Eggon Orthography

Preliminary Orthography Proposal for the Egno [ego] Language of Nasarawa State Terna Timothy Lecturer, LBTD, TCNN, Jos Research Assistant, KWEF 0 TABLE OF CONTENTS 1. INTRODUCTION ................................................................................................................. 1 1.1 Handling Dialect Variations ............................................................................................ 1 2. SOCIOLINGUISTICS ........................................................................................................... 1 2.1 HISTORY OF EGNO ORTHOGRAPHY ...................................................................... 2 3. PHONOLOGY ....................................................................................................................... 2 3.1 Consonants ....................................................................................................................... 2 3.1.1 Consonant Rules_ Complementary Distribution ...................................................... 3 3.2 Vowels ............................................................................................................................. 4 3.2.1 Vowel rules_ Complementary Distribution .............................................................. 4 4. PROPOSED SYMBOLS FOR PHONEMES ........................................................................ 5 4.1. Palatalization ................................................................................................................... 6 4.2 The /r/ .............................................................................................................................. 7 4.3 Long Consonants| Fotis and Lenis ................................................................................... 7 4.4 Open-Mid Vowels ............................................................................................................ 9 5. NOUN CLASS PREFIXES ................................................................................................... 9 6. HANDLING FREE VARIATION ...................................................................................... 10 6.1 Variation Across Dialects ........................................................................................ 10 7. VARIATION — NASALITY ............................................................................................. 14 8. SYMBOLS IN WORDS ...................................................................................................... 17 9. TONES AND DIACRITICS................................................................................................ 17 9.1 Lexical Tones ........................................................................................................... 18 9.1.1 9.2 Marking Lexical Tones .................................................................................... 18 Grammatical Tones .................................................................................................. 21 9.2.1 Verbs ................................................................................................................ 22 9.2.2 Verb Prefixes ................................................................................................... 22 9.2.3 Locative........................................................................................................... 24 9.2.3 Plural ................................................................................................................ 25 9.2.4 Variants of the Negative marker ...................................................................... 26 9.2.5 Verb forms ....................................................................................................... 27 10 WORD BEAKS ........................................................................................................... 27 9.1 Possessive phrases ......................................................................................................... 27 9.3 Focus .............................................................................................................................. 28 11 COMPOUNDS ............................................................................................................ 28 11.1 Reduplications.......................................................................................................... 30 11.2 Clitic............................................................................................................................. 31 1 1. INTRODUCTION This work aims at documenting the symbols used for the writing the Egno language. An orthography is a ‘standardised system of writing (kaJanolintji and Napjadi 2023).’ This document is open for review; suggestions are welcome The symbols are based on the alphabetic writing system and the Roman script. Many speakers are literate in English and or Hausa. This work puts into consideration the different dialects of the Egno language, while maintaining the Wanne dialect as a reference. It compromises in some areas in order to accommodate the minor phonological difference which are in other dialects. Nasalisation is treated in a way that allows different dialects room to express themselves. Eg, lexical variations like kpakpŋa and ngbabi and mbatsa all referring to ‘pepper’ among the dialects are allowed to continually be in use. 1.1 Handling Dialect Variations There are three major clans in Egno, and they are Egno-Ero, Egno-ehlo and Egno-anzo. There is high mutual intelligibility between Egno-ehlo and Egno-anzo but not with Egno-ero. Speakers have to learn to understand Egno-ero. The major variation between dialects however, is phonological and very little of grammatical variations have been noticed. In the resent years however, these blessed linguistic difference has led to a social problem in the community which has affected the ongoing Bible translation project. Two parallel Bible translation projects are ongoing; one of which is consulted by BSN and the other by NBTT. BSN had produced the first Bible, ohwihwim olehe, in 1970, but its writers were soon criticised for using only a single dialect, Awanne. All efforts toward having a single Bible project proved abortive. But in fact, to solve the problem, an orthography that carries every dialect along: Is this the practice across different language groups? No, Smaley warns against coming up with artificial dialects (1959ː26). He outlines a language should consider for standardization, A dialect which is the culturally dominant one, most regular in grammatical formations and is most easily understood by the other dialects (ibid). Since reading is fundamentally a system of visual symbolism and is not completely dependent upon corresponding sounds between the dialects, he adds, speakers of other dialects can easily use the proposed symbols to pronounce words in their dialects once they have a positive attitude. However, he advises against teaching people to read using dialects which are not theirs. Primers as well as introductory materials in specific dialects that accompanies the document, in this case, an orthography, can be very helpful. Learning to read is the major thing to do. After this, readers can readily adjust to their own dialects with ease. Egno speakers can accept a single dialect. But this must be accepted formerly by the relevant stakeholders and not the work of some specific writers. A careful analysis of the different dialects of Egno has in fact shown that we are not so different linguistically. So, an orthography using a single dialect, for accuracy’s sake can serve speakers of other dialects. 