This paper offers a description of the nominal class system in Esahie (Central-Tano, Kwa, Niger-Congo). It contends that, though the noun class system of Esahie per se is morpho-syntactically vestigial, hence differing from other African languages (e.g. most Bantu languages) where noun classes can be assimilated with GENDER, in Esahie, NUMBER, as a syntactic feature, triggers agreement, rendering the class system in Esahie a number-based one. On morpho-syntactic grounds, six distinctive noun form classes are established for Esahie. This paper also provides an account of how morpho-phonological information influences the noun form classes of Esahie. As argued for Akan (cf. Bodomo and Marfo 2006), morpho-phonological information is equally relevant for understanding the choice of one number affix over the other in Esahie. The present work presents yet another piece of evidence in support of the view (cf. Ameka and Dakubu 2008, Aboh and Essegbey 2010, and Güldemann and Fiedler 2017) that unlike the Ghana-Togo-Mountain languages, which have been attested to have a functional class system, the Central-Tano languages, to which Esahie pertains, have a relatively fairly decayed and less-conservative inflectional system. Comparing Esahie to Akan, however, data discussed in this paper seems to suggest, prima facie, that Esahie has suffered a relatively stronger deal of morpho-syntactic decay in the inflectional system of the nominal domain. Data used in this work is collected largely through elicitation from native speakers.
In the typology of West African languages, tone has been noted to play crucial grammatical and lexical roles, but its function in word formation has been less systematically explored and remains to be fully understood. Against this backdrop, the present study seeks to examine the form and function of tonal morphology in the formation of action nominals in four Kwa languages spoken in Ghana, namely Akan, Ga, Lεtε, and Esahie, a relatively unexplored language of the Central Tano subgroup. Relying on data from both secondary and primary sources, we argue that tone raising is an important component of Kwa action nominalization, as it is found across different languages and derivational strategies. Specifically, while across the Kwa languages considered, tone raising tends to be an epiphenomenon of phonological conditioning, sometimes tone is the sole component of the nominalization operation or, as in Esahie, it concurs with the affix to the derivation, hence playing a morphological function.
This paper investigates the infl ectional system of the nominal domain in Esahie (Central-Tano, Kwa, Niger-Congo) by focusing on agreement and syncretism. It off ers a comprehensive description of these infl ectional phenomena in an attempt to test and account for the strength of the infl ectional system of an otherwise under-described language. It shows among other things that morpho-syntactic features including number, person, animacy, and case, all enter the Esahie agreement system in various contexts. Adopting Corbett's (2006) criteria for canonicity of agreement, this work demonstrates that, in Esahie, DP-internal agreement is more canonical than anaphora agreement. A general paucity of infl ection marking is argued to account for the several instances of syncretism in Esahie. Furthermore, this work demonstrates that syncretism is pervasive in the pronominal system of Esahie. Collected largely through elicitation from native speakers, the Esahie data discussed in this work provides empirical support for the irreducibility hypothesis proposed by Stump (2016). Hence, on the theoretical level, this work argues for adopting a paradigm-based approach to infl ectional morphology over a morpheme-based approach to infl ectional morphology.Keywords: Esahie, agreement, syncretism, infl ectional morphology, paradigm 1 We are grateful to the three anonymous reviewers of the Legon Journal of the Humanities for their insightful comments on an earlier version of this paper that have greatly improved on the general quality and outlook of the paper. We would also like to thank Chiara Melloni, Greville G. MuabɔlɛdwireSɔ krataa he te krataa bɔ ɔniania dumaa nwõ dwirɛ nu infl ɛkhyin wɔ Esahie (Tano-Afi ã, Kwa, Niger-Kongo) dwudwolɛ nu bɔ ogyĩ agriimɛnt ne sinkritisim soɔ. Krataa he botae yeɛ ole kyɛ ɔsɔ infl ɛkhyin nu anwoserɛ wɔ Esahie dwudwolɛ n'anu. Yiti, sɔ krataa he mma ngyerɛgyerɛnu paa bɔ ɔfa agriimɛnt ne sinkritisim nwo. Ɔmaa yɛ nwũ kyɛ number, person, animacy ne kase nkoraatiĩ̃ wura Esahie agriimɛnt nu dwirɛ wɔ nekaa sorõ ŋo sorõ ŋo. Sɛ yɛ di Corbett (2006) si aa, yɛkɔ nwũ kyɛ, ɛwɔ Esahie dwudwo lɛ nu ne, DPnu agriimɛnt nwõ yɛ se tra anafɔra nu agriimɛnt. Sɔ krataa he sã da yi adi kyɛ sinkritism gyasilɛ-nu-dwirɛ sone wɔ Esahie nu. Esahie dwudwolɛ nu mpɛnzɛɛmpɛnzɛɛnu bɔ y'ayɛ wɔ sɔ krataa he di Stump (2016) ye irreducibility adwenkyerɛ ne nwõ adanzeɛ. Sɛ ɔba ye tiɔri nu aa, sɔ krataa he kyirɛ hialɛ bɔ ohia kyɛ yɛ kɔ nia infl ɛkhyinaa mɔfɔlɔgyi nwõ dwirɛ wɔ paradaim atẽ ẽ so tra kyɛ yɛ kɔ fa ye wɔ mɔɔfi m atẽ ẽ so.
The paper provides a comprehensive account of the derivation of action nominals in Esahie, a Ghanaian language of the Tano subgroup (Kwa, Niger-Congo) which has been undocumented thus far, especially as far as morphosyntactic phenomena are concerned. The aim of the research is threefold: to contribute to language documentation, to provide a systematic description and analysis of the morphosyntactic properties of Esahie action nominals, and to offer a typological assessment of these constructions. We argue that action nominalization in Esahie primarily involves a composite strategy: a morpho-syntactic operation, invariably involving affixation, and a concomitant prosodic operation in the form of a change in tonal melody. As far as the derivation of action nominals is concerned, it appears that in Esahie, tone raising is not simply a phonologically-conditioned prosodic effect, but plays a morphemic role. Further, depending on the arity of the base verb, nominalization may or may not be coupled with incorporation of the internal argument, which derives a form of synthetic compounding, as in the English truck-driving type. Based on the seminal works by Koptjevskaja-Tamm, Maria. 1993. Nominalizations. London: Routledge; Koptjevskaja-Tamm, Maria. 2006. Nominalizations. In Encyclopedia of language and linguistics, vol. 8, 652–659. Boston: Elsevier, the current work argues that Esahie belongs to the possessive-incorporating subtype of the incorporating languages.
Although studies on genre abound in the Ghanaian literature, only a few have paid attention to the form and function of Chief Examiners’ Reports on the academic performance of candidates at examinations. To address this gap, the current study analyzes Chief Examiners’ Reports from selected Colleges of Education, covering several disciplines. The study adopts a qualitative descriptive design to examine movement patterns as well as the linguistic devices employed in such reports. Cast in Bhatia’s model of move analysis theory and Kanoksilapatham’s move criteria, the study shows that moves employed include both mandatory and discretionary ones: six (out of the ten) of the moves are mandatory while four are discretionary. Furthermore, the study found that most Chief Examiners’ Reports lack Introduction sections, and there appears to be no standard structure/format in Chief Examiners’ Reports. Regarding stance-taking devices, the study found that only three pronouns, it, they and this were used. It is recommended that Chief Examiners pay critical attention to the Introduction segments of their reports and that a standard format is provided to all Chief Examiners so as to achieve uniformity. Keywords: Genres, Moves, Chief Examiners’ Report, English for Specific Purposes
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