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Homorganic Nasal Assimilation in Arsi-Bale Afan Oromo: A Non-Linear Phonology

Received: 22 August 2014     Accepted: 17 September 2014     Published: 2 July 2015
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Abstract

This paper is entitled: “Homorganic nasal assimilation in Arsi-Bale Afan Oromo: A non linear Approach”. The paper is limited to nasal assimilation found in one of the Afan oromo (AO) dialects spoken in Ethiopia. The dialect is a member of the AO language cluster, which belongs to East-Cushitic branch of Afro-Asiatic super family. The study attempts to use Feature Geometry branched from the theory of Autosegmental Phonology proposed by Goldsmith (1976). The paper is basically based on the fieldwork in Arsi, one of the Zones in Oromia Regional State of Ethiopia. The data were gathered from five native speakers of Arsi-Bale Afan Oromo (ABAO) who were born in Arsi regional state of Ethiopia. The informants were made to gather those words and sentences that contain nasal sounds. They were made to repeat the words and sentences several times in different order and the data were recorded by using an audio tape recorder for analysis. Then, the pronunciations were transcribed phonemically and phonetically using the IPA conventions as revised to 2005. The results show that the /n/ in emphatic prefix {hin-} and word internally undergoes partial and total assimilation. When the alveolar /n/ in the prefix boundary or word internally is followed by a word with initial stops /b/, /m/, /g/, /k/ ejective /k’/, fricative /f/, and liquids /l/, /r/, the partial homorganic nasal assimilation occurs and the nasal /n/ totally assimilates to the semi-vowels /w/ and /j/.

Published in Humanities and Social Sciences (Volume 3, Issue 4)
DOI 10.11648/j.hss.20150304.13
Page(s) 140-148
Creative Commons

This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, provided the original work is properly cited.

Copyright

Copyright © The Author(s), 2015. Published by Science Publishing Group

Keywords

Afan Oromo, Assimilation, Feature Geometry, Autosegmental Phonology

References
[1] Al-Shuaibi A. 2011. Nasal Homorganic Assimilation Phenomenon in YTD: An Autosegmental Analysis. In Strength for Today and Bright Hope for Tomorrow. V. 11
[2] Bender, M.L. Mulugeta Etaffa and Stinson, D.L. 1976. In Bender et al (eds) Language in Ethiopia . London: Oxford University Press.
[3] Banti, G. (2008). “Oromiffaa”. In S. Uhlig (ed.). Encyclopaedia Aethiopica, ,Wiesbaden:Otto Harrassowitz.
[4] Clements, George N. (1985). The Geometry of Phonological Features, Phonology 2: 225-252.
[5] Campbell , George L. and King , Gareth. (2013). Compendium of the World’s Languages. USA. Third Edition. V.I
[6] Feda, Negese. (2015). Classification of Oromo Dialects: A Computational Approach. International Journal of Computational Linguistics (IJCL), Volume (6) : Issue (1) : 2015
[7] Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia Population Census Commission. 2008. Summary and Statistical Report of the 2007 population and Housing census. Addis Ababa.
[8] Goldsmith, John A. 1976. Autosegmental Phonology. Ph.D Thesis. MIT.
[9] Goldsmith, John A. 1990. Autosegmental and Metrical Phonology. Cambridge, Blackwell.
[10] Gragg, G. 1976. Oromo of Wallaga. In Bender, M.L. et al (ed). The Non-Semitic Languages of Ethiopia. East Lansing: Africa Studies Center. Michigan: Michigan State University Press. PP. 166-195
[11] Gragg, G. 1982. Oromo Dictionary, Bender et al. (eds.), and East Lansing: The African Studies Center, Michigan State University.
[12] Halle, Morris. 1989. The Intrinsic Structure of Speech Sounds. Ms., MIT, Cambridge, Mass.
[13] Heine, Bernd 1981.The Waata Dialect of Oromo. Grammatical Sketch and Vocabulary. Published as Volume of Language Berlin .
[14] Jeylan W. Hussien. (2005). “The Functions of African Oral Arts: The Arsi Oromo Oral Arts in Focus.” In African Study Monographs, 26(1): 15-58, March
[15] Kebede Hordofa. (1991). “A Contribution to the Dialectology of Afaan Oromoo: Consonantal Suffix Conjugation after the Glides” In Proceedings of the 11th ICES (Addis Ababa 1991) Vol. I, pp. 501-513. Addis Ababa.
[16] Kebede Hordofa. (2005). “The Varieties of Oromo.” ELRC, W Pap. AAU: AAU Printing Press. 1(1): 134-150
[17] Kebede, H. (2009). Towards the Genetic Classification of the Afaan Oromoo Dialects. Published PhD Thesis, Department of Linguistics and Scandinavian Studies: The University of Oslo, Norway.
[18] Lloret Romanyach, Maria-Rosa. (1994). “A Comparative Study of Consonant Assimilation in Some Oromo Dialects.” Ms. A paper presented at the 3rd International Symposium on Cushitic and Omotic Languages, Berlin.
[19] McCarthy, John J. (1988). Feature geometry and Dependency: A Review, Phonetica 45: 84-108.
[20] Mindaye, Abebe 2005. The Oromo of Bale: A historical survey to 1974. Unpublished M.A. Thesis Addis Ababa University. Addis Ababa
[21] Sagey, Elizabeth (1986). The Representation of Features and Relations in Nonlinear Phonology. PhD dissertation, MIT. [published 1990 by Garland Press].
[22] Youssef, Islam. 2013. Place Assimilation; Contrasts, Features and Constraints. Ph.D. Thesis. University of Tromsø.
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  • APA Style

