phonology: consonants b - aflang...

Draft August 30, 2012

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Chapter ##

PHONOLOGY: CONSONANTS

ole, like most Chadic languages, has a series of glottalized consonants at the labial and alveolar places of articulation plus a third glottal, pronounced [ʔʲ] in terms of IPA symbolization, but phonologically occupying the palatal point of articulation in the glottalized series that is parallel to the palatal affricates c and j (IPA [tʃ] and [dʒ] respectively). Also typical of many

Chadic languages, Bole has a series of prenasalized stops consisting of a nasal onset followed by a homorganic voiced stop, but these sounds function as phonological units only word initial, i.e. N+C in word-medial position is a phonological consonant sequence (§2). A striking feature of Bole phonology, distinguishing it from even closely related languages, is the high incidence of geminate consonants, both lexical and derived (§5). A problematic analytical issue in the Bole consonant system is the contrast between the alveolar non-glottalized obstruents /s, z/ and their alveopalatal counterparts /sh, c, j/. There is no question that these five sounds are in phonemic contrast, yet many words allow free variation between the alveolar and alveopalatal counterparts (§4). 1. Consonant Segment Inventory labial alveolar (alveo-)

palatal lateral velar laryngeal

vl p t c k ( í ) stops vd b d j g obst glot ɓ ɗ íy fric vl s sh (h) vd z cont m n ny ŋ nasal stop mb nd nj ng son fric nz liquid r l glide y w 1.1. Remarks on individual segments 1.1.1. Glottal stop ( ’ ). Whether or not one treats glottal stop as an underlying phonological unit is a matter of analytical perspective. Lukas, in all his published work on Bole (see references), treats glottal stop as a consonant in contrast with all other consonants and consistently writes it wherever speakers pronounce it. Glottal stop is in

B

Segmental Phonology: Consonants 2

minimal phonetic contrast with other consonants in a series of words such as íra ‘sorrel’, kra ‘grass mat’, yrà ‘admonishment’, zrà ‘long gourd’. By the classical principle of establishing phonemic status through minimal contrast, it is thus a distinct phonological unit. However, using the principle of contrast as the sole criterion for including glottal stop among Bole’s phonological units ignores at least two aspects of Bole phonology.

First is the distribution of glottal stop itself. If glottal stop were a consonant having contrastive status with respect to all other consonants, we would predict a distribution parallel to that of other consonants. This is not the case. While glottal stop is present at the beginning of every word that we represent orthographically in this grammar with an initial vowel, its presence is limited and skewed in word medial position. The following list is exhaustive for sources of medial glottal stop: (1) Variant of ’y: In the Fika dialect, particularly before front vowels, ’y is usually

rendered as [’], with the original ’y showing up as an individual or dialect variant, e.g. diníil = diníyil ‘baby’, bàííḕti = bàíyíyḕti ‘elder brothers’, pè’’è ‘cupping with horn’ (cf. Gadaka dialect pè’y’yè). The root for ‘dry up’ seems to have become lexicalized in the Fika dialect with a geminate glottal stop regardless of following vowel (pò’’uwò ‘it dried up’, po’’o ‘drying’, pòííànì ‘dry’), though in the Gadaka dialect it has geminate ’y’y, e.g. pò’y’yuwò ‘it dried up’.

(2) Medial lexical glottal stops: From current lexical data consisting of between 4500-

5000 items, excluding compounds, idioms, and other phrasal items, the following is an exhaustive list of underived words with medial glottal stops that cannot be related to /’y/ as discussed in (1):

Native Bole words1 Loanwords āíà ‘no’ ò’’ori (< Hausa ƙ˘ƙarī) ‘effort, attempt’ a’a ‘well well!’ sà’’u (< Hausa sāƙ) ‘weave’ ˘ío ‘yes’ tà’’ama (< Hausa tƙamā) ‘boasting’ bù’ùm ‘black’ là’’ama (cf. Hausa laim) ‘tent’ pò’um ‘gourd plant’ na’ìbi (< Arabic nāíib) ‘deputy’ The first three native words, are interjections or interjection-like. Such words often

contain sounds outside the mainstream phonology (cf. English oh’oh, mhm, etc.). There are thus only two substantive native words with distinctive medial glottal stops that not arguably derived from ’y. In the first three loanwords, all from Hausa, the glottal stop comes from Hausa ejective ƙ. These probably entered Bole from the Guddiri dialect of Hausa, which has systematically replaced ƙ by ’. 2 This replacement also applies to a few Bole loanwords with initial ’ or ’y from Hausa words that originally had initial ƙ: āra ‘court complaint’, ūsà ‘nail’, àrāgò ‘fried peanut cakes’, íyḕta ‘wickedness’ íyûya ‘indolence’ from Standard Hausa ƙārā, ƙūs, ƙàrāg˘, ƙḕtā, ƙyûyā respectively (all beginning with í in Guddiri Hausa). Why these Hausa loanwords have geminate íí rather than a singleton is not clear, though it may be on phonological analogy native words with medial glottal stop, in

1 The Gadaka dialect has rù’ur ‘soot’, not used in the Fika dialect. This word is most likely from Ngamo ùríûr. Gadaka is in a formerly Ngamo-speaking area. 2 One Hausa loanword, hàɓɓuri ‘patience’, inexplicably has ɓ rather than ’ for Hausa ƙ.


most of which the glottal stop is geminate (see (1) above and (3) below). The path by which ëtentí entered Bole is unclear: the Arabic source would be al-xayma, which should not engender a glottal stop, and the counterparts in Hausa and Kanuri, which could have been intermediate sources, do not have glottal stops. Naíibi seems to be a recent, not fully assimilated loan from Arabic. In most loans where Arabic has internal ayin or hamza, the sources of medial glottal stops in Hausa, Bole has simply elided these consonants, e.g. shriyà ëadjudicationí (cf. Hausa shàií), sâ ëluckí (cf. Hausa sāí), jàmâ ëthe populaceí (cf. Hausa jàmaí), àlādà ëcustomí (cf. Hausa àlíād).

(3) Pluractionals of mono-consonant verbs: Pluractional verbs are discussed in (##).

Here we note a pattern of pluractional formation found only with C- and C1VC2- roots. A fair number of verbs of the latter type can form pluractionals by geminating C2, e.g. pàttā ‘many go out’ < pàtā ‘go out’, lòttu ‘chip many’ < lotu ‘chip’. Most monoconsonantal verbs have a counterpart of this type, but since there is no C2 to be geminated, geminate glottal stop is inserted as a default consonant, e.g. mà’’an ‘return repeatedly’ < mā ‘return’, tà’’an ‘many eat’ < tī ‘eat’.3

(4) Reduplication: When words that begin with ’V- reduplicate the initial part of the

word (or the whole word), the initial glottal stop shows up in the middle of the word before the reduplicated part. This is most productive with pluractional verbs (##), e.g. èíḕshuw˘yi ‘he called repeatedly’, òíòppuw˘yi ‘he dug repeatedly’. There are also a few lexicalized full or partial reduplicants, e.g. òl’òli ‘underneath’ < òli ‘earth’, odò’odò ‘kidney’ < odò ‘bean’ (referring to the shape of the kidney).

