Thursday, June 14, 2012

Senses of psychological verbs in Copala Triqui

It is very difficult to accurately translate all the different psychological and emotional verbs into English or Spanish, since Triqui divides the world up somewhat differently.

Case in point is the verb aráya'anj , which has a range of meanings that includes 'be amazed at something; be concerned about someone; be alarmed at something.'   Working through the large corpus with this verb allows us to find examples that show the different shades of meaning.



Here's an example of the 'be concerned' sense:


Here is an example of the 'be amazed' sense


And here is an example of the 'alarmed'  sense



The common semantics of this verb seem to include an aspect of worry/lack of knowledge about the future and concern for people affected in the future.

We also see this verb in combination with the ni'yanj psych marker to show an attitude of amazement toward someone.


No comments: