Iconicity and parts of speech: Changana´s ideophones

Authors

  • Heronides Moura Universidade Federal de Santa Catarina - UFSC - Florianópolis
  • Ezra Alberto Chambal Nhampoca

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.17058/signo.v42i75.11146

Keywords:

Ideophones, Parts of Speech, Radical Construction Grammar.

Abstract

This paper intends to investigate the part of speech and function of ideophones in Changana, a Bantu language, spoken in South Africa, Mozambique, Swaziland and Zimbabwe. Ideophones are words that describe events/actions/scenes which present a noticeable aspect. The analysis is based on Radical Construction Grammar (CROFT, 2000; 2001). The hypothesis put forward in this paper is that ideophones constitute a particular part of speech of Changana, whose function is predicative, even if ideophones in Changana are not the prototypical predicates. The verbs are the prototypical predicates in Changana. Ideophones are marked predicates, both in the sense of functional markedness, and in the sense of typological markedness.

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Published

2017-09-11

Issue

Vol. 42 No. 75 (2017)

Section

VIII Conferência Linguística e Cognição

License

Authors publishing with Signo retain the copyright to their work, licensing it under the Creative Commons Attribution License which allows articles to be re-used and re-distributed without restriction, as long as the original work is correctly cited. Signo is owned by Associação Pró-Ensino em Santa Cruz do Sul and also hosts the Open Journal System plataform. Creative Commons Atribuição 4.0 Internacional.

Licença Creative Commons

How to Cite

Iconicity and parts of speech: Changana´s ideophones. (2017). Signo, 42(75), 48-58. https://doi.org/10.17058/signo.v42i75.11146