Aspects of Inflectional Morphology in Urhobo
Abstract
This study investigates aspects of inflectional morphology in the Urhobo language. The study adopts descriptive approach. The work reveals that verbs are inflected in so many ways in the Urhobo language. Therefore, verb inflection is highly productive in Urhob. The study also reveals that prefix and suffix morphemes are affixed to the verb stem to convey the exact information contained in the surface realisation. It also shows that there is no clear distinction between the simple present tense and simple past tense in the language. For instance, He kills the goat – ọ̀ kwe ẹ̀wẹ̀ nà in example 1 and He killed the goat ọ̀ kwe ẹ̀wẹ̀ nà in example 10. It is also reveals that ‘O” is the only constant morpheme that is used to represent he/she in the language. One striking fact about this personal pronoun in the Urhobo language is that “o” is used to refer to male, female and neutral genders. Finally, the process of aspects of inflectional morphology in the Urhobo language is unique. Verb inflection is attained through prefixes and suffixes. This affixation does not alter the grammatical function/ category in the language. For instance, ọ̀ kwe ẹ̀wẹ̀ nà rhẹ̀ {He has killed the goat} justifies this claim.
Terms and conditions of Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License apply to all published manuscripts. This Journal is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. This licence allows authors to use all articles, data sets, graphics and appendices in data mining applications, search engines, web sites, blogs and other platforms by providing appropriate reference. The journal allows the author(s) to hold the copyright without restrictions and will retain publishing rights without restrictions.
A competing interest exists when professional judgment concerning the validity of research is influenced by a secondary interest, such as financial gain. We require that our authors reveal all possible conflicts of interest in their submitted manuscripts.
The Editor reserves the right to shorten and adjust texts. Significant changes in the text will be agreed with the Authors.