One could cite the appearance of glottal stop in reduplication as evidence for its

presence as an underlying word onset consonant. This suggestion, however, brings us to a second reason to question an analysis of glottal stop as an underlying phonological unit, viz. such an analysis obscures the 100% true generalization that Bole does not permit onsetless syllables (see ## for discussion of syllable structure). Like all the languages of Yobe State, Bole has borrowed extensively from Kanuri. Kanuri DOES permit onsetless syllables, yet when Bole borrows vowel initial words from Kanuri, it provides an initial glottal stop, e.g. [’àbàgàna] ‘younger paternal uncle’ (literally in Kanuri, “junior father”). Why would Bole provide glottal stop as an onset, rather than some other consonant? The answer is clearly that glottal stop is the default onset, predictable by rule, for otherwise onsetless syllables, an explanation that works equally well to explain the presence of glottal stop in reduplicants such as those in (4) above.

With these facts in mind, we have chosen to transcribe words that begin with a phonetic glottal stop as being vowel initial. This conforms to the standard orthography of Hausa, which is the basis for the Bole orthography and, in our view, is a desirable practice from an analytic point of view as well. 1.1.2. /h/. The sound [h] is marginal as a phonological unit of Bole. It occurs only word initial in a small number of items, mostly borrowed words. In Gimba and Schuh (forthcoming), there are only 30 items with initial h. Of these, at least 23 are loanwords (some are Islamic proper names). About a third have variants without the h-, though other items do not admit such variants. In one word, h- alternates with sh-. Several seem 3 Pluractionals of this type for monoconsonantal verbs require a plural subject and are thus cited here with the plural subject agreement suffix –an.


to be onomatopoeic, such as ‘sneezing’ and ‘yawning’ below, and hhu (= ppu) ‘lungs’. hankàli = ankàli ‘intelligence, common sense’ (< Arabic via Hausa or Kanuri) Hàbu = Àbu variant of the name Abubakar haccità = accità ‘sneezing’ hantà = antà ‘button’ honcònê = shoncònê ‘now’ but hàɓɓuri ≠ *àɓɓuri ‘patience’ (< Hausa hàƙurī) hākùm ≠ *ākùm ‘yawning’ hku- ≠ *ku ‘force open’

Although h parallels glottal stop in not appearing medial in roots, h is one of the contrasting phonemic consonants of Bole. Unlike glottal stop, h is not the predictable onset of otherwise onsetless syllables. One must know which words have initial h, and it is never added as the onset of borrowed words that themselves do not have h- in the source language. 1.1.3. /w/. The glide w has both labial and velar characteristics. The primary basis for placing it in the velar column is the fact that it conditions assimilation of a precding nasal to [ŋ] of a preceding nasal, e.g. ŋ wātùwo ‘I got it’ < /n/. See §3 for discussion of nasal assimilation. See §6.3.1 for w alternating with ’ before round vowels. 2. Prenasalized Consonants

Prenasalized consonants are phonological units only in word initial position. In the table in §1, they are grouped with nasal sonorants. The reason for this categorization is their behavior with Low Tone Raising (LTR)—see ## for extended discussion. This rule raises a word initial L(ow) syllable to H(igh) following a H EXCEPT WHEN THE L SYLLABLE BEGINS IN A VOICED OBSTRUENT. Word initial syllables beginning in prenasalized consonants DO undergo LTR, thus patterning with sonorants rather than with voiced stops, e.g. njḕlè ‘sleeping’ an njēlè ‘one who sleeps’ (with LTR) vs. jḕlè the tree Prosopis oblonga an jḕlè ‘owner of P.o.’ (without LTR). Instrumental data shows the nasal portion of word initial prenasalized consonants to have considerably more duration than the stop portion (Gimba 1998:Appendix). A better term than the traditional label, “prenasalized stop/fricative”, which suggests that the obstruent element is the primary feature of these segments, might thus be “orally released nasal”.

In word medial position, the elements that we represent as mb, nd, nz, nj, and ng are phonological sequences comprising a nasal coda followed by a voiced obstruent onset of the next syllable. There are several types of evidence showing that medial NC is a sequence, not a phonological unit. (1) Verb classes Bole verbs fall into five classes differing in tone and in final vowels (##). Class A1 verbs all consist of roots of the form CVC- (V = short vowel) whereas class A2 verbs comprise roots of all other structures with two or more consonants, including CVCC- roots. Roots of the structure CVNC- are all class A2 verbs, not A1. Note the difference in FUTURE tone patterns and in SUBJUNCTIVE final vowels in the following verb class A1 and A2 verbs


Class A1 Class A2 FUTURE à lòma gòma he will reach the market à lòmbà íyàla he will mix the grain

SUBJUNCTIVE lòmi gòma that he reach the market lòmbe íyala that he mix the grain (2) Long vowel shortening Bole disallows long vowels in closed syllables (##). There are no words with a long vowel in the environment /___NCV, i.e. there are many words such as bàmbà ‘locust’, but no words such as *bmbà.4 Moreover, when a nasal is added before a voiced stop through some morphological process, it causes a preceding underlying long vowel to be pronounced as short. For example, plural subject agreement in the PERFECTIVE adds a nasal before and after an object clitic, which has an underlying long vowel. Addition of the subject agreement marker causes shortening of the vowel of the object clitic. The following examples have the additive extension -dì following the indirect object suffix -tā. bàsā-tā-dì ‘he shot for her again’ bàsa-n-ta-n-dì ‘they shot for her again’ (3) Metrics: Native Bole poetry and song has a quantity-base system of metrics, i.e. the basis of rhythm in song texts derives from the arrangement of heavy and light syllables. In meter, the –CVN- syllable of a –CVNCV- sequence counts as heavy. For example, in the kona song style (Schuh 2001), the line Zònge ɗ‰ lè? ‘Is it a hyena or what?’ scans – v – –, i.e. the word zònge ‘hyena’ scans as heavy-light zòn.ge, not at light-light *zò.nge.

This discussion of medial NC sequences refers to root internal sequences. A root initial prenasalized consonant retains its status as a unit when phrase medial or even within a word when a prefix or proclitic initiates the word. In a word like ngo.ngor.wṑ.yi ‘he repeatedly tied’ < the root ngor-, native speaker intuition syllabifies after the first ngo, as shown by the period, not *ngon.gor…. Direct evidence for this intuition could come from metrics if scansion showed that ngo fell in a position requiring a light syllable (the opposite case from the syllabification of zòn.ge mentioned above), but at present we do not have data of the necessary type. There are, however, other types of evidence that demonstrate the integrity of root initial NC.

(1) Retention of vowel length: One no longer productive verb derivational pattern (##) infixes –Ci- or –Cu- where C = the initial consonant, the first syllable has a long vowel, and the infix vowel usually agrees in roundness with the first vowel, e.g. ppùru-w˘-yi ‘shake dirt from roots’. The verb ngngùru-w˘-yi ‘murmur, mumble’ infixes –ngu- and retains the long vowel of the first syllable even though it is follwed by –ng-. Retention of

4 In the Fika dialect, there is one exception to this statement, at least in the writing practice that we have chosen. This is the word dāndè ‘children’. What seems to be exceptional about this word, however, is not the long vowel in the closed syllable, but rather an exceptional syllabification as dā.ndè. Moreover, in normal speech, it is often pronounced [dānè]. In the Gadaka dialect it is pronounced dandê, with a short vowel in the first syllable. Another special case of a word pronounced with a long vowel in a closed syllable is p‰rɗo ‘eight’. Historically speaking, a least, this is a contraction of a reduplication of pòɗɗo ‘four’—cf. Ngamo horhìɗo, Karekare fīfḕɗu ‘eight’.