2. SOCIOLINGUISTICS According to the Ethnologue, Egno is an Eastern Benue-Congo language in Nasarawa Egno LGA of Nasarawa State with an estimated population of 270,000 speakers. More than half of the population live in rural areas and practice farming as their occupation. Ivan Hepburn who was the first missionary to Egno land, was the first to reduce Egno into writing in the 1930s. There are over 10 literatures written in the language, including a New 1 Testament Bible which was published in 1975. Last year, a book titled “Egno Orthography” was written by Luka Masin, a Lawyer who is also a writer with lots of experience. The work however does not accurately cover the different areas of orthography. This work is not building on that the already existing work. The people are bordered to the North by the Mada and Nungu, to the south by the Migili, to the East by Alago, and to the west by Gwandara language groups (Blench 1). As such many speak Egno, English and Hausa. This work hopes to serve the need for a working orthography in the community. Whatever is written here is just but a proposal and subject to corrections and further suggestions is always welcomed. With this, the primary audience of this work is the Egno people both literate and non-literate. Some technical terms were used to describe certain things where necessary. This will be relevant to linguists who might as well refer to this work. Most of the work in this paper is done using the IPA in which case [] is used for phonetic data, // for phonemic data and <> for orthographic data. 2.1 HISTORY OF EGNO ORTHOGRAPHY There are several documents written in the Egno language. The most popular of these is the Bible Ohwiohwim olehe (1970). Primers also were written entitled Egno Readers book 1 and 2 by Filibu Adgizi. There is an unpublished dictionary by Roger Blench in 2015. In fact, much recently in 2020, a booklet on the Egno orthography was published by Luka Masin. Since after the works of Sibomana, Leo (1985) and Ian Maddieson (1981), no thorough linguistic investigations were done in the Egno language. There are no prior linguistics document explaining the choice of symbols used in the writing of the Egno New Testament. Yet, the symbols used only proved the presence of a thorough linguistic analysis. This study builds on that. Notable of these is the use of symbols which suggest velar fricatives in words like eghwo ‘grinding stone’ awaghrẽ ‘slave’ khwo ‘finish’ Sometimes, she had marked locations as in Lk 17ː21 oraŋ ahogbrẽ owo ésõ bimi angyiŋ. In many other places they don’t. 3. PHONOLOGY The consonants and vowels of Egno are presented in this section alongside the phonological rules that apply to them 3.1 Consonants After a thorough investigation of the Egno phonology, the following consonant phonemes tend to be contrastive. The phonemes are based on the Wanne dialect of the Egno language. Other consonant modifications like pre-nasalisation and nasalised consonants are treated underneath. 2 Table 1ː Consonant phonemes of Egno (Wanne) bilabial labio alveolar post dental plosive p prenasal pls. b t ᵐb d tɹ ̝̥ dɹ affricate ts dz m ⁿdʒ ɾ s grooved fric. f prenasal fric. ɥ lat. approx v ᶬv labiovelar ɹ ̝̥ ʃ z ɟ k ɡ kp ᵑɡ ᵑɡb ɲ ŋ ŋm ʒ h ⁿz ⁿʒ ɹ j l w h̃ ɥ̃ 3.1.1 Consonant Rules_ Complementary Distribution There are certain rules that affect these consonants. Some of them are pronounced in more than one way sometimes depending on where they occur in a word. The phonological rules listed in (1) below show that certain sounds are merely allophone of other phonemes. These are the only cases of allophone found. Words that are started * tend to be produced without the initial plosive. It appears to be laxed entirely. But it is good to write them with double consonants as proposed. Ex 1 a) [ɸ] and [β] are allophones of /p/ and /b/ when they occur as C2 in a sequence with labial sounds. Table 2 Complementary distribution_bilabial fricatives Egno Gloss Egno Gloss k’pa to dig g’ba to share ppa wide bba* to burrow ppi* to winnow bbi* to tie ppyi* to lick bbu* to purge tpi to stir ndba to stretch ekppi feather ongbba root 3 ɡb dʒ n tap nasal glide tʃ ⁿdz prenas affr. approximant c ⁿd flat fricative glottal alveolar flat. affr. nasal palatal velar b) [x] and [ɣ] are allophones of /k/ and /g/ when they occur as C2 with velar sounds. Table 3 Complementary distribution_velar fricatives Egno Gloss Egno Gloss kka* to hang ngga to snatch kko to put on gbga to grind kpka to scrub yga to take 3.2 Vowels Awanne dialect of the Egno language has five vowels. Close-mid vowels also occur in Egno but only in exclamatory words. When a word is pronounced loud, the vowel steps up from open-mid to close-mid instead. This is the case also in vocatives, cases where a person is being called. Some obvious cases of words with [e] and [o] are exclamatory words like: [ɑ̂jê], [ɑ̂ɟê], [âwô] ‘said to show fear’, [ɑ̀wɑ̂je] ‘said during celebration.’ Also, when names like ‘Ovye’ ‘Aklo’ and ‘Aknye’ are called loudly, they are often pronounced as [ɔ̀vjɛ̄] [áklɔ̀] and [ákɲɛ̀] respectively. There seem to be evidences of [e] and [o] in Angwashlu, Ognre and Egno-ero dialect groups where they are used phonemically, as recorded I have recorded in my BA thesis ‘A linguistic Survey of Egno Dialects and Implications for Language Development.’ But this is subject for further studies. Below are the vowels, with the close-mid vowels in brackets. Table 4: Egno Vowel phonemes Front Mid Back Close i u Open-mid ɛ ɔ Open a A seven-vowel system is in consonance with Blench’s earlier proposal of seven vowels in his A dictionary of Egno (Blench 2015ː 4). Egno is a noun class language and these are the noun class prefix a, e and o. u and i are never used as noun class prefix. Each vowel can be found word medially, and word finally. 3.2.1 Vowel rules_ Complementary Distribution The noun class prefixes <a> <e> and <o> have allomorphs which we want to explore. Details about this is provided in 5.0 below. Ex 2 a) /a/ [ɤ]_Cu | as a way of interpretation, /a/ is realised as [ɤ] before /u/ in words like aku ‘room’, abu ‘dog.’ b) /a/ [e] _Ci | as way of interpretation, /a/ is realised as [e] before /i/ in words like akyi ‘tree’, asi ‘thief’, ambyi ‘excreta’ c) /ɛ/ [i]_ Ci and u | as a way of interpretation, /ɛ/ is realised as [i] before [i] or [u] in words like enu ‘cock’ eku ‘death’, eknu ‘mountain’, esi ‘theft’ evyi ‘groundnut’, eniŋ ‘soup’ 4 d) /ɔ/ [u]_Ci and u | as a way of interpretation, /ɔ/ is realised as [u] before /i/ and /u/ in words like oknu ‘back’, ogbu ‘rain’ ombi ‘stinginess’ osri ‘load’ 4. PROPOSED SYMBOLS FOR PHONEMES The tables below are the above phonemes and the proposed symbols. For ease of analysis, the phonemes are being grouped into those which correspond to monograph symbols, digraphs and trigraphs. A single word is used for each letter. The words are carefully chosen to show the symbols word initially. Because all consonants are either lengthened or modified intervocalically (excluding /w/, /j/, /ɾ/ and /h/), it might be helpful to write all such cases like ana, ada, Monographs | those represented by one symbol S/N Table 5 Phonemes and Graphemes of Egno Phoneme orthography word Gloss ‘Match’ 1. /p/ <p> <pa> 2. /b/ <b> <ba> 3. /t/ <t> <ta> 4. /d/ <d> <da> 5. /k/ <k> <ka> 6. /ɡ/ <g> <ɡagre> 7. /f/ <f> <fa> 8. /v/ <v> <vu> 9. /s/ <s> <se> 10. /z/ <z> <zi> 11. /h/ <h> <ha> 12. /m/ <m> <mama> 13. /n/ <n> <ana> 14. /ɾ/ <r> <are> 15. /ɹ/ <r> <gre> 16. /j/ <y> <yi> 17. /w/ <w> <wa> 18. /ŋ/ <ŋ> <ng> <ŋo> <ngo> 19. /l/ <l> <lu> 20. /t͡ʃ/~ /c/* <c> <cku> 21. /ʒ/ ~ /ɟ/* <j> <jmu> 22. /d͡ʒ/~/ɟ/* <gy> <gygu> 23. /ɲ/ <ny> <nye> ‘pound’ ‘learn’ 24. /ʃ/ <sh> <eshi> ‘what’ 5 ‘come’ ‘Play’ ‘let’ ‘see’ ‘big’ ‘fetch’ ‘catch’ ‘remove’ ‘walk’ ‘hang’ ‘until’ ‘mother’ ‘person’ ‘went’ ‘go’ ‘drink’ ‘2sg.sub.pro ‘speak’ ‘pursue’ ‘turn’ 25. /k͡p/ <kp> <akpa> ‘book’ 26. /ɡ͡b/ <gb> <agba> ‘side’ 27. /ɥ/ <wy> <ewyi> ‘iron’ 28. /ɹ/̝̥ * <sr> <sri> ‘carry’ Nasalized Consonants Phoneme orthography word Gloss <wyn> <awyne> ‘child’ 30. /ɥ̃/ /h̃/ <hn> <ehne> 31. /ᵐb/ <mb> <mbo> 32. /ⁿd/ <nd> <nde> 33. /ᶮɟ/ <ngy> <ngybi> 34. /ᵑɡ/ <ng> <nga> 35. /ᵑɡ͡b/ <ngb> <ngbaku> 36. /ᶬv/ <mv> <mvye> 37. /ⁿz/ <nz> <nze> <nj> <njne> ‘clear’ <ngy> <ngygu> to speak ill of 29. 