The <i>la</i>-form: Russian verbs in Nanai speech

Nanai speakers who are fluent both in Nanai and Russian use verb forms with a Russian root and the suffix - la (called further “ la -forms”) in their speech. The status of - la is under question: on the one hand, it resembles the Russian past tense form (- l ), on the other hand, it can be interpreted as the Nanai derivational suffix - la /- lə , which is used in Standard Nanai for the verbalization of nouns. We argue that in modern Nanai this case turns out to be a complicated one, and that la -forms are maintained due to their links with both of these sources.