length also applies across word boundaries, e.g. b˘ ngòropi ‘mouth of a guest’, with long vowel on b˘ ‘mouth’ (cf. b˘ gòggò ‘edge (“mouth”) of the road’). (2) C+NC: The maximum syllable in Bole is CVC (##). This precludes CCC word internal sequences, which would require a *VC.CCV or *VCC.CV syllable break. However, the same infixation process described in (1), results in C.NC sequences, as in ngìrngìru-w˘-yi ‘hold tightly, cling’, where the the syllable –ngi- has been infixed following the base root ngir- (no longer used as a simple root). (3) Application of Low Tone Raising (LTR): LTR (##) applies to prenasalized consonants but not to simple voiced stops, e.g. /sun ngòropi/ [sun ngoropi] ‘name of the guest’ vs. /sun gòggò/ -/-> *sun goggò ‘name of the road’. Note in particular in the latter example the final -n of the first word does not create a prenasalized –ng- with the initial g- of the second word, which would be subject to LTR. Bole has a productive process that prefixes a H tone CV syllable to a noun to give a meaning “like NOUN” (##), where C is the first consonant of the noun and V is a short version of the first vowel of the noun. If the noun begins in a prenasalized consonant, the prefix conditions LTR, but if the first consonant is a voiced obstruent, LTR does not apply, e.g. ngkà ‘hernia’ ngungūkà ‘like a hernia’ vs. gsho ‘stone’ gugsho ‘like a stone’.

There is dialect and/or individual variation of the following types involving initial prenasalized mb, nz, and nj: mb- varying with m- nz-/nj- varying with z-/j- mblùmò mlùmò ‘elephant’s trunk’ nzharɓàl (G) jarɓàl ‘silver ornament

worn in hairdo’ mbḕlè mḕlè type of flute nzēmo zēmo (G) ‘unripe millet

heads’ mbisso misso ‘distributing’ nzhìlliki (G) jìliki ‘eye matter’ mbormi mormi ‘ebony’ nzokno (G) zogino ‘tossing’ mbùrè mùrè ‘poverty’ njùkka jùkka ‘hobble by tying

front feet ’

Most words beginning in mb- have individual or dialect variants with plain m-. Presumably the original consonant is mb- in all cases inasmuch as there are many words beginning with m- and with b- which do not have variants with mb-. The variation between nz-/nj- and z-/j- seems to be primarily a difference between dialects for only a few lexical items. Most of the words having prenasalized vs. plain obstruent counterparts have a prenasalized in the Gadaka dialect, indicated by (G) in the table above, and a fricative or affricate in the Fika dialect, though in one case (‘unripe millet heads’ in the table above), the situation is the reverse. The variation within the Fika dialect seen in the word for ‘hobble’ appears to be unique. With current data it is not possible to know whether all these words originally had prenasalized consonants or whether sporadic loss or creation of prenasalization is taking place.


The other prenasalized stops (nd, ng) seem never to show variation with either plain nasals or plain stops, at least in citation forms.5 In fast speech, initial nd- sometimes is pronounced as a nasal, but further investigation is necessary to determine how general this phenomenon is across individual speakers and across the lexicon. The medial sequence /nasal + homorganic voiced stop/ never varies with plain nasal or stop (with the exception of the word dāndè/dānè mentioned in footnote ##). 3. Distribution of Nasals

Although the table in §1 shows four contrastive nasals, their distribution is skewed in a number of ways. Only m and n are contrastive in all positions. The following table shows the distribution of the four nasals with examples of contrast for each position. The phoneme /ny/, phonetically [ɲ], is uncommon, occurring in perhaps fewer than a dozen words.6 Initial Medial /___V Medial /___C Final m mammḕ ëthusí amā ëthat, that oneí kàmti ëharvest festivalí dòm ëbloodí n nakatì ëearlyí mana ëlike, así wùnti ënoseí tàn ëhow?í ny nyamkà ëarroganceí ŋ gòŋ ëgood, niceí

Phonetically, [ŋ] appears medially only before velar consonants, as in [baŋgè] ‘baboon’, and ny [ɲ] appears only before y and ’y, e.g. [aɲyà] ‘well then, OK’, [diɲ’yil]‘baby’. In these cases, we consider the nasal to be underlying /n/, which assimilates to the following consonant, a process that also takes place across morpheme boundaries (see §6.1 for discussion of nasal assimilations). Orthographically, we represent such assimilated nasals as “n”.

A distributional fact about n worth noting is its rarity in word initial position. Though n is a high frequency phoneme in word medial position, and a number of high frequency grammatical morphemes contain n or are even manifested by syllabic n alone, n is the word initial phoneme in fewer than ten native substantive words in a lexicon of over 5000 items. Indeed, there are more words with initial ny, a marginal phoneme at best, than with initial n. 4. Alveolar and Alveopalatal Fricatives and Affricates (= Coronal Stridents) 4.1. Alveolar vs. alveopalatal contrasts. One must recognize phonemic contrast between the voiceless coronal obstruents /s, sh, c/, between the voiced counterparts /z, j/, and between the prenasalized counterparts /nz, nj/.7 One can demonstrate such constrasts through word pairs such as the following:

5 The word for ‘vervet monkey’ has the variants ndìràkì, ngiràki, gìràkì. It seems best to view this as variants unique to this word, since there are no other words that vary between either prenasalized stops at different points of articulation or between ng-/g-. 6 This distribution table excludes reduplicants that place one of the restricted nasals in medial prevocalic position, e.g. nyanyatì a type of locust. There are no reduplicants that place one of the restricted nasals in preconsonantal position. 7 The Fika dialect does not have voiced alveopalatal fricatives [ʒ] or [ɲʒ] as counterparts to voiceless [sh].


/s/ ~ /sh/

sâ ‘o’clock’ shâ ‘circumcision’ sèkè ‘brattiness’ shèkè ‘foot, leg’ s‰ni ‘honey’ sh‰rìn ‘root’ sit ideophone for black shit ideophone for red sūrì ‘singing for alms’ shla ‘fig (sp.)’ òsi ‘fire’ ˘shi ‘goat’ tāsà ‘tethering rope’ dshà ‘red sorghum’

/c/ ~ /sh/

cājì ‘charge (in a court)’ shāshùm ‘sugar cane (sp.)’ cir˘mà a royal title shìrìmba ‘epidemic’ cêk ‘bank check’ shèkè ‘foot, leg’ kicìn ‘kitchen’ ishìn ‘him’ kàcallà a traditional title kàshàu ‘sesame’

/z/ ~ /j/

zlà ‘fencepost’ jàlà ‘Albizia chevalieri’ zèwe ‘ladder’ jèwè ‘female slave’ zongò ‘caravan stop’ jòngòm ‘saddle-billed stork’ zingìu ‘bouncing’ jingì ‘protection’ zūgà, zugà ‘bellows’ jgà ‘pile of corn heads’ mbùzam ‘hunter’ kujàm ‘thirst’ ngozì ‘learning’ g˘ji ‘sickle’

/nz/ ~ /nj/

nzāno ‘dumping out’ njālo ‘dabbling’ nzēmo ‘unripe corn’ njḕlè ‘sleeping’ nzòno ‘yesterday’ njoɓirom ‘a little bit’ nzil ‘straight’ (id.) njilà ‘small piece’ nzùna ‘dampness’ njla ‘occiput’

These word pairs show that alveolars and alveopalatals contrast before all vowels and

contrast both intially and medially in words. The alveolar vs. palatal and voiced vs. voicelss distinctions are neutralized word final, where only [t] and [s] are allowed, e.g. git ‘all’ but no *gic or *gij, baràs ‘leprosy’ but no *baràz or *baràsh.8 (Nearly all words ending in obstruents in Bole are ideophones.)

