The Tonal System of Igbo 9783110869095, 9783110130416

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The Tonal System of Igbo

Publications in African Languages and Linguistics The aim of this series is to offer, at regular intervals, carefully worked out studies or collections of papers in African linguistics. In this way, it is hoped that important work can be brought to the attention of a wider linguistic audience including scholars who are not primarily concerned with African linguistics but who wish to keep abreast of recent advances in the fields of historical linguistics, theoretical phonology and linguistic typology, all of which, incidentally, tend to rely rather heavily on African language data. At the same time, the editors intend to include occasional volumes which offer general accounts of major language groups, hoping that such surveys will be of assistance not only to linguists working on African languages but also to those who specialize in other areas. Throughout the series an attempt will be made to strike a healthy balance between theory oriented and data oriented research. Editors:

Advisory

George N. Clements Didier L. Goyvaerts

John Goldsmith (Bloomington, Indiana) Claire Gr6goire (Tervuren) Frank Heny (Middlebury, Vermont) Larry M. Hyman (Los Angeles, California) William R. Leben (Stanford, California) Thilo C. Schadeberg (Leiden)

Other books in this

board:

series:

1. Ivan R. Dihoff (ed.) Current

Approaches

to African

Linguistics

(vol. 1)

2. Gerrit J. Dimmendaal The Turkana

Language

3. G.N. Clements and J. Goldsmith (eds.) Autosegmental

Studies

in Bantu

Tone

4. Koen Bogers, Harry van der Hulst and Maarten Mous (eds.) The Phonological

Representation

of

Suprasegmentals

5. Jonathan Kaye, Hilda Koopman, Dominique Sportiche and Andr6 Dugas (eds.) Current

Approaches

to African

Linguistics

(vol. 2)

to African

Linguistics

(vol. 3)

to African

Linguistics

(vol. 4)

6. Gerrit J. Dimmendaal (ed.) Current

Approaches

7. David Odden (ed.) Current

Approaches

8. Paul Newman and Robert D. Botne Current

Approaches

to African

Linguistics

(vol

5)

9. Isabelle Haik and Laurice Tuller (eds.) Current

Approaches

to African

Linguistics

(vol. 6)

Mary Μ. Clark

1990 FORIS PUBLICATIONS Dordrecht - Holland/Providence Rl - U.S.A.

Published by: Foris Publications Holland P.O. Box 509 3300 AM Dordrecht, The Netherlands Distributor for the U.S.A. and Canada: Foris Publications USA Inc. P.O. Box 5904 Providence R.I. 02903 U.S.A.

CIP-DATA KONINKLIJKE BIBLIOTHEEK, DEN HAAG Clark, Mary M. The Tonal System of Igbo / Mary M. Clark. - Dordrecht [etc.] : Foris. - (Publications in African Languages and Linguistics ; 10) With ref. ISBN 90-6765-310-1 paper SISO afri 837.2 UDC 809.6-4 Subject heading: Igbo ; Phonology.

ISBN 90 6765 310 1 (paper) © 1990 Foris Publications - Dordrecht

No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system, without permission from the copyright owner. Printed in the Netherlands by ICG Printing, Dordrecht.

This study is dedicated to the staff and students of Egbu Girls' Secondary School, Egbu, and Bishop Lasbrey Training College, Irete, and to the people of Irete village, in grateful appreciation for the warmth and kindness they showed me during the years 1964 and 1965, when I lived among them.

Contents

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

XI

Chapter 1: INTRODUCTION

1

1. Overview 2. An Introduction to Igbo 2.1. Syntax 2.2. Morphology 2.3. Phonology Notes to Chapter 1

1 4 4 7 12 15

Chapter 2: THE NATURE OF THE TONAL REPRESENTATION

1. The Separation of the Tonal and non-Tonal Features 2. Underspecification in Underlying Representation 2.1. The Underlying Representation 2.2. Default Tone Assignment 2.3. Assignment of Tone by Tonal Affixes 2.4. A Comparison with Previous Analyses 2.4.1. Traditional Segmental Analyses 2.4.2. The "Tone-Formula" Approach 2.5. Potential Problems 2.5.1. Igbo and the Notion of a Universal Default Tone 2.5.2. The Third Tonal Class in Mbäise 3. The Phonological Representation of Downstep 3.1. The Distribution of Downstep 3.2. The Rule of Η Deletion 3.3. Downstep and Downdrift 3.4. A Comparison with Other analyses 3.4.1. The Floating-tone Approach 3.4.2. The Third-tone Approach 4. Conclusion 5. Rule Summary Notes to Chapter 2 vii

