Nominal Class System of Fula

1 Alex Ortiz Field Methods Prof. Gillian Gallagher 12.15.15



Fula Noun Classes: Morphological Distinction and Vowel Harmonization





The Fula language is a West-African language in the Niger-Congo family. There

are approximately 2,550,000 speakers across Guinea, with a total of 2,929,200 across the general region. Ethnologue has it classified as a “provincial” language, where provincial means the following: “The language is used in education, work, mass media, and government within major administrative subdivisions of a nation. ”Among other notable linguistic conventions of the language are the number of noun classes and the concept of vowel harmonization. Throughout my course of study of this language, many different noun classes presented themselves in various ways and with various nouns. Each class is marked by a distinct determiner that undergoes vowel harmony with the stem of the noun. This is shown by trying to move nouns from one class to another (especially between augmentative and/or plural classes) we attempt to give the expected form of a noun, only to find that the word exists but means something else. However, each class also has nouns that overlap significantly with other classes in terms of what plural markers they take, what augmentative forms they can take, if any, and stem changes. The only way to effectively demonstrate all of this is to give some very typical cases as to when the nouns behave exactly as would be expected and contrast them with counterpoints. The number of noun classes within the language seems to vary based on what dialect is spoken. The dialects studied by D.W. Arnott in 1970 had roughly 25 classes. Through my research developed over the course of the semester 19 were found. The 19 classes discussed below are results of both phonological processes like vowel harmonization as well as some inherent morphological distinctions. Different words also have different changes to form based on consonant cluster prevention as well, even across word boundaries. As a general rule words only end in sonorants.



2 Number1 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19

Class Name on n gen n gun n gon n gol n gal n gil n dun n den n dan n din kin kun kon kan ɓen ɗin ɗen ko͡i

Meaning/Grouping

Example

Persons and French loanwords Various Various Various Various Augmentative Augmentative Various and animals Various and round objects Fluids Various Various Diminutive Various non-singular nouns Various Plural persons / loanwords Plural various Plural various Plural diminutive

gorko on – the man nage ngen – the cow teu ngun – the beef felo ngon – the mountain cangol ngol – the river lega ngal – the tree nagi ngil – the (oversized) cow sondu ndun – the bird wofo nden – the egg n dia ndan –the water n gari ndin – the (male) cow leki kin – the medicine paɪkun kun – the (little) boy maro kon – the rice kafa kan – the machete worɓe ɓen – the men bariɟi ɗin – the dogs bole ɗen – the snakes paɪkoɪ koɪ – the boys

Classes 1 and 16: on and ɓen The definite article “on” is primarily used for nouns that are people, loanwords, and some exceptions. Below are some examples of words in the class: debo on – ‘the woman’ neneɟu on – ‘the mother’ babaɟu on – ‘the father’ karamakuɟo on – ‘the teacher’ ɟanganakuɟo on – ‘the student’ bobo on – ‘the baby’ baharu on – ‘the ocean’ krejon on – ‘the pencil’ (French loan) butiki on – ‘the store’ ʒy on – ‘the juice’ (French loan) mafe on – ‘the soup’ (word can also be used with definite article ‘kon’) 1 These numbers were assigned by me personally and do not reflect in the literature. 2 The optional –re at the end of words appears to be something that marks definiteness and quantity in a sentence. If it drops it is considered indefinite and indicates “some/few” The –re appears to always be necessary when the noun precedes its