Though examples in the table show that /c/ is in contrast with the alveopalatal fricative /sh/, /c/ plays a marginal role as a phonemic unit. The number of words with initial [c] and singleton medial [c] is small and most are loanwords from Kanuri or English (probably via Hausa in most cases), as in the examples in the table above.9 In a number of words (both native and borrowed), singleton [c] and [sh] are in free variation,

8 There are two words that end in –sh: pûsh ‘stud worn in the nose’ (< Kanuri fs) and ush!, and interjection dismissal of someone’s silly idea. 9 Gimba and Schuh (forthcoming) list only 12 words as having invariant initial [c], of which 7 are obvious loanwords. There are only 11 words with singleton invariant [c] as C2 or C3, of which 8 are obvious loanwords.


e.g. cònji = shònji ëpumpkiní, dci = dshi ‘that’s that, thereupon’ (< Kanuri).10 In an apparent process of nativization, Bole has replaced original [c] in some loanwords with [sh] and does not retain the original [c] at all, e.g. shta ‘disease’ from Hausa ctā, shepino ‘selling’ from Hausa cḕfàne ‘grocery shopping’.

Medial geminate [cc], on the other hand, is fairly common in native words, sometimes in free variation with geminate [ssh], e.g. bàccim‰ɗì = bàsshim‰ɗì ‘six’, mècce = mèsshe ‘travelling’, mòcci = mòsshi ‘locust bean tree’, sometimes as the only variant, at least as listed in Gimba and Schuh (forthcoming), e.g. gicciyo ‘being tilted’, màccà ‘sorrel seeds’, pocco ‘arrow’.11 In summary, it appears that [c] is a sound native to the Bole phonetic consonant inventory, perhaps as a variant of /sh/, esp. as a medial geminate. Its status as an independent phoneme /c/ may have been firmed up through loanwords where the source [c] is always retained, and some words, both native and borrowed, with a medial geminate seem to show at least a lexical preference for [cc] over [ssh], or more rarely, for [ssh] over [cc]. 4.2. Variation between /s ~ sh, z ~ j, nz ~ nj/. Section 4.1 shows that the phonemic contrast between /c/ ~ /sh/ is rather fluid. Phonemic contrast between the remaining alveolar vs. alveopalatal pairs is beyond question, as shown by the table in §4.1, yet a significant number of words show apparent free variation between [s] ~ [sh], [z] ~ [j], and [nz] ~ [nj], as illustrated in the table below:12 [s] ~ [sh] [z] ~ [j] [nz] ~ [nj] sàri = shàri Acacia sieberiana

zarɓàl = jarɓàl hair ornament

nzwar = njwar earthworm

sèrèɗì = shèrèɗì finger millet

zèmɓer = jèmɓer hemp plant

(there seem to be no words of this type where V1 = e}

sòttu = shòttu sharpen to a point

zogìna = jogìna Gynandropsis pentaphylla

njònni = nzònni a twin

sìra = shìra pour quality grain heads

zwò = jwò body

nzìmòkì = njìmòkì Ruppell’s griffon

sunsinà = shunshinà child of a slave

ztuw˘yi = jtuw˘yi he lifted

nzùrùl = njùrùl cold

kàsàdabì = kàshàdabì castor oil plant

gāzà = gājà rooster

lisìm = lishìm tongue

dḕzi = dḕji Bambara groundnut cakes

Looking at the data in this table and that in the table in §4.1, one wonders whether not

the same rather fluid situation might exist for each of the alveolar vs. alveopalatal pairs as seems to exist for /c/ vs. /sh/. A lexical count shows that this is not the case. The table 10 Gimba and Schuh (forthcoming) list 8 words with initial variation between [c] and [sh] and 6 with medial singletons in free variation. 11 Gimba and Schuh (forthcoming) list 13 words with [cc] ~ [ssh] in variation, 11 with [cc] only, and 6 with [ssh] only. 12 The “=“ signs in the table are somewhat misleading. Particular speakers, and possibly all speakers of the Fika dialect, may (strongly) prefer one variant over the other, but all are recognized as possible pronunciations by native speakers of Bole.


below shows the numbers of words that Gimba and Schuh (forthcoming) listed as having invariant alveolars or alveopalatals vs. those that show variation. Counts for /c/ vs. /sh/ data discussed in §4.1 are included in the table. Counts for geminate C2 are also included.13 There are no words with geminate C3. The prenasalized pair /nz ~ nj/ are phonological units only in word initial position, as explained in §2. Type Initial % init C2 % C2 Gem C2 C3 % C3 s only 265 64.32% 156 58.21% 19 53 42.06% sh only 102 24.76% 67 25.00% 8 57 45.24% c only 12 2.91% 18 6.72% 13 6 4.76% s or sh 25 6.07% 11 4.10% 0 5 3.97% c or sh 8 1.94% 16 5.97% 13 5 3.97% TOTAL 412

268

53 126

z only 138 47.10% 52 44.44% 2 18 31.03%

j only 128 43.69% 49 41.88% 4 37 63.79% z or j 27 9.22% 16 13.68% 0 3 5.17% TOTAL 293

117

6 58

nz only 18 34.62%

nj only 26 50.00%

nz or nj 8 15.38%

TOTAL 52

It is possible that Gimba and Schuh (forthcoming) inadvertently omitted some cases where aveolar vs. alveopaltal variation exists, but these numbers show that, overwhelmingly, words with invariant pronunciations for the respective alveolars and alveopalatals outnumber those with variant pronunciations in all word positions for all alveolar vs. alveopalatal pairings.

What is difficult to explain is how speakers seem to keep separate those words that have variant pronunciations from those that do not. A parallel situation exists in English in words like economics or either, where both [ˌikəˈnamɪks] or [ˌɛkəʼnamɪks] and [ˈiðɚ] or [ˈajðɚ], respectively, are acceptable whereas such variation in similar words is not allowed (ecology [iˈkaləˌdzi] but not *[ɛˈkaləˌdzi], geyser [ˈgajzɚ] but not *[ˈgizɚ]). In Bole the situation is simply more extensive. 4.3. Non-variability within roots. One might attribute the alveolar vs. alveopalatal variation discussed in §4.2 to phonologically conditioned changes in the consonants. Thus, for example, a number of Chadic languages palatalize alveolars before front vowels, e.g. Hausa das ‘to transplant’ vs. dàshē ‘seedling’ (something transplanted), Ngizim ksu ‘he swept’ vs. à kāshi ‘sweep!’. The table in §4.2 shows that in Bole, alveolar vs. alveopalatal pronounciation cannot be attributed to a phonologically conditioned alternation, since the variants in question are found before all vowels.

13 The raw numbers for C2 include the geminates. Thus, for example, there are 156 words with invariant [s], which includes 19 cases of invariant [ss], i.e. there are 137 cases (156 – 19) of invariant singleton [s].