17

18 23 24 26 29 34 34 35 37 37 38 42 42 47 53 55 56 58 59 60 64

viii

The Tonal System of Igbo

C h a p t e r 3: THE ORGANIZATION OF THE LEXICAL PHONOLOGY

1. Introduction 2. Cyclicity 3. The Word Level 4. The Root and Stem Levels 4.1. The Argument from Morphological Ordering 4.2. The Argument from ATR Harmony 4.2.1. ATR Harmony at the Stem Level 4.2.2 ATR Harmony at the Root Level 4.2.3. ATR Harmony at the Word Level 4.3. Palatalization 5. The Organization of the Lexical Phonology 6. Strict Cyclicity 6.1. Introduction 6.2. Strict Cyclicity in Reduplicated Nouns 7. Rule Ordering 7.1. Ordering Relationships That Follow from the Level Ordering 7.2. Ordering Relationships That Follow from the Cyclical Application of Rules 7.3. Ordering That Follows from a "Feeding" Relationship Between Rules 7.4. Ordering by the Elsewhere Condition 7.5. Positive Advantages of Free Ordering Within the Level 8. Conclusion 9. Rule Summary Notes to Chapter 3 C h a p t e r 4: THE PHRASAL PHONOLOGY

1. Introduction 2. Two Phrasal Levels 2.1. Η Deletion 2.2. Vowel Assimilation 2.3. Phrase Level I and Phrase Level II 2.4. Falling Contour Simplification 2.5. Middle Η Deletion 3. The Role of Syntactic Structure in the Postlexical Phonology 3.1. Syntactic Structure in Phonological Rules 3.2. The Branching Condition

69

69 69 71 75 76 77 79 81 82 83 86 88 88 93 97 97 98 98 99 100 102 103 107 117

117 118 118 120 121 123 125 127 127 129

Contents 4. The Role of Prosodic Structure in the Phrasal Phonology 4.1. Intonational Phrasing 4.2. The Lack of Evidence for Other Levels of Prosodic Structure 4.2.1. An Argument against the Phonological Phrase 4.2.2. Cliticization or the Prosodic Word? 4.2.3. The Organization of the Grammar 5. Coalescence and Syllable Shortening 5.1. Coalescence 5.2. Feature Sharing and Long Syllable Shortening 6. On Conditions of the Form "X is Unspecified for [F]" 7. Conclusion 8. Rule Summary Notes to Chapter 4 C h a p t e r 5: VERBS AND VERBAL CONSTRUCTIONS

ix

141 142 145 146 152 155 157 157 158 162 164 166 167 173

1. Introduction 2. The Inflectional Morphology of the Verb 2.1. The Inflectional Affixes 2.2. The Assignment of Inflectional Features 3. The Tonal Melody of the Verb

173 178 178 180 186

4. The [+ASSERTIVE] I NFL Particle

190

5. The Tonal Alternation in the NP That Follows the Verb 6. The Subject Prefixes 7. The Relative Clause Forms 8. The "Question" Forms 9. The Sequential Forms 10. Auxiliary Verbs 11. The Structure of I NFL 12. Conclusion Notes to Chapter 5 Chapter 6: THE LEXICAL PHONOLOGY OF NOUNS

191 195 197 201 203 206 208 210 212 221

1. Morphology 221 2. The Tonology of Nouns with Monosyllabic Roots 223 3. Polysyllabic Nouns 225 3.1. Nouns Formed by the Lexicalization of Phrases ...226 3.2. Nouns Formed from Compound Verb Stems 228 3.3. Nouns Formed by Reduplication 228 3.4. Nouns Formed with the Nominalizing Suffix -IV or -rV 236 3.5. Nouns Formed by Compounding 242

