This study is a description, analysis, and contextualization of relative clauses and adnominal possessive constructions in the Cushitic language Oromo (Afaan Oromoo) spoken in Ethiopia, which are of interest for language typology. First, SOV order is combined with postnominal possessors, which is only attested in a few languages, such as Kurdish. Second, both relative clauses and adnominal possessive constructions involve the uninflected particle kan, which represents a relatively rare conflation pattern. The study shows that the first feature is inherited and can be observed in many other Lowland East Cushitic languages. The particle kan represents a recent grammaticalization from the demonstrative kana ‘this’. The study argues that a weak morphosyntactic differentiation between relative clauses and adnominal possession is a likely source of both the emergence and, in the case of Oromo, the retention of cross-linguistically rare word order patterns. A parallel can be found in East Asian languages such as Mandarin, which exhibit an even rarer and complementary combination of (S)VO order with prenominal relative clauses and also show syncretism of relative and genitive markers.
This study examines synchronic variation in the syllable structure of Igede, an Idomoid language spoken in Nigeria and concludes that the syllable structure of the language is currently undergoing change. Existing body of work on the language as far back as Bergman (1971) show that Igede has the V, CV, and N syllable types. Without necessarily focusing on the syllable, patterns in the Igede data in other works conform to these syllable structures (Abiodun 1989, 1991, 2005; Anyogo 2012). However, data from twelve competent speakers recorded between 2021 and 2023 show that the language is currently developing a CrV (CCV) structure. The CrV structure is evolving where V1 gets elided in a C1V1C2V2 sequence. There are two main characteristics to this variation, namely (i) V1 is one of the high vowels /i/, /ɪ/, /u/ and /ʊ/, and (ii) C2 is strictly a /r/. The summary of this is that in a disyllabic word where a high vowel as the nucleus of a CV syllable is immediately followed by /r/ in the onset of a following CV syllable, the high vowel is elided. The result of this elision is the reduction of two contiguous CVCV syllables to only one having the CrV structure. The description of the CrV structure is complemented with acoustic analysis with the use of PRAAT. This CrV structure is systematic and consistent in the speech of all the twelve speakers that participated in this study. It is therefore concluded that this is a case of change in progress. The current stage of the change is modelled using Optimality Theory.
Ndam (Eastern Chadic, ISO [ndm]) displays an array of seven or nine surface vowels. However, the distribution and behavior of these vowels, as evidenced from morphophonemic data, shows that the inventory can be reduced to two basic vowels, /ə/ and /a/, if the operation of two prosodies is also admitted. These prosodies, labialization and palatalization, are distinctive units in the phonology of the language, as well as the two basic vowels; together, they account for the full range of surface vowels and their alternations, as shown in this article. The prosodic analysis, a hallmark of the analysis of Central Chadic languages, provides another example of an Eastern Chadic language which exploits prosodies in its phonology (see Roberts 2009). The article concludes by claiming that Chadic vowel systems are all rectangular, with a fundamental dichotomy between high and non-high vowels. The conclusion also warns of the dangers of confusing the two vowels [ɨ] and [ə] in the transcription of Chadic languages.
The goal of this paper is to give a typological overview of the main characteristics of restrictive relative clauses in Gavar. The analysis is based on 572 examples of relative clauses taken from a corpus of 59 interlinearised texts, elicited examples and example sentence provided for lexical items. It is observed that relative clauses in Gavar are externally headed, with the head noun, when present, preceding the relative clause. Headless relative clauses are also possible. The relative clause begins with a relative marker. Subject relative clauses are marked with the relative marker ma whose tone varies between high and low. Non-subject relative clauses are marked with relative marker ndə́ (ná) which always carries a high tone. There is no restriction on the grammatical roles that can be relativised. Subject, direct and indirect object, oblique, genitive and object of comparison relative clauses are all possible. The gap strategy is used to encode NPrel within a subject relative clause. A resumptive pronoun is frequently but not always used to encode NPrel within a non-subject relative clause. Gavar does not have special ‘relative’ tense/aspect marking, but perfective marking on the verb is disallowed in relative clauses. The existential status of the head noun is coded by the use versus the absence of a post-relative demonstrative. Subject relative clauses with an adjectival predicate form the basis of the comparative construction in Gavar. Non-subject relative clause constructions have developed into various types of adverbial clauses.
