ISSN: 2347-7474
International Journal Advances in Social Science and Humanities Available online at: www.ijassh.com
RESEARCH ARTICLE
Sketch Morphology and Syntax of Me’enit
Eba Teresa Garoma*, Amanuel Raga Yadate
Jimma University, Ethiopia
*Corresponding Author: Email: [email protected]
Abstract
The purpose of this study is to briefly present the sketch morphology and syntax of Me’enit language, the south- eastern Surmic sub-family of the Eastern Sudanic branch of the Nilo-Saharan Phylum. The research method used mainly in the study is qualitative. Different linguistic data are gathered through elicitation and storytelling from native speakers, which appropriate tools for linguistic fieldwork. Descriptive accounts are made on morphology and syntax of the language. Me’enit has two major word classes: nouns and verbs. Nouns are described in terms of number, gender, nominalization and pronouns. Verbs are also discussed in line with the different tenses, aspects, verb to be/copula and verb to have. Adjectives, adverbs, ad positions, conjunctions, numerals and calendar system are also discussed in the study. Syntax is also dealt with incorporating simple declarative, interrogative, imperative and passive sentences with their illustrations. Major phrases of Me’enit, such as noun phrases and verb phrases are presented with sufficient data.
Keywords: Sketch Morphology, Sketch Syntax, Me’enit, Me’en, Nilo-Saharan. Introduction Literatures in ethno-graphic and linguistics studies and neighbouring ethnic groups represent Me’enit people by various names. Some of the names are Bodi, Mekan, Me’en, Tishena, Sur, Shuro, and Daim. However, the people name themselves and their languages too “Me’enit”. Me’enit people recently inhabit in the lowlands of eastern Omo, being neighboured by the Mursi people (people speaking one of the Omotic languages in Ethiopia) in the south, and scattered in Me’enit Goldeya and Me’enit Shasha Woreds, which are found in Bench Maji Zone of Southern Nations, Nationalities and Peoples Regional State (SNNPRS, from now onwards) in Ethiopia. Besides, they also exist to some extent in Guraferda, Decha and Selamango Woredas in Banch Maji, Kafa and Southern Omo Zones in SNNPRS.
Me’enit people are mostly pastoralists, and those who live in the highlands of Bench Maji Zone are farmers. Though the lives of some members depend on agriculture, their farmlands are usually displaced to others during harvest times. Their houses are small hats which have roofs covered by grasses. The walls of the hats are easy to construct because they have very light sticks. The houses have only one door [1].
Me’enit is the Nilo-Saharan language which has two major dialects: Bodi and Tishena. Bodi is the variety spoken in southern Omo area around Arba Minch and Jinka. It is bounded by Omo River in the northern, eastern and western, and neighbored by Mursi language in south. Tishena is the variety spoken in Bench-Maji Zone, in and around Bachuma and Jemu woredas [1]. Tishena dialect is neighbored by by other pastoralists and agriculturalists of the zone who speak Bench, Sheko, Zilmamo, Dizi and Surma, all of which are categorized under East Sudanic sub-family of Nilo-Saharan phylum [2, 3]. This study focused on the description of the morphological and syntactic aspects of the two dialects, as the two dialects have little difference in their lexical except their geographical distribution. Accordingly, attempts are made to describe the sketch morphology and syntax of Me’enit. Methodology The method used in the study is qualitative because the language paradigms are described qualitatively. The subjects of the study were the native speakers of the language, both Bodi (Jinka area) and Tishena
Eba Teresa Garoma et. al. | July 2015 | Vol.3 | Issue 7 |30-50 30
Available online at: www.ijassh.com
(Kafa and Mizan areas) speakers. Key informants were selected using convenient sampling and snowball sampling. Swadesh wordlist is one of the tools used to gather data from key informants. Elicitation and participant observation were also dominantly used in the study. The glosses of each wordlist and paradigm were collected into a morpheme list. The function of each morpheme was analyzed based on its distribution and meaning. Since the morpheme list was utilized in glossing all new items, the analysis of individual morphemes was continuously tested against the new material already collected. Different areas within morphology, such as the case system, gender or verb inflections were described with the help of examples from the texts, and from material elicited for this and other purposes. The analysis of syntax was also based on examples from stories and semi-structured