χ The Tonal System of Igbo 4. Conclusion Notes to Chapter 6 Chapter 7: THE ASSOCIATIVE CONSTRUCTION

248 249 253

1. Introduction 253 2. The Syntactic Status of the Associative Particle 257 3. The Phonological Effects of the Associative Particle ...263 3.1. The Associative Forms of Nouns with Monosyllabic Stems 263 3.2. Associative Marking in Polysyllabic Nouns 267 3.3. Associative Marking in Nouns that Begin with Geminate Nasals 269 3.4. Agentives and Personal Name Possessives 271 3.5. Cardinal Numerals 279 3.6. Monosyllabic Possessive Pronouns 281 4. Conclusion 282 Notes to Chapter 7 284 Chapter 8: CONCLUSION

Notes to Chapter 8

289

299

Appendix I: Maps Appendix II: Summary of Principles Appendix III: Summary of Rules

301 303 307

REFERENCES

319

Acknowledgments

I would like to thank the following people for their assistance with this project: Phillip Nwachukwu, Nonyelu Nwokoye, Peter IhiQnu, E.N. EmenanjQ, and a succession of Igbo-speaking students at the University of New Hampshire, for their assistance with the data. Professor Nwachukwu, especially, gave me hours of his valuable time; without his help, none of the discussion of the Mbäise dialect would have been possible. Peter I hi gnu played an important role in uncovering several errors in the next-to-final version. I owe an enormous debt to these two linguists. Deirdre Wheeler, G.N. Clements, Rochelle Lieber, Elisabeth Selkirk, Alan Prince, Phillip Nwachukwu, Larry Hyman, Donca Steriade, Paul Kiparsky, David Odden, and Ε. N. EmenanjQ for helpful discussion of the issues, and for insightful criticism of earlier versions of the manuscript. Victor Manfredi for his encouragement throughout this seemingly endless project, and G.N. Clements and Foris Publications for the saintly patience with which they waited for the completed manuscript. G. N. Clements for his thoughtful editing of the final manuscript. Deirdre Wheeler and David Odden for showing me how to set up the manuscript for typesetting, and the University of New Hampshire Computing and Information Services for allowing me to use their facilities. The University of New Hampshire Printing Services, for typesetting the manuscript, and Sherry Palmer for her careful art work. The University of New Hampshire College of Liberal Arts for a Summer Research Stipend which gave me time to work, and the Humanities Center of the University of New Hampshire for financial assistance with the typesetting. My husband, Bernie Wideman, for keeping me happy whether things were going well with this project or not. xi

Chapter 1

Introduction

L. O V E R V I E W

This will be a study of the tonal system of Igbo, within a unified theoretical framework which draws together several recent developments in the theory of phonology: (i) the theory of autosegmental or "tiered" phonology (Williams (1976), Goldsmith (1976), Clements (1985), Sagey (1986), and others), (ii) the theory of Underspecification (Kiparsky (1982a,b), Archangeli (1985), and others), (iii) the theory of level ordering (Mohanan (1982), Rubach (1981,1985), Kiparsky (1982a, 1982b, 1985), Pulleyblank (1986) and others), and (iv) the theory of Strict Cyclicity (Kean (1974), Brame (1974), Mascaro (1976), and Kiparsky (1982a,b)). The results will, I hope, be of interest to both Africanists and theorists. I believe Africanists will be impressed with the way in which this theoretical framework elucidates the grammar of Igbo, bringing out patterns and regularities in data which otherwise appear to be unpatterned and arbitrary. For theorists, it should be interesting, first of all, to see how these theoretical ideas are incorporated into a single unified theory and applied to a large and complex body of data. In addition, as I will show, Igbo provides empirical evidence regarding several details of the theory, as follows: With regard to the phonological representation, Igbo provides strong evidence for a separation of the tonal and non-tonal features into separate tiers, and for an underlying representation which is "radically underspecified" in that one of the two contrasting tones (the high tone) is left unspecified. With regard to the representation of downstep (which plays a very important part in the tonal system) I will argue that, in Igbo, this is the effect of a phonetic register-lowering rule which lowers the high pitch register after every high tone. This rule creates a "downstep" (represented by a raised exclamation point) between adjacent syllables with separate high tone specifications, as shown below: 1

