In terms of grammatical typology Rama may be considered a fairly "normal" language for the linguistic area within which it is located, despite the lack of close genetic ties with its immediate neighbours. For example, Rama shares some general typological features with
Miskito, a dominant contact language, displaying many characteristics typical of SOV languages (even though not all sentences are actually verb-final). A single set of prefixes serves to express both pronominal possessors (e.g.
n- "my eye") and subjects (e.g.
n- "I went"). Noun phrase relations are indicated by postpositions, tense and
subordination by verbal suffixes.
Noun phrase Elements of the noun phrase There are no articles. Nouns are frequently undetermined, e.g. "(The) lizard walks on (the) ground" (literally: lizard ground on (s)he-walks), "He/she caught (a) fish with (a) hook" (fish hook with (s)he-caught). Demonstrative determiners precede the noun: "
this house", "
that dog". Quantifiers follow the noun: "
one dog", "
two cats", "
many houses", "
every morning", "
all the people", "the
other dog,
another dog". Most nouns do not change for
number, but those denoting humans can take the plural suffix or , as in "men", "women", "children", etc. Attributive adjectives follow the noun they qualify: "(a/the)
big fish".
Possession Inalienable pronominal possession, found with body parts and characteristics, is expressed by prefixes attached to the possessed noun: "
my eye", "
his/her strength", "
our fingers". In other cases (including kinship relations), a genitive pronoun (formed from the pronominal prefix + ) precedes the possessed noun, e.g. "
my cat / house / name / child / father / sister", "your family (lit. your people)", "
his/her name", "
our Rama language". The forms etc. also function predicatively (as equivalents of English possessive pronouns), as in "That cat is
mine". Nominal possession is expressed by two constructions: possessor + possessed (i.e. simple juxtaposition), e.g. "my father's name" (my father name), and possessor + + possessed ( being a genitive postposition), e.g. "Nora's house".
Pronouns Personal pronouns have free (independent) and bound (prefix) forms as in the following table. The third person singular bound form is
i- before a consonant or
y- before a vowel. The independent pronouns are often used as subjects: "
I live in Bluefields" (I town in stay), "Can
you sew a dress?" (you dress sew-IRREALIS), "
He/She is going". They may also be complements of postpositions: "My mother lives in this house with
me" (my mother this house in stay I with), "from
you", "The tiger came out at
them" (tiger they at came-out). Note that
-ut changes to
-ul before a vowel, for example in "with us". The prefix forms of the pronouns are used as subject prefixes with verbs: "I gave it to Nelly" (Nelly OBJECT I-gave), "Tomorrow I will cook some meat" (tomorrow meat I-will-cook), "With whom did you go?" (who with you-went), "he/she went", "
They came to the island" (island in they-came). In the second person plural,
m- is prefixed and
-lut suffixed to the verb. Subject prefixes are omitted when the subject is represented by an independent pronoun: "I am going" is either or , "He is going" is either or , etc. They are also commonly absent in the presence of a full subject noun phrase: "My father is going", but "repetition" of the subject is also possible: "The lizard (he) walks on the ground" (lizard ground on it-walks). A pronominal object is expressed by adding the postposition
aa to the pronouns, which adopt the prefix form in the singular but the full form in the plural: but (for ) etc. But third person objects are commonly zero-marked, that is, the absence of an overt object of a transitive verb implies an understood "him", "her" or "it", e.g.
Anangsku "They cleaned it" (lit. they-cleaned). The demonstrative pronouns are the same as the corresponding determiners: "this", "that", as in "This is my house". The interrogative pronouns are "what", "who", as in "What is your name?", "Who speaks Rama?" (who Rama language speaks), "With whom did you go?" (who with you-went).
Postpositions Rama
postpositions perform roughly the same functions as English prepositions, as in "
on the ground", "
in (the) town", "
with me", "
of the house", etc. Postpositional phrases may occur either before or after the verb. Some postpositions have a shorter and a longer form; following the verb the long forms are used, e.g. "I ran away from my father" (I-ran my father from) but before the verb the short forms are more usual: (my father from I-ran). Although or is given as an object marker, most objects (other than personal pronouns) take no postposition, e.g. "The tiger ate the man" (tiger man ate). In addition to the simple postpositions there are more complex forms of the
relational type that express more specific relationships. These are composed of a noun-like lexical form followed by a postposition, such as "inside", "out of". They are placed after a noun phrase, e.g. "inside the hole", or a postpositional phrase, e.g. "out of the pot" (literally: pot in out-from). Such expressions may also be used adverbially.