38. 39. /ⁿʒ/ /ⁿd͡ʒ/ <ngyongyo> VOWELS 40. /i/ <i> <si> 41. /ɛ/ <e> <se> 42. /a/ <a> <ka> 43. /ɔ/ <o> <klo> 44. /u/ <u> <ku> ‘tuwo’ ‘also’ ‘erect’ ‘bury’ ‘then’ ‘mud’ ‘all’ ‘sleep’ Describes elasticity ‘to steal’ ‘remove’ ‘see’ ‘to find’ ‘plenty’ As already introduced in 3.2.1 and elaborated in 5 below, the sound [ɤ] is not a contrastive sound of Egno language. The sounds [e] [ɛ] do not contrast. Neither do [o] [ɔ]. So, we only need symbols for ɛ and ɔ which are proposed above as <e> and <o>. 4.1. Palatalization There are cases of palatalization in Egno as seen in the contrasts in Table 6. When sounds are followed by <y>. Only /fʲ/ does not contrast with /f/. Palatalization affects labials /pʲ, bʲ, mʲ, fʲ, vʲ, kpʲ, ɡbʲ/ and velars like /kʲ, ɡʲ/ which could have been interpreted as palatal plosives, if not for the palatalization which is common. Since labialization affects other consonant sounds in Egno, it is symmetrical to assert from the whole language that it is actually palatalized velar plosives and not palatal plosives. This contrast should be represented in the orthography. 6 IPA ppʲi abʲì k͡pʲɛ amʲǐ mʲǐ akʲi kʲú ɔɡʲu avʲi fʲɛ̌ Table 6 Distribution of palatalization Orth Gloss IPA Orth ppyi to lick ppi ppi abyi our abi abi ͡ kpye little drops kpɛ kpe amyi water ami ami myi repair mì mi akyi tree aki aki kyu to marry kū ku ogyu we ɔɡu ogu avyi adder ɛvi evi fye to strangle * - Gloss to winnow bad breakage that park shouts plenty clan pawpaw - When consonants, especially glides, occur after modified consonants like gbyle, gyle, bwla. The solution in the past had been the use of vowels as in gbile, gile, bula etc, suggesting two syllables. 4.2 The /r/ The /r/ symbol represents two sounds [ɾ] and [ɹ], calling for a rule to explain where each is used. /ɹ/ occurs after other consonants, never word initially, word medially or word finally. /ɾ/ occurs word initially and word medially. It also occurs after consonants, but since it is in free variation with <l> in this position, <l> has been chosen in this position. See Table 7 and Table 8 Table 7 Words with <r> 1 kwre little pwre to march awre path abro bag kro scratch Table 8 Words with <r> 2 ri eat argo throat ara dance arŋe king gbaru trumpet 4.3 Long Consonants| Fotis and Lenis It is the case in Egno that consonants tend to be longer in whenever they are used intervocalically. It leads to the almost conclusion that there are fortis and lenis consonants in Egno. These consonants are produced with some delay in time and are released with some hardness. This has been observed in (a) the way in which names like atta, anna, okko, ollu, etc, are spelled in the community (b) single consonants are rare intervocalically, (c) though without 7 acoustic analysis, a good listening ear can reveal that the consonants below are longer while their equivalents in the word in the word initial position are shorter. This leaves us with the resolution that single consonants occuring word medially should be spelled with one symbols even though they tend to sound longer. Since this is a consistent feature in the language, adopting the old way of spelling with double symbols, is ubsurd. The table below is therefore the suggestion. Table 9 fortis and lenis consonants VCV Gloss CV Gloss aku room ku plenty apa slab pa mesh aba thunder ba come asi thief si steal ashe woman she strong ese animal sp se remove ada father da to let ata player ta play Consonant cluster however, is a common feature of the Egno language. Consonants can cooccur with other consonants or with the same consonant. As already noted in consonant rules above, the second consonants in some CC sequences tend to be lighter. This have been severally misunderstood as CVCV structures instead of CCV, buga ‘kill’ instead of bga etc. This also suggests that ‚‘to close’ is kka and not kkha or kha. Since these sounds tend to be lighter when they occur Table 10 [consonant] [consonant] sequences plosive+ plosive plosive +fricative fricative+ plosive bga kill pse white.v sko carry bba open bzi call shko greet tka touch gzo vomit srko feed dga lost mvye all srpu defecate ndba stretch tska cut kppa breakage cku pursue gbga grind fka curse gbba hard vgu scatter ppa wide kpa dig kka close 1 Break grain 8 obstrient +glide glide +plosive pli pass lge proud tslo pack rba pamper jlɛ weep shla mesh kla rush srle careful sla select gla break1 bli full 4.4 Open-Mid Vowels Since there are no phonemic /e/ and /o/ in Egno, the phonemic open mid vowels /ɛ/ and /ɔ/ are written as <e> and <o> respectively. It has been established above that the close-mid vowels only occur in exclamatory and a few exceptional cases. It has also been stated that they are not contrastive. Readers should bear in mind that though the symbols e and o in Egno be pronounced as [ɛ] and [ɔ]. The vowel quality is different from that of Hausa. This is also observed in the mispronunciations of Hausa words like Yesu, ceto, zo, roko as yɛsɔ, cɛtɔ, zɔ, rɔkɔ, respectively. The English words, set, led, red, egg, uses the sound [ɛ] while in words like lord, short, norm, English uses [ɔ]. 5. NOUN CLASS PREFIXES Nouns in Egno can begin with one of three vowels, a, e, o. As demonstrated in 0, nouns, adjectives, numerals begin with vowels. These vowels are the noun class prefixes as found in most plateau languages. These prefixes have the potentials of going higher in sound depending on the vowel of the root. The word for death has two syllables e- and ku, with the <e-> being pronounced as [i], thereby [iku]. Two strategies have been used by various writers. 1. Phonetic writing: this involves writing sounds as they are heard. In this case, words are written like iyi ‘key’ iku ‘death’ eyi ‘eye’ omu ‘shadow’ umbgu ‘fight’, and the 3sg pronoun for example will have at least 2 forms o lu ‘he said’ a ba ‘he came’ e si ‘he stole.’ 2. Morphophonemic writing: this investigates the underlying forms of sounds; it writes every sound with some consistency. It overlooks the surface sound and just writes following the stated rule eyi, eku, ayi, amu, ombgu; and it represents the 3sg consistently as <a> regardless of the environment. In all of these cases, we adopt a deep orthography in writing. This is so as to keep a constant morpheme image. Things should look the same wherever they are found. Some writers clearly hear the distinction between these sounds, and therefore represent them; while others don’t hear any difference or they hear the alternations only in some rare cases are therefore not consistent in their writing. Table 11 Shallow versus Deep Vowel Representations Shallow Deep Meaning ikpi ekpi rat iku eku death ulu olu prayer upyi opyi wood eki aki tree oku aku room Pronouns, especially the 3sg can also have the same form all through 9 Table 12 Shallow versus Deep Vowel Representations Shallow Deep a ba a ba o lu a lu e tsi a tsi Meaning he came he spoke he read Numerals, cardinals, can then maintain a consistent prefix as in aknye, aha, atra anyi, atno afni, afoha, afote, atrunyi and the ordinals as in orni, oha, otra, onyi, otno, ofoha, ofote, otrunyi. Avoiding this principle will result in uri, oha, otra, unyi etc. Adjectives will also concord as appropriately as possible. Ex 3 ashe edziadzi ashe adziadzi evgo idziedzi evgo edziedzi obgo udziodzi obgo odziodzi when the adjective has no high vowel in its root form, the prefix retains its underlying form. Ex 4 akpa akyeakyle evgo ekyekyle obgo okyeokyle I propose that the deep representation be maintained. First, because this is the method used in the writing of the Egno Bible. Also, because the method reveals the true nature of the language. The language reveals a pattern with which it can be written. A deviation from the inherent pattern found in the language for any reason would achieve the immediate goal of easy reading but it will be harder to understand how the language works; the hidden rules embedded in the language. 