2

The

Tonal

(1) Downstep:

System

σ I

Η

!

of

σ I

Η

Igbo

No downstep:

V

σ

σ

Η

Secondly, with regard to the organization of the lexical phonology, I will show that Igbo has five phonological "levels" or "strata" — three lexical and two postlexical. This "level ordering" is the only extrinsic rule ordering; within their levels, the rules apply whenever their structural descriptions are met, subject to general principles of rule application such as the Elsewhere Condition of Kiparsky (1973). In the lexical phonology (but not the postlexical phonology) the rules apply cyclically, in tandem with the rules of word formation — first, the phonological rules, then a word-formation rule, then the phonological rules again: (2)

Root Level:

Stem Level:

Word Level:

I The entire lexical phonology conforms to the Strict Cycle Condition of Kiparsky (1982a,b), which protects the integrity of lexical outputs by preventing structure-changing rules from applying entirely within a lexical item which was already present in the input to the current cycle. In addition, as I will show, Strict Cycle effects are also found in the postlexical phonology, in that, at the first phrasal level, structure-changing rules do not apply within words, but only across word boundaries. At the second phrasal level, Phrase Level II, this condition is no longer in effect, and the rules apply freely, either inside words or across word boundaries.

Chapter 1: Introduction

3

Because tone interacts so closely with syntactic structure, this study will also, necessarily, be concerned with the interaction between phonology and syntax. In some cases, tonal processes will be found to provide evidence for syntactic structure. For example, in Chapter 5, section 9, I will give tonal evidence to show that, under certain circumstances, the verb occupies the "I NFL" node, as argued by Koopman (1984) for Vata and Gbadi. More importantly, as I will show, the tonal system of Igbo provides evidence regarding the nature of the syntactic information which is available to phonological rules. In a recent proposal by Selkirk (1986), (most) postlexical phonological rules apply to a modified representation called "P-structure", in which the syntactic structure has been replaced by a division into prosodic categories such as intonational phrase, phonological phrase, and prosodic word. The evidence from Igbo argues against this proposal, in two ways: First, as I will show, tone rules continue to make reference to syntactic structure throughout the derivation, showing that, contrary to Selkirk's proposal, the syntactic structure is never removed from the representation. Secondly, rules whose structural descriptions do not refer to syntactic structure apply freely across the intonational phrase, without the domain restrictions which we would expect if the string were divided into phonological phrases as Selkirk proposes. As for the constituent which Selkirk calls the prosodic word or clitic group, this can be shown, in Igbo, to be a syntactic word; in other words, clitic groups are formed by an adjunction rule which adjoins the cliticizing particle, syntactically, to an adjacent word. Although the tonal system of Igbo does not support the particulars of Selkirk's proposal, it does suggest a way of capturing some of the constraints on syntactic effects in phonological rules which form such an appealing part of her proposal. In particular, as I will show, phonological rules which refer to syntactic structure in Igbo are always of the form abc . . . a] or [a . . . abc, where a, b, and c are phonological units and α is a (set of) syntactic feature(s). Thus the role of syntactic bracketing in phonological rules is limited, essentially, to an indication of domain, closely parallelling the prosodic domains of Selkirk's framework. The matching of the structural description to a phonological string is further constrained by a "Branching" Condition which limits the circumstances under which a syntax-sensitive rule can reach into a branching constituent other than the constituent which is named in the structural description of the rule. This constraint does much of the work which is accomplished, in Selkirk's theory, by the division of the string onto prosodic phrases. The Branching Condition holds throughout the derivation, as I will