Indeed, in Bole, presence in a particular root INHIBITS alternations. Verb morphology consists largely of changes in stem final vowels, producing both back and front vowel environments for root final consonants (##). For verbs with an alveolar or alveopalatal as the root final consonant, this consonant never alternates, regardless of the following vowel, with one apparent exception, which involves a verbal noun suffix -she, added directly to the root of most A1 class verbs, e.g. ngòrshè ‘tying’ from the root ngor-. For verbs with a final /s/ or /z/, the -she verbal noun can have a geminate [ʃʃ] (spelled “ssh” here). This is a result of assimilation to the underlying sh of the suffix, NOT palatalization in a front vowel environment. Significantly, all such verbs allow an alternate with [ss], i.e. the lexical strength of the root consonant can condition perseverative assimilation of the underlying /sh/ of the suffix to the root consonant. The table below shows non-alternation of alveolars and alveopalatals in a variety of environments. The only verb with j in an environment where vowels alternate is gòjju- ‘buy’, with a geminate jj. There are no verbs with geminate zz in the relevant environment.14 Non-front vowel environment Front vowel environment Invariable /s/ gòsakk˘yi ‘she put a pot on the

fire’ gòsshè ~ gòssè gòsî (*goshî)

‘putting the pot on’ ‘put (the pot) on!’

mbosuw˘yi mbòsà

‘he counted’ ‘speech, talking’

mbòsshè ~ mbòssè; mbòsìni (*mbòshìni)

‘counting’ (gerund) ‘counting’ (DVN)

mùusuwò mūso

‘he got a sprain’ ‘a sprain’

msî (*mshî) ‘get a sprain!’

bàsāw˘yi ‘he shot (it)’ ‘he spun (it)’

besì (*beshì) bèse (*bèshe)

‘shooting’ ‘spinning’

pùnsuw˘yi pùnsa

‘he cast a spell’ ‘casting a spell’

pùnsî (*pùnshî) ‘cast a spell!’

òssakk˘yi òssò

‘she ground (it)’ ‘grinding’

òssî (*òsshî) ‘grind (it)!’

Invariable /sh/ gashuw˘yi gasho (*gaso)

‘he wrenched out’ ‘wrenching out’

gashî ‘wrench it out!’

washuw˘yi washo (*waso)

“he nibbled (it)’ ‘nibbling’

washî ‘nibble!’

pshuw˘yi psha (*psa)

‘he washed (it)’ ‘washing’

pshî ‘wash (it)!’

wàsshuw˘yi wassho (*wasso)

‘he trimmed (it)’ ’trimming’

wàsshî ‘trim (it)!’

Invariable /z/ ngozuw˘yi ‘he learned (it)’ ngozì (*ngojì);

ngòsshè ~ ngòssè ‘learning’ (DVN) ‘learning’ (gerund)

ùzāw˘yi ‘he spread(it) to dry’ ùzè (*ùjè) ‘spreading to dry’ 14 There are a few verbs where the final root consonant varies between s and sh, e.g. bùshu- ~ bùsu- ‘spend the day’. As would be expected, such verbs have comparable variants in all environments, e.g. bùshi ~ bùsi ‘spending the day’, with the result that one might hear a single speaker use busuwò ‘he spent the day’ alongside bùshi ‘spending the day’ (heard frequently, for example, in the greeting Bark bùshi! ‘Good afternoon!’). The choice of consonant here has to do with lexical s/sh variation, not conditioned palatalization. There are no verbs with z/j variation in root final consonants.


rùgùzuw˘yi ruguzo

‘he razed (it)’ ‘razing’

rùgùzânyi (* rùgùjinyi)

raze it!

zàkāw˘ ‘he sighed’ zekì (*jekì) ‘a sigh’ Invariable /j/ gòjjuw˘yi gojjo (*gozzo)

‘he bought (it)’ ‘buying’ (gerund)

gojjì ‘buying’ (DVN)

The only two words in Bole showing alveolar ~ alveopalatal alternations that were

presumably originally conditioned by following vowels are gorzo ëman, husbandí, with plurals gorji and gòrjwi, and gāzà = gājà ëroosterí with plural gajje. Both these involve lexically frozen, non-productive plurals (##). The latter is probably not even a case of *z > j /__e. The singular has the /z ~ j/ alternation described above, and the plural has been lexicalized with the alveopalatal, with only the singular showing variation. This leaves only gorji ‘men’ as an apparent case of *z > j /___i, lexically frozen as such. The variant gòrjwi has been formed on analogy to a group of human nouns using a suffix -wi (##). Note that the /j/ of the lexicalized plural is used rather than the /z/ of the singular, even though it falls before a back vowel. 4.4. Palatal and voicing harmony.15 Consective coronal stridents in a word nearly always agree for the features [±palatal] and [±voice].16 shìnshor ‘dew’, but no *sìnshor, ïshìnsor, *jinshòr, etc. s‰sò ‘patch on clothes’, but no *s‰shò, ïsh‰sò, *s‰zò, etc. jànja ‘star’, but no *zànja, ïjànza, *shànja, etc. zzoki ‘Pterocerpus eririaceus’, but no *zjoki, ïjzoki, *zsoki, etc.

There is evidence that PALATAL HARMONY is at least semi-active. Consider the following words: jjì = zzì ‘porcupine’ jjirmà = zzirmà ‘leopard’ shshu = ssu ‘change’ zjin = jjin ‘before’ (cf. z ‘before’) zajìn = jajìn ‘time’

The first three words have variants with alveolars or alveopalatals, but the two sounds must match for the feature [±palatal]. The word for ‘change’ is from Hausa sākḕ [saːkʲèː] ‘change’. Before the final front vowel, the velar in the second syllable is automatically palatalized in Hausa to [kj], a sound that does not exist in Bole and is realized as [c] by

15 Will will not have much to say here about VOICING HARMONY other than to point out that consecutive coronal stridents and affricates virtually always agree in voicing. There are no evident restrictions for other consonant pairings involving voicing, e.g. tèze ‘vein’, zottò ‘wrapper’, gke Fairdherbia albida, kgilmo ‘garlic’. 16 In Gimba and Schuh (forthcoming), there are 10 words with /s…s/, 8 with /sh…sh/, 3 with /z…z/, and 7 with /j…j/. No words with initial /nz/ or /nj/ have any of the sounds of interest as C2. It isn’t clear how significant these numbers are, however, since a number of the words are probably frozen reduplicants, where repetition of the same consonant would be expected for morphological reasons rather than phonotactics, e.g. sinsini ‘moneywort’, jijjìmāko ‘parrot’.


Boles who have a Bole accent in Hausa.17 The nativized Bole pronunciation of this word would have created a violation of PALATAL HARMONY. This problem has been handled in two directions: (1) the initial s palatalized to match the c < [kj] (with subsequent shift of c to sh seen in many words) OR (2) the c < [kj] shifted to the alveolar counterpart to match the initial s of the source pronunciation.

The variant zjin ëbeforeí appears to violate PALATAL HARMONY, but the variant jjin confirms its (semi-)productive status. These words are, historically at least, bimorphemic, combining z ëbeforeí, which can be used alone and has invariant /z/, with jin, which does not seem to exist independently in modern Bole. As zjin, which is still used, came to be felt to be monomorphemic word, PALATAL HARMONY let to the pronunciation jjin. The same process must account for the variants zajìn = jajìn ëtimeí, though in this case, the sources of the two original morphemes have not been identified.

