The morphosyntax of ghomala' verbs: focus on inherent complément verbs and serial verb construction

Conclusion

In this last chapter, the morphosyntactic properties of serial verb constructions in Gh?maìlaì' have been addressed. In this vein, formal properties that characterize serial verb constructions have been addressed as well as diagnostics that differentiate SVCs from other multiverb structures in Gh?maìlaì'. Gh?maìlaì' SVCs are used to impart various semantic functions amongst which, direction, aspect and tense, comparison...etc. Looking at the marking of grammatical categories, tense, negation, nominalizer as well as subordinators are marked once per SVC in the language under study. However, each component of a SVC can have its own aspect marker just like it can be either focused or questioned. On the basis of their morphosyntactic behaviors, it has been argued that any analysis built on the argument sharing hypothesis cannot account for Gh?maìlaì'^ì data. Following Aboh (2009), it has been argued that the first verb is functional and does not theta-mark the apparently shared object. As an indication, most of the semantic functions imparted by SVCs are mostly encoded by the first component in Gh?maìlaì'.

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GENERAL CONCLUSION

The general objective of this work was to examine the morphosyntactic properties of two verbal constructions namely inherent complement verbs and serial verb constructions. In doing so, apart from the general introduction, the dissertation has been structured into five chapters.

The general introduction sets the scenery by presenting the objective of the study, its motivations, the methods used in data collection as well as the language under study. It also provides a sketchy review of previous works on the language with a special focus on works related to the topic addressed in this dissertation.

Chapter one presents the theoretical assumptions adopted in this work. The essential features and relevant aspects of the minimalist program have been discussed. This presentation was completed by a brief review of approaches to serial verb constructions as well as major contributions in the analysis of inherent complement verbs.

Chapter two provides background information on the grammatical aspects of Gh?maìlaì' based on previous studies on the language. Sound system, noun morphology, TAM features and basic clause structure have been addressed. The discussion revealed that Gh?maìlaì' is a tone and noun class Bantu grassfield language with an SVO order devoid of noun class prefixes. Subject-verb agreement signaled by a subject marker is not attested in the language. Negation is signaled by two particles that occur respectively at the sentence middle and final positions.

Chapter three was devoted to Gh?maìlaì' verbs. Verbs have been classified following three criteria, namely the tone pattern, the syllable structure and the morphology of the verb. Two derivative morphemes are attested in the language. These morphemes encode different semantic interpretations (reflexivity, reciprocity, attenuative...etc.) and may affect the valency of the verb. As far as transitivity is concerned, the work has argued for a three way distinction of intransitive verbs in Gh?maìlaì'. The first group is made up of verbs that fail to be transitivized and therefore, are strictly intransitive; the second group comprises verbs which can be transitivized but their subject argument in the intransitive clause becomes the object in the transitive construction; the third group gathers together verbs that also can be transitivized but their subject arguments remain subjects in both clauses. It has been argued that most of the transitive verbs in Gh?maìlaì'^ì can select

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a generic-meaning DP as object. However, there are some verbs which do not take generic objects and require a more specific object.

Inherent Complement Verbs were the raison d'être of chapter four. In this chapter, I have addressed their morphosyntactic properties. In this vein, their formal features as well as their semantics have been discussed. Being compositional or metaphorical, ICVs in the language under study can be classified into regular and irregular. Their morphosyntactic features show that Gh?maìlaì' ICs can be pronominalized. This is an indication that IC bears phi-features in this language as opposed to Ga (Korsah 2011) or Gungbe (Aboh 2015). It has also been demonstrated that IC cannot be marked with a question feature in Gh?maìlaì'. As far as focalization is concerned, it has been argued that both the verb and its complement can be focused though the focused IC has a predicate focus reading. On the basis of these morphosyntactic properties, it have been claimed that Gh?maìlaì' ICVs are either intransitive or transitive. They purely merge under a functional position namely ?° that selects an abstract VP which licenses a bare NP. This NP incorporates to the abstract V.

The last chapter tackles the morphosyntactic properties of serial verb constructions in the language under study. In doing so, formal properties of serial verb constructions have been addressed as well as diagnostics that differentiate SVCs from other multiverb structures in Gh?maìlaì'. Gh?maìlaì' SVCs are used to impart various semantic functions amongst which, direction, aspect and tense, comparison...etc. As for marking of grammatical categories, tense, negation, nominalizer as well as subordinators are marked once per SVC in Gh?maìlaì'. Nevertheless, each component of a SVC can have its own aspect marker just like it can be either focused or questioned. On the basis of their morphosyntactic behaviors, it has been argued that any analysis built on the argument sharing hypothesis cannot account for Gh?maìlaì'^ì data. Following Aboh (2009), it has been argued that the first verb is merged under a functional position wherein it fails to theta-mark the apparently shared object.

The study of inherent complement verbs and serial verb constructions in Gh?maìlaì' reveals that there is a class of verbal roots that can merge in the predicate head or in the functional domain. It has been claimed that some functional items in Gh?maìlaì' are the results of the grammaticalization process that target minor verbs. However, this issue has not been deeply addressed here and need to be profoundly discussed in future research just like the syntax of idioms.

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