Himalayan Linguistics

This paper explores a special pronoun, the locutor-referential pronoun tha in Zhoutun, a Tibetanized Chinese variant spoken in the Amdo Sprachbund. Two rules of the use of tha are found in this paper. Rule 1: If tha occurs in a complement clause of a speech verb, it refers to the internal locutor. Rule 2: If tha occurs in an environment other than a complement clause of a speech verb, it refers to the narrative locutor. If only rule 1 is followed, then tha can be considered a logophoric pronoun; however, the speciality of tha lies in the fact that it can also be used in the context to which rule 2 applies, a usage that does not fit the definition of a logophoric pronoun. The use of tha is not obligatory. An inherited form from Mandarin Chinese, the formation of the locutor-referential tha has to do with the contact with Amdo Tibetan and its probable evolving pathway is “third-person pronoun> logophoric pronoun> locutor-referential pronoun”.