This dissertation describes and analyzes the morphology and syntax of verbal agreement in Uab Meto, an Austronesian language of Indonesia and Timor-Leste. The introduction provides background on Uab Meto, its speakers, and previous work on the language. Then the dissertation presents analyses of several aspects of Uab Meto grammar. The second chapter analyzes the syntactic structure of Uab Meto verbs and the morphology and allomorphy of elements within it, except agreement. The third chapter analyzes the allomorphy displayed by the language’s verbal agreement prefixes. The fourth chapter analyzes the syntax of these agreement prefixes in a broader clausal context. Finally, the conclusion summarizes the main findings from these analyses and suggests directions for future work.
These analyses yield several interesting findings. Firstly, the allomorphy of the verbal agreement prefixes demonstrates conditioning by non-linearly adjacent morphemes, grammatical conditioning from lower morphemes, and conditioning by multi-morpheme constituents. These types of conditioning occur when the relevant morpheme or constituent of morphemes is structurally adjacent to the agreement prefix. The dissertation proposes a modified Obliteration operation to create structural adjacency when intervening morphemes are null. Secondly, the syntax of verbal agreement demonstrates that agreement can be nominative-aligned (i.e. prefer to target subjects) but sit in a low position below tense-aspect-mood markers and negation. This dissertation places this agreement on an independent Agr head immediately above Voice. Nominative case is still assigned by T, and this divorcing of case and agreement leads to several differences in agreement behavior from “high nominative” languages like English that link case and agreement to the same head. Ultimately, all of these findings illustrate the benefits of working with speakers of understudied languages. This research increases the documentation of Uab Meto, and it provides novel data that expand our understanding of what is possible in language.