Datapoint Bislama/Expletive subject of existential verb

There is considerable discussion in the literature on Bislama (and related languages) about what the best linguistic characterization of i (as in i luk) is. Meyerhoff (2000a) considers the various analyses that have been proposed and argues from the distribution of single pronoun, focused pronouns and null subjects that i (and oli) are not pronominal. Meyerhoff (2000a, b) calls them "agreement", another reasonable alternative is "predicate marker" (if it is understood that the form of the marker is related to the person and number of the subject).

Values

An expletive subject is not used

Example 23-107:
long ples ia i no gat fulap si ok
long
prep
ples
place
ia
def
i
agr
no
neg
gat
have
fulap
full.up
si
sea
ok
oak
Around here, there aren't very many sea oaks.

Source: Meyerhoff nd

Confidence:
Very certain