The verb Overview The simplest structure for verb forms consists of these elements: • an optional
subject prefix (already discussed above under Pronouns) • the verb
stem • either a
tense/mood suffix (or zero) or a
subordination marker e.g. "I live in Bluefields" (no subject prefix and no tense suffix), "He/She is going" (no subject prefix, present tense suffix), "With whom did you go?" (second person subject prefix, past tense suffix), "I will cook some meat" (first person subject prefix, future/irrealis suffix), "when they see the tiger" (third person plural subject prefix, "when" subordinator), "I am looking for meat to buy" (first person singular subject prefix, purpose subordinator). This basic structure may be expanded by adding other elements, including aspect markers (which come between the stem and the tense/mood suffix) and preverbs (which precede the subject prefix, if present). More complex meanings can be expressed through the use of serial verb constructions.
Tense/mood and subordinator suffixes Most verb forms end in a suffix such as one of the following which either specifies a tense (or a mood) or else signals a subordinate clause: Use of one of the subordinator suffixes constitutes the main subordination strategy. Since these suffixes occupy the same place as the tense suffixes, the resulting subordinate clauses are tenseless, in this respect resembling non-finite clauses in European languages. Nonetheless, Rama verb forms with subordinators take subject prefixes under the same basic conditions as tensed ones, and in this way resemble finite forms. Examples with "come": "I am coming", "I came", "I will come", "for me to come", "when I come", "if I come" etc. In some cases the lack of any suffix signals a lack of marked tense or a habitual sense: compare "I am ready to go" (now) with "I live in the town". Imperatives in the second person singular are also suffixless, e.g. "Come!" One verb, "go", has a suppletive imperative or "go!". Sometimes forms with the
-bang suffix are used in independent clauses: see the section on Aspect below.
Aspect Using the simple past tense of "eat", the sentence means "The tiger ate the man", but the "manner of eating" may be specified further to express completion of the action by adding to the stem the aspect marker , giving "The tiger ate the man all up". Further examples with are: "He/she shut the door tight" ( "close") and "They saw the whole manatee" ( "see"). Another aspect-marking suffix similarly used is () expressing repetition. A range of further aspectual nuances may be conveyed by a variety of periphrastic constructions. Several of these involve the verb "stay" or its derivative (which contains the preverb ), either of which, following a verb stem, may convey progressive aspect: "I am crying" ( "cry"; the second vowel in can copy the vowel of the suffix). can also express "be about to (do something)". The suffix (see also above) may express intention, as in "I am going to look at the baby" ( "look at"), and in first person plural imperatives (i.e. "let's..."), as in "Let's sleep!" ( "sleep"). In the latter use the subject prefix may be omitted, e.g. "Let's speak Rama!" ( "speak"). A form related to , , means "want" with a nominal object, as in "He/she wants a banana", but with verbal complements means "be going to (do something)" in the simple form, as in "He/she is going to walk" ( "walk"), or "get ready to (do something)" in the progressive construction, as in "I get ready to drink" ( "drink"). Another periphrasis, constructed with following the subordinate form in of the main verb, expresses "be ready to (do something)", e.g. "I am ready to go" ( "go"). One other means of expressing aspectual (or mood) nuances is provided by the use of a second set of emphatic tense suffixes which replace the simple suffixes, namely emphatic affirmative, habitual past and emphatic future.
Modality Modal notions are expressed by further periphrastic constructions. A verb with the suffix may be used in an independent clause to convey obligation: "All the children must go to school". is used as a modal auxiliary of volition, as in "I want to learn Rama" ( "learn"). Ability may be expressed by the future/irrealis tense form in , e.g. "Will/can you sew a dress?" Inability is expressed by the negator preceding the complete verb, e.g. "I cannot speak Rama".
Preverbs Rama has
preverbs which form constructions comparable to English
phrasal verbs such as "run
away", "come
over", "carry
on" etc. The Rama preverbs resemble some of the postpositions in form: they are and . Like English phrasal verbs, the meanings and uses of Rama preverb constructions can be quite idiomatic and unpredictable. Preverbs precede the subject prefix if present: "I ran away from (him/her)" ( "run" with the preverb "from": is the subject prefix). "They brought the wild pig to the town" ( "come with, i.e. bring"). "Who took the child?" ( "go with, i.e. take"). While many preverb-verb combinations are lexically specified, may also be used productively to express an instrumental argument, e.g. "That's why we have tongs, in order to roast meat with (them)" (therefore tongs we-have, meat for-we-roast-with).
