A clause in Kuuk Thaayorre can be as small as a single
predicate constituent. Any
arguments that a predicate subcategorises for can be omitted. Predicating constituents include
verbs,
adjectives,
nouns,
demonstrative pronouns, and
locative adverbs. Kuuk Thaayorre is on the whole a
nonconfigurational language at the level of the
clause, although for
complex clauses there are constraints on the ordering of the main clause and the
dependent clause. Within a clause
noun phrases have intricate structure. The irregular form of the
ergative morpheme makes it a clear
suffix, rather than an
enclitic; however, it is borne on the last nominal in the noun phrase. This makes Kuuk Thaayorre an example of a language displaying affixation to phrases. Ergative marking has the pragmatic function of displaying the degree of expectedness of the subject. There are multiple
inclusory constructions, i.e. those referring to a superset while simultaneously focussing on a subset (these are found in many IE languages, e.g. German
Wit Scilling 1.du Sc. "Sc. and I"). One of these is a set of single-word inclusory pronouns encoding both superset and subset. == Lexical semantics ==