Difference between revisions of "Typological Features Template for Luganda"
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|'''syntactic structure | |'''syntactic structure | ||
| − | '''|In the following fields a description of some of the basic morpho-syntactic properties of nominal constituents are given. | + | |'''|In the following fields a description of some of the basic morpho-syntactic properties of nominal constituents are given. |
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|nominal modification | |nominal modification | ||
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|'''Possession in other noun classes (impersonal pronouns)''' | |'''Possession in other noun classes (impersonal pronouns)''' | ||
| − | 1 OMU wa e.g Omwana wa Mukasa 'Maria's child' | + | |1 OMU wa e.g Omwana wa Mukasa 'Maria's child' |
2 ABA ba e.g Abaana ba Mukasa 'Mukasa' children' | 2 ABA ba e.g Abaana ba Mukasa 'Mukasa' children' | ||
3 OMU ga e.g Omuti gwa Mukasa 'Mukasa's tree' | 3 OMU ga e.g Omuti gwa Mukasa 'Mukasa's tree' | ||
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|'''Subject and Object Personal pronouns''' | |'''Subject and Object Personal pronouns''' | ||
| − | Subject Pronouns | + | |Subject Pronouns |
Singular Plural | Singular Plural | ||
1st Person n- tu- | 1st Person n- tu- | ||
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|Object Pronouns | |Object Pronouns | ||
| − | 1st Person Singular -n-, Plural -tu-; 2nd Person Singular -ku-, Plural; -ba-; 3rd Person singula -mu- , Plural -ba- | + | |1st Person Singular -n-, Plural -tu-; 2nd Person Singular -ku-, Plural; -ba-; 3rd Person singula -mu- , Plural -ba- |
|- | |- | ||
|Example sentences | |Example sentences | ||
Revision as of 17:59, 8 September 2010
| Feature | Description |
| Phonological Features | |
| Vowel inventory | Luganda has only 5 vowels: [ a, e, i, o, u ]. Any of them can be long or short.
i: high, front u: high, back e: mid, front o: mid, back a:front, low |
| Vowel harmony
Nominal Vowel harmony |
Vowel harmony in Luganda relates to the Luganda Vowel Chart, which contains only five vowels. The vowel on the noun class dictates the initial vowel that the noun takes on. The Luganda noun classes allow only three vowels, namely: [u, i, a]. The occurence of any of those vowels on a noun class dictates the initial vowel in this manner: [u] harmonizes with [o], [i] harmonizes with [e] and [a] harmonizes with [a]. Examples, omuti, emiti, amata. |
| Verbal Vowel harmony | This harmony occurs on suffixes only. This harmony follows this manner: verbs whose penultimate syllable has [a, u, i] harmonizes with [i] in suffixing the root. Verbs whose penultimate syllable has [e, o] harmonizes with [e] in suffing the root.
Examples: sab-a = sabira, fun-a = funira, sib-a = sibira, som-a, sek-a = sekera, simool-a = simoolera |
| Consonant inventory | There are mainly 20 consonants in Luganda: [p, b, m, w, f, v, t, d, n, l, s, z, c, j, y, ny, k, g, ŋ, nÿ ]. Bilabials [p, b, m], labiodentals [f, v], alveolars [t, d, n, l, s, z], alveopatal [nÿ], palatals [c, J,nnya], velars [k, g, ŋ], semivowels [w,y].Each of those consonants can combine with any vowel to form a syllable. All consonants can be long with the exception of [w,y,l]. A long consonant is one that is pronounced with force as compared to one that is single. |
| Consonantal Combinations | [m] is followed by bilabials. [n] is followed by all other consonants except [l]. [n] is followed by all alveolars except [l]. [ŋ] is followed by all velars. |
| Semi vowel combinations | All consonants can be followed by a semivowel except labiodentals, [f, v]. [f, v] cannot be followed by [w]. [s,z,c,J,nÿ] are not followed by [y]. [ŋ] does not allow combining with [y].
Allophonetic sounds include: [β, ɱ, ɽ, l] |
| Tone | Luganda is a pitch-accent or a two tone language. Tone in the roots of uttarances can be arranged as HL or HH. Sometimes a resultant HF tone may occur. The two basic tones are modified by downstepping and downdrifting. |
| Syllable Structure | Basic syllable structures: V, CV, CV:, C:V, C:V:, NCV, NCV:, Cw/yV, C:w/yV, C:w/yV:, NCw/yV, N |
| Morpho-syntactic Features | |
| morphological classification (1) | Luganda is principally/basically agglutinative, which in many cases exhibit modifications in the roots of verbs when particular affixes are added. |
| morphological classification (2) | Luganda is generally a head-marking language at both phrase and sentence level. For instance, Omwana (N) omuto (Adj) akuba (V) embwa (Obj) [A little child is beating a dog]. In pronominalisation forms, it is possible to have a dependent marking in the verb phrase. For instance, Omwana omuto agikuba. [A little child is beating it]. A- [Subj], -gi- [Obj], kub-a [V]. |
| Nominal Phrases | In the following fields we aim for a description of some of the basic morpho-syntactic properties of nominal constituents |
| syntactic structure | In the following fields a description of some of the basic morpho-syntactic properties of nominal constituents are given. |
| nominal modification | A Luganda noun is glutinable for number and gender. The linear ordering in a noun phrase is: Determiner-Noun-Possessor-Numeral-Quantifier-Modifier-Verb. |
| nominal specification | To specify a noun, Luganda uses determiners, demonstratives, numerals, quantifiers and nominal specifiers. |
| Possession | Luganda uses pronouns to indicate possession in different grammatical persons.