3 papu on – ‘the (hot grain-like food)’ This class seems to be sort of a catchall default class. When words are introduced in the language, they very easily fit into this class of nouns because there is no requirement for vowel harmonization like there are with the other classes. Even words that have the inherent quality of being a person (like ‘neneɟu’ or ‘babaɟu’) do not have any matching vowels with that of the article. Since class 1 “on” is the default and manages to catch nouns of varying forms, it resists vowel harmony that is prevalent elsewhere. The marker “on” can be used to denote a quality of personhood, or loanwords. The plural mapping of class 1 “on” can be unique to class 16 “ɓen” for all of the nouns that are people. The words in this class that do not map to class 15 map to the plural class 16 ‘ɗin’: dolekaɟi ɗin – ‘the shirts’ butiki ɗin – ‘the stores’ These all intuitively map to class 6 for augmentatives, but possess the capacity to map to class 7 in pejorative contexts. Examples for the plural forms of the nouns for class 16 are below: worɓe ɓen – ‘the men’ reu ɓen – ‘the women’ sagata ɓen – ‘the young boys’ Classes 2, 3, and 4: ngen, ngun, and ngon The definite article “ngen” is used with few nouns, of which I only found three of throughout the semester, “ngun” has only been found with one noun, and “ngon” has only been found with two. Examples include: ɲale ngen – ‘the female cow’ nage ngen – ‘the cow’ nange ngen – ‘the sun’ ɟeu ngun – ‘the beef’ felo ngon – ‘the mountain’ hogo ngon – ‘the fence’

4 The classes “ngen,” “ngun,” and “ngon” all seem to contain various nouns with constant vowel harmonization. There has been no real generalization to be made about these three noun classes. Interestingly enough it was difficult to establish whether words like ‘felo ngon’ and ‘mejo ngon’ are actually ‘felong on’ and ‘mejong on.’ The decision to separate these into a separate class is because it would break the rule of words ending only with sonorants. The only distinctions that can be made are phonological in the sense that vowel harmonization occurs forming three separate, allomorphic classes. The plural mappings of these singular nouns are all the same and naturally map to class 17 “ɗin.” They cannot map to class 18 “ɗen” which is thought to be a plural with an extra qualification (most frequently, augmentative.) Class 5: ngol The definite article “ngol” has been assigned to class 5. There are very few nouns in the class that I could find, though there is a semantic generalization to be made. All of the nouns belonging to this class appear to be long, thin, objects. cango ngol – ‘the river’ kako ngol – ‘the leaf’ bogo ngol – ‘the rope’ cukulo ngol – ‘the hair’ (singular hair) lawo ngol – ‘the street’ “Kako” can be pluralized, or augmented (in both forms): kaki ɗin – ‘the leaves’ kaki ngil – ‘the leaf (too big) (aug.pej) kaka ngal – ‘the leaf (aug) “cangol” can be singularly augmented, and it can take both plural markers, with the latter denoting a plural augmentative. The rest of the nouns present can all be augmented, but only with the ‘ngil’ determiner. candi ɗin – ‘the rivers’ cande ɗen – ‘the rivers’ (aug) cangil ngil – ‘the river’ (aug) labi ngil – ‘the street’ (aug) bogi ngil – ‘the rope’ (aug)

5 Classes 6 and 7: ngal and ngil The definite articles “ngal” and “ngil” are different classes that take nouns into an augmentative form. The below is a list of words that occur naturally within classes 6 and 7. Naturally occurring : lega ngal – ‘the tree’ (legal) taba ngal – ‘the table’ (tabal) bali ngil – ‘the sheep’ (balil) sunsulibi ngil-the mosquito Formed from stems of other classes: bola ngal – ‘the snake’ [aug] barewa ngal – ‘the dog’ [aug] nagi ngil – ‘the cow’ [aug] cuwi ngil – ‘the house [aug] n diji ngil – ‘the water’ [aug] (“too much water”) Words like ‘legal’ and ‘tabel’ drop the word-final /l/ before taking a definite article. That rule is shown below: /l/ -> /Ø/ / _#[consonant] Words that occur naturally in the class have no problem taking plural forms, though they map to different plural definite articles. There is not an overarching system of which plural class they transition to. This leads one to believe that there has to have been some underlying form belonging to a different, non-augmentative, class. There is also no way to augment words that occur naturally in an augmentative class. The below was a realization of the capability of most nouns (including people) possessing the capability to go between both augmentative classes. deji ngil – the woman (aug.pej) deja ngal – the woman (aug) gora ngal – the man (aug) guri ngil – the man (aug.pej) n gil – judged to be used mostly for animals

