The Guro language <grammatical sketch, with O. V. Kuznetsova> (Н.В. Кузнецова, О.В. Кузнецова. Гуро язык) (original) (raw)
Related papers
Person Marking in South-West Mande Languages: a tentative reconstruction
Mandenkan, 2010
The article presents a brief comparative analysis of systems of person marking in the six languages of the South-Western group of the Mande family and a tentative reconstruction of the proto-language person markers. The paper includes data from the newly-discovered Zialo language recorded in 2010 by the Russian linguistic expedition to West Africa.
L’objectif de ce travail est de présenter une description grammaticale aussi complète que possible de la langue mano (près de 400 000 locuteurs en Guinée et au Libéria) tout en la plaçant dans un contexte typologique, en comparant le mano avec d’autres langues mandé, mais aussi en distinguant des particularités typologiques à un niveau plus large. Le texte de la thèse est divisé en six chapitres: Phonologie et phonétique; Morphologie; Groupe nominal; Groupe verbal; Système prédicatif; Syntaxe de l'énoncé. Justifiant l'orientation typologique de la thèse, chaque chapitre se conclut par une section présentant des caractéristiques typologiques. Les thèmes suivants ont été examinés en détail: étude quantitative de phonotactique, étude de la catégorie du nombre, y compris l’expression du nombre et l’accord en nombre; le système des quantificateurs; la structure argumentale; l’étude de corpus de distribution des marqueurs prédicatifs; la syntaxe de l’énoncé, notamment la syntaxe de l’énoncé relatif. Les annexes à la fin de la thèse représentent des compléments d'information importants, notamment les paradigmes verbaux complets. Deux de ces annexes sont des textes glosés.
2011. Le système prédicatif du mano de Guinée. Mandenkan 47, 13 – 55.
2011
The article deals with the description and analysis of the system of predication in Mano, South Mande. The segmental and suprasegmental morphology of verbs is analyzed. Two types of predicative constructions are distinguished: those with copulas and those representing combinations of verbs with predicative personal markers. TAM-characteristics of the constructions are consequently described, the nature of the negation system and the problem of contractive markers are also discussed.
EXPLAINING SOME UNIVERSALS OF CAUSATIVE VERB FORMATION (plenary lecture)
However, these universals are not widely known, so that one finds proposals for language-particular accounts of the corresponding restrictions in individual languages (eg [Alalou, Farrell 1993] on Berber,[Cole, Son 2004] on Indonesian) that are clearly lacking in generality.[Hale, Keyser 2002] provide an account of a variant of (2), but they miss the fact that it is only a one-way implication. I start with the observation (due to [Haspelmath 1993]) that unaccusatives fall into two classes with respect to causative verb formation.
Southern Mande languages, spoken in Côte-d’Ivoire, Liberia and Guinea, display different strategies in the expression of negation. The most frequent one consists in the use of special “negative” series of personal subject pronouns (all Dan languages, Mano, Tura, Guro, Yaure, Mwan, Beng). In some languages the negative pronouns are completed by auxiliaries, most often following the subject pronouns. Two languages (Guro and Yaure) have developed a frame negative marking: the first element of the negation follows the subject group (and optionally fuses with the subject pronoun), the second follows the verbal group.
Propping up predicates: Adjectival predication in Tłįchǫ Yatıì
In TłĮchǫ Yatıı̀ (Dene, aka Athapaskan), copulas appear obligatorily with adjectives predicated of animate subjects, but are barred from appearing with adjectives predicated of inanimates. I propose that this asymmetry arises from a requirement to realize grammatical agreement for person, and that animate nouns alone bear a person feature. Unlike verbs, adjectives in this language cannot inflect; hence copulas are inserted in adjectival predicates as a rescue strategy to avoid ungrammaticality.