Embedded questions

This is a much overdue followup to the seminal piece on embedded questions and theta clauses from a couple years ago. These expansions and adjustments quickly developed in the weeks after.

As a reminder, the standard way to say things like "I don't know what you want" or "I wonder where my clock came from" is apparently via nominalization of the sub-clause, thus

ni-na-ilo ka-se-halu
1SG-NEG-know DEF-2SG-want
"I don't know what you want," lit. "I don't know the thing you want"

toko keo ka-sáti-ni (ko-tule)
wonder origin DEF-clock-1SG (NOM-come)
"I wonder where my clock came from," "I wonder about the origin of my clock('s coming)"

Figuring out these structures was a huge relief from my previous anxiety that I might be thoughtlessly calquing IE strategies, but once I had them in hand I realized right away that that fear wasn't really cross-linguistically motivated. A more familiar variety of finite embedded clauses is well represented in languages from many other families, and as such I really don't see a reason to ban them from Koa:

ni-na-ilo [ kea sa se-halu ]
1SG-NEG-know what FOC 2SG-want
"I don't know what you want," "I don't know what it is you want"

toko [ o-kea sa ka-sáti-ni i tule ]
wonder ABL-what FOC DEF-clock-1SG FIN come
"I wonder where my clock comes from," "I wonder where it is that my clock comes from"

As glossed above, these kinds of forms might see slightly different usage pragmatically, feeling a little wordier, possibly softer, possibly less formal.

Entirely new to this discussion are embedded yes/no questions. Here too a finite structure is possible, using ai "whether, or":

ni-na-ilo ai ta-cu-tasi
1SG-NEG-know whether 3SG-IRR-repeat
"I don't know whether it will happen again"

...and again this option exists against another possibility with a nominalized clause headed by one of the infamous ke-compounds: kema "current, ongoing," kesi "past," kecu "future, what would/will be," kete "possibility," kelu "desire," keki "necessity." Thus

ni-na-ilo kecu ko-ta-tasi
1SG-NEG-know future NOM-3SG-repeat
"I don't know whether it will happen again," lit. "I don't know the future of its happening again"

Similarly, with the other types:

kema kotatasi "whether it is/was happening again"
kesi kotatasi "whether it had happened again"
kete kotatasi "whether it could happen again"
kelu kotatasi "whether there was a desire for it to happen again"
keki kotatasi "whether it has to happen again

Any of these could be rephrased with ai and the particle in question within the clause rather than outside it: kete kotatasi = ai tatetasi "whether it could happen again, whether there's a possibility of it happening again." Here I have the sense -- which as usual will have to be confirmed in time by usage -- that the ai-type clauses may be more comfortable and vernacular, the ke-clauses more literary.

Obiter: in the original theta clause post, I was omitting the nominalizer ko in the embedded clauses with ke-compounds (i.e. just kete tatasi rather than kete kotatasi). I'm unclear on why I did this, and at this point I think it was either just a mistake...or I was getting a little ahead of myself with an experimental idea that ko might be optional in clauses lacking a nominal subject. In this event, we could also have e.g. niilo selóhani "I know you love me" alongside niilo koselóhani "I know that you love me." I'm not sure yet what the implications of this would be for parseability, so an official verdict is pending more rigorous exploration.