6. HANDLING FREE VARIATION Free variation is when a sound can be used in place of another sound without affecting the meaning of a word. 6.1Variation Across Dialects The following is a careful summary of the various difference that exist among the different dialects. Suggestions are given following each analysis. a) The alveolar flap, the alveolar approximant, or the + aspiration 1 Dialect (A) Dialect (B) Dialect (C) Proposed Gloss ɔvʰɔ ɔvɹɔ ɛvɾɔ ovro fire 10 2 3 4 ak͡pʰɔ ak͡pɹɔ ɑɡ͡bʰɔ ak͡pɾa ɑɡ͡bɹɔ pʰa pɹɛ akpro lie ɑɡ͡bɾɔ agbro ball pɾa pre press is a presentation of the variation specified in the caption above. The variation is obviously more complex than is presented in Table 14. Individual dialect groups have specific variationsː Ezeŋ has /ɔ̄fʰɔ̄/ ‘fire’ with an <f>, Odzi has /aɡ͡bʰu/ ‘ball’ with the last vowel being <u>. Other variations include the use of <a> where other dialect groups use <o>. These can can learned. Each dialect group can adjust to adopt the same symbols for representing their unique pronunciation. Table 13 Table 14 Phonetic Variation and orthographic suggestions 1 2 3 4 Dialect (A) Dialect (B) Dialect (C) Proposed Gloss ɔvʰɔ ɔvɹɔ ɛvɾɔ ovro fire akpro lie ɑɡ͡bɾɔ agbro ball pɾa pre press ak͡pʰɔ ak͡pɹɔ ɑɡ͡bʰɔ ak͡pɾa ɑɡ͡bɹɔ pʰa pɹɛ b) The alveolar flap and the lateral approximant Consider that the sound /ɾ/ and /l/ are both in free variation when they occur in a CC sequence as second consonants when the first consonant is a voiceless obstruent. They are never in contrast in this position. Table 15 Free variation between [r] ~[l] in Egno Cɾ tɾǎ àtɾɔ̀ kɾɔ́ kɾǐ kʲɾɛ̌ ɔ̀pɾɛ̌ tîtɾî ɛ̀ʃɾí Cl tlǎ àtlɔ̀ klɔ́ klǐ kʲlɛ̌ ɔ̀plɛ̌ tîtlî ɛ̀ʃlí Proposed tla atlo klo kli kyle ople titli eshli Gloss refuse blister find all over white kunu truely tree sp. However, both /ɾ/ and /l/ are phonemes of the Egno language as shown Table 16 /ɾ/ and /l/ contrast IPA Gloss IPA Gloss ɾɛ́ slime lɛ́ or ɾǔ chik.sick lú say ɾá remain lá lay with Using /ɾ/ leads to ambiguity with /ɹ/ as both can occur in the same environment. 11 Table 17 /ɾ/ and /ɹ/ contrast IPA Gloss tɾǎ refuse kɾɔ́ like IPA tɹá kɹɔ́ Gloss hit scratch c) The alveolar nasal and the lateral approximant The variation here is restricted to the environment _um, and is limited to a few words. Some other words in the same environment use /n/ and not /l/. The grapheme <n> is more appropriate here. It has a wider range of use and should be used in such cases too. Table 18 phonetic variation and orthographic suggestions sun man to lie down /n/ lulmu almu lmu /l/ nunmu anmu nmu d) The alveolar affricate, the palatal plosive or the alveolar flap The table below demonstrates the variation of dialects phonologically. Each column represent a dialect; from A to C. The solution presented in the Orth column is not applicable to dialects in C. The writers of the new testament had implored the use of the symbols <ky> for words 1,2,3 in Table 19. Table 19 phonetic variation and orthographic suggestions [tʃ] and [dʒ] (A) [c] and [ɟ] (B) [t] and [d] (C)* proposed gloss 1 atʃŋɛ acŋɛ atɛ acne one 2 tʃɛ cɛ tɾɛ ce shift 3 tʃku cku tku cku because 4 adʒi aɟi adi agyi we 4 ɛdʒu iɟu idu egyu axe 1. Seeking to maintain a reference dialect while being intentional about choosing symbols that other dialects can use must be prioritize. Some consonants have a wider range than others; for example more words are spoken with the sounds [t͡ʃ] and [dʒ] than with the sounds [c] and [ɟ]. Consequently, while all the words spoken with [c] and [ɟ] are pronounced by speakers of other dialects using [t͡ʃ] and [dʒ], not all words with [t͡ʃ] and [dʒ] can be pronounced using [c] and [ɟ]. So, [c] and [ɟ] are allowed only in some words. 2. The convention is that <ch> is used for [tʃ] and [ky] for [c]. But <ky> for [c] does not help speakers who use [t͡ʃ] in words like cucku, ce, aci, etc. The h in <ch> is rather useless. Languages like Hausa has had to do away with such ch and retain only c in their recent publications. The table below is a summary of the above statements with examples. Table 20ː phonetic variation and orthographic suggestions Gloss proposed ʒ ɟ dʒ cane aja àʒá - 12 mango to weep to twist bird nest far we bird sp. shift because to be white gun night ejba je jmu ejgu gyugnyu gyi tangyu ce ocku cle acuŋ cucku ɛ̀ʒbà ʒɛ̀ ʒmǔ ìʒɡú - ɟuɟŋu ɟi těɲɟu cɛ ucku clɛ acuŋ cucku d͡ʒud͡ʒŋu d͡ʒi těɲd͡ʒū ͡tʃɛ ut͡ʃku * at͡ʃuŋ ͡tʃut͡ʃku The words below are clearly distinguishable. ɟ ʒ agyi we aji/azhi egg gybi pound jbyi/azhi mix e) The alveolar flat affricate and the alveolar grooved affricates Across dialects, these two are in free variation. I do not yet have a detailed list of what dialect uses what sound. tʃ and dʒ are common in all dialects, but in few words, tʃ and dʒ are being replaced by tɹ̝̥ and dɹ. these words include those in Table 21. We suspect that many speakers are also unable to produce the alveolar flat affricates. We propose as shown that <dr> and <tr> for the sounds. Table 21 alveola flat affricates and alveolar grooved affricates Group (a) Group (b) Proposed Gloss ͡ ͡ àdɹɔ́ àdʒɔ́ adro mad ͡ ͡ ͡ ͡ ͡ ͡ ɛ̀ŋɡbɤ̄dɹūdɹū ɛ̀ŋɡbādʒūdʒū engbadrudru funnel ͡tɹ̝̥ á ͡tʃá tra to lock ͡àtɹ̝̥ á ͡àtʃá atra three f) Head. esri, eshi, or esi? As above, there is also a variation between the specified sounds. <s> and <sh> are widely used for many words in all dialects. But <sr> does not occur in dialects like Ginna, Angwashlu, and Egno Ero dialects. As alternative, they use <sh> in words like <srma>~<ʃma> ‘to bark,’ <srno>~<shno> ‘to shake’ etc. In the word for ‘head’ the following is recorded. [s] <isi> by Eznee, Ogba, Angwashlu and Aginna [ɹ̝̥ ] <esri> by Erekpa, Ognre, and Awakma [ʃ] <liʃe> by Egno-ero dialects 13 For the word ‘head’, we adopt the trigraph <sr> so we can distinguish <esri> from <esi> ‘theft’ and <eshi> ‘what.’ In this case, we can write <sru> ‘pound’, <sri> ‘carry’ etc. Dialects without the <sr> sound might as well use the alternative <esi> and <eshi> if necessary. g) Lexical difference between dialects Lexical differences as presented in Table 22,Error! Reference source not found. below should not be imposed on any dialect. The variation of Wanna should be used in the Bible but not obligatory for other documents. Speakers are also aware of these differences. It is hence appropriate for each dialect to use words associated to them. As stated in the introduction, Egno-ero speakers understand only a little of Egno-ehlo and Egno-anzo. The two are different in syllable structure and types, word initial consonants for nouns, different vowels and they are also different in some lexical words. For the sake of this work, we will not explore all of that. It is too broad an area to consider in an orthography. The areas have been put into consideration as seen above. Table 22 lexical difference between other dialects and Egno-Ero Meaning Other dialects Egno-Ero little tsitsi fifi sikho nyonyo all mvye tse tku groundnut apye and kala pepper kpakpa road ojne lega Yam angyu eshi to bark srma gbŋo pmye ngbu evyi evyi tala pala kpala ngbabi mbatsa shita 7. VARIATION — NASALITY One interesting but complex characteristic of the Egno language is nasality. This is because it is quite hard at every level for a linguist to judge whether it is a property of vowels or of consonants. Nasal consonant sounds are hardly realised phonetically word-finally. Review of the Egno New Testament Orthography By way of examining the orthography in use, the Eggon New Testament Bible which is the only comprehensive document with a fairly scientific approach of writing Egno adopt different strategies for marking nasality including the tilde above the vowel esõ, shĩ, ahogbrẽ, ozhẽ, sõ, zhĩ, eshyẽ, vẽ; the use of a CN in Moaegŋe, gno, bmi, okŋe, ek’poetno, and the use of a final N atuŋ, otum. It is not clear for instance why they use gno and then Moaegŋe; or zhĩ ‘to ask’ and then zhiŋ ‘to turn.’ For glides, the tilde is used as in moarehwĩ, moahwõ, ahrẽ. This strategy is inconsistent but testament to the complexity of the question of nasality in Egno. The rules that underscore the choices of symbols used by these writers is not documented. The variation in Egno is not influenced by changes in the different dialects but by a process common to many languages where longer words or phrases are shortened with time and use. 14 The issues that surround the understanding of nasals in the Egno language is perhaps the most complex aspect of the phonology of the language because of the following a. Should we adopt a uniform solution in dealing with nasality or should each word be looked into independently. b. Should each word be written as they sound, that is fluid, or should there be a solution that is predictable? c. Is nasalization a feature of consonants or a feature of vowels? Ãhã or ah̃a, d. Should nasalisation in Egno be interpreted as single modified consonants or as sequences CN. It is helpful to therefore analyze give thoughts on some of the above. Nasality on Vowels or on Consonants From the phonology of the language, it is actually possible to take any side. This work finds it easier to prove that nasalisation is a process associated to consonants and not vowels. But as is stated in 3.1.4 below, /ɛ̄ / ‘yes’ and /ã᷇/ ‘what, exclamation’ are distinct words, although /ɛ̄ / ‘yes’ can also be pronounced as /e/. Only /ã᷇/ is a nasalised one sound word with no alternative pronunciation. They should therefore be written as <en>, and <an> respectively. Should nasalisation in Egno be interpreted as single modified consonants or as sequences CN? 1. Some consonants are followed by homorganic nasals, that share the same place of articulationː like abmo ‘song’ ebme ‘goat’, bmwre ‘to mould’, kpmre ‘scratch’, ebmwa ‘??’, egbmo ‘price.’ 2. Others are followed by non-homorganic nasalː kma ‘to hold’, gma ‘to break’, atma ‘swamp’ etc. 3. Other consonants are followed by nasals that cannot be determined, likeː odna ~ odaŋ, gŋa ~ gaŋ, shno~ shoŋ ‘fast’, àfní~afiŋ ‘six’, vnɛ̀ ~veŋ ‘to beg.’ Some of these words carry high vowels, allowing nasals to alternate between final position and cluster position including, otmu ~ otum ‘work’, agmu ~ agum ‘medicine’, ekmu ~ ekum‘??’, smu ~sum ‘sew’, ekpymi ‘bundle’, pmi ~ pim, ‘pound’ mbma, ‘red.’ 4. It is observed that nasals occur as C2 like other consonant clusters. Like other words with consonant clusters where the second consonant is lost in case of reduplication abgo becomes aboabgo; oklo to okoklo, so it is for otmu to become otutmu and zni becomes oziozni. They all obey the same phonological rule. Should nasals occur word finally, the pattern would have changed with it. Applying this principle, we had also interpreted ts and tʃ as single consonants beause ofː tso becomes otsotso. 5. There are no unambiguous word final consonants; no word final approximants. Since there are other consonant sequences which are not ambiguous2, and since only nasally released consonants are ambiguous, we can conclude that all cases of consonant clusters be written together. There are no obligatory CVN but there are obligatory CNV; pushing us to admit that CN is the most appropriate interpretation Insights From Egno-Ero 2 This include words like bga, tka, sla, jbi, bza, etc 15 Same words in Egno Ero do not have nasal release as shown in Table 23. What stands out as we observe the situation in Egno Ero is that nasals do not occur by any means word finally, nor are they released following other consonants as is in other dialects. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 Table 23 Nasal release in Egno Ero Egno — Others Egno-Ero mɑtsɛ tɑsɑnɑ ɑbmi lɛmbəmɛ ɑhɑ kɑhɑnɑ N z ɔ zŋɔ ɑbmɛ lɑbɑnɑ ehɥi lɑɥini ɑhɔɡ͡bŋ͡mɹɛ kɑhɑnɑɡ͡bɑnɑ N ɛhʷ ɹɛ ɔhwɑnɑ N ef i ɑfini ɛkŋɔ jikɔnɔ bmji bimjɛ hmi ɡ͡bənɑ Gloss hair breast cloud burn red black god grey hair six knife agree mould Glides Egno has nasalised glides as seen in the Egno NT. Different solutions were adopted in previous writings as in Anwye, hwin, ahan, ahon. Except for words related to Anwye, nasalised glides have been written with a nasal consonant post-posed to the stem of words. Previous works are inconsistent in representing the phoneme /ɥ/. It is written with the trigraph <nwy> in <anwye> ‘child’ and <enwye> ‘little’ but with a different principle in <arehwĩ> ‘human’ and <hwin> ‘dark’. What then do we do, stick to the way it is used in earlier materials or adopt the principle of consistency and write both words as <arehnwyi> which will lead us to having 4 consonants in a sequence. But it helps with consistency. To be consistent, a uniform system is being proposed as in Table 24. Table 24 proposed writing for Egno glides ahno another awyne child hwni to be dark ahna sky ehne tuwo Proposed Symbols Table 25 Proposed Strategy for Nasally Released Consonants 16 <Cm> <Cŋ> <Cn> mmo nme nunmu rmu to dry to bend sun to off tna gna kna fnye to eat much shake off to blow nyme to swell shna to heal atma gma kma ekpyme bmwre ogbmre akpma swamp to break to hold rope to mould fat tuber srno zno tsno sni zni afni Cny anŋa nŋa nyŋu rŋa sibling to cultivate to smell sweet ndŋi very cold fnye plenty to shake mbyŋo Very sweet to be burnt cŋe one to be old to grow to look down six The following points can be deducted from the above point as solution a. b. c. Consistency, which makes room for predictability. There has to be an internally consistent way for writing the language, in this case, nasally released consonants. Each dialect can read. The convention does not strictly follow a single dialect but allows each dialect as well as idiolect the freedom compromise wherever needed. Like Gbagyi, Egno should adopt the use of <n> following alveolar sounds and <m> after labials. 3SG There are a few exceptions, the possessive pronoun should be written as <bŋa> because it is a combination of <ba> ‘of’ and <ŋa> 3sg. This applies to other cases of proclitic like <dŋa> ‘let him’; a combination of <da> ‘let’ and <ŋa> 3sg. /ᵑg/ /ᵑg͡b/ Table 26 examples with prenasalised velar plosive <nga> <nglo> <ng’ba> ‘then’ ‘bath’ ‘to give way’ <ngbŋi> <ngbaku> <ngbak’pu> ‘ID.dark’ ‘clay’ ‘bone’ 8. SYMBOLS IN WORDS The symbols are arranged following the pattern in English. A H Ŋ V GB Table 27 Letters of the Egno alphabet B C D E I J* K L O P R S W WY Y Z 17 F M S SR G N T GY GY NY U KP Noteː j is used for /zh/ and gy is used for the English /j/. See above for detailed explanation. 9. TONES AND DIACRITICS Tone plays an important role in Egno. It has a heavy functional load. Egno language has three contrastive tone levels and three contours. There are both lexical and grammatical tones in the language. This section is concerned with the various symbols adopted to mark difference in tone or pitch. These differences in the pitch of words have been noticed to redirect the meanings of words. This happens at the level of lexical items and at the level of the grammar of the language. 