Differential Case Marking in Bodo

Abstract

Bodo exhibits differential case marking for its subject and object arguments. In Bodo, subject marking is obligatory with inanimate subjects of stative verbs and animate subjects of dynamic verbs. Object marking, on the other hand, is obligatory with human and proper nouns. As for pronouns, the split is along the lines of person. The 3rd person subject gets obligatory marking, whereas in all other cases, subject and object marking on pronouns remains optional. Like in many other Tibeto-Burman languages, which exhibit optional case marking, the choices for subject and object marking depend on various semantic or pragmatic factors. One crucial factor in which the subject is case marked in Bodo include whether the subject involvement is conceived as an event or state, and the speaker’s knowledge of the subject involved in an event or state. Other crucial factors for object marking include the specificity of the object, the degree of affectedness of the object, and contrastive focus.