4

The Tonal System of Igbo

show, but only for rules whose structural descriptions are defined in terms of syntactic bracketing. The exposition will be organized as follows: In the remainder of this chapter, I will give a brief introduction to the syntax, morphology, and phonology of Igbo. The next three chapters, 2-4, will be concerned primarily with theoretical issues — especially the nature of the phonological representation (Chapter 2) and the organization of the grammar (Chapters 3 and 4). Finally, Chapters 5, 6, and 7 will present a systematic analysis of the tonal system of Igbo, based on the theoretical findings of the preceding chapters. The data for this study is taken, for the most part, f r o m the detailed descriptive grammars and dictionaries of Ward (1936), Green and Igwe (1963), Igwe and Green (1970), Weimers and Weimers (1968a, 1968b), EmenanjQ (1978), Nwachukwu, ed. (1983), and Williamson (1972). Where I have needed data which is not available in these sources, I have been fortunate to be able to obtain the very sophisticated linguistic judgments of Prof. P. AkujyQobi Nwachukwu, f r o m Mbaise, Peter Ihionu, also f r o m Mbaise, and Prof. Nonyelu Nwokoye, f r o m the O n i c a area. Of course, these speakers are not responsible for the use I have made of their judgments, or for any misinterpretation I may have made of the information they gave me.

2. A N INTRODUCTION TO IGBO

2.1. Syntax Igbo is a Niger-Congo language of southeastern Nigeria, with approximately 16,000,000 speakers. The basic word order is SVO, with the complement to the right of the head in all types of phrases: (3) a.

b.

VP

PP

v

NP

Ρ

mechie

ä-nya

nä

'Close (your) eyes.'

NP

Owe re

'in Owere'

Chapter 1:

Introduction

5

NP2

c.

Ν

d.

NP

PP

A

P

NP

Ρ

M'many a

QIJUIJU

drinking wine (assoc.) 'the drinking of wine'

e.

NP

oft) Qwäänyi one woman (assoc.) 'one (of) woman'

CP

ka änyi lää that we go 'that we (should) go'

Adjuncts, also, appear to the right of the head:

VP

(4) a.

NP

VP

NP

A

V

PP

AP

AP

Λ

P

kv/ύό say

NP

'yä rjwäyÖQ it (assoc.) slowly 'Say it slowly.'

U'my ntä people small 'children'

6

The Tonal System of Igbo c.

NP

d.

NP

PP

NP

Λ

Ν

Ρ

NP

NP

Ν

Ν ύΐό house

Λ

Ρ

NP

ä'hyä market (assoc.)

'house (of) market' (=market-stall)

PP

ÜlQ house

NP

AP

ähyä ukwü market large

'the house (near) the large market'

Specifiers are on the left. Thus the subject precedes the I NFL node, which, following Chomsky (1986), I take to be the head of the sentence: (5) a.

Ekwe

e assert

mechiri anya closed eyes

'Ekwe closed (his) eyes.'

b.

nä prog

ägä ά-hyä going market

'We're going (to) market.'

Chapter

1:

Introduction

And there may be a wh-NP before the complementizer (c): (6)

CP

ebe-

ole

place which

unu

gara

you went

'Where did you go?'

2.2.

Morphology

Most (possibly all) noun, verb, and adjective roots are monosyllabic. Nouns begin with a vowel or syllabic nasal prefix. If the prefix is a vowel, it undergoes ATR harmony with the root; if it is a syllabic nasal, it takes its place of articulation from the following consonant. Except for these phonological requirements, the prefix may consist of any vowel or syllabic nasal, with either high or low tone: 3 (7)

NOUN

ä~kwä ä~bü ä-s( e-nyö ό-kwü Q-yä ö~bi ö~ke i-bü i-bü \-kpe ü-ta u-ce u-kwe Ü~dä ή~ηί

'crying' 'song' 'lie' 'mirror' 'cover' 'sickness' 'ancestral house' 'share' 'load' 'bigness' 'slander' 'blame' 'mind' 'assent' 'sound' 'food'

VERB

i'-kwä i-bü {•-si i-nyö i'-kwü ί-yä i'-bi ί-ke ί'-bü i-bü ί-kpe iLtä ί-ce ί'-kwe ί-dä ί'-li

'to 'to 'to 'to 'to 'to 'to 'to 'to 'to 'to 'to 'to 'to 'to 'to

cry' sing' say or tell' observe' cover' be sick' live' share' carry' be big' slander' blame' think' agree' make a sound' eat'

8

The Tonal System of Igbo m-bö ή-jQ n-tQ

'revenge' 'evil' 'kidnapping'

f-bö i'-jo /-£