The aim of this paper is to get abetter grip on certain propertiesof evidentials in Shabaki. Theproblem the paper will focus onconcerns the interactionbetween evidentials andconditionals, negation,anaphors, tense and aspect.

Evidentials are those means by whichany alleged fact whose truth isinvestigated is established ordisproved. They indicate the source ofevidence for the reality of aproposition. Languages differ greatlywith respect to the sources ofinformation they mark grammatically.

In general, there are three subtypesof evidentiality: direct evidentiality,based on first-hand sensoryevidence; indirect evidentiality,based on second- and third-handevidence; and inferentialevidentiality.

Willet’s taxonomy of evidentials

EPISTEMIC MODALITY: the marking of thespeaker’s degree of certainty and/or thenecessity/possibility of the truth of thepropositional content.

EVIDENTIALITY (narrow view): the grammaticalmarking of the speaker’s source of informationin assertions

The research questions include: Canevidentials be semantically embedded underconditionals and negation? How doesevidential content affect anaphoric relations?And, do evidentials block anaphora in a waysimilar to modals in the absence of additionalmodal operators?

The corpus is based on the data excerptedfrom everyday communication in Shabaki.This language is classified as a modernIranian northwest of the Indo-Iranianfamily spoken at north-east and south-eastplateaus of Mosul, Iraq.

IRAQ, MOSUL, NINIEVAH PLAINS, SHABAK PEOPLE

Shabak people were

displaced by ISIS on

August, 9. 2014

In western research, Shabaki together withZaza-Dimli, Gorani, Gaspian Dialects, SouthDari and Hawramani are classified as a Zaza-Goran dialect of northwestern Kurdishlanguage of the Indo-Iranian family. Anotherview claims that Shabak are the shabankara(or shawankara) Kurds of Fars district in Iran.

Arab writers believe that the name‘Shabaki’ is derived from the Arabic verbshabaka, ‘to intertwine, or interweave’,which reflects their view of Shabaki peopleas a community of heterogeneous originsheld together by allegiance to a commontariqa (Sufi order) and to the same spiritualleaders (Vinogradov,1974 & Bruinessen,1998).

In semantics and pragmatics, thereare two important distinctions.

1. The distinction between truth-conditional content (e.g. entailment)and non-truth-conditional content(e.g. presupposition andimplicature).

2. The distinction between at-issue content and not-at-issuecontent. Non-truth-conditionalcontent is typically not at-issue.But truth-conditional contentcan come in two flavors, as at-issue or not-at-issue.

TESTS FOR TRUTH-CONDITIONALITYScope interaction with propositional-level operators (negation),embeddability in the antecedent ofconditionals and under factivesentences; and challengeability (canthe content be directly assented ordissented with?)

Scope interaction: under negation

(1) a. Aşnaft-am kat-â nasâǧ.‘I heared he was sick.’

(1) b. Ina dro-na, kas inaş na-wât.#‘That’s not true. Nobody said that.’

Evidentiality always scopes outside of negation.

Embeddability in the antecedent of conditionals

Embedding Shabaki evidentials in the antecedent of a conditional is grammatical as in (2) with the reportative.

(2) Aga Ahmad law-â yâna dede-ş, na-da-ş xalât.‘If Ahmad visited his aunt, don’t give a present.’

Embedability under factive verbs

In Shabaki, the cognitive verb ‘zâni’ (infer or come to conclusion) is used to express evidence which is inferred by the speaker. Consider the sentence in (3).

(3) Zân-im muhandas-â.I came to know (inferred) that she was an engineer.

Sentence (3) expresses direct evidential which may take on inferential value based on reasoning or assumption ‘I came to the conclusion that x.’

Scope under propositional attitude predicates

(4) Mâç-â zame larz-â ça amrika. ‘They say there was an earthquake in America.’

(5) Mâç-in-yo zame larz-ân ça Amrika. ‘It is said that there was an earthquake in America.’

(6) Sar qasa-i, dadâ-ş şiş kard. According to the rumor, his grandma married.

Shabaki seems not to allow evidentials under predicates. In above sentence, it is not embedding but quotation because of the impossibility of bound anaphora into such clauses. If the markers can occur below an attitude operator, the evidential information should not be repeated as part of the complement proposition. In contrast, if the marker occurs in the matrix clause, only the thus modified proposition should be asserted, and there is no commitment with respect to the underlying proposition to be true.

Modal subordination (pronominal anaphora)Modal subordination refers to the phenomenon of a modalbeing interpreted semantically subordinate to a modal in apreceding clause and it is best illustrated by anaphoricdependencies.

(7) a. Bâbo-m xâbar-aş kard uzera. ‘My father called yesterday.’

b. [Wât-aş+ brâ-t trombel-aş taqlaş ward. ‘*He said+ my brother had a car crash.’

c. # Brâ-t trombel-aş taqlaş ward. ‘My brother had a car crash.’

The reportative evidential ‘wâtaş’ in (7b) is interpreted anaphorically – the source of the report that ‘My brother had a car crash’ is taken to be my father from (7b). Since the speaker only has reportative evidence that his brother had a car crash, not using the reportative evidential, as in (7c), is infelicitous.

Challengeability and deniability (assent/ dissent)

If an element can be questioned, doubted, rejected or accepted, it contributes to the propositional content of the speech act; otherwise, it should be taken as an illocutionary force indicator.

(8) Mâç-â zame larz-â ça Hawler. ‘They say there was an earthquake in Irbil.’

P: there was an earthquake in Irbil.Evidential: speaker was told that p

CONCLUSIONSThe central claim of this paper is that evidentiality in Shabaki take a wide scope with respect to another, including negation, anaphora, conditionals, modal subordination, attitude predicates, and embedding factive verbs.

Imam Ridha’s maqaam in a Shabaki village

Shabaki people walk to Imam Al-Sajaad’s maqaan on

Imam Hussain’s martyrdom anniversary

Shabaki people memorialize ashura

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