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Simultaneity.

Ø´Ô koo is often used as an AVP (´Õ¥à kittu) attached to one or more non-finite verbs (AVP's) to indicate that those actions are simultaneous with (either completely, or just partly) another action. Often English `while' can be used to translate this. Sometimes simultaneity is explicitly emphasized by adding emphatic Î ee, as in the first example below.

Because of the multiple semantic interpretations of lexical and aspectual Ø´Ô koo, it is sometimes possible to interpret it in various ways. Sometimes `simultaneous' Ø´Ô koo may be interpreted as `self-affective', i.e. in example 2? above, ؽԥàØ´Ô poottu koo could also mean `having put on' rather than `while wearing', since Ø´Ô poottu-koo does mean `wear' (this is one of those examples mentioned above where Ø´Ô koo has become part of the stem of the lexical entry). The sentences in examples (1) and (4) could be either interpreted as the lexical verb ×´ÔýàØ½Ô kondupoo `take (something)', as simultaneous Ø´Ô koo `while taking, was carrying', or self-affective Ø´Ô koo `was carrying along with him' (for his own benefit). In the first sentence emphatic Î ee serves to block this interpretation. But the ambiguity in such circumstances, if any, is usually trivial.



Vasu Renganathan
Sat Nov 2 21:16:08 EST 1996