Languages may or may not differ in their marking of the comitative (‘with’) function and the conjunction of noun phrases. Those that use the comitative, rather than a distinct ‘and’ strategy, to express nominal conjunction are known as with-languages. In languages of this type, there is no formal distinction between ‘A and B’ and ‘A with B.’[1] To identify the type a given language falls into, only the conjunction of two nominal constituents, not more, should be considered. If the strategy used for the conjunction of two nominal constituents differs from that of more than two (for example, medial connectives can only appear between the first or last two constituents in the list), this should be noted in the commentary.
Types:
Juxta: Juxtaposition (zero-marking) is used to express both nominal conjunction and the comitative. This type of structure is also known as asyndeton.
JuxtaN&DM: Juxtaposition (zero-marking) is used to express nominal conjunction; dependent marking (DM) is used to express the comitative.[2]
JuxtaN&HM: Juxtaposition (zero-marking) is used to express nominal conjunction; head marking (HM) is used to express the comitative.[3]
Conn: A medial connective is used to express both nominal conjunction and the comitative.
ConnN&DM: A medial connective is used to express nominal conjunction; dependent marking is used to express the comitative.
ConnN&HM: A medial connective is used to express nominal conjunction; head marking is used to express the comitative.
MorfRepet: All constituents in a nominal conjunction or comitative construction are marked by the same affix or adposition. This type of structure is also known as polysyndeton.
MorfRepet&DM: All constituents in a nominal conjunction are marked by the same affix or adposition; dependent marking is used to express the comitative.
MorfRepet&HM: All constituents in a nominal conjunction are marked by the same affix or adposition; head marking is used to express the comitative.
Monomorf: One constituent in a nominal conjunction or comitative construction is marked by an affix or adposition. This type of structure is also known as monosyndeton.
Monomorf&DM: One constituent in a nominal conjunction is marked by an affix or adposition; dependent marking is used to mark the comitative.
Monomorf&HM: One constituent in a nominal conjunction is marked by an affix or adposition; head marking is used to express the comitative.
[1] With-languages sometimes distinguish these two functions without developing into and-languages. This can manifest in any of the following ways: (1) the use of word order (one noun appears closer to the other in the ‘and’ construction than it would in the equivalent ‘with’ construction); (2) differences in verbal agreement (for example, the dual is used instead of the singular to express an ‘and’ function); (3) the duplication of an otherwise identical marker, to express the function ‘and.’ Any such distinctions should be described in the commentary.
[2] Dependent marking can be identified by the use of an adposition and/or affix on the dependent constituent.
[3] When HM is used to express the comitative, the comitative marker is incorporated into the predicate. In some cases, the predicate becomes transitive and the companion functions as the object of the resulting transitive verb. This phenomenon can be clearly identified in languages that use serial verbs: a verb with the meaning ‘accompany’ or ‘follow’ attaches to the main verb, and the object of this verb is the companion.