Indices to Bantu languages

Jouni Filip Maho

Throughout the history of Bantu language studies, which by now spans some 400 years, many languages (and people) have been mentioned in both specialist and general literature.

The various language names used have varied considerably throughout the years. In fact, it is not always self-evident what language any given name may refer to. Not all authors agree on what is a language and what is a dialect, or how name them. Some names used refer to languages, some to dialects. Some refer to sociolects, secret languages, locations, etc., while others are simply obscure. Consequently, one quite often stumbles on difficulties in trying to work out how any given name relates to other identical, similar or even totally different names.

The present index of Bantu languages offers a tool to keep tabs on this glossonymic diversity. It includes a tabular index of Bantu language names found in the literature organised according to the New Updated Guthrie List (Maho 2003, 2009), an update of Guthries well-known 1971-classification. In addition, there are cross-references to the coding systems of several other Bantu classifications, specifically those of Johnston (1919/22), Doke (Cole 1961), Cope (1971), Henrici (1973), Heine (1973), Heine, Hoff & Vossen (1977), Bastin, Coupez & Man (1999), and SIL14 (2000).

ISBN 9783895866883. LINCOM Studies in African Linguistics 73. 195pp. 2008.

Topics in Descriptive and African Linguistics

Essays in Honor of Distinguished Professor Paul Newman

Samuel Gyasi Obeng (ed.)
Indiana University

Some of the papers in this volume are both descriptive and theoretical in nature whereas others are purely descriptive. Two things all the papers have in common are; the ways in which Paul Newman’s work has influenced the work of the individual authors; and the close and systematic attention each author pays to natural language data. Hyman’s chapter examines verb classes and verb morphology (perfective, the pluractional, and progressive) in Leggbó, an Upper Cross language spoken by the Abi and Yakurr, in Cross River State, Nigeria.

Heine’s chapter on contact-induced grammatical replication argues that although it is fairly easy to establish that lexical material has been transferred from one language to another, establishing such lexical transfer is not easy when it comes to grammatical replication, where no form-meaning units are involved. Using the sentence as his operational construct and taking the basic sentence structure of Akan as, Subject-NP VP, Ofori examines the function(s) of the non-contentive de and fa, their complementary usage, and formal difference in activity-based (embedded serial) sentences.

Schuh, Goge and Dole examine productivity of “ish” reduplication in Gudi Ngamo, a Chadic language spoken in Yobe State, Nigeria, by demonstrating that Gudi has a productive nominal reduplication process that expresses the concept “like a NOUN,” “NOUN-like,” or “NOUN-ish.” The authors also discuss the tone patterns of reduplicants. Obeng’s chapter describes Akan (Akuapem-Twi) deverbal nouns by grouping them into simple, reduplicated, compound, and functionally shifted. Obeng describes morphophonological processes like place and voice assimilations, vowel harmony, and tonal assimilation that take place during the formation of deverbal nouns.

The chapter by Alexandra Y. Aikhenvald outlines the split ergative system (ergative-absolutive and nominative-accusative constructions) of Paumari, a member of the Arawa family spoken in Brazil on the Purús, Ituxí, and Tapauá rivers with around 200 speakers. The author shows how the above constructions are marked including case marking, cross-referencing, noun class and gender agreement, and the order of constituents. Tristan Purvis' chapter discusses adverbial expressions of manner in Tigrinya, a Semitic language of Eritrea. Purvis provides an overview of several adverb constructions and then argues that these forms exist in their own grammatical category. He discusses manner adverbs in nominalization, prepositional phrases, subordinate clauses, and serial verb constructions. In the final chapter, Obeng describes the linguistic strategies used by politicians to create new political vocabulary and expressions. He identifies eponymy, clipping, borrowing, semantic change, compounding, derivation, and coinage, as being some of the strategies through which Ghanaian political vocabulary are created.

Contents:

Samuel G. Obeng: Introduction

Larry M. Hyman: Perfective, Pluractional, and Progressive Aspect Formation in Leggbó

Bernd Heine: Identifying Instances of Contact-Induced Grammatical Replication

Seth Antwi Ofori: De and Fa in Activity-Based Sentences: A Reconsideration of Their Function(s), Complementary Usage, and Formal Difference

Russell G. Schuh with Umaru Mamu Goge and Jibir Audu Janga Dole: “Ish” Reduplication in Gudi Ngamo

Samuel G. Obeng: Akan Deverbal Nouns

Alexandra Y. Aikhenvald: Syntactic Ergativity in Paumarí

Tristan M. Purvis with Salem Hailemariam: Adverbial Expressions of Manner in Tigrinya: A Question of Semantics or Syntax?

Samuel G. Obeng: Linguistic Pragmatics: Noun Formation in Ghanaian Political Discourse

Paul Newman – List of Publications

ISBN 9783895868146 (Hardbound). LINCOM Studies in African Linguistics 74. 174pp. 2009.

