Overall goal: Successfully divide roots and prefixes, identify allomorphy in the stems and prefixes, and state the distribution of allomorphs. This problem will take you through a number of steps to help you produce a morphological analysis of the Kazakh noun
Data (Click here to hide/show data)
The table below contains simple and possessed nouns in Kazakh.
Note: the symbol /q / represents a voiceless uvular stop, and /ɵ/ represents a mid central rounded lax vowel.
| IPA | English Gloss | IPA | English Gloss | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. | qalam | 'pen' | 9. | ormanymyz | 'our forest' |
| 2. | ormanyŋyz | 'your (form.) forest' | 10. | ʒol | 'road' |
| 3. | qolym | 'my hand' | 11. | ʃopanyŋyz | 'your (form.) shepherd' |
| 4. | qoly | 'his/her hand' | 12. | qol | 'hand' |
| 5. | ɵlym | 'my boy' | 13. | ʃopany | 'his/her shepherd' |
| 6. | ʒolymyz | 'our road' | 14. | ʃopan | 'shepherd' |
| 7. | qalamy | 'his /her pen' | 15. | ɵl | 'boy' |
| 8. | orman | 'forest' |
Step 1: Arrange forms systematically
When you have data that only differs in two dimensions (as here, where the words differ in root and in possessor), one way to organize the data is to put the forms in a table. This will help you see the morphological patterns. The forms have been arranged for you in the table below.
| 'pen' | 'hand' | 'forest' | 'shepherd' | 'road' | 'boy' | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| simple form | qalam | qol | orman | ʃopan | ʒol | ɵl |
| my 'X' | qolym | ɵlym | ||||
| your (form.) 'X' | ormanyŋyz | ʃopanyŋyz | ||||
| his/her 'X' | qalamy | qoly | ʃopany | |||
| our 'X' | ormanymyz | ʒolymyz |
Note that you don't have every form for every noun. This is commonly the case when conducting research on a language. The next time you are in Kazakhstan, you can collect the missing forms. In the meantime, work with what you have.