The only words in Gimba and Schuh (forthcoming) that violate PALATAL HARMONY and/or VOICING HARMONY are the following: s‰jà ‘soldier’ sunsinà = shunshinà = sunshinà ‘child of a slave’ zḕsa = jḕsa ‘mane of a horse’ zḕsu = jḕsu ‘tilt to one side’ sshi ‘placenta of an animal’ sshe ‘replacement, substitute’

The first, which violates both types of harmony, is a recent loan from English, probably via Hausa, which has not undergone any nativization processes seen in words mentioned above. The second has two variants that conform to PALATAL HARMONY. The one that does not seems to be a blend. The other four words appear to be true exceptions. No loan sources have been identified, and they all seem to be based on monomorphemic roots. It is striking that ‘mane’ and ‘tile’ share a homophonous base zḕs- = jḕs-, and ‘placenta’ and ‘replacement’ share ssh-, but the significance of this fact is not clear. 4.5. Gadaka dialect. The first extensive work that RGS did on Bole was with Abdullahi Idi from the town of Gadaka. In the Gadaka dialect, there is much more phonetic variation in the pronunciation of the coronal stridents than in the Fika dialect. The voiceless sounds range across [s, ɕ, ʃ, tʃ] and the voiced ones across [z, ʑ, ʒ, dʒ], often for one and the same word. Moreover, in many words where the Fika dialect allows only a palatal pronunciation, Gadaka allows a variant with alveolar (possibly slightly palatalized) pronunciation, e.g. Gadaka sìtta ‘red peppers’ (Fika shìtta only), Gadaka posso ‘arrow’ (Fika pocco only), Gadaka zo ‘running’ (Fika jo only), Gadaka zànkar ‘louse’ (Fika jànkar only).

The area where Gadaka is located is at the northern border of the Bole-speaking region, and though it is within the historical Ngamo-speaking region, it is in transition to becoming Bole-speaking.18 One might attribute these features of Bole of Gadaka to 17 Today, only very old speakers would be likely to have this pronunciation, since all Bole speakers born, say, since the middle of the 20th century are functionally bilingual in Bole and Hausa. RGS lived in Potiskum in 1969-1970 during the reign of Moi Muhammadu Idirissa, who at the time was advanced in years. RGS would pass by the palace on occasion for a courtesy greeting and remembers distinctly the Moi describing the situation of the emirate with the phrase “dà câu’ for Hausa dà kyâu ‘good, in a good state’. 18 The court of Mai Gudi, the Islamic sovereign of the Ngamos, is located in Gadaka. The language of Mai Gudi’s court is Bole, not Ngamo. Likewise, children in neighboring villages can be heard speaking Bole to each other, rather than Ngamo (and suprisingly, rather than Hausa!).


Ngamo influence, but the speakers of Ngamo with whom RGS has worked, do NOT show this type of variation in coronal stridents. Thus, it seems more likely that variation in coronal stridents is an internal development in Bole, which has been extended in Bole of Gadaka, has become lexicalized for individual items in the ways illustrated above in Bole of Fika, or a combination of these two developments. 5. Geminate Consonants

A striking feature of Bole segmental phonology is the pervasiveness of geminate consonants. The following rough figures will give an idea of the number of words in Bole with lexical geminate consonants:19 Total lexicon: 12.75% (481 out of a total 3773—excludes compounds) Nouns: 9.15% (219 out of 2393—excludes compounds) Verbs: 21.4% (177 out of 828)

These figures do include a few words with derived geminates, such as pluractional verbs (##) and noun plurals (##), but all geminates of these types require lexical listing, i.e. the geminates in these words do not result from processes that are productive in modern Bole. We do not have figures for words with lexical geminates in other Chadic languages, but it is safe to say that the figures for Bole are exceptionally high. Some Chadic languages, such as Bade, Ngizim, Miya (Schuh 1998), and even closely related Ngamo have essentially no geminate consonants in native words. Even in Hausa, where geminate consonants are fairly common because of various productive derivational processes and phonological assimilations, there is only a handful of nouns with lexical geminates, and aside from verbs borrowed as Arabic Form II, e.g. fassara ‘translate’, hallaka ‘perish’, bayyana ‘explain’, geminate consonants in Hausa verbs ALL arise, historically or through productive derivation, from CVC reduplication with obligatory assimilation of the second C to an abutting consonant, e.g. babbake ‘singe’ with reduplication of bak-, though this root does not exist in modern Hausa independent of the reduplicated form (Newman 2000:397).

In Bole, there are numerous apparently lexically unrelated minimal pairs distinguished by singleton vs. geminate consonants.20 Singleton Geminate tùwa ‘stump of a tree’ tuwwà ‘day after tomorrow’ mukì ‘vomiting by baby’ mukkì ‘a sideways blow’ nzòna ‘dampness’ nzonna ‘twins’ usè ‘hello’ ùssè ‘accompanying’ à diɓ˘yi ‘he makes it turbid’ à diɓɓ˘yi ‘he stabs it’ shapo ‘snapping off of’ shappo ‘losing strength’ ngoto ‘nodding head’ ngotto ‘delaying’

19 Since this chapter was originally written, our Bole lexicon has expanded by nearly 1000 items (excluding compounds and idioms). The raw numbers here are therefore out of date, but the general proportions of items containing geminates would remain about the same. A somewhat more detailed study of gemination in Bole can be found in Schuh (2001), downloadable from

http://www.linguistics.ucla.edu/people/schuh/Papers/ms_2001_Bole_gemination.pdf. 20 Some of these pairs also differ in tone, but there is no relation between consonant gemination and tone pattern.


sùrakkò ‘she had a miscarriage’ sùrrakk˘yi ‘she fried (it)’ mùíya ‘co-wife’ mùíyíyà (b˘) ‘rinsing (the mouth)’

In Bole discourse, the number of geminates increases greatly beyond those found internal to roots. Bole has phonological assimilations that sometimes result in geminate consonants (§6) as well as several morphemes or parts of morphemes that are underlyingly G, i.e. gemination of a consonant as part of morphological marking. Following is a list of those morphemes: Noun Plurals: Some nouns form their plurals by geminating the second root consonant (plus changes in tone pattern and/or final vowel)—see ## for a complete list of nouns with this type of plural, e.g. bùdà, (pl) budde ‘servant’ mòle, (pl) mollè ‘younger sister’ Genitives: “Underweight” nouns (those of the form CV, V = short vowel) geminate the consonant of a pronoun possessor clitic —see ## for a complete list of nouns with this property, e.g. ko ëheadí konnì ëhis headí íya ‘thing’ íyànno ‘my thing’ lo ‘meat’ lôkko ‘your (m) meat’ Gemination in certain C-final words: Two words for ‘all’ end in lexically distinct consonants when phrase final but form a geminate with any following consonant: shap but sham mi’y’yà, shat temka, sha’ ’awwà, shak kòmshine ‘all the people, all the sheep, all the goats, all the cattle’ git but gim mi’y’yà, giɓ ɓàrkinshe, gil làbâr ‘all the people, all the goats, all the news’ Pluractional verbs: Some verbs of classes A1 and B (classes with CVC- root structure, V = short vowel) form their pluractional by geminating the second root consonant—see ## for a complete list of verbs with this pluractional type, e.g. lotu-, (plac.) lòttu- ‘chip piece off’ gàɗā-, (plac.) gàɗɗā- ‘pass by’ Feminine agreement with PERFECTIVE verbs: In the PERFECTIVE, verbs with 2nd and 3rd person singular feminine subjects add a suffix -aG(…-G), which geminates the consonant following the verb stem and also geminates a consonant following any non-final clitics added to the stem (##), e.g. ɗòpp-at tèmshi ‘she followed a sheep’ ɗòpp-ak kòm ‘she followed a cow’ (cf. masculine subject form ɗòppū tèmshi/kòm ‘he followed a sheep/cow’)


kàrr-a-n-na-t-tì yàbbi kirkir ‘she slaughtered all the chickens for me’ (cf. masculine subject form kàrrā-nā-tì yàbbi ‘he slaughtered all the chickens for me’) ngòr-a-t-tù-í *ishì ‘she tied him up’ (cf. masculine ngor-t ishì ‘he tied him up’) SUBJUNCTIVE and IMPERATIVE verbs with the ventive extension: In the SUBJUNCTIVE and IMPERATIVE, verbs with the ventive extension always have a clitic of the form G+clitic. The clitic may be the Ø object ventive clitic or a pronominal object clitic (##), e.g. ishi ri-t-tù ‘he should come in’ ishi ɗòppi-n-n-yi ‘he should follow me here’