Phonologie et morphologie de la langue bemba

Alexander Raymond Makasa Kasonde
Africa University, Mutara

Le présent travail comprend deux parties, à savoir une description du système phonologique suivie d’une description de la structure morphologique de la langue bemba. La langue bemba est la langue nationale principale de la Zambie où elle occupe la partie septentrionale avec quelques enclaves dans la région du Shaba de la République Démocratique du Congo (DR Congo). La langue bemba aussi fait partie du groupement linguistique bantu qui couvre grosso modo l’ensemble de l’Afrique au sud de l’équateur. La langue bemba est désignée „M.42“ dans la classification de Guthrie (1948). Précisons que les langues bantu font partie de la famille linguistique niger-congo suivant la classification de Greenberg (1963), revue par Williamson (1989). Sur le plan phonologique, la langue bemba comprend cinq phonèmes vocaliques du type triangulaire, faisant partie ainsi de la branche centrale du bantu de Nord-Est.

L’existence de l’opposition entre les tons bas et haut est tout à fait remarquable. S’agissant de la morphologie nominale, la langue bemba distingue 15 classes nominales simples et 3 classes locatives. Les sous-classes nominales sans augments existent indéniablement. La morphologie verbale de la langue bemba est caractérisée par une symétrie opposant notamment l’aspect et le temps. Sur le plan temporel, la langue bemba distingue le passé immédiat, récent et éloigné. De même, la langue bemba fait une distinction entre le futur proche et lointain. La phrase déclarative de la langue bemba est typiquement SVO.

Makasa Kasonde est responsable du programme Etudes Françaises au sein de la faculté Sciences Humaines et Sociales à l’Université d’Afrique (orig. Africa University). Il enseigne principalement les cours des langue et civilisation françaises.

ISBN 9783895868238. LINCOM Studies in African Linguistics 75. 402pp. 2009.

A Grammar of the Kilba Language

Mohammed Aminu Mu’azu
University of Bayreuth

This book presents a detailed description of Kilba, a language of the Bata-Marghi sub-group of the Chadic family of the Afro-Asiatic Phylum. The book describes some linguistic aspects of Kilba. As a preliminary to the main discussion, the geographical location of Kilba land, the culture and dialects of the Language are highlighted. The book then describes the Phonology, Morphology and Syntax of the Language. On phonology, the book treats the sound system, phonological processes and the tonal system of the language.

The section on Morphology treats, in part, nominal and verbal morphology of the language. On the nominal, the book treats nouns, adjectives, pronouns and adverbs, while the verbal morphology discusses the derivational and inflectional aspects of the verbs. Finally, concerning syntax, the book treats the various constituents that make up the two phrases: nominal and verbal. The book reveals the nature and restrictions that occur in the usage of the lexical items in the two phrases. Each of the items that occur in both the phrases are spelt out and phrase structure tree diagrams of some of the sentences are drawn and phrase structure rules are also established in order to show how the constituents are hierarchically related.

Mohammed Aminu Mu’azu holds a PhD in General Linguistics from the University of Maiduguri, where he is a Senior Lecturer in the Department of Languages and Linguistics. He was born in Gombi Local Government area of Adamawa State in 1968 and attended Gombi One Central Primary School, Adamawa from 1974 -1980. He also attended Government Science Secondary School Gashua, Yobe State from 1980 -1985. After a one year remedial programme at College of Preliminary Studies Yola, Adamawa State from 1986-1987, he then proceeded to the University of Maiduguri in 1987 and without break obtained a Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) degree in General Linguistics in 2003. This book was written during his tenure as lecturer in the Department of African Studies (Afrikanistik II), University of Bayreuth, Germany (2008 - 2010). He has also published articles on various linguistic fields of the Kilba language in international journals of languages and linguistics.

ISBN 9783895866654. LINCOM Studies in African Linguistics 76. 198 pp. 2009.

The Verb and Related Areal Features in West Africa

Continuity and Discontinuity within and across Sprachbund Frontiers

Petr Zima (ed.)

in co-operation with
Thomas Bearth, Norbert Cyffer, M.Holubová, Herrmann Jungraithmayr, Rudolf Leger, Henning Schreiber, Anne Storch, Ulrike Zoch


This volume brings the results of international research, the roots of which were already laid in the volume, published as No 47 of Lincom Studies in African Linguistics (Areal and Genetic Factors in Language Classification and Description: Africa South of the Sahara), some time ago.

More recently, a preliminary questionnaire regarding further research in the areal distribution of TAM paradigms and functions was proposed on p.10 of the volume Sprachbund in the West African Sahel , ( published in Paris by Bernard Caron and Petr Zima, Eds., 2006). Several related non-verbal criteria suggested to complement the original questionnaire were added to the list since 2007, within the framework of the currently running Czech Science Foundation Project No 405/07/0277, and discussed at an international workshop organised in co-operation with the Prague Linguistic Circle in October, 2008. Data from languages of differing genetic origins spoken West of Lake Chad, be they such sociolinguistically important languages as Kanuri, Hausa, Fula, Songhay, etc., or be they sociolinguistically minor languages from the Chadic, Mande or Niger-Congo genetic contexts, served for attempts at a theoretical generalisation.