interviews and elicited examples. In many ways, the procedure repeated that of morphology. Whatever procedure was followed, care was taken that the data were presented in a way that allowed other analysis to be made. Results and Discussion With regard to the purposes/objectives of the study, the description of morphology and syntax of Me’enit language which deals with the internal structures of words in the language is the Main target. In Me’enit, there are major and minor word classes. Hence, the description of such words is presented first and followed by the discussion of each of them. With regard to syntax, Me’enit sentences often exhibit SVO (Subject-Verb-Object) word order. However, word order is not strict in the language. The following sentence types are distinguished: affirmative and negative declarative sentences, interrogatives and imperatives. Nouns and their modifier(s), and verbs and their complements are also discussed in this study. Morphology of Me’enit Nouns in Me’enit Nouns are words which describe name, replace and identify various entities such as persons, places, things, animals, etc and abstractions in the world. With regard to the focus of this study, there are nouns which are used to perform the above features. However, such nouns have uncommon forms in singular, plural and gender indication of inflectional markings, and nominal derivations in Me’enit. We can exemplify the case below.
Data 1-10 reveal that singular nouns in Me’enit are made plural by using inflectional suffixes [-o] and [- o:]. As one can observe from the data, when a noun ends by vowel phoneme [i], it takes the suffix [-o:] where as when it ends by vowels other than [i] or consonants like [ŋ, n, g, g, etc], it attaches the plural suffix [-o]. Note that the hyphen in both plural form of Me’enit and plural gloss in English indicates separation of plural suffix and the base word to which the suffix is attached.
Number Singular Gloss Plural Gloss 1. [lupu]
The other point here is that in morpheme boundaries, vowel harmony (combination of two different vowels) is permissible in Me’enit. Nouns in Me’enit can also be pluralized by using the inflectional suffix [-a] as indicated below.
In the below data (11-21), the nouns attach the inflectional suffix [-a]; they end in [ʧ, ɲ, r, ɓ, u, p, k, g and m]. As one can see the data, there is no any strict and one-to-one rule for the affixation of the plural inflectional suffix. Words listed under data 19-21 end in vowel [a] in their singular forms, and when the
Eba Teresa Garoma et. al. | July 2015 | Vol.3 | Issue 7 |30- 50 31
Available online at: www.ijassh.com plural suffix is attached to these words, it changes the short vowel to long so that the length is indicated by colon (:).
Thus, based on the context of the word, the native speakers use the proper forms of the nouns.
Singular Gloss Plural Gloss 11. [wɔʧ]
The third types of nouns in Me’enit are those which are pluralized using different forms; we can call these nouns irregular and the plural inflectional suffixes attached to these words are lexically conditioned suffixes.
Singular Gloss Plural Gloss 22. [mɛ]
Since the suffixes are attached based on the nature of the individual words, the name is given to them. Thus, words in data 22-28 attach different suffixes or they change their internal parts in some way to be plural forms. Nevertheless, there are nouns which do not change their forms at all to be plural forms. Such nouns are illustrated below.
Singular Gloss Plural Gloss 29. [maʤa]
These (data 29-34) are the last types of nouns exist in Me’enit language. Certain nouns in the language appear the same in both singular and plural forms. The native speakers use the proper forms based on the context of their utterance. However, such words can have plural forms in some other languages including English as indicated in the plural gloss by hyphen (-). Gender Gender distinction in Me’enit is not expressed by using certain inflectional affixes. However, it is described by using different forms of words as indicated in the data below.
As in many other languages, natural gender of some animate nouns can be expressed by using different lexical items.
Eba Teresa Garoma et. al. | July 2015 | Vol.3 | Issue 7 |30- 50 32
Available online at: www.ijassh.com
Masculine Gloss Feminine Gloss 35. [ʃubune]
Some of these have a distinct generic form as the examples given above show. Similar to the above examples, any other lexical items in Me’enit are indicated by isolated forms to show gender forms of masculine and feminine. Nominalization In Me’enit, some other nouns are formed from the existing ones. Here, different lexical forms are used in the process as shown below.