We undertake an initial crosslinguistic comparison of formal coding linked to the functions of phasal aspect in selected languages from West Chadic and West Benue Congo. Canonical phasal aspect types are semantically characterized as INITIATION, TERMINATION, and CONTINUATION. We consider phasal and non-phasal forms, the latter having similar positional limitations as phasal aspect expressions. In Hausa and Miya, phasal aspect is coded by verbs and an immediately following complement. Hausa phasal verbs take truncated sentence-complements, gerundives or participles, or sentence-complements, while those in Miya show truncation or parataxis. In the same slot as phasal aspect forms Hausa exhibits verbs that do not convey aspectuality. Instead, they provide either temporal interpretations of various kinds, frequency, duration, habituality, or meanings that are capacitive or quantitative in nature. In Emai of West Benue Congo, phasal aspect is coded by verbs with truncated complements and by grammatical morphemes. The latter code canonical phasal aspect and precede the main verb. In the same pre-verb position, Emai and other West Benue Congo languages exhibit grammatical morphemes that show non-canonical phasal aspect: temporal interpretations as well as capacitive, volitive, or quantitative meanings. We conclude that canonical phasal aspect forms and similarly positioned but non-phasal forms in West Africa provide fertile ground for further crosslinguistic comparison.
Dans la région Extrême-Nord du Cameroun, les Guiziga sont sans doute la population la plus intimement imbriquée avec les Peuls. Ils occupent ensemble la vaste plaine du Diamaré, jusqu’aux piémonts des monts Mandara. Si leur longue cohabitation n’a pas toujours été idyllique, leurs langues respectives en ont tiré profit en s’empruntant mutuellement de nombreux vocables. En outre, le fulfulde, langue de nomades à l’origine, riche de nombreux contacts historiques, a permis à la langue giziga de recevoir des apports lexicaux de nombreuses autres langues (arabe, kanuri, hausa, anglais, etc.).
This article explores lexical contact between Cushitic and Nilotic taking the proposed Cushitic language Proto Baz as point of departure. Proto Baz is a putative East Cushitic language proposed by Heine, Rottland & Vossen (1979), on the basis of words borrowed into South Nilotic. Some of the loans were already pointed out by Ehret (1970, 1971, 1974). A critical assessment of the proposed loans shows that there is more diversity in their origin than formerly thought, and that it is in fact not necessary to assume the existence of a separate language (Proto Baz) to account for the loans. Instead, the loans came from various reconstructed stages of existing Cushitic languages. We discuss different contact situations between groups of East Cushitic and South Nilotic languages, as well as the recurring challenges in historical interpretation of the available evidence. The Appendix provides the reader with an overview of the discussed lexical items from earlier sources and new proposed analyses.
The present article is dedicated to the documentation of conative animal calls (CACs) in Mokpe and Oroko (Bantu Zone A) and the analysis of the cognancy / phylogenetic relatedness of these constructions. The examination of original data demonstrates that the CAC categories in both languages comply with synchronic and diachronic tendencies characterizing CACs in the world’s languages. Primary CACs closely match the prototype of CACs and can be regarded as its canonical instantiations; secondary CACs may violate the prototypical features, which is also regular from a typological perspective. Furthermore, the comparison of Mokpe and Oroko CACs reveals the low cognancy of CACs in the two languages. The greater similarity exhibited by primary tokens than is the case of secondary ones does not stem from shared ancestry, but is more likely due to parallel developments and the exploitation of fully motivated, typologically common strategies.
This paper aims to systematically analyze the formal marking of numbers on common nouns and adjectives of Sidaama, a Highland East Cushitic (HEC hereafter) language spoken in Ethiopia. There are three formal categories of number in Sidaama: basic form, singulative, and plurative. The basic form is a form of a noun that is not marked for number; a singulative denotes a single referent, and a plurative marks multiple referents. The singulative of nouns is usually marked either by -ʧ-o ~ -ʧʧ-o. There are also a few nouns that contain the formatives -ʃ-o, -ʧ-o, and -k-o as markers of the singulative. Such forms arose from the merging of the final consonant of the nominal root with the initial -ʧ of the singulative. Unlike nouns, singulative is marked only on a handful of adjectives. Five types of nominals and six types of adjectival pluratives are identified. All of them are suffixal, and two of them involve the copying of a root-final consonant. Sidaama has inherently singular nouns that usually denote humans and higher animals. In such nouns, their basic form marks a single referent. The language also contains inherently plural nouns that refer to a collective of entities or a group. Few nouns are transnumeral; in their basic form, they can refer to either a single entity or plural entities.
