Locations in time and space in te reo

Friday, 28 June 2019

Once you have mastered the distinction between personal and location nouns, the journey towards speaking te reo is much simpler.

In earlier columns some coverage has been given to the use of personal pronouns in te reo Māori, and it was mentioned that consideration of what are called 'location nouns' would follow.

But firstly, to restate the overall principle involved here: in English two main classes of noun are recognised: common nouns and proper nouns. In te reo Māori three main classes are recognised: common nouns, personal nouns and location nouns.

In English, names of people and of places are all included in the single class of proper nouns. But in te reo names of people (and things, such as houses for instance, which have been given personal names) are identified as personal nouns, whilst names of places are classed as location nouns.

The reason for this distinction is because the constructions in which each of the two types of are used are quite different, one from the other. The distinction is explained clearly and simply in Bruce Biggs' Let's Learn Maori.

**READ MORE:

* Classifying base words in te reo

* The simplicity of verbs in te reo Māori

* More on kei and i and some notes on dialects**

Personal nouns, or 'personals', are base words which are (as explained previously) directly preceded by the personal article a after the location particle ki; whereas location nouns, or 'locatives', which are the focus of this week's column, are the only base words which can follow the location particle ki directly.

Sentences in which a name of a town is used are usually quite straightforward: e.g. Ka haere / au / ki Oamaru / āpōpō. ('I will go to Oamaru tomorrow.').

All place-names are classified as location nouns - but there is also a small sub-group of twenty or so frequently used words quite unlike any English words in the manner of their use. They refer to locations in space and time. Six of the most common are: runga, raro, roto, waho, mua and muri.

Making use of the question-word whea? which asks about location in space, and remembering that the four location particles are kei, i, hei and ki, the following exchange may be considered: Kei whea / tāku pukapuka? ('At where / my book?' = 'Where is my book?') Kei runga / i te tepu. ('At topside / of the table.' = 'On the table.')

Because, in translating the answer into idiomatic English, a simple preposition ('on') is used, phrases such as kei runga have sometimes been described as 'complex prepositions'. This would seem confusing. Just because the best translation is a preposition doesn't mean that the Māori phrase kei runga is a preposition.

The word runga is a noun and the phrase kei runga is a complete noun phrase.

Further discussion of this interesting set of words (runga, raro and others) is intended for next time.