    Tilahun Negash. (2015). Homorganic Nasal Assimilation in Arsi-Bale Afan Oromo: A Non-Linear Phonology. Humanities and Social Sciences, 3(4), 140-148. https://doi.org/10.11648/j.hss.20150304.13

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    Tilahun Negash. Homorganic Nasal Assimilation in Arsi-Bale Afan Oromo: A Non-Linear Phonology. Humanit. Soc. Sci. 2015, 3(4), 140-148. doi: 10.11648/j.hss.20150304.13

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    AMA Style

    Tilahun Negash. Homorganic Nasal Assimilation in Arsi-Bale Afan Oromo: A Non-Linear Phonology. Humanit Soc Sci. 2015;3(4):140-148. doi: 10.11648/j.hss.20150304.13

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  • @article{10.11648/j.hss.20150304.13,
      author = {Tilahun Negash},
      title = {Homorganic Nasal Assimilation in Arsi-Bale Afan Oromo: A Non-Linear Phonology},
      journal = {Humanities and Social Sciences},
      volume = {3},
      number = {4},
      pages = {140-148},
      doi = {10.11648/j.hss.20150304.13},
      url = {https://doi.org/10.11648/j.hss.20150304.13},
      eprint = {https://article.sciencepublishinggroup.com/pdf/10.11648.j.hss.20150304.13},
      abstract = {This paper is entitled: “Homorganic nasal assimilation in Arsi-Bale Afan Oromo: A non linear Approach”. The paper is limited to nasal assimilation found in one of the Afan oromo (AO) dialects spoken in Ethiopia. The dialect is a member of the AO language cluster, which belongs to East-Cushitic branch of Afro-Asiatic super family. The study attempts to use Feature Geometry branched from the theory of Autosegmental Phonology proposed by Goldsmith (1976). The paper is basically based on the fieldwork in Arsi, one of the Zones in Oromia Regional State of Ethiopia. The data were gathered from five native speakers of Arsi-Bale Afan Oromo (ABAO) who were born in Arsi regional state of Ethiopia. The informants were made to gather those words and sentences that contain nasal sounds. They were made to repeat the words and sentences several times in different order and the data were recorded by using an audio tape recorder for analysis. Then, the pronunciations were transcribed phonemically and phonetically using the IPA conventions as revised to 2005. The results show that the /n/ in emphatic prefix {hin-} and word internally undergoes partial and total assimilation. When the alveolar /n/ in the prefix boundary or word internally is followed by a word with initial stops /b/, /m/, /g/, /k/ ejective /k’/, fricative /f/, and liquids /l/, /r/, the partial homorganic nasal assimilation occurs and the nasal /n/ totally assimilates to the semi-vowels /w/ and /j/.},
     year = {2015}
    }
    

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    T1  - Homorganic Nasal Assimilation in Arsi-Bale Afan Oromo: A Non-Linear Phonology
    AU  - Tilahun Negash
    Y1  - 2015/07/02
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    AB  - This paper is entitled: “Homorganic nasal assimilation in Arsi-Bale Afan Oromo: A non linear Approach”. The paper is limited to nasal assimilation found in one of the Afan oromo (AO) dialects spoken in Ethiopia. The dialect is a member of the AO language cluster, which belongs to East-Cushitic branch of Afro-Asiatic super family. The study attempts to use Feature Geometry branched from the theory of Autosegmental Phonology proposed by Goldsmith (1976). The paper is basically based on the fieldwork in Arsi, one of the Zones in Oromia Regional State of Ethiopia. The data were gathered from five native speakers of Arsi-Bale Afan Oromo (ABAO) who were born in Arsi regional state of Ethiopia. The informants were made to gather those words and sentences that contain nasal sounds. They were made to repeat the words and sentences several times in different order and the data were recorded by using an audio tape recorder for analysis. Then, the pronunciations were transcribed phonemically and phonetically using the IPA conventions as revised to 2005. The results show that the /n/ in emphatic prefix {hin-} and word internally undergoes partial and total assimilation. When the alveolar /n/ in the prefix boundary or word internally is followed by a word with initial stops /b/, /m/, /g/, /k/ ejective /k’/, fricative /f/, and liquids /l/, /r/, the partial homorganic nasal assimilation occurs and the nasal /n/ totally assimilates to the semi-vowels /w/ and /j/.
    VL  - 3
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    ER  - 

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Author Information
  • College of Social Sciences and Humanities, Debre Markos University, Debre Markos, Ethiopia

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