9.1 Lexical Tones There are three contrastive tone levels in Egno as presented in Table 28 below. In addition to the three level tones, there are words which are said with a combination of high and low pitches, and others which are a combination of high and mid pitches. Table 28 tonal contrast Low/deep High/sharp Mid/average 1 dzu sit ta play anye today 2 gbu arrive ojeŋ ka see 3 nglo bath ba come ewyle hole 4 gzo vomit bza paste 5 su announce su ango road plate High/low kso leave High/mid mbo also ce an depart exclamation gma break tla leave angba money zuŋ refuse remind 9.1.1 Marking Lexical Tones The tonal functional load is light in Egno. This means that, not too many words are different only by tone; and of the few words that are different only by tone, only some few words might need some form of marking to distinguish between pairs. Otherwise, the contexts always help. Two kinds of ambiguities have been observed; absolute ambiguity and relative ambiguity. Words are used in speech, not void of a context and in Egno, the semantic or the syntactic context often make it unnecessary to mark tones. This is demonstrated below. Words that should not be marked In Ex 5 it is demonstrated that though aci and akpro can mean different things depending on the tone with which they are pronounced, the contexts are always different. Ex 5 <abmiku a bah a ba odne aci> <Allu a ta aci> <Ovye a tska aci> ‘Abmiku will come home tomorrow’ ‘Allu spat’ ‘Ovye cut a tree’ <Me e shne akpro> ‘I told a lie’ akpro a kpó me ‘catarrh is disturbing me’ *akpro a kpó me ‘lie is disturbing me’ 18 <Me e ta akpro > ‘I blew catarrh’ In Ex 6, each word falls in a different grammatical category. Ex 6 <ojne lo owo ce> <Ovye a ce a ba susku> ‘the road is straight’ ‘Ovye shift closer’ In some cases, like Ex 7, each verb is different in transitivity. Ex 7 <Ovye a ygi> <Ovye a ygi anzho> ‘Ovye returned’ ‘Ovye wore clothe’ In Ex 8 Consider /lɛ́/ ‘or’ and /lɛ̄/ ‘at all’, the first links two noun phrases while the concessive ‘at all’ is last in its clause and should be separated by a comma as shown. Ex 8 <Ovye ā ba le Aklo ā ba> <Ovye ā ba le, Aklo à so> ‘is it Ovye that come or it is Aklo’ ‘if Ovye comes, Aklo should leave’ See also /má/ ‘that’ and /mā/ ‘right.’ Observe that the syntax always disambiguates these ones as in Ex 9 Ex 9 <Ovye a ma ŋo ὸ ba> ‘Ovye said that you should come’ <Ovye ma > ‘Ovye right?’ Words that should be marked Cases of absolute ambiguity | homographic heterophones? What do we do? We shall disambiguate them by giving them a graphic distinction. 1. Two or more words with different pronunciations but same spelling ------do not write differently 2. Two or more words with same pronunciation and same spelling -----------write differently Demonstratives and 1sg pronoun | he, hi, me, miː The proximal demonstrative has two phonetic forms hi and he, depending on if the vowel of the noun it modifies has a high tone. The Egno New Testament writes each as they sound. By implication, there are two forms of the demonstrative. But this practice is questioned on the grounds of the ambiguity it creates. Considering the distal demonstrative me and mi ‘that’ and the ambiguity in awyne me ‘my child’ and ‘that child’, it might be helpful to maintain a single form for the demonstratives, hi and mi. This way, the ambiguity is removed leading to awyne me ‘my child’ and awyne mi ‘that child’ affecting structures like aci mi ‘that tree.’ and ashe hi ‘this woman.’ Speech intruducers: Speech introducers in reported speech include a lu ma ŋa... but the m can elide leaving ‘a ŋa... Whenever there is a case of consonant elision, the ‘should be used. In the same vein, consider lu ma ‘say that’ which is often pronounced as lá. It is recommended 19 that the shortened form should be written as lu’a making it different from la ‘with’ and la ‘to lay with’ as in Ex 10 Ex 10 Ashe alu’a ŋa abah. Ashe said that she is coming. Ashe la Allu. Ashe and Allu. Allu a la ashe bŋa Allu laid with his wife. Gramatical Verbs yi Yi is used for ‘to know’ and ‘to go.’ I propose yii for ‘to know’ and yi for ‘to go’ Yi should not be marked when it is used as a grammatical verb. Consider Ex 11. Ex 11 o yi odne ‘go home’ me e yí odne or me e yih odne ‘I am going home’ me e yii odne ovye ‘I know Ovye‘s house’ me e yi e bá or me e yi e bah ‘I am still to come’ Ba Ba is just as ambiguous, and should be marked as suggested in Ex 12. Ex 12 me e ba e lu egba I came and spoke me e bá e lu egba I almost spoke me e bà e lu egba I just spoke Nyŋu Words like nyŋu etc, can be distinguished by their contexts but only in the environment after the words. In other words, the context before does not help us to arrive at the meaning of these words; only the contexts after. I will propose that b) in Ex 13 be marked on the grounds that it is the most ambiguous of all. Ex 13 a) mo a nyŋu me egba babi to inform ‘they made bad comment to me’ b) lo a nyŋu a dzu well ‘it is well sitted’ c) lo a nyŋu eppyi babi smell ‘it has a bad smell’ d) me e nyŋu e gre odne conversly ‘I on the other hand went home’ Furthermore, there are few cases of words with no difference in sound. And in this also, the contexts should as help. Consider eyi hi ‘this year ~ this eye’ which contrast in tone with eyi 20 ‘key.’ In context, a key can be carried, sko eyi but it gets harder for eyi ‘year.’ Yet there is no need for writing each differently. The examples below show homophones which also need not be written differently because of the obvious contexts in which each is used. Words that sound alike and are written alike can easily be distinguished by contexts. Words like the ones in Ex 14 are examples of such. Ex 14 eshko eshko me e ri allu me e kpo allu eshko my name is Allu I greeted Allu enu enu ekpoh me enu me sleep is doing me my fowl zi Ovye a zi wangze me e zi shoshno ovye mixed the floor for tuwo. I walked fast yle ashe me a yle ekno lo akko mbo. mo a yle aglu a kko. my wife is yet to finish sieving the flour. the transplanting of corn is over. yla eshne sek'pa bŋa e yla. anmu he a yla ashe bŋa anzu. aku a yla sek'pa bŋa. his pot of rice is melted. this man beat his wife beating. Aku cut his rice. cu a cu ashe emaebi a cu ola he married a wife snake peels its back k’po a k’po ŋo a k’po me angba he is your seniour he lent money to me jma ashe a jma ŋa a tsiŋ walgi a jma eg’ba his wife charmed him he has oiled his body with oil jni a jni ogbu me e jni oka bŋo he turned back I asked about you When dealing with words, you also have the issue of floating tone. In this case, the words are lost, or in some cases their presence is not obligatory. The tone of such words however floats spreading its effects on the following word Ex 15 awyne ba me e mbwre ‘the child I have given birth to’ 21 awyne me e mbwre From the above, lexical tone should not be marked. 9.2 Grammatical Tones In Egno, tone has more implication in the grammar. Tone marks the progressive aspect, the perfective aspect, location, plural forms of some nouns, possessive pronouns. Also, the agreement marker has a variety of meanings depending on the tone. Each will be discussed a little and suggestions will be given regarding the way they are to be written. A semiographic approach as well as partial marking shall be adopted as we shall see in the data. 9.2.1 Verbs If in the statement <me e ba> we do not give a graphic distinction between the perfective and progressive, we are unable to distinguish whether it means ‘I came’ or ‘I am coming as the context does not always help.’ The New Testament did not mark this distinction. Two ways of writing the progressive are proposed in Table 25; a word final -h or an acute accent mark on the vowel of the verb. This is subject to review, but it should be known that to minimise ambiguity, the progressive aspect must be marked. Table 29 distinction between perfective and progressive aspect Perfective progressive me e klo I liked me e kloh me e kló I am liking me e mbga I measured me e mbgah me e mbgá I am measuring me e nglo I bathed me e ngloh me e ngló I am bathing me e tna I ate me e tnah me e tná I am eating me e tmu I dropped me e tmuh me e tmú I am dropping 9.2.2 7Verb Prefixes Verb prefixes function like pronouns; in fact, they are sometimes used instead of pronouns. Each noun class has the verb prefix it triggers. Prefix changes depending on the pronoun used. Although each of these prefixes have a different sound when the vowel in the verb root is either <u> or <i>, the vowels must be written the same way in either case as demonstrated in Ex 16. Why we must keep them separate Egno verbs begin with consonants and nouns begin with vowels The following statements are ambiguous unless verb prefixes (bold) are kept separate from verb roots. The prefix is a copy of the noun class prefix on the verb; it is phonologically bound to the verb root. But since all nouns begin with vowels and all verbs begin with consonants, indexes should be written separately always. This makes learning of the language easier as the shape of verbs and nouns can be clearly distinguished. 22 Ex 16 a yii agbi anŋa ‘he knows how to cultivate’ or ‘he knows his mother’s farm’ me eklo eyi odne ‘I want to go home’ ‘I want the key to the house’ or Verb prefixes are either of e, o, a. Verb prefixes are not marked in the New Testament. But from personal observations, the contexts are not always clear. Not distinguishing them have created a lot of ambiguities like reading forward and coming back to correct oneself. This is why we are proposing the use of one of either tone marks or punctuation marks on the verb prefixes; the perfective, being the most frequent remains unmarked. There are many software that allow users to type in accent marks; and such can be installed on mobile devices or desktops. But the option of leaving any form of marking is being discouraged. Only in very rare cases does it become necessary to mark the subjunctive as the contexts almost always makes it obvious. 1) It is the only aspect that can stand without an NP to begin a sentence. 2) Expressions like omba ba gyi ... anticipates a subjunctive prefix, if the verb is in a progressive form omba ba gyi e luh egba ‘when we were talking’ then the prefix is in the perfect form. As demonstrated in Table 30, perfective and subjunctives should not be marked. Two options are proposed for focus and future. Table 30 proposed marking for indexes Classes phonetic proposed orth Orth1 perfective subjunctive focus future gloss Orth2 [ā bā] a ba he came [ā ksɔ̌] a kso he rose [ā ᵑɡlɔ̀] a nglo he bathed [ā dzù] a dzu he sat [à bá] a ba He should come [à ksɔ̌] a kso He should leave [à ᵑɡlɔ̀] a nglo He should bath [à dzù] a dzu He should sit [â bā] a- ba [â ksɔ̌] a- kso if he rises [â ᵑɡlɔ̀] ā kso a- nglo a nglo if he bathes [â dzù] a- dzu ā dzu if he sits [á bā] a: ba he will come [á ksɔ̌] aː kso á ba ā ba if he comes á kso he will rise 23 [á ᵑɡlɔ̄] [á dzū] aː nglo á nglo aː dzu á dzu he will bath will sit 9.2.3 Locative High tone marks location in Egno. This is to say that the locative tone harmonizes with whatever tone on the first syllable of a noun to show location as shown in Table 31. In the New Testament, locatives are not marked. This is because its occurrence is fairly predictable from the contexts. Considering the ambiguities presented in Ex 17, where the use of the locative tone can radically affect the grammar as in (a) as well as when locatives begin a sentence as in (b). Locatives should be marked with an acute accent above the first vowel of the noun when it marks an idiom and when it begins a sentence. Ex 17 a. ŋo o gre ábgo ŋo o gre abgo ‘you have entered hand’ ‘you are difficult’ b. éshko eYesu eshko eYesu ‘in the name of Jesus’ ‘the name of Jesus’ Table 31 locative markers Root location Proposed [ɔ̄dgá] ‘leg ’ [ɔ́dgà] ‘On leg’ ódga [ɛ̀tʃ͡ kú] ‘market’ [ɛ̂t͡ʃkū] ‘in the marker’ écku [àklà] ‘bush’ [ɔ̄dnɛ̄] ‘home’ [àkù] ‘room’ [âkla] ‘In bush’ [ɔ́dnɛ̀] ‘at home’ [âkù] ‘in the room’ Ex 18 algo a wo áku ‘food is in the room’ a num óbmi ‘he layed down’ lo a gre ég’ba ‘it entered body’ o kso ángye ‘you should rise up’ Ahe ‘here’ must be distinguished from ahe ‘new’ as Ex 19 ba ahe> ‘come here’ lo a wo áhe ‘it is here’ 24 ákla ódne áku lo a wo ahe ‘it is new’ Áhe ‘in here’ must continually be marked when used in such expressions as above. Words like aci ‘tomorrow’ abe ‘away’ which are locative in form do not need any marking because they are not ambiguous. They should be written without the acute as demonstrated in Ex 20. Ex 20 Ovye á ba odne aci. ‘Ovye will come home tomorrow’ sri lo o ygi abe. ‘throw it away’ Some distinctions are also helpful. As shown in Ex 21 the contexts in which each occurs does not help. Ex 21 lo a wo ami ‘it is that one’ lo a wo ámi ‘it is there’ lo a wo aŋa. ‘which is it’ lo a wo áŋa? ‘where is it’ Possessive pronouns indicating ‘my place, his place etc‘ should also be marked with the acute accent mark Ex 22 lo a wo ame ‘it is mine’ lo a wo áme ‘it is at my place’ lo a wo abyi it is ours’ lo a wo ábyi it is at our place’ 9.2.3 Plural There are different strategies for marking plurals in Egno including noun class prefixes reduplication and tonal alternation. In this section, we shall consider those in which the difference between singulars and plurals is tone, as demonstrated in Table 32. The plural is marked by a macron above the first syllable while the singular remains unmarked. A list of the nouns that make their plurals through tones will be drafted and learners can master just those words and how to go about them. Those marked by prefix and reduplication do not need any other marking. 25 Table 32 marked singular/plurals Singular Plural Proposed.pl Meaning [ɑ̀zɡɑ̀] [ɑ̄zɡɑ̀] āzga ‘hoe’ [ìjì] [ījì] [ìnú] [ìnú] ēnu ‘chicken’ [ɛ̀ndɡɑ́] [àh̃ɔ̄] [ɛ̄ndɡɑ̄] [āh̃ɔ̄] ēyi ‘seed’ ēndga ‘cow’ āhno ‘another’ Pronouns are also included as shown in Table 33. Table 33 Pronoun singular/plurals Singular Plural Proposed.pl meaning [àmɛ̀] [āmɛ̀] āme mine [àbŋɔ̀] [ābŋɔ̀] [àbŋà] [ābŋà] [àbjì] [ābjì] [àgjmí] [āgjmí] [àmɔ̀] [āmɔ̀] ābŋo yours ābŋa his ābyi ours āgymi yours āmo theirs Compare the expressions in Ex 23 Ex 23 <āme a wo áŋa? ‘where are mine’ <ame a wo áŋa?> ‘here is mine’ Though cardinals also form their plurals like the nouns in Table 32, cardinals do not pose any ambiguities when used as modifiers to nouns or when the noun is already marked for a plural as seen in Ex 24. This implies that numerals should not be marked. Ex 24 <evgo eha> <asheshne aha> <āndu aha> ‘two fingers’ ‘two pots’ ‘two cows’ 9.2.4 Variants of the Negative marker Here, we shall look at the behaviour of the negative marker mbo its realization in different contexts and recommendations on how it should be represented. No other word changes in this manner. Table 34 Variants of Negative mbo. 26 Interrogative ŋo o bá mbo? ‘aren’t you coming?’ ‘I am not coming’ Indicative me e bá mbo. denial me e rí mbuuǃ ‘I am not coming oooo’ 9.2.5 Verb forms Gerund When a verb is used as a gerund, it takes the prefix o- or a-, and not the prefix that agrees with noun. O- for Gerunds should be written together because of the obvious contrast in Ex 25 onŋa agbi cultivation o nŋa agbi you should cultivated farm otpi oko ayi spoiling of place o tpi oko ayi you (should) spoil the place anŋa agbi the one who cultivates a nŋa agbi he cultivated farm atpi oko ayi the spoler of place a tpi oko ayi he spoiled the place Same is true for expression as those in Ex 26. Ex 26 me e ba onŋa agbi I came (for) farming a ba otpi oko ayi he came spoiling of place me e ba e nŋa agbi I came and cutivated a ba a tpi oko ayi He came and cultvated 10 WORD BEAKS The decisions to be made on word boundaries should be based on the following criteria; mobility separability, substitutability, pronounceable in isolation, phonological unity, phonological bridging, minimal ambiguity, conceptual unity, referential independence and faithfulness to existing syllable structure as proposed by Williamson (1984). We shall apply the most appropriate tests to each questionable construction. 