Inflectional Verbal Morphology

There are two potential verb templates in Sereer. The first is used in almost all TAM situations:

Main verb template:

Auxiliary verb (aspect) | Subject | STEM | Derivation | Tense | 1sg/2sg subject* | =Object

Negation is not listed in the table, because it is always a portmanteau with tense when marked. A 1sg or 2sg subject is only marked as a suffix when no preverbal morphology (i.e., an aspectual auxiliary verb) is present. Otherwise, 1sg/2sg subjects are marked in prefixes, like the rest of subject marking always is.

The second type of verbal template used marks subject in a different place. So far, this only happens when the auxiliary xe/we 'progressive' is used:

xe/we verb template:

Subject (all) | xe/we | STEM | Derivation | Tense | =Object

Person Marking

Subject Marking

Sereer verbs agree with subject; the following table shows the basic subject marking paradigm, which occurs when no pre-verbal morphology is present:

Basic subject marking:

Gloss	Sereer	Gloss	Sereer
1SG	-m	1PL	i-[mut]
2SG	-'	2PL	nu-[mut]
3SG	a-	3PL	a-[mut]

Singular and plural forms for first, second, and third person are all distinguished from each other. The only distinguishing characteristic between singular and plural third person, however, is the stem-initial consonant mutation of the verb stem. Initial consonant mutation occurs with all plural subjects.

The paradigm above is one of many: type of subject agreement is conditioned (at least) by clause type, negation, focus, and presence or absence of auxiliaries. Most subject agreement morphemes within these paradigms are prefixes. Regardless of subject agreement type, all plural subjects trigger verb stem-initial consonant mutation.

When the preverbal aspect marker xe/we is present, a different subject marking paradigm occurs:

Subject marking with xe/we:

Gloss	Sereer	Gloss	Sereer
	-xe		-we
1SG	me-	1PL	in-
2SG	we-	2PL	nuun-
3SG	a-	3PL	a-

With the auxiliary verb xan, or special preverbal clitic kan, subject marking always occurs immediately before the verb stem:

Subject marking with xan or kan:

Gloss	Sereer	Gloss	Sereer
1SG	-m	1PL	i-[mut]
2SG	o-	2PL	nu-[mut]
3SG	a-	3PL	a-[mut]

The first person subject marker, -m, replaces the final /n/ of xan or kan, and alternates with a zero 1sg subject marker.

Object marking

Sereer object marking varies based on how the subject is marked (which in turn varies based on tense/aspect marking). When there is no pre-verbal morphology and the subject is 3S, 1P, 2P, or 3P, the 'basic' subject marking appears, which can the following objects:

Basic object marking:

Gloss	Sereer	Gloss	Sereer
1SG	-xam	1PL	(a) 'in
2SG	-ng	2P	(a) nuun
3SG	-n	3P	(a) den

The singular objects are best analyzed as suffixes, because they display morphophonological interactions with other person-marking suffixes, and are always marked in the same place relative to the verb. The plural objects never show such alternations, and they are preceded by the object marker a. Additionally, other words can intervene between them and the verb. For example

<gl fontsize=11> anafana a Jegaan a den \gll a= naf-an-a a Jegaan a den 3sg.sbj= hit-ben-fv obj Jegaan obj 3pl \trans He hits them for Jegan (130) </gl>

So, it seems that the plural object series is not bound as the singular object series is. However, it turns out that other facts point to both series being syntactic clitics with different morphological states. The evidence comes from certain subordinate clauses, where an object marker can appear attached to either the verb that is thematically associated with or with a higher verb:

<gl fontsize=11> bugaam owarong \gll bug-aam o-war-ong want-1sg.sbj infin-kill-2sg.obj \trans I want to kill you. (155) </gl>

<gl fontsize=11> bugaxong owar \gll bug-a-xong o-war want-fv-1sg>2sg infin-kill \trans I want to kill you. (155) </gl>

In (2), the object suffix appears on war 'kill', but in (3) it attaches to bug 'want'. This can also occur with the plural series:

<gl fontsize=11> buga (o)foon a in \gll bug-a o-foon a in want-2sg.sbj infin-kiss obj 1pl \trans You want to kiss us. (155) </gl>

<gl fontsize=11> buga (a) in owar \gll bug-a (a) in o-foon want-2sg.sbj obj 1pl infin-kill \trans You want to kiss us. (155) </gl>

This `climbing' cannot occur with a lexical object: *buga (a) Jegan ofoon 'You want to kiss Jegan' We should conclude that both series are clitics that attach to their hosts in different ways.

Basic object marking is altered when the subject is 1sg or 2sg. This is because these subjects are marked as post-verbal suffixes, and so these suffixes interact with the the singular object suffixes:

Objects of a 1sg subject:

Gloss	Sereer	Gloss	Sereer
1SG>2SG	-xong	1SG>2P	=nuun
1SG>3SG	-num	1SG>3P	=den

In -xong, the -x- is analyzable as a 1sg marker, and -ong as marking for 2sg. Likewise, in -num, -n could mark for 3sg, and -um could mark 1sg.

The 2sg subject::object paradigm has similarly analyzable parts:

Objects of a 2sg subject:

Gloss	Sereer	Gloss	Sereer
2SG>1SG	-xamo	2SG>1PL	='in
2SG>3SG	-no'	2SG>3P	=den

The -xam- in -xamo marks for 1sg, and -o is a 2sg marker; -n in -no' marks for 3sg, and -o' marks for 2sg. For all of these markers, except -xong, 1sg>2sg, the object marking comes inside the subject marking. This is the opposite order than what is normally expected.

