Keren Rice

The Optative and *s- and *n- Conjugation Marking in Slave

0. Introduction. In recent work, Athapaskanists (e.g., Kari 1979 and Rice 1983) have proposed a system in which morphemes called conjugation markers occur in the imperfective, perfective, and future modes of the verb. In this model, the optative is the only mode that occurs independent of the conjugation markers. The question to be explored in this article is whether this treatment of the optative as different from the other modes is indeed the correct one. It will be shown that in Slave,2 an Athapaskan language of Canada, the optative patterns like the imperfective and perfective modes in that it too combines with the different conjugation markers. In 1, an overview of the Slave verb is given. The form of two of the conjucation markers, *nand *s-, in the imperfective and perfective is discussed in 2. In 3, it is shown that if the optative is treated as containing conjugation marking, problems in accounting for variation in the form of the optative are easily solved. Finally, in 4, the implications for a model of the verb in Athapaskan in general are explored.

A New Editor at IJAL

It has become tradition for an incoming editor of the International Journal of American Linguistics to publish an introductory statement on beginning their editorship. Franz Boas, writing in 1917 in the first issue of IJAL , edited by Boas and Pliny Earle Goddard, set out the goals for the new journal and the state of the field. His opening sentence sums up what IJAL was conceived to be, and has continued to be, over the years: “The International Journal of American Linguistics will be devoted to the study of American aboriginal languages” (1917:1). Boas outlined a number of reasons such a journal was necessary, reasons that continue to echo over the years. Among these are quality documentation, including a variety of texts, preferably unaffected by bilingualism, and literature. The linguistic goals are many: he outlines issues concerning classification, borrowing, structure, diversity, and effects of bilingualism, among others. And he points out the need for documentation of Latin American languages, an area in which very little work had been done. Boas continued as editor, jointly with Goddard until volume 5, published in 1929, shortly after Goddard’s death, through volume 10, number 3, in 1939, when Carl Voegelin took over with volume 10, number 4. The Journal was published irregularly during Boas’s editorship, apparently coming out when Boas was able to pull together sufficient funds for publication. During Voegelin’s term as editor, however, publication became what it is now: four numbers per year. In his opening editorial, Voegelin compared his goals and perceptions of the field with those of Boas, seeing little reason for change in overall aims, although he sharpened and updated some of the goals. David Rood became editor in 1981, and in his editorial statement, as he looked forward to his term as editor, he stressed that IJAL “will strive to be a source for language facts as well as for the arguments that surround the interpretation of those facts, while also serving those whose interest is not language itself, but psychological or cultural phenomena revealed by language” (1981:189), noting further that the purpose of the Journal is “to provide all sorts of data from the native languages of the Americas, either for their own intrinsic interest, to contribute to our understanding of the history of the languages or the cultures of their speakers, or for the light they can