Verb Gloss Derived noun Gloss 40. [am] Nouns can be derived from verbs in Me’enit either by attaching certain derivational affixes or by changing the forms of the verbs as indicated in data 40-46 above. Thus, nominalization process occurs in Me’enit language to derive new lexical items such as derived nouns/nominals. Pronouns Pronouns, in Me’enit, function like nouns in some way, but vary in having their own paradigm for person and number. Thus, there are different types of pronouns in this language such as, subject personal, object personal, demonstrative, interrogative pronouns and reflexive pronouns. Subject Personal Pronouns Subject personal pronouns make distinction of first, second and third persons along with singular and plural numbers to function as subjects of sentences. In the following data, these sets of pronouns will be discussed. Table 1: Subject personal pronouns Data Person Singular Gloss Plural Gloss 47. 1st person [ani] [eda] 48. 2nd person [ini] 49. 3rd person [mendija] 50. 3rd person [winʤua] As can be seen in table one, all singular subject personal pronouns are different for first, second and third persons where as they are the same for plural forms of second and third persons. It seems that the affix [- gua] is attached to first person plural form to change it to second and third persons. Object Personal Pronouns Object personal pronouns are a bit complex than subject personal pronouns in that they sometimes Eba Teresa Garoma et. al. | July 2015 | Vol.3 | Issue 7 |30- 50 33 Available online at: www.ijassh.com appear with inflectional forms with the verb. The common ones which occur in most contexts in Me’enit are listed in the table below. Table 2: Object personal pronouns Data Person Singular Gloss Plural Gloss 51. 1st person [boj] 53. 3rd person masculine [nɛn] 54. 3rd person feminine [winʤua] In the above data (table two), one can identify that plural forms of all persons in object personal pronouns are the same, but the singular forms all different. Second person singular object pronoun is the same with the corresponding subject pronoun. Demonstrative Pronouns Demonstrative pronouns are also common in Me’enit language. These are four in number as listed below. Demonstrative pronoun Gloss 55. [dija] The demonstrative pronouns of Me’enit as indicated above (55-58) are all different lexically. When they appear in context, they become parts of words and they may change their forms based on the noun they are attached to as exemplified below. Demonstratives Gloss 59. [eleduwa] Interrogatives Gloss 63. [minen] As can be noted from data 63-66, all the interrogative pronouns in Me’enit language are lexically different from each other. They mostly occur either at the beginning or in the middle of sentences to ask questions. Reflexive Pronouns A reflexive pronoun is a pronoun that is preceded by the noun, adjective, adverb or pronoun to which it refers within the same clause/phrase. In some languages, there is a difference between reflexive and non- reflexive pronouns. It depends on the part of the sentence containing the pronoun. In Me’enit, reflexive pronouns are formed by combining subject pronouns with some other lexical items as shown below. Eba Teresa Garoma et. al. | July 2015 | Vol.3 | Issue 7 |30- 50 34 Available online at: www.ijassh.com 67. [ani sab-tiyaŋ] ‘I myself’ 68. [ini sab-tenu] In data 67-72, we get reflexive pronouns formed from subject personal pronoun, the lexical item [sab]
In general, we have seen the various inflectional and derivational natures of nouns and their pronoun counter parts in Me’enit. Accordingly, Me’enit has nouns which can be inflected to number, but they use independent lexical items to show gender. Nouns are also derived from different words, such as verbs by attaching certain affixes. Another point under this section is the discussion about pronouns. Pronouns are of different types in Me’enit based on their functions; they are subject personal pronouns, object personal pronouns, demonstrative pronouns and interrogative pronouns. Discussions and illustrations of all these items are presented in detail. Now, the next linguistic item to be dealt with in the upcoming section is verb. Verbs in Me’enit In the preceding section, we have attempted to show the various nouns and pronouns in Me’enit. In what follows, we will discuss verbs along with their features. Verbs of Me’enit are not mostly inflected to tenses, persons, numbers and genders. Rather, they use independent lexical item to show these features. The word [ɓoru] is the name of cultural food which is prepared from sorghum and maize in Me’enit, which is culturally precious; this word is used along with other words different illustrations below:
Tenses of verbs Present tense 73. [ani k-ami ɓoru] ‘I eat ɓoru.’ 74. [ini ami ɓoru]
Available online at: www.ijassh.com <2nd p.pl-you eat ɓoru> ‘You (pl) eat ɓoru.’ 79. [meta-eda ami ɓoru] <3rd p.pl-they eat ɓoru> ‘They eat ɓoru.’