6 n

gal – judged to be used for anything

After discussing this further the consultant made a judgment that while both things technically mean the same thing (big) calling someone “deji ngil” was considered rude while “deja ngal” is just sort of a statement. I was informed that class 6 is used for basically anything, and that class 7 is often rude or pejorative, so it’s reserved typically for animals or emphasis. “legal” for example occurs naturally in class 6, but if one wanted to discuss a tree that is too big, the term would be “legi ngil”. With respect to nouns that are formed from other classes as opposed to naturally occurring ones, there can be a slight pejorative connotation with the augmentation process. Words like bola, nagi, barewa, and diji all have a pejorative-augmentative meaning like “cow that is too big/scary” “scary/big dog” or “too much water.” This pejorative meaning only occurs with formed words and not the naturally occurring ones. So words like ‘bali’ or ‘sunsulibi’ in spite of their average-to-small size cannot be augmented. There also seems to be some sort of semantic restriction on what can and cannot go through augmentation from other classes. Some liquids can be augmented like ‘ndia’ and ‘neɓi – (oil)’ but not ‘kosa – (milk)’. We also can’t augment ‘leke kin – (medicine)’ or ‘kafe nden – (coffee) or ‘sagata on – (young boy)’. The expected, yet ungrammatical forms are below: *kosa ngal/kosi ngil – ‘the milk ‘(aug) (too much) *lekiwa ngal/lekiwi ngil – ‘the medicine’ (aug) *kafi ngil/kafa ngal – ‘the coffee’ (aug) (too much) *sagata ngal/sagati ngil – ‘the young boy’ (aug) This restriction doesn’t seem morphological, since it isn’t class specific. It also doesn’t seem phonological, since both stem-changing and stem-constant nouns seem to be able to take an augmentative form. It seems purely semantic in a seemingly arbitrary way. The primary argument for splitting augmentatives into another class is the combination of both naturally occurring augmentatives (that also have an inherent sense of being

7 augmentative/large/qualified) as well as the inability for augmentative to undergo further augmentation Class 8: ndun The noun class “ndun” takes various arbitrary nouns as well as some animals. Examples include: bariru ndun – ‘the dog’ ɲariru ndun – ‘the cat’ sondu ndun – ‘the bird’ tutiru ndun – ‘the frog’ sudu ndun – ‘the house’ hendu ndun – ‘the wind’ lejuru ndun – ‘the moon’ The only generalization that could be made is that class 8 denotes some degree of animacy (with the exception of ‘house’) The plural mapping for the class ‘ndun’ is ‘ɗin.’ This class has a very strong pattern of vowel harmonization with absolutely no exceptions of vowel disagreement between the noun and article. Beyond this, there seems to be this split within the class as to which augmentative class the nouns transition to: bariru ndun -> barewa ngal sondu ndun -> cola ngal sudu ndun -> cuʔil ngil Seeing as all of the nouns in the class have stem changes in augmentatives, diminutives, and plurals, this change is surely morphological to mark that the noun is no longer residing in its natural class regardless of what class it has transitioned to. Unfortunately, the process of stem changing is something that appears to be more complex rather than a simple rule. Class 9: nden

The noun class “nden” takes some arbitrary nouns but especially round things as

well as fruits and vegetables. Examples include: haire nden – ‘the rock’

8 wofo(re)2 nden – ‘the egg’ deftere nden – ‘the book’ dʒulere nden – ‘the chair’ ɓende nden – ‘the heart’ balore nden – ‘the ball’ urere nden – ‘the pot’ pomo(re) nden – ‘the apple’ mango(re) nden – ‘the mango’ limonere nden – ‘the orange’ For the most part this class seems to have the overarching semantic property of being round-shaped. There are exceptions like ‘deftere’ and but the majority of nouns in the class have some sort of round and/or food-like quality to them. This class has a very strong pattern of vowel harmonization as well. Since there is a generalization that can be made as well as the potential for some nouns to drop their harmonized vowels, the separation between this class and the previous (as well as the one after) seems to be completely morphological. They do not appear to be allomorphs though there is variety in the nouns within the class. If the nouns all belonged to the same class, we would expect them to be able to transition freely between using the different definite articles using only vowel harmony. Class 10: ndan The noun class ‘ ndan’ seems to take no arbitrary nouns, only fluids and semifluids. The current examples include: n