9.1 Possessive phrases We shall treat this in two ways; the possessive pronoun in relation to kinship terms then their relationship to other nouns and adjectives. With kinship terms Kinship terms, <ada> <ana> <anŋa>, respond differently to word breaks because of the challenge of vowel suppletion. They should be written together with the pronouns. In Table 35, a paradigm is presented of all possessive pronouns with all pronouns. The next question is whether the vowel should show the phonetic appearance or the vowel of the root. Either is Table 35 Kinship Terms with Pronouns i ada |father ana|mother anŋa|sigbling adime anime anime 27 adŋo anŋŋo he adŋa anŋo we adigyi anigyi anigyi you adigymi anigymi anigymi there adimo animo animo you anŋa anŋŋa We realise that possessive pronouns can and should be separated from other nouns as in Ex 27 Ex 27 odga me ‘my leg’ oci byi ‘our tree’ 9.3 Focus The default marker for focus is angyŋi. But it can be elided, leaving behind its tone. Like the case treated in 9.2, the apostrophe should be used to show when the focus marker is not being used. This use of the apostrophe consistently shows the elision of a word or symbol. See Ex 28 Ex 28 a. a hmu me otmu b. a hmu me angyŋi otmu c. a hmu me ótmu ‘he sent me’ ‘it is me he sent’ ‘it is me he sent’ 11 COMPOUNDS Vowel sequences are restricted to compound words, not within a word. Since most words, both nouns and verbs end in vowels, and since nouns begin with vowels, in the case of compounds, there are usually cases of vowel sequences. In vowel sequences, V1 +V2 = V2. By interpretation, whenever the first vowel meets the second vowel, the first vowel is usually overpowered by the second. You almost don’t hear the first vowel. We have two options: to allow both vowels, in which case, we do not care much about the pronunciation or we write only the second vowel which is prominent. Different principles will be required for compounds. Generally speaking, it is better to write words in a compound separately. This is because, most compounds, especially compounds involving nouns, have a possessive phrase structure. Consider the words in Ex 29. Ex 29 apa odga akpa anyu ekpku odga masne esri ogba odzi aci ehwla aci makpa palm lips leg bone hair holy spirit tree sp. tree sp. 28 sese ekpypi ekpyi embwre soso ezni atski enŋi big black ant rat sp. grass sp. stirring stick When the V1 and V2 are the same, one vowel should be used as in Ex 30. It doesn’t help having the same letter written twice when it is not a case of vowel length. akpa Ex 30 adga akpadga aba aka abaka ashe ewu ashewu When V1 and V2 are different, both vowels should remain. The reason is clear, it helps to preserve the visual image of each word. It helps beginning readers but it doesn’t help in the long run when we are reading for meaning. The proposed ones on the other hand maintain the word image of each word. In this way, readers don’t get to lose the meanings of the parts that make the whole. Ex 31 adigyi odne adigyiodne 1ord are ahwni areahwni human abmi eku abmieku name ari egu ariegu name Because of the long use of the words in Ex 32 it might be best to write them together. Ex 32 areahnwi human awyneshe girl awynenmu boy Names The challenge with names is that they are mostly compounds which have been spelt differently for a long time. It is more helpful to maintain the form of the components that make up the new word. But if at all a vowel must be deleted, let this be the vowel that ends the first word and not the vowel that begins the second word. This has been the case with names like alumbgu, abimiku, abaya etc where the vowel that is left is that of the first word. 29 Table 36 Proper Nouns 1 2 3 4 ashe aba alu abmi Components ‘woman’ adzi ‘one of’ ekŋa ‘speaker’ embgu ‘he accepts’ eku 5 6 7 8 9 ari ashe ashe angba ombgu ‘eater’ ‘woman’ ‘woman’ ‘gong’ ‘fight’ egu esla ewu ashum adu ‘doer’ ‘runner’ ewu ayi 10 akpo 11 aknye ‘good’ ‘poverty’ ‘fights’ ‘death’ Former ashedzi abekna alumbgu abimiku ‘inheritances’ arigu ‘holy’ ‘suffering’ ‘idol’ ‘word?’ ombugadu umbugadu ‘suffering’ akpuwu ‘who’ akyenyi Proposed asheadzi abaekna aluembgu abmieku ariegu ashesla ashewu angbashmu ombguadu akpoewu aknyeayi It might be helpful just to include a few other non-compound proper nouns that are wrongly spelled in this sections. Ex 33 Former Ovey Okolo Akolo Obile Abile Proposed Ovye Oklo Aklo Obyle Abyle arahwin ebbyekpmye ahogbmre Words are ‘person’ acki‘turner’ amyi ‘water’ Words ahwi ‘black one’ enŋi ‘soup’ engbŋo ‘place of bath’ Former arahwin Proposed areahwyni ackienŋi amyiengbŋo 11.1 Reduplications When a root word does not contain consonant clusters, the reduplicated form is full, but when a word has consonant cluster, only the first consonant is produced in the first part of the reduplication as the whole word is retained in the second part of the reduplication. Two syllable words are copied all over but words more than two syllables reduplicate the final syllables. Numerals are reduplicated in expressions as gyi e ri atratra etc. It might be better to write them together especially because of words with more than two syllables, as shown in Ex 34. aha Ex 34 Numerals ahaha 30 atra afote atrunyi ek’po etra atratra afoteote atrunyionyi ek’po etraetra These words can be turned into adverbs of time as shown in Ex 35. Ex 35 Time words alo it ba alo-alo, since omi that ba omi-omi since then ogbi those days ba ogbi-ogbi, since those days kumbyi before now ba kumbyiombyi since anye today ba anye-anye since omba time ba omba-omba mé since that time When we reduplicate names as shown in Ex 36, are used for demeaning- an unexpected outcome. Like those discussed, it might be best to write them together, retaining the final vowels of the first words and the first vowels of the second Ex 36 ovye oveovye aklo akoaklo alu alualu abmiku abmikueku ombguadu ombguaduadu The following are sentences with chosen names above. In (3), an English name like Timothy will also undergo the same process 1. Moare a hwne esek’pa agbuhu atno, ombguaduadu mbo a hwni agbuhu ok’po 2. Oveovye mbo nga a hre anwye éngla 3. Timototi mbo nga a cu ashe. 11.2 Clitic Demonstrative (ma) Ma ‘that’ which is often used with the verb to speak lu, can be reduced as shown in Ex 37. Ex 37 a) me e lu ma me e kpo mbo b) a lu ma ŋa a ba me e l’a me e kpo mbo a l‘a ŋa a ba In some cases, lu is not used, as in Ex 38 retaining only the demonstrative ma ‘that’ Ex 38 A ma ŋa a ba ‘he said he is coming’ Subordinative marker <ba> 31 We shall treat the marker in relation to two things; nouns, then pronouns. The problem we have is on whether to write it as a prefix to the root or as a separate unite from the root. There seem to be no problem when used with nouns as shown in Ex 39, but when used with pronouns, a problem arises that must be tackled. Ex 39 Awyne ba Ovye a mbwre ‘The child Ovye gave birth to’ With pronouns When ba is used before a pronoun, there arises an optional phonological bridging. First, Ex 40 a) otmu ba gyi e kpo b) algo ba gymi e ri otmu byi e kpo algo bymi e ri the work we did the food you all ate Ex 41 c) odga ba me e kplu d) adga ba mo a kplu odga ‘me e kplu adga ‘mo a kplu ‘The leg that I cut’ ‘The leg that they cut’ Ex 42 a) omba ba ŋa a ba b) omba ba ŋo o aba omba b’ŋa a ba omba b’ŋo o aba when he came when you came APPENDIX a hi ŋo Vu Letters of the Egno alphabet ba ca da i ji ki o pa re Wu wyi Yi e li se Zi 32 fe mi she Sri gre no Ta Gyi gyi nye U nye