The present tense form of verbs in Me’enit has no any inflectional affixes. The verb in the above sentences (Data 73-79) is [ɓoru]
Future tense 80. [mirɛgɛ ani k-ami ɓoru]
Past tense 87. [ɛfage ani k-usabuji ɓoru]
Eba Teresa Garoma et. al. | July 2015 | Vol.3 | Issue 7 |30- 50 36
Available online at: www.ijassh.com ‘They ate ɓoru yesterday. ‘
Data 87-93 show that verbs in past tense forms in Me’enit language dominantly add independent lexical items. In the data, all the sentences have lexical item [ɛfage]
Perfective aspect 94. [Kifle k-aʧi ani afala]
As can be noted from the above data (94-100), there are no any inflection forms attached to the verb (different past forms of [aʧi]
Imperfective aspects 101. [ɛfage k-ami nando ɓoru]
Available online at: www.ijassh.com
Imperfective aspect shown above (data 101-106) is indicated in Me’enit by using the lexical item [nado], [nando] or [nanodo] based on the subjects of the sentences. If the subject is first person singular or 2nd person singular, the imperfective aspect is shown by [nando] whereas if the subject is first person plural, third person singular or third person plural, the imperfective aspect is shown by [nado] and second person plural subject takes [nanodo] as imperfective aspect marker on its verb. The only difference between past imperfective aspect and non-past imperfective aspects (present progressive and future progressive) is that in the past imperfective aspect, we add time adverb to show that the action was happening in the past whereas the case does not work in the non-past imperfectives as exemplified below.
107. [ani k-ami nando ɓoru] ‘I am eating ɓoru.’ 108. [ini ami nando ɓoru]
Therefore, the present imperfective aspects in data 107-112 are similar with the past imperfective aspects given above in their forms except that the past imperfective aspects add time markers at the beginning of the sentences. The verb ‘to be’/copula Verb to be in Me’en is indicated in singular and plural subjects, and present and past actions. In all these cases, there are variations of the copula in sentences. In what follows, we can identify the different forms of ‘verb to be’. 113. [wo ga-burej]
Available online at: www.ijassh.com ‘The stones are big.’
Copulas in Me’en are parts of words because they are affixed to nouns or adjectives in sentences. As can be seen in data 113-118, the copula [ga-] is prefixed to the adjective [burej]
In the data above (123-128), one can see that the lexical item [ij:e]
Available online at: www.ijassh.com
As indicated in data 129-134, verb to have for objects which naturally belong to the owner or which cannot be detached from the subject are indicated by the lexical item [ale]
Under this section, features and various inflectional properties of verbs are presented with detail description. Accordingly, present, past and future tenses of verbs, imperfective (past and present) and perfective aspects of verbs, copula and verb to have (temporary and permanent ownership) of verbs in the language are presented and analyzed exhaustively. The next section will present another lexical item of Me’enit. Adjectives in Me’enit An adjective is a word that modifies a noun or a pronoun by describing, identifying, or quantifying it. An adjective usually precedes the noun or the pronoun which it modifies. In Me’en, there are adjectives to describe colors, manners/properties, size, length and other features of nouns or pronouns. Adjectives of Color Adjectives of color are used in Me’enit to describe various entities in the surrounding of the speakers. Color adjectives Gloss 135. [kɔrɔj]
As can be noticed from the data (135-145), the terms are derived from natural things like cattle (ox, cow, etc), leaf, wild animals (rat), honey, sky and others. Thus, terms such as [karamajidi]
Adjectives of manner Gloss 146. [gesi]
Eba Teresa Garoma et. al. | July 2015 | Vol.3 | Issue 7 |30- 50 40
Available online at: www.ijassh.com 151. [ʧomaʃi] 152. [c’araʃi]
Adjectives of size/length/distance Gloss 156. [t’ini] 157. [ratu]