1st person Singular, –ange 1st person Plural, -affe 2nd person singular, -o 2nd person plural, -ammwe 3rd person singular, -e 3rd person plural, -abwe |
| Possession in other noun classes (impersonal pronouns) | 1 OMU wa e.g Omwana wa Mukasa 'Maria's child'
2 ABA ba e.g Abaana ba Mukasa 'Mukasa' children' 3 OMU ga e.g Omuti gwa Mukasa 'Mukasa's tree' 4 EMI gya e.g Emisooli gya Mukasa 'Mukasa trees' 5 ELI lya e.g Eliiso lya Mukasa 'Mukasa's eye' 6 AMA ga e.g Amaaso ga Mukasa 'Mukasa's eyes' 7 EKI kya e.g Ekikopo kya Mukasa 'Mukasa's cup' 8 EBI bya e.g Ebikopo bya Mukasa 'Mukasa's cups' 9 EN ya e.g Embuzi ya Mukasa 'Mukasa's goat' 10 EN za e.g Embuzi za Mukasa 'Mukasa's goats' 11 OLU lwa e.g Olugoye lwa Mukasa 'Mukasa's cloth' 12 AKA ka e.g Engoye za Mukasa 'Mukasa's clothes' 13 OTU twa e.g Otulo twa Mukasa 'Mukasa's sleep' 14 OBU bwa e.g Obutungulu bwa Mukasa 'Mukasa's onions' 15 OKU kwa e.g Okugulu kwa Mukasa 'Mukasa's leg' 20 OGU gwa 'all nouns here are derogatory' 22 AGA ga 'all nouns here are derogatory' |
| Pronominal system | Luganda has both free and bound pronoun forms.
The free pronoun forms are: Singular Plural 1sr Person Nze ‘I’ Ffe ‘We’ 2nd Person Ggwe ‘You’ Mmwe ‘You’ 3rd Person Ye ‘He/She’ Bo ‘They’ All pronouns are marked for their grammatical functions: there are subject and object pronouns. All pronouns in Luganda appear as prefixes. Luganda also has double object constructions. |
| Subject and Object Personal pronouns | Subject Pronouns
Singular Plural 1st Person n- tu- 2nd Person o- mu- 3rd Person a- ba- |
| Object Pronouns | 1st Person Singular -n-, Plural -tu-; 2nd Person Singular -ku-, Plural; -ba-; 3rd Person singula -mu- , Plural -ba- |
| Example sentences
Nsoma ekitabo ‘I am reading a book’ Osoma ekitabo ‘You are reading a book’ Asoma kitabo ‘He/She is reading a book’ Tusoma ekitabo ‘We are reading a book’ Musoma ekitabo ‘We are reading a book’ Basoma ekitabo ‘They are reading a book’ |
Example sentences: object pronouns
Ansomesa ‘S/he is teaching me’ Atusomesa ‘S/he is teaching us’ Akusomesa ‘S/he is teaching you’ [singular] Abasomesa ‘S/he is teaching you’ [2nd person plural] Abasomesa ‘S/he is teaching them’ [3rd person plural] Yeesomesa ‘S/he is teaching him/herself’(reflexive) |
| Verbal Phrases | In the following fields a description of some of the basic morpho-syntactic properties of verbal constituents is given. |
| word order | the word order in Luganda is SVO |
| TAM | A Luganda verb is agglutinable for 3 tenses: the present tense, the past and the future.
The present tense is zero marked. E.g Nfumba emmere ‘I cook food’or ‘I am cooking food.’ Past tense is marked by three aspect constructions which appear either as prefixes and suffixes. i.e. Nfumbye emmere ‘I have cooked food.’ Nafumbye emmere ‘I cooked food.’ Nafumba emmere ‘I cooked food’ [far past] Future tense is marked by two aspect constructions. Banaafumba emmere ‘They will cook food’ Balifumba emmere ‘They will cook food’ [far future’ In some constructions, Luganda displays periphrastic tenses. E.g Nfumba emmere bulijjo ‘I always cook food’ Nja kufumba emmere ‘I will cook food’ |
| Mood
Luganda makes use of the following moods: imperative mood, conditional mood, subjunctive mood, indicative mood and infinitive mood. | |
| infinitival forms | Luganda has one infinitive form marked by (o)ku-. It should be noted that all Luganda verbs are bound morphs, sometimes called deverbal nouns, except about two only that appear as free morphs. The infinitive (o)ku- relates to the 15 OKU noun class. |
| Verbal constructions | Luganda has traditional ditransitive Verbs as well as those derived by verb extensions that can take two or more objects. Luganda has serial verb constructions or complex verb forms composed of several verbs. Luganda also has light verbs used to mark aspect. |
| Adpositions | Luganda has prepositions at both word and phrase level. E.g mu ‘in’, ‘among’, ‘within’, ‘to’, ‘from’; ku ‘at’, ‘on’, ‘to’; e ‘to’ etc. At phrase level, they appear as, waggulu ku… ‘on top of…’, waggulu wa… ‘above’ etc.
In indicating the grammatical relation between the verb and the noun, Luganda concordial agreements based on the noun class system. |
| Complementation | In this field you describe complementation strategies. Does [your language] make use of complementizers? |
| Special Properties of Luganda | Negative sentences in Luganda are usually formed by prefixing si- for 1st person singular (this replaces the 1st person personal pronoun, n-). For all other persons, the prefix te- is used coming before the subject pronoun. Depending on the morpho-phonological environment, the negators, si- and te- change. In environments where the negator comes but not next to a verb, it is an independent entity. |
| Short Bibliography | # Ashton, Ethel O., and others (1954) A Luganda Grammar, London: Longmans, Green.
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