The high frequency of geminates in Bole utterances thus results from the convergence of factors. The most obvious is assimilation of a consonant to an abutting consonant, resulting in phonetic gemination. In some cases Bole speakers seem to have reanalyzed these constructions as G rather than as assimilation of one specific consonant to another. • ‘all’: The original final C's of shap, git are still seen before pause. • Feminine PERFECTIVE verb agreement: Though the agreement is always G in

connected speech, there is a hesitation form –k (##), and some literate Bole speakers prefer to write “k” as the agreement marker rather than a doubled consonant.21

• Ventive SUBJUNCTIVE G: The source of G is probably *n, via reinterpretation of geminate nasal resulting from assimilation of *n + initial nasal of the pronouns na/no ‘me’, ni ‘him’, mu ‘us’, e.g. ngòri-n-nì ‘that he tie for him (and come)’. If the –n- is understood as /G/ in such a construction rather than /n/, then the way is open for, for example, ngòri-t-to ‘that he tie for her (and bring)’ rather than *ngòri-n-to.

• Nouns with gemination in genitive: The most likely explantion is that there was originally a genitive linker which assimilated to some or all the pronoun possessors, with reinterpretation as G—some Bole genitive constructions still use linkers –n or –ti (##).

Geminates in noun plurals and pluractional verbs may likewise have explanations

other than simple gemination: • Noun plurals: Geminates may be original though there is another explanation, viz.

reduction of reduplication (cf. Hausa sāshḕ ‘branch’with plural sâssā ‘< *sāsàsā). Some nouns with lexical geminate consonants may be lexicalized plurals, e.g. àmma ‘water’ (a plural in many languages, including Hausa ruwa, which has plural agreement in Niger Hausa), dakka ‘fence made of cornstalks’ (always requires multiple stalks), redde ‘bush papaya’ (multiple fruits?), etc.

• Pluractional verbs: It is possible that at the level of proto-Bole, verb pluractionals were already formed by gemination of a root consonant. Bole’s sister language,

21 The feminine agreement marking G must have a source in some specific consonant, but what that consonant was is not obvious. From a comparative Chadic point of view, a candidate is *t, the ubiquitous Chadic (and Afroasiatic) feminine agreement marker, but Bole’s Chadic sisters, such as Ngamo or Kirfi, do not mark feminine agreement on verbs and hence do not provide evidence for or against this candidate. One bit of evidence that the agreement marker may have actually been *k is the fact that k is the linker in Ngamo N+N genitives where N1 is a feminine noun. The fact that -k is the hesitation form and the form that some speakers prefer to write suggests that, in modern Bole at least, /k/ is even a plausible underlying representation.


Kanakuru, for example, provides evidence that it also formed pluractionals by gemination (Newman 1974). At a deeper historical level, however, geminate pluractionals came from infixal REDUPLICATION of a copy of C2 of the verb root. For example, the pluractional pàttāwò ‘he repeatedly went out’ (simple verb pàtāwò) comes from *[pa-ti-tāwò, with subsequent syncope of the vowel of the reduplicated syllable. Support for this reconstruction is the fact that infixal reduplication is the primary or only pattern of pluractional formation in Bole’s close relatives, Ngamo and Karekare, as well as its more distant relatives, Ngizim and Bade. See ## for discussion of pluractionals, including comparative notes.

This set of relatively natural processes, mainly involving assimilations with loss of

identity of the original C1 of a C1C2 sequence, has made gemination a part of the Sprachgefühl of Bole. The result is what one may call “gratuitous gemination” in cases where there is no structural reason to expect it, such as the following: • Dialect variants bòlou (Fika), bòllou (Gadaka) ‘two’ rùta (Fika), rùtta (Gadaka) ‘work’ mēsekì (Gadaka), messhekì (Fika) ‘Guiera senegalensis’ • Cognates in closely related languages òlloki, cf. Ngamo òlyò ‘smoke’ pòɗɗo, cf. Ngamo hòɗò ‘four’ sunna, cf. Ngamo sùnâ ‘dream’ • Borrowings àgoggo < Hausa àg‰go ‘watch, clock’ àkku < Hausa àku ‘parrot’ ò’’ori < Hausa ƙ˘ƙarī ‘effort’ hàɓɓuri < Hausa hàƙurī ‘patience’

In addition to such pairings, where Bole has a geminate that is absent elsewhere, Bole appears to have “gratuitously” shifted many verbs to the structure CVGV-, e.g. ɗòppu- ‘follow’ (cf. Ngamo ɗfâ), a structure associated with pluractionality but where the verb incorporates no pluractional sense (##). 6. Consonant Alternations

Section 5 describes complete assimilation of a consonant to a following consonant, resulting in a geminate. Though geminate formation processes are, historically, the result of regular phonological assimilation, they are now lexically specific and, in some cases, the historically original consonant is lost, with the underlying specification simply being G (“geminate the next consonant”). Bole does have some regular, phonologically conditioned assimilation processes as well as several other phonological alternations of limited productivity.

6.1. Nasal assimilations. Nasal consonants in syllable codas undergo the following rule:

n, ŋ complete assimilation to following liquid, point of articulation of all other C


Note that /m/ does NOT assimilate to a following consonant: 22 kùrùm-nì/-tò , not ïkùrùn-nì/-tò ‘his/her fingernail’ gà dòm-no/ko, not ïgà dòn-no/gà dòŋ-ko ‘in front of me/you’

Nasal assimilation takes place across both clitic and word boundaries and affects the final nasal of all word categories. Subject + Verb /næ/ ‘I…’ /gayaŋ/ ‘the pot…’ l lomuwò ‘I arrived’ gayãl lotuwò* ‘the pot got chipped’ r rùkkuwò ‘I became thin’ gayãr rùkùɓuwò* ‘the pot shattered’ m pàtāwò ‘I went out’ gayam pāwò ‘the pot is closed’ n zaluw˘yi ‘I began’ gayan tàɓāwò ‘the pot is red’ ŋ konuw˘yi ‘I took (it)’ m montùwo ‘I know’ ŋ íàlātùwo ‘I carried (it)’ ŋ wātùwo ‘I got (it)’ ny íyoruwò ‘I stopped’ gayany íyoruwò ‘the pot is erect’ *Note that when assimilation is to a non-nasal, some nasalization remains on the vowel, at least in moderate speech. Verb + Object Noun /gòjjan…/ ‘they bought a…’ gòjjãl lekidè* ‘they bought a ladle’ gòjjãr rìya* ‘they bought a bow (for shooting)’ gòjjam bri ‘they bought a water pot’ gòjjan tēɓile ‘they bought a scoop’ gòjjaŋ gànga ‘they bought a drum’ gòjjaŋ íàdà ‘they bought a dog’ gòjjaŋ wàkkà ‘they bought a large calabash’ gòjjany ywi ‘they bought a chicken’ *See note on Subject + Verb table above. Preposition + Noun /n/ ‘they gave (it) to…’ onuw˘ l Lengì ‘he gave (it) to Lengi’ onuw˘ r Rìmân ‘he gave (it) to the Imam’ onuw˘ m Madù ‘he gave (it) to Madu’ onuw˘ n Tandu ‘he gave (it) to Tandu’ onuw˘ ŋ Kakkè ‘he gave (it) to Kakke’ onuw˘ ŋ íAdamù ‘he gave (it) to Adamu’ 22 There are a couple of lexicalized exceptions where m assimilates: gùnyò, plural gùmāya ‘young woman’, gòntu- - ‘join (tr.)’ < gomu- ‘join (intr.)’ (m usually does not assimilate to the –t- transitizing suffix—##). Reduplicated items also complicate the picture somewhat. There are many CVm reduplicants with unassimilated -m, e.g. ɗimɗim ‘eyelash’, ’yam’yam ‘gong’, kùmkùm ‘small of the back’, but strangely, there are no reduplicated words of the form CVn-CVn at all. There are reduplicated words of the type CVN-CVNV. In these words, all see, to assimilate, e.g. kòŋ-kònì ‘hangnail’, kòŋ-kòmi ‘being a nuisance’.