Generally, Me’enit language has various types of adjectives to modify, describe, elaborate or explain the different properties of nouns and pronouns in sentences. The adjectives mentioned above are adjectives of color, adjectives of manner and adjectives of size/length/ distance. The next section will give description of adverbs in the target language. Adverbs in Me’enit An adverb is a word that changes or qualifies the meaning of a verb, adjective, other adverb, clause, sentence or any other word or phrase, except that it does not include the adjectives and determiners that directly modify nouns. Adverbs are traditionally regarded as one of the parts of speech, although the wide variety of the functions performed by words classed as adverbs means that it is hard to treat them as a single uniform category (Bender 2000). In Me’enit, there are words which are categorized as adverbs to modify verbs, adjectives or another adverbs or the whole sentence. There are also nouns which are used instead of adverbs to describe the time of an action. Below are examples of adverbs in Me’enit. Adverbs of Time Adverbs of time in Me’enit mostly occur at the beginning of sentences or at the end of sentences, but they can also occur often after verbs in sentences.
Adverbs of time Gloss 166. [ane]
Eba Teresa Garoma et. al. | July 2015 | Vol.3 | Issue 7 |30- 50 41
Available online at: www.ijassh.com Adverbs of manner in Me’enit are many in number as compared to adverbs of time. What come below are adverbs of manner.
Adverbs of manner Gloss 174. [fale]
Adposition Gloss 191. [tuntɔ]
Conjunctions Gloss 199. [ke]
Eba Teresa Garoma et. al. | July 2015 | Vol.3 | Issue 7 |30- 50 42
Available online at: www.ijassh.com clauses in a sentence. They are all lexical items found between the items they join.
Numerical System in Me’enit The language has two types of numerals: cardinal and ordinal counting numerals. Hayward [4] has also identified some of the cardinal numerals. Both the cardinal and the ordinal numerals identified in the present data are given below. Cardinal Numerals Me’enit has a numeral system of ten bases, which is a quinary numeral system as outlined in Hayward [4]. Thus, simple lexical words that are used for the basic counting cardinal numbers are from one up to ten, as indicated below.
Cardinal numerals Gloss Number 205. [kɔnaŋ]
As can be noted from the data, the language has ten numbers as bases which are counted from one to ten. When the number is between ten and twenty, the term [tɔm:ɔn] is used with the conjunction [o:] and followed by the bases which are listed in 215-221. However, the digits of ten, that is, numbers such as twenty, thirty, forty, etc. add the prefix [ʤar-]
Ordinal numerals Gloss Number 225. [lele]
Available online at: www.ijassh.com 229. [hac’:ana-ŋ-eji]
The above data (225-236) reveal that ordinal numerals are formed by adding the suffix [-eji] on cardinal numerals. The first ordinal numeral [lele] (see data 225) is unique in that the lexical item is different from cardinal numerals. However, there can be epenthetic sound (epenthesis is the process of inserting a consonant or a vowel to keep the arrangement of sounds in words (phonotactics) of the language) to be inserted between the base word and the ordinal marker suffix based on the phonotactics of the language. For example, in data 229, the ordinal numeral [hac’:ana-ŋ-eji]
Table 3: Months of a year in Me’enit Me’enit Gloss English 237. [ta’is kɔnaŋ]
As can be seen in table three above, there are twelve months in a year according to Me’enit calendar. The first month is the month when they begin farming their land. The months have no their own lexical items, but the speakers represent these using basic cardinal numbers (one to ten) after the word [ta’is] which means moon/month. The first month in this calendar system is summer time. In relation to the system of calendar of Me’enit, the issue of seasons of the year is another concept related to farming and harvesting. The following table presents the four seasons in Me’enit.
