University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign

The structure of the do/make construction in Chichewa and Chichewa/English

Batteen, Christopher

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https://hdl.handle.net/2142/35292

Description

Title
The structure of the do/make construction in Chichewa and Chichewa/English
Author(s)
Batteen, Christopher
Issue Date
2012-12-12
Keyword(s)
  • Syntax
  • Chichewa
  • Code-switching
  • Language contact
Abstract
This paper analyzes a structure found in Chichewa for adapting English verbs. This structure, in which an English verb or adjectival predicate complements a Chichewa light verb meaning ‘do’ or ‘make’, appears to be employed during code-switching. Code-Switching (CS) is found quite frequently among populations which use more than one language. CS occurs when lexical items and strings of two languages are found in one discourse, sentence, or even phrasal category. This construction is not limited to English verbs. I suggest that the English items go through a nominalization process. The data illuminating the ‘do/make’ structure give strong evidence that two parallel structures exist. One structure works on a monolingual level, and the other structure employs two separate languages. I propose that the Chichewa verbs -chit- ‘do’ and -pang- ‘make’ serve as light verbs that contain little or no semantic information, which may precede a nominalized English bare verb. The English verb allows the semantic construal of an event, while the light verb creates the appropriate Chichewa syntactic structure and makes it well-formed. I suggest that most English verbs undergo a syntactic process of nominalization before being inserted into a Chichewa sentence structure following a ‘do’ or ‘make’ verb. This paper attempts to draw parallels between monolingual grammars and multilingual grammars of language rather than rely on code-switching specific models.
Publisher
Studies in the Linguistic Sciences, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
ISSN
0049-2388
Type of Resource
text
Language
en
Permalink
http://hdl.handle.net/2142/35292
Copyright and License Information
Copyright © 2012 Christopher Batteen

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Studies in the Linguistic Sciences: Illinois Working Papers PRIMARY
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