The same rule applies as a condition on the internal structure of roots. There are no

roots with nasal+liquid sequences or of n or ŋ followed by obstruents not sharing the same point of articulation, i.e. there are words like dìndì ‘toad’, [zòŋge] ‘hyena’ but no words like *dìnbì or *[zòŋde]. Conversely, there are words with m followed by alveolars and velars, e.g. lemɗe a type of grass, nyamkà ‘arrogance’.

Nasal assimilation applies iteratively from right to left, i.e. a nasal that assimilates to a consonant on its right in turn conditions assimilation of a nasal on its left: /dàwun n mànshi/ [dàwum m mànshi] ‘mat of an old woman’ /dàwun n lìpìlā}/ [dàwũl l lìpìlâ] ‘blue mat’ (See note on Subject + Verb table above for nasalization of the vowel in [dàwũl].) 6.2. ɗ G / ___C. The implosive ɗ regularly assimilates completely to a following consonant, resulting in a geminate. The nature of the Bole lexicon and morphological processes limit this assimilation to a small number of lexical items, but it is regular for those items. kuɗu- ‘refuse, dislike’: This verb and all other A1 verbs with root structure CVɗ- add clitics directly to the CVɗ- root (##), with assimilation of ɗ to the consonant of the clitic. /kuɗ-kā-wo/ kukkāwo ‘he dislikes you’ /kuɗ-mū-wo/ kummūwo ‘he dislikes us’ /ishi kùɗɨ-su/ ishi kǔssù ‘he should dislike them’ dìɗo ‘neck’: Body part nouns of the shape CvCo before possessors lose the final -o, resulting in juxtaposition and resultant assimilation of ɗ to the possessor clitic (##). /dìɗo + kò/ dikkò23 ‘your neck’ /dìɗo + mù/ dimmù ‘our neck(s)’ 6.3. Alternations affecting /w/ 6.3.1. Deletion of w in #__u/o... . Words beginning with /wu-/ or /wo-/ can drop the /w/. If this takes place, the requirement that all Bole syllables have an onset adds an initial glottal stop as the default onset (§1.1.1). Note that words with initial /w/ contrast with words with initial /u/ or /o/, e.g. ùdo [’ùdo] ‘tooth’ but not *wùdo, odò [’odò] ‘beans’ but not *wodò. wodì = ’odì ‘biting’ wòli = ’òli ‘earth’ wula = ’ula ‘load, burden’ wùnti = ’ùnti ‘nose’ 6.3.2. Fronting w before front vowels. A front vowel following /w/ conditions fronting of the glide to [ɥ], written w here. 23 With a possessive pronoun, the root /dìɗ-/ of ëneckí takes H tone. This is an idiosyncratic property of this word. Note the R tone of kǔssù ëshould dislike themí in the preceding example, where the underlying L of the root remains as the first part of a rising tone.


[ywi] ‘chicken’ [kòɗùwi] ‘handle (of hoe or axe)’ [zèwe] ‘ladder’ 6.4. Non-productive consonant alternations. In modern Bole, productive consonantal alternations are of three main types: alveolar vs. palatal variation (§4), morphemes with final G which is realized as gemination of a following consonant (§5), and nasal assimilation (§6.1). Bole also has a number of lexically specific alternations, mainly nominal singular vs. plural. These may have been environmentally conditioned alternations at one time but are now lexically stipulated. The following is a complete list from available materials: 6.4.1. Labial obstruent alternating with w or with Ø plus vowel length ywi, (pl.) yàbbi ‘chicken’ b˘wu, (pl.) bòbbè ‘father’ kàwā-, (pluractional) kàbbā- ‘be sated; swell’; (plac.) ‘swell locally’ g, (Gadaka dialect) gùbù ‘corpse’ ngòropi, (pl.) ngorwa ‘stranger, guest, visitor’ zaa(ti), (pl.) zàppè ‘compatriot’

These alternations are the result of a sound change *P > w /r, V___V (“P” = any labial obstruent). The effects of this sound change on many Bole roots are evident from comparative data: dèwe ‘black plum tree’, Ngamo (Yaya dialect) dàbi; tuwwà ‘day before yesterday’, Ngamo (Yaya dialect) tūfà. It is unknown why –p- remains in the singular of ‘stranger’. The –pp- in the plural of ‘compatriot’ is completely idiosyncratic. 6.4.2. Velar obstruent alternating with w or with Ø plus vowel length bwùsu- ‘singe’, bòkku- ‘burn’ sūru, (pl.) sùgure, (Gadaka dialect) sukkure ‘in-law’ njla, (Gadaka dialect) njùkùla ‘occiput’ shla, (Gadaka dialect) sùkùla ‘Ficus thonningi’ d‰sho, (pl.) d˘wì ‘horse’ (d‰sho < *d‰ko < ?*dōki—cf. Hausa doki) ˘shi, (pl.) uwwà ‘goat’ (˘shi < *˘ki or more likely *kwi—cf. Hausa akwiya) See discussion at the end of the next section for relevant sound changes. 6.4.3. Velar obstruent alternating with a palatal dshīti, (pl.) dìkkè ‘grandfather, grandson’ tèmshi, (pl.) temka ‘sheep’ bùnga, (pl.) bunje ‘young man’

Bole has undergone two phonological changes affecting velars. One is a change *k > c (> sh in Bole) /___i, shared by all the Bole-Tangale languages: Karekare òci, Bole ˘shi


‘goat’ vs. Hausa àkwiy, Ngizim akù; Karekare tàmci, Bole tèmshi ‘sheep’ vs. Hausa tumkìyā, Ngizim tmku; Karekare cìru-, Bole shìru- ‘steal’ vs. Ngizim kru, Miya kəәra. This change accounts for the sh ~ k alternations in ‘grandfather’ and ‘sheep’ just above as well as the sh in ‘goat’ in §6.4.2. The g ~ j alternation in ‘young man’ just above seems to be related, but this alternation is idiosyncratic to this word.

The second sound change is *K > w /V__V (“K” = any velar) and is specific to Bole. It is evident through comparative evidence in many Bole roots: Bole àko ‘belly’, Karekare àko; Bole zùwè ‘musk shrew’, Ngamo (Gudi dialect) zùzūgà. This accounts for the w ~ k alternation seen in §6.4.2 and, combined with the *k > sh /___i change, for the sh ~ w alternants seen in §6.4.2. 6.4.4. Alveolar alternating with a palatal. This alternation was discussed in §4.1. As noted there, alternations between alveolar vs. alveopalatal fricatives and affricates in modern Bole virtually all involve free variation for particular lexical items. There are, however, the following two pairs where the alveopalatal alternants in the plural are fixed. gāzà, (pl.) gajje ‘rooster’ gorzo, (pl.) gorji ‘man’

phonology: consonants b - aflang...

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