Reflexivity

Reflexive verbs are always marked by xoox-, which is synchronically or diachronically derived from the word xoox- ‘head’. When it acts as a reflexive pronoun, xoox- displays no consonant alternations between singular and plural forms (which is not the case for the normal noun), and is always marked for person with the regular nominal possessive markers:

1SG || xooxes || 1P || xoox'in

Reflexive pronouns:

Gloss	Sereer	Gloss	Sereer
2SG	xooxof	2P	xooxnun
3SG	xooxum	3P	xooxden

Things that we need to talk about (--Nico 07:56, 30 November 2012 (UTC))

• Suffixes or clitics?

I think the singulars are suffixes (there are morphophonological interactions between them and other suffixes) and the plurals ((a)'in, (a)nuun, (a)den) are enclitics. Things can intervene between (say) aden and a verb. (a nafana aJegaan aden, "I hit them for Jegaan".) If no one argues I might find the time to implement this interpretation here. Faytak 22:32, 14 December 2012 (UTC)

• Movement of the object markers from one verb to another (clitic climbing?)
• -xong vs. -ong, -xam vs. -um/-am, etc.

Either -x- is a first-person marker that isn't analyzable out from -xong, or it's some sort of phonologically optimizing allomorphy. Faytak 22:32, 14 December 2012 (UTC)

Tense and aspect

Tense

Matrix verbs are obligatorily marked for either tense or aspect in Sereer, and are often marked for both. The three tense markers are suffixes:

Typical subject marking:

Gloss	Sereer
Simple past	-'a
Proximal	-aa
Progressive past	-eega

The suffix -aa is glossed as proximal tense. It marks events that happened temporally close to the speech act, which includes the present or recent past. Events outside of the recent past-present time frame cannot be marked with -aa. The future aspect when marked with xan, however, can take -aa marking to indicate future progressive.

The auxiliary verb xan can also appear by itself without any suffix aspect marking, and is glossed as the simple future.

Another auxiliary, kan, behaves similarly to xan with regards to subject marking and position relative to the verb, but whose semantic applications are quite different. So far, the best gloss of kan is as a marker of predicate focus.

The proclitic progressive aspect marker xe/we must occur with either proximal tense or progressive past tense. With proximal tense -aa, xe/we is glossed as present progressive, and is past progressive with -eega. xe/we has special person marking; see the section on subject marking.

For paradigms of tense and aspect inflection, see example verb paradigms.

Proximal Tense

Sample proximal-tense verbal paradigm:

Proximal:

Gloss	Sereer	Gloss	Sereer
1sg- 'I run'	ʄuufaam	1pl- 'we run'	iƈuufaa
2sg- 'you run'	ʄuufaa'	2pl- 'you all run'	nuƈuufaa
3sg- 'he runs'	ʄuufaa	3pl- 'they run'	aƈuufaa

Past Tense

Sample past-tense verbal paradigm:

Proximal:

Gloss	Sereer	Gloss	Sereer
1sg- 'I ran'	ʄuuf'aam	1pl- 'we ran'	iƈuuf'aa
2sg- 'you ran'	ʄuuf'aa'	2pl- 'you all ran'	nuƈuuf'aa
3sg 'he ran'	ʄuuf'aa	3pl- 'they ran'	aƈuuf'aa

Past Progressive Tense

Proximal:

Gloss	Sereer	Gloss	Sereer
1sg- 'I was running'	ʄuufeegam	1pl- 'we were running'	iƈuufeega
2sg- 'you were running'	ʄuufeega'	2pl- 'you all were running'	nuƈuufeega
3sg 'he was running'	ʄuufeegaa	3pl- 'they were running'	aƈuufeega

Aspect

Two auxiliary verbs, xe/we 'progressive', and xan 'future', mark aspect in Sereer. The auxiliary xe/we takes special subject marking (see the section on Subject marking), and can occur with the proximal or past progressive tense. The auxiliary xan takes a different type of exceptional person marking, and can occur without a tense suffix or with the proximal tense suffix (for a future progressive reading).

TAM Combinations

The suffixal tenses and pre-verbal auxiliary aspects can be combined in the following ways:

TAM combinations:

Pre-verbal	Root	Post-verbal	Gloss
	_	-aa	proximal
	_	-'a	past
	_	-eega	progressive past
xe/we	_	-aa	present progressive
xe/we	_	-eega	progressive past
xan	_		future
xan	_	-aa	future progressive

Examples of TAM combinations

The following are examples of each attested TAM combination in Sereer thus far:

Present progressive:

me-xe lac-a

1s-prg. ask-non.past

‘I’m asking’

Proximal:

ŋas-aa-m

play-non.past-1s

‘I play’

Future progressive:

xan naf-a a Jegan

future hit-non.past Obj Jegan

‘I will be hitting Jegan repeatedly’

Future:

xan naf a Jegan

future hit Obj Jegan

‘I will hit Jegan (once)'

Past:

sob ’a-m

be.clumsy past-1s

‘I was clumsy’

Progressive past (1):

fec-eega-m

dance-prg.past-1s

‘I used to dance’

Progressive past (2):

me-xe fool-eega

1s-prg. jump-pst.prg

‘I was jumping (repeatedly)’

Stem-initial consonant mutation

See Phonological Alternations.