ISBN 9783929075892. LINCOM Studies in African Linguistics 77. 240pp. 2009.

A Grammar of the Miship Language

Mohammed Aminu Mu'azu & Katwal Pemak Isah
University of Maiduguri

Miship belongs to the West-Chadic sub-group of the Afro-Asiatic phylum and is spoken by 17,000 people in Plateau State, Nigeria. This book consists of five chapters. The first part looks at the historical and ethnic backgrounds of the speakers of the Miship language, discusses its linguistic classifications and provides an overview of the dialects of the Miship language. The second part deals with the sound system, which includes descriptions of the consonants, vowels sounds, other related phonological aspects, as well as the tonal system of the language. The third section discusses the nominal and verbal morphology of the language, covering such diverse dimensions, as the conventional nouns, verbs, inflections and other grammatical features, as well as ideophones and its structures. The fourth chapter treats syntactic features of the language using Choamskian’s method of sentence analysis. Phrase structure tree diagrams are drawn, and phrase structure rules are established for some of the sentence types that occur in the language. The concluding chapter presents the vocabulary of the language.

The authors, Mohammed Aminu Mu’azu and Katwal Pemak Isah studied General Linguistics in the Department of Languages and Linguistics, University of Maiduguri-Nigeria. This book was completed during Mohammed Aminu Mu’azu’s tenure as a lecturer in the Department of African Studies (Afrikanistik 11), University of Bayreuth, Germany (2008-2010).

ISBN 9783895869938. LINCOM Studies in African Linguistics 78. 209pp. 2010.

A Descriptive Analysis of Bura Verbs and Vocabulary

Mohammed Aminu Mu'azu & Fibi Balami
University of Bayreuth, University of Maiduguri

Bura is an endangered language spoken in the southern part of present-day Borno state, Nigeria. The language belongs to the Chadic branch of the Afro-Asiatic family, whose other members are Semitic, Egyptian, Cushitic, Omotic and Berber. This book offers a descriptive analysis of Bura verbs and vocabulary and is the first book ever on this aspect of the language.

The book is divided into four chapters. The first discusses the geographical location of the language, the origin of the Bura people and the two dialects of the language: Bura and Paber. The second explores the Bura verbal system, identifying two types of suffixes: derivatives and inflectional suffixes. It as well examines verbal morphological processes and the tonal system of the language, identifying two level tones, high and low tones, and the verb syllable structure. The third chapter illustrates the numeral system of the language, discussing the conventional ordinal, cardinal, numerals adverb and distributive numerals, while the fourth chapter, which concludes the book, presents the vocabulary of the language. The authors Mohammed Aminu Mu’azu and Fibi Balami are both graduates of General Linguistics and lecturers in the Department of Languages and Linguistics, and General Studies (GST), University of Maiduguri-Nigeria. This book was written during Mohammed Aminu Mu’azu’s tenure as a lecturer in the Department of African Studies (Afrikanistik II) University of Bayreuth, Germany.

ISBN 9783895869068. LINCOM Studies in African Linguistics 79. 174pp. 2010.

Civili, langue des Baloango

Esquisse historique et linguistique

Paul Achille Mavoungou & Hugues Steve Ndinga-Koumba-Binza
Université Omar Bongo (UOB) de Libreville; North-West University (Potchefstroom), Afrique du Sud

A leur arrivée sur les côtes d’Afrique centrale au XVe siècle, les Portugais découvrent un Etat structuré d’une certaine modernité : le royaume de Loango. Malgré l’ossature ethnolinguistique hétéroclite de sa population, le royaume est doté de plusieurs institutions stables dont une devise et une langue officielle. Cette dernière est le civili, langue bantu du groupe H10. Motivé par plusieurs centres d’intérêt historiques, sociolinguistiques et linguistiques, cet ouvrage est un condensé de connaissances sur la langue de ce royaume aujourd’hui partagé entre plusieurs entités politiques (Gabon, Congo, Angola, etc.) issus de la décolonisation.

Il présente de façon succincte quelques phénomènes historiques, phonologiques, morphosyntaxiques, homonymiques et analogiques de la langue. Des faits sémantiques des emprunts linguistiques y sont également décrits dans le cadre des changements linguistiques. Le concept de changements linguistiques est ici élargi à la création des nouveaux mots, et des structures phonologiques et morphologiques par le biais de l’emprunt linguistique et du phénomène d’analogie. L’étude aboutit à la certitude selon laquelle le civili est une langue en pleine évolution dans ses structures phonique et lexicale ainsi que dans sa position comme langue locale dont il faut tenir compte dans les planifications linguistiques de quelques pays d’Afrique centrale.

Sommaire: 1. Introduction. 2. La langue et son milieu. 3. Aperçu du système phonologique. 4. Aperçu du système morphosyntaxique. 5. Les emprunts lexicaux. 6. Le phénomène d'homonymie. 7. Les phénomènes analogique revisités. 8. Conclusion.

IBSN 9783862880065. LINCOM Studies in African Linguistics 80. 134pp. 2010.