Table 4: Seasons of a year in Me’enit Me’enit Gloss English 249. [ba loguru]
The four seasons listed in the table (data 249-252) indicate the times when people become abundant, when they sow and harvest, and when they face certain problems related to dry season.
Eba Teresa Garoma et. al. | July 2015 | Vol.3 | Issue 7 |30- 50 44
Available online at: www.ijassh.com In general, this section exhaustively discusses the morphology of Me’enit. Under the first subsection, nouns with their inflectional forms and their different kinds of pronouns are presented with data obtained from native speakers of the language. The second subsection deals with verbs and their inflectional forms, copula/verb to be and verb to have. Adjectives, adverbs, adpositions, conjunctions, cardinal and ordinal numerals, and calendar in the language are linguistic items dealt with under the third subsection. Syntax of Me’enit Sentence Types Simple Declarative Sentences A simple declarative sentence is made up of one independent clause with only one predicate. Simple sentences include sentences with main verbs, copula verbs, and adjectival or nominal predicates. A simple sentence consists of a noun phrase (NP) and verb phrase (VP).
253. [ani k-ami aʧuk] ‘I eat meat. 254. [ini ami aʧuk]
As demonstrated in data 253-258, noun phrases which are underlined in the sentences precede verb phrases which are not underlined in the sentences. In the sentences, the verb is [ami] which is found in the middle of the sentences. When the sentences are in negative forms, the word order is changed to SOV. The negative forms of the declarative sentences are given below.
259. [ani aʧuk k-ami-oŋ] ‘You do not eat meat.’ 261. [nɛn aʧuk am-oŋ]
Data 259-264 show that the negative marker for declarative sentences is [-oŋ]. However, the vowel in the suffix becomes long for second person plural negative marker [o:ŋ]. The other point in the order of words
Eba Teresa Garoma et. al. | July 2015 | Vol.3 | Issue 7 |30- 50 45
Available online at: www.ijassh.com in negative declarative sentences is that the verb comes at the end and the negative marker is attached to the end of the verb, which means the negative marker is suffix.
Interrogative Sentences In Me’enit, interrogative sentences usually use different word order from declarative sentences. The word order in interrogative sentence is SV (subject-verb). The following are different types of interrogative sentences.
265. [tudaʧ-ija a kataŋ]
In interrogative sentences, when the sentence is wh-question, the wh-word comes at the end of the sentences. The subject of the interrogative sentence comes at the beginning, making the verb occur in the middle. When the subject of the interrogative sentence is second person, the occurrence of the subject is implicit so that it is not mentioned in the sentence. Imperative Sentences Imperative sentences in Me’enit have similar word order with English. In English, we simply use verb alone, keeping the subject of the sentence implicit because it is understood between the speaker and the listener or the writer and the reader. Examples are given below.
269. [dɛʃi giʧ]
As can be seen from the above data (Data 269-274), the verbs. [dɛʃi, alit and kuni] appear at the beginning of imperative sentences, but when there are negative marker words like [ke] and prepositions, they occur before the verbs as indicated in data 271, 272 and 274. Passive Sentences Passive sentences in Me’enit are also formed in similar way with those formed in English. The subject of the passive sentence comes at the beginning followed by verb. Tense marker occurs at the end of sentences. Illustrations are given below. Eba Teresa Garoma et. al. | July 2015 | Vol.3 | Issue 7 |30- 50 46
Available online at: www.ijassh.com
275. [ɓoru usi ja-bɔj] <ɓoru drink be-pst> ‘ɓoru was drunk.’ 276. [Kifle ʃɔ j-abɔj]
As indicated in the above data (275-278), the doers of the actions in the sentences were not mentioned because they are not necessary conditions for the sentences to be complete. That is to mean, the sentences are meaningful without the objects of the passive sentences. Major Phrases in Me’enit Noun Phrases Noun phrases are the major category of phrases found in almost all languages. The phrasal category is also found in Me’enit. It is formed from noun and other words as modifiers. The following data show noun phrase in the language.
