can be represented as in table I.