Noun Incorporation in Bribri

Based on both published sources and working sessions with a native speaker and language expert, this article examines noun incorporation (NI) in Bribri (Chibchan, Costa Rica). While many incorporated nouns are body-part terms in the language, numerous other nouns also occur. In Mithun’s (1984) terms, Bribri has NI structures belonging to Types I (intransitivizing; ‘leg-hit’ > ‘dance’), II (argument-structure rearranging; ‘tongue-drink’ > ‘lick’), and IV (classificatory; ‘feather-drink’ > ‘defeather’). We have also identified a related phenomenon (‘debt-stab on’ > ‘blame’) that is heavily restricted and shows parallels to antipassives or transitivity-discord constructions. In Baker et al.’s (2005) terms, Bribri NI is similar to its counterparts in Mapudungun or Nahuatl (rather than to NI in Mohawk and Tiwa).