The Khoekhoe languages
Work on Khoe languages has traditionally been confined largely to Nama, in terms of its number of speakers the most important Khoe language. The present paper is confined to non-Khoekhoe languages, even if the phenomena discussed can be observed in a similar way in the Khoekhoe languages Nama, !Ora, and Xiri. The structure of pgn use in Nama as well as the other Khoekhoe languages requires a separate analysis; nevertheless, the following rough remarks on pgn marking in Nama may be helpful:
Pgn marking on nouns has been generalized to the extent that Nama nouns do not normally occur without a pgn. In this respect, Nama has proceeded further than any of the languages examined above (see Vossen 1997:246).
Similarly, personal pronouns in Nama have reached at least the same stage of evolution as personal pronouns in Naro, that is, they consist almost invariably of a pgn plus an additional pronominal element.
At the same time, pgn use has not spread to pre-nominal modifiers (and determiners) like adjectives, demonstratives etc., as illustrated by the examples in (1). Nevertheless, Nama has developed a fairly rigid pattern of post-nominal modification where pgn use is obligatory. Thus, there are two patterns of nominal modification, the structure of which is sketched in (2) reprinted below for convenience as (3).
(1)
(2)
(3)
