Doctoral Dissertation Research: The structure of complex verbal expression in Ndebele

University Of Chicago, Chicago IL

Investigators

Abstract

Languages describe when actions or events happened (e.g., past or present "tense") and different ways events can occur ("aspect"). Some ?analytic? languages express this by adding words as in English by using two verbs, a main verb like 'eat' or 'see' and an additional auxiliary verb where the tense (?I did eat?) and aspect (?I have eaten?) information goes. Other, ?synthetic? languages build these expressions with more complex verbs by stacking prefixes or suffixes. However while languages can generally be described as analytic or synthetic, these modes of expression sometimes interact in ways we do not yet understand, but which will be illuminated by this dissertation project by examining their use in a particular language. This dissertation project investigates the nature of word formation, focusing on the way verbs encode inflectional meanings in Ndebele, a language of Zimbabwe. This research will be conducted at two locations in Zimbabwe and involve elicitation of linguistic data from native speakers. It aims to contribute to the understanding of mechanisms that regulate the relationship between synthesis and periphrasis by investigating contrasting single verb and multi-verb constructions in Northern Ndebele. Ndebele verbs exhibit a high level of synthesis, e.g. the Ndebele counterpart of English "It will be given" with three verbal elements is expressed by a single verb word "Kuzaphiwa." At the same time, the language makes considerable use of periphrasis, in various types of multi-verbal constructions involving a series of auxiliaries or light verbs. Light verbs are auxiliary-like, expressing information found in verbal prefixes or suffixes, or even as adverbs in other languages. As such, Ndebele offers an interesting and important perspective on the study of word formation due to the abundance of both synthetic and periphrastic forms within a single language. The dissertation will investigate this locus of cross-linguistic variation in the limits of word-internal complexity that languages allow.