Bole-Tangale Verbs

TENSE/ASPECT/MOOD FORMS IN BOLE-TANGALE LANUGAGE

 

Completive (Perfective), Subjunctive, Future

The movie below shows verb forms in four relatively closely Yobe languages, all of the Bole-Tangale group:

Karekare
Yaya Ngamo
Gudi Ngamo
Bole

The speakers of each language pronounce full paradigms of verbs in four forms:

  • Completive (Perfective) with no extensions
  • Completive (Perfective) with totality extension (roughly a form that focuses on the completedness of the action or state)
  • Subjunctive
  • Future (incompletive, imperfective)
  • Completive (Perfective) of an intransitive verb bearing the Intransitive Copy Pronoun (this is the intransitive counterpart of the totality extension use with transitive verbs, consisting of a reflex of the totality extension plus a pronoun copying features of the subject)

Each of these sets of Tense/Aspect/Mood forms is presented with verbs of two lexical classes:

  • Class A1 verb: CVC- root with -u or Ø completive stem vowel (for the transitive verb, the illustrative verb is ‘put, place’, with the orignal completive stem *zabu-)
  • Class B verb: CVC-root with -a completive stem vowel (the illustrative verb is ‘shoot’, with the original completive stem *basa-)
  • Class A1 verb with the Intransitive Copy Pronoun: the illustrative verb is ‘come to a stop, stand still’, with the original completive stem *‘yoru-

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