O P Adéṣọlá[1]
1 The Problem of Homonymy
The form kọ represents
a class of verbs that exhibit strict subcategorisation in the literature (Awóbùlúyì 1978: 52
and Bámgbóṣé 1990: 34). By strict subcategorisation, we refer to a concept in the syntax of the
verb in which a verb selects a particular noun as its specific object.
According to the two writers,
such verbs cannot select more than one specific noun phrase as their object. Awóbùlúyì (1978: 52) notes that 'other verbs with
highly specific meanings each occur with only one noun as object and goes on to
list such verbs (with the specific noun objects in brackets) as lá (àlá) 'to dream', kọ (orin) 'to sing', jó
(ijó) 'to dance', kò (iná) 'poke fire', gbọ́n (ọgbọ́n) ‘be
wise' gọ̀ (agọ̀) ‘be foolish'
and pa (àdé) 'to meet'. Bámgbóṣé's (1990: 34) list also includes most
of those that appear on Awóbùlúyì's list.
However, we have
found out that the problem of homonymy was not taken into consideration in
their analyses. By homonymy, following Crystal (1985:149), we mean
a term used in SEMANTIC analysis to refer to
LEXICAL ITEMS which have the same FORM but differ in MEANING. 'Homonymy' is illustrated
from the various meanings of bear (= animal, carry) or ear (of body, of
corn). In these examples, the identity covers both spoken and written forms.
He clearly distinguishes homonymy
from polysemy when he describes the latter as a
term used in SEMANTIC analysis to refer to a
LEXICAL ITEM which has a range
of different MEANINGS, e.g. plain = 'clear', 'unadorned', 'obvious' ....
the antecedents of homonymous items would be
formally distinct ... (and) the meanings
of homonymous items would be further apart, or unrelated (Crystal 1985: 236).
One can compare 'the related senses of
(the polysemous) plain above with the homonymous plane = 'carpenter's tool'
and plane = 'aeroplane' (ibid.). Almost every item on Awóbùlúyì and
Bámgbósé's list is affected in this respect but we will use the verb kọ to
illustrate our position.
2
Kọ́ in Yorùbá Syntax
Both Awóbùlúyì
(1978: 52) and Bámgbóṣé (1990: 134) agree that kọ can select only one specific noun object
which is orin 'song'. The first question one would like to ask here is
if there is only one kọ in Yoriiba language. The answer to this seems to be
in the negative. There are at least two tokens of the item in the language. The
first one is transitive while the other one is intransitive. The intransitive kọ
is exemplified in (1).
(1) Àkùkọ kọ The cock crows'
The kọ that assigned an
accusative case is involved in one type of homonymy. This is shown in (2).
(2) (a) Olú
kọ okùn ‘Olú weaves the rope
(b) Olú kọ irẹ́ ‘Olú tapes rubber tyre’
(c) Olú ko ìwé ‘Olú writes a book’
(d) Olú
kọ àmàlà ‘Olú picks àmàlà
(e) Olú
kọ etí sí Adé ‘Olu turns his ear to
Ade'
(f) Olú
kọ orin ‘Olu sings a song’
(g) Olú
kọ ewé ‘Olu cuts leaves'
(h) Olú
kọ ẹsẹ̀ ‘Olu hits his
leg on an object, i.e. he
stumbles'
(i) Olú
kọ ebè ‘Olu makes heaps'
(j) Olú
kọ ẹyin ‘Olu reaps
palm-nuts'
We may first ask if these tokens of kọ
represent just one item whose meaning is decided by the object noun
phrase. This will mean that the item is a light verb which has no meaning of
its own in the language. If this is
adopted, then, does that mean that any verb that is involved in any type of
homonymy has no meaning of its own? If we have more than one kọ in
these examples, how do we distinguish one from the others?
Let us consider the occurrence of kọ
in these examples. The kọ in example (2 a, b, c, e, f and i) connotes one
form of production or the other while the kọ in (2 d, g, h and j)
connotes an act of termination.
The question, then, is how many tokens
of kọ exist in the language? Those that are grouped together
may be seen as those that are involved in accidental homonymy. We can see those
that belong to separate
groups as tokens that are involved in a systematic homonymy. The structure of
the of kọ that assigns accusative case will
look like (3).
(3) [VP[V][{NP1
}{NP2} {NP ...}]
(4) [VP[v[kọ1, kọ2,
kọ3, kọ…]][NP]
(3)
represents a view that the meaning of kọ is determined by the
noun phrase object it takes. In this, kọ
is a single item in the language. (4) represents the view that we have
about ten tokens of kọ in
the language which can be subcategorised f or noun phrases. A mid-way position
which we shall take for now is that
we have about two tokens of kọ in the language (according to the
groups). These kọ’s can
then be subcategorised for noun phrases. The structure will look like (5).
(5) [VP[v[kọ1/kọ2][{NP1 }{NP2} {NP
...}]
One should note that the structural positions
of the kọ that assigns accusative case does not differ regardless of
the meaning it connotes. It occurs in the structure in (6).
(6) [VP[V][NP]
The syntactic behaviour of the item is also
the same in each of the ten tokens. For example, it can be nominalised for focusing
and its object can be focused. If this shows that the item is one and the same,
then, structure (3) may be more applicable. The major differences in the kọs
are the intentional and extensional meanings which they connote.
3 Conclusion
It is clear from the above that it is
important to take a closer look at the subcategorisation features of the
Yoruba verbs. The attempt we make in this paper is on one of those that are
said to exhibit
strict subcategorisation and the description is more revealing.
References
Adesola,
O. P. (1993), 'Àgbéyẹ̀wò Ọ̀rọ̣̀ àti Àpólà Atọ́kun lédè Yoruba.', M A Thesis,
University of Ìlọrin.
Adésọlá, O. P. (1995), 'Does the Yoruba Verb Subsume the Preposition?',
Paper Presented at the Ondo State University, Ado-Ekiti 14th LAN Conference.
Adésọlá, O. P. (forthcoming), The Problem of Homonymy in Yoruba
Monosyllabic Verbs.', PhD Dissertation
University of florin.
Awóbùlúyì, O. (1978), Essential of Yorùbá Grammar. Ìbàdàn: OUP.
Bámgbóṣẹ́, A. (1990). Fonọ́lọ́jì àti Gírámà Yorùbá. Ìbàdàn: UPL.
Crystal, David (1985). A Dictionary of Linguistics and Phonetics.
Oxford: Basil Blackwell Ltd.
Hale, K. and S.J. Keyser (1993). ‘On Agreement Structure and Lexical
Expression of Syntactic Relations’ in The Views from Building 20, edited
by K. Hale and S.J. Keyser. Massachusetts: MIT Press.
[1] This
paper was published as Adesola, O.P. (1998), ‘Kọ in Yorùbá Syntax’, Research
in Nigerian Languages and Literatures (edited by L.O. Adewole) 6: 30-33.
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