Subordinate Clauses in Skwxwu7mesh: Their Form and Function

Abstract

This paper examines three subordinate clause types in Skwxxwu7mesh: nominalized clauses, conjunctive clauses and /u/ clauses. These three clause types overlap in their syntactic functions. The first two clause types function as complement clauses. All three clause types function as adverbial clauses. I propose that the distribution of these clause types is due to the degree of certainty of the truth of the subordinate clause proposition, whether from the speaker’s perspective or that of the main clause subject.