dia ndan – ‘the water’ (ndian) lanɗa ndan – ‘the salt (lanɗan) biroɗa ndan – ‘the sour cream’ kosa ndan – ‘the milk’ neɓa ndan – ‘the oil’

2 The optional –re at the end of words appears to be something that marks definiteness and quantity in a sentence. If it drops it is considered indefinite and indicates “some/few” The –re appears to always be necessary when the noun precedes its definite article, but the judgments were conflicting on occasion.

9 The generalization of the class consisting of primarily fluids combined with the very rigid vowel harmonization demonstrates a very solid example of a class that exhibits both a phonological separation from the previous two classes, as well as the obvious morphological distinction. There appear to be arbitrary restrictions on what can and cannot go through augmentation, as some nouns possess the capability while others do not. However, they all possess the incapacity to become diminutives as shown below: *ndijun kun *lanɗun kun *biroɗun kun *kosun kun *neɓun kun Much like with the augmentative classes, there seems to be a rule prohibiting a consonant from occupying the word-final position when the noun precedes a definite article. That rule is realized below: /n/ -> /Ø/ / _#[definite class 10 article] In environments without the article (such as an indefinite) the nasal consonant stays on the end of the word as normal. Class 11: ndin

The noun class “ndin” seems to take various nouns, inclusive of more animals.

Examples are included below: n

gari ndin – ‘the male cow’ dentori ndin – ‘the rooster’ budi ndin – ‘the snake’ n duri ndin – ‘the honey’ biɲiri ndin – ‘the bottle’ finkari ndin – ‘ the gun’ There is no semantic grouping or morphological generalization to be made for class 11, though it does follow a very solid phonological framework for vowel harmonization. Unlike with the augmentatives, it appears that all of the “ndVn” style noun classes are not allomorphs. They all have different meanings and semantic groupings.

Within the class there is a split much like the one seen in class 8. Instead of there

being words that are split between the two augmentative classes it appears that the

10 words within this class split themselves between different plural noun classes, which seems to be rather interesting as shown below: ngaʔi ɗin – ‘the male cattle’ bole ɗen – ‘the snakes’ Class 12: kin

This noun class has very limited data with only two words being present.

leki kin – ‘the medicine’ laɓi kin – ‘the knife’

Of the two words placed in the class, one does not have vowel harmonization

while the other does. There is not overarching semantic connection that can be drawn between simply two nouns. This class appears to be separated more by phonological processes rather than by morphological. Classes 13 and 19: kun and koɪ

The definite article “kun” marks the one and only diminutive class. If a noun can

go through diminutivization then it will end up in class 13. The examples include below: Naturally occurring: fuseti kun – ‘the fork’ kujer kun –‘the spoon’ paneu kun – ‘the bowl’ Formed from stems of other classes: lekun kun – ‘the small tree’ (dim) paikun kun – ‘the young boy’ (dim) dejun kun – ‘the small woman’ (dim) The diminutive class has a relatively rigid grasp on the concept of vowel harmonization, with most nouns belonging to the class at least possessing the vowel within the word. This combination of both phonological distinction and obvious semantic distinction cements this as a very solidly separate class with no potential allomorphy. There are words (like all of the liquids for example) that cannot be diminutivized. All diminutives can take a plural form, in this case the form “koɪ.”

