Awngi language

Spoken in

  • Afro-Asiatic Cushitic centrally Awngi

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Cus

Awn

Awngi is a Central Cushitic language that is spoken by the Awis, an ethnic group in Central Gojjam in northwestern Ethiopia. In the literature, the language is classified as a Agau language, and as such it is part of the Cushitic branch of the Afro-Asiatic language family.

Most speakers live in the Agew Awi Zone, a district of the Amhara region. There are also other groups of speakers in different areas of the Metekel Zone, Benishangul - Gumuz a district of the region. Status of Kunfel, another southern Agaw language in the area west of Lake Tana, is not yet fully understood. It is closely related to the Awngi and could be a dialect.

  • 3.1 The noun
  • 3.2 The verb

Phonology

Vowels

The central vowel / ɨ / is the default epenthetische vowel of the language and almost completely predictable in its occurrence.

Consonants

  • / h / occurs mainly in Lehnworten in free variation with zero.
  • / ɢ / is usually realized as a uvular voiced fricative [ ʁ ].
  • Although / z / and / ʤ / are realized phonetically in most environments as fricatives, they are based on their behavior in phonological rules in many respects to be regarded as the voiced counterparts of the voiceless affricates.

Tones

Palmer and Hetzron both have three significant distinctive pitches identified in Awngi: high, medium and low. The bass, however, occurs on the vowel a is only at the end of words. A falling tone ( high - medium ) also appear only at the end of the word.

The syllable

The syllable usually fits in Awngi in the maximum syllable scheme CVC (C stands for a consonant, V for vowel). This means that at most one finds a consonant in the syllable and the syllable rhyme. Exceptions may indicate word boundaries, where extrametrikalische consonants can occur.

Phonological processes

Gemination

In non- initial sound positions there is contrast between geminate and non- geminate consonants in Awngi. In the following consonant, the contrast does not occur: / ɢ, ɢ ʷ, ʦ, ʧ, j, w, ʒ /.

Vowel harmony

If a suffix with the closed [ high ] vowel i is attached to a stem, there is a productive vowel harmony. Hetzron calls this process vowel height assimilation. The process takes place only if the underlying vowel of the final root syllable is e. This vowel and all previous manifestations of e and o take over the feature [ high ] until another vowel is encountered. Then the vowel harmony is blocked. Hetzron provides the following example: / moleqés -á / ' nun ' vs. / muliqís -í / ' monk '.

Spelling

Awngi is used in the primary school grades 1 to 6 in Awi zone as a language of instruction. The spelling is based on the Ethiopic script. Special characters for Awngi are ጝ for the sound ŋ and ቕ for the sound q. The sign ፅ is for ts, the character ኽ used for the sound ɢ. Various aspects of the Awngi spelling are still to be determined ..

Morphology

The noun

The noun is marked for number with gender ( masculine, feminine or plural) and case. In a class of nominal nominative is unmarked, in other classes by -i for masculine nouns and -a for feminine nouns. All cases are accusative, dative, genitive, locative, directional, ablative, comitative, comparative, invocative and translative. Hetzron also called the adverbial as a case of Awngi, but an interpretation as Derivationsmarkierung seems to be more appropriate. Both number with gender and case are marked by suffixes on the trunk.

The verb

The verbal morphology of Awngi has a wealth of conjugations. The four main times are imperfective past imperfective non- past perfective past and perfective non- past. There are many other and coordinated subordinate forms which are all selected as the main time as suffixes to the verb root. With regard to the person there is in Awngi the following distinctions: 1sg, 2SG, 3mask, 3fem, 1pl, 2pl, 3pl.

Hetzron showed that the verbal morphology of the Awngi can be described most economical, if one sets four different strains for each verb. The first strain is used for 3mask, 2pl and 3pl, the second for 1sg, the third for 2SG and 3fem, and the fourth for 1pl. These four strains must be recorded for each verb in the lexicon (and that even the infinitive and the imperative forms); then serve as the basis for all forms of the verb. These strains remain the same in all paradigms, and the surface forms of all members of a paradigm can reliably predict when the base and the steady Tempussuffix are known.

Syntax

The main verb in the sentence is only available at end of block. The Konstituentenreihenfolge in the sentence is subject-object - predicate. Subordination and coordination is achieved exclusively by suffixes on the verb.

Endnotes

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