279. [kes-i gemari]
The data exemplify the structure of noun phrase. It indicates that noun phrase is formed from noun preceding its modifier words which can be quantifiers, adjectives, articles and others. Nouns are major word classes in Me’enit because many entities are described by using nouns together with their modifiers.
However, when noun phrases are formed from possessive nouns and its modifiers, the structure is of different order. That is, the modifiers occur first, and then followed by the head noun as illustrated below.
283. [kes-poss Asteri]
Eba Teresa Garoma et. al. | July 2015 | Vol.3 | Issue 7 |30- 50 47
Available online at: www.ijassh.com As shown in 283-286, the noun phrases in in possession have possessed possessor order. In third persons, the possessive indicator [-e] is attached to the possessed items. And in some other cases, the possessive indicator lexical item [de] is found between possessor and the possessed.
Verb Phrases Verb phrases are other phrasal categories found in Me’enit. Verb phrases are formed from verbs preceding modifier words/phrases like noun or noun phrases, adjectives or adjective phrases and adverbs or adverb phrases. The following data show some examples.
287. [ir ma]
As one can see from the data (287-294), verbs occur at the beginning of verbs phrases. However, the past tense marker lexical item [boj] always appears at the end of the verb phrases.
In this section, syntax of Me’enit is discussed briefly. Four structurally different sentences are presented with descriptions of their internal structures and two major phrases of the language are described. The first is declarative sentence in which the order is SVO (subject-verb-object). The subject of the sentence comes first and followed by verb, and then object comes at the end of the sentence. If the declarative sentences are in negative forms, the word order is changed to SOV. The second type of sentence discussed interrogative sentence. Interrogative sentences with transitive verbs use the same order as declarative sentences (SVO). However, if the sentences use wh-words, the wh-words occur at the end of the sentences. Another sentence presented in the chapter is imperative sentence. In Me’enit, imperative sentences are formed from verbs alone just like most languages of the world. The last sentence discussed is passive sentence. This sentence is formed from passive subject coming at the beginning, then comes the main verb. However, the tense marker verb to be appears at the end of passive sentence. The two major phrases discussed in this chapter are noun phrase and verb phrase. In noun phrase, the noun phrase functions as head of the phrase occurring at the beginning. Modifiers exist following the noun. Verb phrase is formed from verbs at the beginning of the phrase, and making the modifiers occur next to them. Verbs are heads of verb phrases. Conclusion This research presents a sketch of descriptive morphology and syntax in Me’enit, Eastern Sudanic subfamily language of Nilo-Saharan phylum in Ethiopia. The number of the speakers is about 62,885. The Me’enit people are relatively settled farmers and pastoralists. Me’enit has two dialects: the Bodi and
Eba Teresa Garoma et. al. | July 2015 | Vol.3 | Issue 7 |30-50 48
Available online at: www.ijassh.com the Tishena dialects. The present study is based on both dialects. The linguistic description is based on about 8 weeks fieldwork conducted between April and June 2013.
Accordingly, the Me’enit people and the state of their language are briefly overviewed in the study. The people are found in SNNPRS Bench Maji Zone, Bachuma and Jemu Woredas in specific local kebeles such as Shasha/Jemu, Bachuma/Goldiya and Shebench. The language has contact with Benchnon, Dizi, Surma and Sheko. The main objective of the research is description of the basic morphological and syntactic aspects of the language. Descriptive/Qualitative method is thoroughly used because there is no any statistical description in relation to description of the language. The different techniques and tools of data collection and analysis are used in detail under the methodology section.
Based on the data gathered, analysis of morphology and syntax of Me’enit are made. Nouns with their inflectional forms and their different kinds of pronouns are presented with data obtained from native speakers of the language. And then, it deals with verbs and their inflectional forms, copula and verb to be. Adjectives, adverbs, adpositions, conjunctions, cardinal and ordinal numerals, and calendar in the language are other linguistic items dealt with.