Serial verbs A limited range of serial-type constructions are found. A notable case of this is the use of the verb "walk" following another verb, as in: "Men of Rama Cay go to look for manatee in the lagoon" (island from man manatee they-seek walk lagoon side). The morphological analysis of "they go to look for" is: (PREVERB-they-seek walk-PRESENT).
Sentence 'Be' and 'have' Noun and adjective predicates are constructed without a copula, in the order Subject + Predicate, e.g. "This is my house" (this my house), "His name is Basilio" (his name Basilio), "The manatee is a big animal" (manatee animal big), "My house is pretty" (my house pretty); so also "That cat is mine" and "My cat is for killing rats". The Subject + Predicate order is inverted in a question such as "What is his name?" The verb "stay" is used to express "be (in a place)" and "be (in a state)", as in "The school is on the south side" (school south side in stay), "I am fine" (I well stay). can also mean "live (in a place)" as in "I live on Rama Cay" (I island in stay), and "there is" as in "There are many houses on Rama Cay" (house many island in stay). The verb (or ) means "have", e.g. "I have two sisters" (I sister two have), "That's why we have tongs", "The octopus has many arms".
Word order with verbal predicates In sentences with a verb as predicate, the basic order is: • SV if intransitive, e.g. "The frog jumps", "I am crying" (I cry AUXILIARY), "My child is sick" (my child is-sick) • SOV if transitive (assuming that both arguments are present as noun phrases in the utterance), e.g. "The tiger ate the man" (tiger man ate), "Nora speaks Rama" (Nora Rama language speaks),
Nah tausung saiming kuaakar "I have one dog" (I dog one have). Other sentence elements (in bold here) may be placed: • in front of the verb: "The lizard walks
on the ground", "The scorpion bites
with its tail", "They came
to the island", "There are many houses
on the island", "Speak
with me!", "I grew up
on the south side", "I don't want to go
for water", "He caught a big fish
with a hook", "The tiger came out
every morning". • at the end of the sentence (i.e. after the verb): "We are learning Rama
with Nora", "My mother lives in this house
with me", "The man kills the wari
with a lance", "Can you sew a dress
like mine?", "My father brings the silkgrass
into the house", "when he brings the tongs
into the house", "when the oil comes
out of the pot". • or at the beginning of the sentence: "I was born
on Rama Cay", "She took the child
inside the hole", "They put the oil
in the empty pot", "
Tomorrow I will cook meat". Clausal elements (i.e. those containing a verb) usually follow the main verb, e.g. "I am going
to plant corn", "I am looking for meat
to buy", "They are happy
when they hear about the manatee".
Questions Yes/no questions take the same form as the corresponding statement, e.g. "Is your house big?", "Do you live on Rama Cay?", "Do you speak Rama?", "Have you a sister?", "Can you sew a dress like mine?" Such questions may be answered using "Yes" or "No". Some question words (sometimes called wh-words): Question words may be preceded by another sentence constituent as topic, e.g. "Who took the child?" (child who took), "And you, where do you live?" (you, where live). However, question words generally stand at the beginning of the sentence: "Where do you live?" (where you live), "Where does the wari live?" (where wari lives), "Where is Nora's house?" (where Nora GENITIVE house stay), "Where is he/she going?" (where he/she goes), "Where is his/her father going?" (where his/her father goes), "Who speaks our Rama language?" (who our Rama language speaks), "With whom did you go?" (who with you-went). Questions words with a non-verbal predicate: "What is your name?", "How is your family?"
Negation Sentences may be negated by placing after the verb or predicate, e.g. "I do not live on Rama Cay", "You do not speak Rama", "My house is not big", "That dog is not mine", or by placing
aa before the verb, e.g. "They didn't look for the manatee", "I don't want to go". There is a special negative word, , to express impossibility, e.g. "I cannot live in Bluefields".
Coordination and subordination Coordinating conjunctions: "and", "but": "My sister
and my brother live in this house with me", "I have one dog
and you have two cats", "My house is not big, but it is pretty". Subordinate clauses may be formed by means of subordinator suffixes as described above. Reported speech is formed by juxtaposition as in "They found it, they say" ( "find", "say"). Relative clauses also have no specific subordinator but the clause marker may be employed, e.g. "The meat I bought, I gave it to Nelly" (meat I-bought Nelly OBJECT I-gave). == Lexicon ==