Lele language (Chad)
| Lele | |
|---|---|
| Native to | Chad |
Native speakers | (26,000 cited 1991)[1] |
Afro-Asiatic
| |
| Language codes | |
| ISO 639-3 | lln |
| Glottolog | lele1276 |
Lele is an East Chadic language spoken in the Tandjilé Region, in the Tandjilé Ouest department, south of Kélo.[1]
Phonology
[edit]Vowels
[edit]Lele has five underlying vowels. The mid vowels are lower mid rather than higher mid. All vowels may have long variants.[2]
Consonants
[edit]There are some asymmetries in Lele's consonant inventory.
Consonants Labial Alveolar Palatal Velar Labio-velar Glottal Nasal [m] [n] [ɲ] [ŋ] Plosive voiceless [p] [t] [k] [kp] voiced [b] [d] [ɡ] [ɡb] implosive [ɓ] [ɗ] prenasalized [ᵐb] [ⁿd] [ᵑb] Fricative [s] [h] Trill [r] Approximant central [w] [j] lateral [l]
Grammar
[edit]Nouns
[edit]Nouns are grammatically masculine or feminine, but there are no morphological markings of gender on the nouns.[2]: 55 This distinction is only seen in the agreement system (covert gender). Only a subset of nouns are marked for plural: large animals, kinship terms and a few inanimate objects. Plurals nouns are marked in a variety of ways including a suffix /-e/ or /-we/ and an infix /-a-/.[2]: 56 There are three nouns that have irregular plural forms: "woman", "hen" and "person".[2]: 58
There is a grammatical distinction between alienable and inalienable possession in the noun phrase. In inalienable possession, a singular possessor is marked by a suffix on the noun indexing the possessor (possessor agreement suffix). In plural inalienable possession and all alienable, the possessor is indexed by a pronominal word following the noun.[2]: 61
Verbs
[edit]The tense-aspect-mood system includes four verbal forms labeled "past", "future", "nominal" and "imperative". The "past" form normally has a stem-final vowel /i/. The "future" and "nominal" forms both have a stem-final vowel /e/. They are distinguished from each other by a high tone on the first syllable of the "future" form. The imperative form normally has a stem-final vowel /a/ or /u/.[2]: 44
Some verbs also have a plural form indicated by a suffix /-wi/ or a devoiced initial consonant. The plural form of the verb can indicate the plurality of an action, a plural intransitive subject, or a plural object.[2]: 124 Verbs can also be modified by adverbs, including a class of ideophones,[2]: 164 by a "ventive" marker (derived from the verb "come") following the verb, or an "inceptive" marker (derived from the verb "leave") preceding the verb.
Pronouns
[edit]The reference system makes a 10-way distinction. Gender is distinguished in second and third person singular pronouns. The first person non-singular pronouns include a dual inclusive form, a plural inclusive form, and a plural exclusive form. The plural inclusive form is a bimorphemic pronoun which combines the first person dual inclusive form with the second person plural form.[2]: 100
Word order
[edit]In a pragmatically neutral sentence, nominal arguments occur in a SVO word order. However, third person subject pronouns usually follow the verb.
References
[edit]Bibliography
[edit]- Cope, Pamela Simons. 1993. The plural in Lele. JWAL 23(1)
- Cope, Pamela Simons and Donald A. Burquest. 1986. Some comments on nasalization in Lele. JWAL 16(2)
- Cope, Pamela Simons (2010). Dictionnaire lélé-français : suivi d'un index français-lélé. Essai de description lexicale de la langue tchadique parlée dans la région de Kélo, Tchad (in French). Nicolas Quint. Paris: L'Harmattan. ISBN 978-2-296-10335-1. OCLC 608164729.
- Frajzyngier, Zygmunt. 1995. Two complementizers in Lele. In Ibriszimow, Dymitr and Leger, Rudolf (eds.), Studia chadica et hamitosemitica: Akten des internationalen Symposions zur Tschadsprachenforschung Johann Wolfgang Goethe-Universität, Frankfurt am Main, 6.-8. Mai 1991, 163-170. Köln: Rüdiger Köppe Verlag.
- Frajzyngier, Zygmunt. 2001. A grammar of Lele. Stanford: CSLI Publications.
- Lami, Pierre. 1942. Etude succincte de la langue lélé et du dialecte nantchoa. Beirut: Imprimérie Catholique. 197pp.
- Lami, Pierre. 1951. Le nombre et le genre dans la langue lélé. In Comptes rendus du première conférence international des africanistes de l'ouest, Dakar 1945, 197-208. Dakar: Inst. Français de l'Afrique Noire (IFAN).
- Simons, Pamela. 1982. Nè... be marking in Lele: a cleft construction. Studies in African Linguistics 13. 217-229.
External links
[edit]- Dryer, Matthew S.; Haspelmath, Martin, eds. (2013). "Lele". World Atlas of Language Structures Online. Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology.