Syntax of Me’enit is also discussed briefly in the discussion. Four structurally different sentences (declarative, interrogative, imperative and passive sentences) are presented with descriptions of their internal structures and two major phrases of the language are described in the study. However, the tense marker ‘verb to be’ appears at the end of passive sentence. The two major phrases mainly discussed are noun phrase and verb phrase. In noun phrase, the noun functions as head of the phrase, occurring at the beginning. Modifiers exist following the noun. Verb phrase is formed from verbs at the beginning of the phrase, and making the modifiers occur next to them. Verbs are heads of verb phrases [5-21]. Acknowledgement This research article is the second part of the project conducted in 2013 entitled “Descriptive Grammar of Me’enit”, which is funded by Jimma University, College of Social Sciences and Humanities. References 1. Zerihun D (2009) Ethno-History of Me’enit Nationality. SNNPRS Council of Nationalities: Hawassa p.30-32. 2. Bender ML (1976) The Non-Semitic Languages of Ethiopia. (Occasional Papers Series, Committee on Ethiopian Studies, 5.) East Lansing: African Studies Center, Michigan State University. 3. Bender ML (2000) Comparative Morphology of the Omotic Languages. Munich: Lincolm Europa. 4. Hayward RJ (1982) “Notes on the Koyra Language,” in: Afrika und Übersee. 65(2):211-268. 5. Aklilu Y (1988) The phonology and grammar of Sheko. MA thesis, Addis Ababa University. 6. Aklilu Y (1994a) A sketch of Nayi grammar. Survey of Little-known Languages of Ethiopia 16: 1-20. 7. Aklilu Y, Ralph S (2002) Sociolinguistic Survey Report of the Chara, Dime, Melo, and Nayi Languages of Ethiopia. Summer Institute of Linguistics. 8. Bowern C (2008) Linguistic Fieldwork: A Practical Guide. New York: Palgrave MacMillan. 9. Crass Joachim, Girma A. Demeke, Ronny Meyer and Andreas Wetter (2005) Copula clause in Ethiopian languages. Papers on Africa, Languages and Literature, 25. University of Leipzig. 10. Fleming Harold (1990) A grammatical sketch of Dime (Dim-Af) of the Lower Omo. In Omotic Language Studies, R.J. Hayward (ed.), pp. 494-583. London: School of Oriental and African Studies. 11. Gebre Bizuneh (2005) The impact of orthographic problems on education in Ethiopia: the case of Xamt’anga. In the 17th social science research project of OSSREA, Ethiopian Languages Research Centre, Addis Ababa. 12. Goldstein Q (1965) A Guide for Field Workers in Folklore. Hatboro: Folklore Associates, Inc. 13. Heine, Bernd and Derek Nurse (2000) African Languages: An Introduction. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 14. Hellenthal A (2009) Possession in Sheko. In the Linguistics of Endangered Languages-Contributions to Morphology and Morphosyntax, L. Wetzels (ed.), Utrecht: LOT, pp. 221-242. 15. Hellenthal A (2010) A grammar of Sheko. Utrecht: LOT (Netherlands Graduate School of Linguistics). Eba Teresa Garoma et. al. | July 2015 | Vol.3 | Issue 7 |30-50 49
Available online at: www.ijassh.com 16. Kurzon D, Silvia E. (Eds) (2008) Adpositions: Pragmatic, Semantic and Syntactic Perspectives. Amsterdam / Philadelphia; John Benjamins Publishing Company 17. Mulugeta S (2008) A grammar of Dime. Utrecht: LOT (Netherlands Graduate School of Linguistics). 18. Rapold CJ (2006) Towards a grammar of Benchnon. PhD dissertation, Leiden University. 19. Summer Institute of Linguistics (SIL) (1995) Sociolinguistic Survey Report of the Nilo-Saharan Languages of Ethiopia. Addis Ababa: Summer Institute of Linguistics (Publisher). 20. Theil R (2007) Kafa phonology.Journal of African Languages and Linguistics 28 (2): 193-216. 21. Zelealem L (1998) Some structural signs of obsolesence in K’emant. In Endangered Language in Africa, Matthias Brenzinger (ed.), pp. 163-185. Köln Rüdiger Köppe Verlag.
Eba Teresa Garoma et. al. | July 2015 | Vol.3 | Issue 7 |30-50 50