11 Examples below: dejo koɪ – ‘the women’ (dim) goroɪ koɪ – ‘the man’ (dim) paɪkoɪ koɪ – ‘the boys’ (dim) All diminutive plurals take the same form as well, following a very strict vowel harmonization with the diphthong “oɪ”. Class 14: kon

The definite article “kon” marks a small noun class consisting of only three nouns

currently: maro kon – ‘the rice’ mafe kon – ‘the soup’ hako kon – ‘the leaf/leaves’ This class is relatively unique in the sense that it seems to make an exception for vowel harmonization, as well as the fact that it can be used as a sort of plural class with the word ‘hako.’ It can mean a number that cannot be counted or simply a large amount of innumerable substance (like soup.) Class 15: kan

The definite article “kan” marks another small noun class containing the

following words: tanka kan – ‘the train’ kafa kan – ‘the machete’ n daha kan – ‘the ink’ The above words cannot be augmented, and the primary intuition was to pluralize them as the following: kafaɟe ɗen – ‘the machetes’ tankaɟe ɗen – ‘the trains’ n dahaɟe ɗen – ‘the inks’ The above lead me to believe that there is some sort of qualification and/or inherent augmentative property (since they were immediately combined with the article ‘ɗen’). The following was a counterpoint:

12 *kafaɟi ɗin tankaɟi ɗin – ‘the trains’ ndahaɟi ɗin – ‘the inks’ The judgment on the above was that the (grammatical) nouns with ɗin have exactly the same meanings as their ‘ɗen’ counterparts. Classes 17 and 18: ɗin and ɗen

The definite articles “ɗin” and “ɗen” are the two primary plural markers for the

noun classes that are not diminutive or class 1. They appear to be allomorphic with the majority of their difference being in vowel harmonization because they often actually split some of the classes between which words can and will take which plural marker. Examples include: paɪɗe ɗen – ‘the boys’ bale ɗin – ‘the sheep’(pl) kaje ɗen – ‘the rocks’ cudi ɗin – ‘the houses’ bole ɗen – ‘the snakes’ defte(re) ɗen – ‘the books’ n gaʔi ɗin – ‘the male cattle’ The above demonstrates nothing more than vowel harmonization being the distribution of how nouns from various classes are mapped to the plural class and article that will be used. Nouns from the same singular class can in fact map to different plural classes and harmonize vowels, especially in cases where stem changes have to occur because the vowels are not /e/ or /i/ like in class 8. The counterpoint here is that there are occasions where ‘ɗen’ can mean a qualified/augmentative plural. That being said the differences and meanings of the two separate articles are neither fully consistent nor productive. If there are restrictions, they appear to be lexically arbitrary. If they are systematic, then the system by which they accept nouns is not well understood. The classes are not freely interchangeable as shown below: leʔe ɗen - the trees *leʔi ɗin naʔe ɗen - the cattle (aug)

13 naʔi ɗin - the cattle defte ɗen - the books *defti ɗin *bale ɗen bali ɗin - the sheep (pl) gore ɗen - the men (aug) #gori ɗin - the lines Overall the inability for nouns to freely and arbitrarily move between the different classes is the primary argument for their distinction. Beyond that, there are semantic generalizations that can be made about some, though not all, of the classes. Those without the overarching semantic generalization likely possess some sort of inherently lexical arbitrary distinction. The stem changes appear to be a marker of the noun moving out of its natural class. How the stems change, on the other hand, is something that would require a closer phonological inspection. While some noun classes seem to have this sort of overarching morphosemantic grouping, others seem to have absolutely no semantic relationship at all and end up grouped together purely out of vowel harmonization. This intersection of morphology and phonology shaping an entire system of 19+ noun classes is rather interesting. It’s as though where morphology no longer is the driving force for a specific nominal class, phonology steps in and bridges the gap and vice-versa.



14 References Arnott, D.W. (1970) The Nominal and Verbal Systems of Fula. Ethnologue. "Pular." Ethnologue. Ethnologue, n.d. Web. 23 Nov. 2015. . Paradis, C. (1987). Strata and Syllable Dependencies in Fula: The Nominal Classes. Journal Of African Languages And Linguistics, 9(2), 123-140. doi:10.1515/jall.1987.9.2.123