This paper examines verb data from five Chadic languages of Chad, in order to show the extent to which the prosodies of labialization (LAB) and palatalization (PAL) are relevant to the synchronic analysis of their phonologies. Previous studies have established the synchronic functioning of prosodies in Chadic languages of the Central branch, but not for other branches of the family. Of the languages considered in this paper, one (Heɗe) is from the Masa branch, the other four from the Eastern branch: Somrai, Gabri, and Kabalay from the Chari-Logone subbranch, and Mawa from the Guéra subbranch. In Heɗe and Somrai, the vowel system can be reduced to a single underlying /a/, similar to the analysis claimed for many Central Chadic languages. Epenthetic [ɨ] is added to separate between consonants, and the distinctive prosodic features of LAB and PAL blanket whole words, creating a full set of surface vowels. A consequence of such a system is that high vowels like [ɨ] are marginal, while only the nonhigh vowel /a/ is fully phonemic. Gabri displays these characteristics, but to quite a lesser degree; in this language, pal also seems to play a limited morphological role. The vowel system of Kabalay again shows a dichotomy in behavior between high and nonhigh vowels, but there is only a hint that prosodies are relevant. Mawa clearly shows that the vowel /a/ can be affected by LAB and PAL, but these prosodies do not interact with the seven other phonemic vowels. The article concludes by suggesting that the LAB and PAL prosodies must have functioned in Proto-Chadic, although they have been lost to differing degrees in individual languages in the Chadic languages of Chad.
STAMP morphs, prefix conjugations and the multiverb predicate subtype called auxiliary verb constructions (AVCs) that these derive from in the Chadic languages are discussed. Chadic languages are typically SVO (or VSO) and typically AUX V syntactically. Synchronically complex verb forms which derived etymologically from AVCs are also discussed. Across all subgroups of Chadic (but most common in West and Central), subject pronouns have sometimes fused with auxiliaries that have eroded to only a tone or floating tone or have become completely opaque synchronically. In recent Africanist typological studies these have been called STAMP morphs. These occur in different inflectional configurations across the languages of the family speaking to their origins as AVCs. There are at least ten STAMP morph series in Guus (Sigidi) (Caron 2002). In some Chadic languages like Mbuko, STAMP morphs have later fused with lexical verbs to create prefixal conjugations. This process of deriving prefix conjugations from fused STAMP morph constructions has happened repeatedly in the history of Chadic. This is a major reason why Chadic prefixal conjugations are not directly inherited from Proto-Afroasiatic.
Proto-Benue-Congo has been reconstructed both with a simple velar nasal *ŋ and with the velar nasal as part of a *ŋg structure. The loss of the simple velar nasal has been noticed as a feature of Bantu languages but has not been studied in other Bantoid groups. This paper considers the lexemes for which this phoneme has been reconstructed and then examines the subsequent development of the velar nasal in several groups. The results vary from preservation in Ekoid to near absence in Bantu. The phonological loss of velar nasals is not surprising, as parallels demonstrate. Rather the question arises of why certain languages only preserve remnants of the original velar nasal, and a partial answer is connected to suffixation and cluster formation.
Review of Christoph Marx. 2021. Von Berlin nach Timbuktu – Der Afrikaforscher Heinrich Barth – Biographie.
The Bantoid languages are a body of some 150-200 languages positioned geographically between Nigeria and Cameroun. They do not form a genetic group, but all are in some way related to Bantu more closely than other branches of Benue-Congo. The most well-known branches are Dakoid, Mambiloid, Tivoid, Beboid, Grassfields, and Ekoid. Bendi, formerly Cross River, may be Bantoid, while Jarawan is probably Narrow Bantu. Their classification is controversial. Due to their inaccessibility, many are poorly described. The article summarises the literature on their classification and main linguistic features, and in particular how these relate to Bantu. It also includes a brief survey of endangerment of smaller languages and the state of literacy development. Their main typological characteristics include S (AUX) OV word order, functioning or fossilised nominal affixing and concord (sometimes alliterative), suffixed verbal extensions, ATR vowel harmony and labial-velars in the phonology. Some languages have developed highly complex tone-systems as a result of extreme erosion of segmental material.
