The Morphosyntactic Spell-Out Of The Functional Category Neg In Igbo

Authors

  • G. O. C. Obimalu Department Of Linguistics Nnamdi Azikiwe University, Awka

Abstract

From a descriptive point of view, negation in Igbo is assumed to be morphologically marked by a discontinuous morpheme, e----ghi comparable to French ‘ne---pas’ (cf Emenanjo,1981;Clark, 1989; Uwalaka, 2003). However, “Dechaine (1993), in line with the V-movement analysis adopted for Igbo, argues that the e-prefix is not a negative marker but a default agreement marker. (it occurs only with non-clitic subjects in negative constructions) instantiated by a null T(ense). T is empty because V-movement to T is blocked by Neg. Following the theoretical assumptions and supported by available data, we argue in line with Dechaine (1993), we however differ from her in arguing that the high risk of tone borne by the default agreement prefix does not inherently belong to the prefix but rather a neg marker. The high tone then becomes a plausible candidate for the templatic analysis earlier proposed by Emenanjo (1981) and supported by Clark (1989) and Uwalaka (2003).

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Published

2006-06-15

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Articles