This paper provides new information on patterns of consonant mutation and vowel ablaut found in the numeral systems of four language varieties of the Lower Fungom region of Cameroon. This phenomenon is of interest in the context of the comparative investigation of noun class marking in Niger-Congo languages, and a particularly noteworthy pattern found in some of the varieties are apparent cases of mutated numeral roots being analogically extended to contexts where they would not be predicted to be found on the basis of regular patterns of sound change.
Alongside a reduced gender system of the Bantoid type, the Eastern Grassfields language Ngəmba (Cameroon) of the Ghomala’ cluster operates an incipient numeral classifier system that is restricted to a given set of nouns. The present paper provides a first analysis of its semantic, morphosyntactic and etymological profile and explores its relation to the concurrent gender system following the model of Fedden & Corbett 2017. Semantically, Ngəmba numeral classifiers categorize counted items for their shape and texture (saliently one-dimensional long and rigid vs. two-dimensional flat shape vs. three-dimensional globular), their partition (morsel vs. lump vs. slice) and their arrangement or aggregation (pile vs. bunch vs. tuft) with an instance of conflation with the notion of counterexpectual scantiness and inferior quality (meagre portion). On the etymological level, Ngəmba numeral classifiers develop from ordinary generic nouns denoting concepts such as head, horn, grain, stick, pod, pile and lump. Eventual loss of nominal properties indexes an incipient functional split of the lexical source item and the newly emergent word class of numeral classifier. While Ngəmba conforms with the profile of numeral classifier systems found in other Bantoid languages such as Tiv (Angitso 2020) and beyond (Kießling 2018) in these respects, it diverges by its morphosyntax in establishing a close bond between classifier and numeral to the exclusion of the enumerated noun.
The Tivoid subgroup of Bantoid presents an evolving numeral classifier system with restricted lexical coverage, as attested for a number of various subgroups of the Benue Congo languages of Nigeria and Cameroon (Kießling 2018). Semantically, these classifiers categorise counted items for their shape and texture (e.g., oblong and rigid vs. flat vs. small and globular) as well as for their aggregation type (bundle vs. heap) and partition (half, piece) with an occasional conflation with the notion of counterexpectual scantiness. On the morphosyntactic and etymological level, they can be seen to develop from full-fledged generic nouns denoting concepts such as LEAF, SEED, FRUIT and HEAP used as head nouns in associative constructions. Eventual loss of nominal properties indexes an incipient functional split of the lexical source item and the newly emergent word class of numeral classifier. A comparison of numeral classifier systems in two Tivoid varieties, i.e. Tiv (Angitso 2020) and Ugare (Angitso & Kießling 2021), reveals both substantial overlap and variation. For example, cognate classifiers such as Tiv ítíné (5/6) and Ugare íʧín (5/6), both used for counting longish outgrowths from a base and applicable to items like plantains and hair, allow for a Proto-Tivoid reconstruction, whereas non-cognates such as Tiv ì-ké (9/6) ‘testicle’ vs. Ugare kù-kwà (9/10) ‘palm nut’, both used for counting items such as mangos and cashews, attest to the application of different cognitive models. Based on a comparison of the Tiv classifier system and its Ugare counterpart, the contribution explores the extent to which a numeral classifier system can be reconstructed for the Proto-Tivoid stage.
This paper describes how a syntactic constituent can be manipulated within the structure of a sentence in Nda’nda’ in order to give it pragmatic prominence. To achieve this, attention has to be paid to the various means used by Nda’nda’ speakers to bring listeners to focus their attention on the constituent bearing the special information they want to pass across. Two main categories of prominence in information structure are usually differentiated in language generally: topic and focus. Focus in Nda’nda’ is encoded by cleft constructions, pseudo-cleft constructions and the adverbial ndɑ̀ʔ ‘only’. While analyzing focus via cleft construction we argue that there is similarity between the object cleft construction and the relative clause. The focus marker ndaʔ marks restrictive focus with concomitant morphosyntactic changes. Topic constructions are restricted to noun phrases and are achieved essentially through left-dislocation to mark contrastive topic with an additional pronoun in resumptive function whose form varies depending on whether the topicalized element is human or non-human.
Review of Batic, Gian Claudio & Rudolf Leger (eds.). 2017. Studia Africana - Papers in honour of Sergio Baldi. (Topics in interdisciplinary African studies, 46.) Köln: Rüdiger Köppe Verlag.
