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TYPE CRAFT IN-DEPTH ANNOTATION OF MULTI-VERB CONSTRUCTIONS IN ÈDÓ

LANGUAGE BACKGROUND

-ÈDÓ IS A LANGUAGE SPOKEN IN MID-WESTERN NIGERIA.

-IT BELONGS TO THE EDOID GROUP (ELUGBE 1979) OF THE BENUE-CONGO SUBFAMILY OF THE VOLTA-CONGO FAMILY (GORDON 2005).

-IT IS SPOKEN BY ABOUT A MILLION AND A HALF PEOPLE (1991 CENSUS).

-ÈDÓ APPEARS IN THE LITERATURE UNDER THREE DIFFERENT LABELS. THESE ARE: BENIN, ÈDÓ AND BINI. IN EARLY EUROPEAN LITERATURE, THE LANGUAGE IS OFTEN REFERRED TO AS BINI (GREENBERG 1966 AND MELZIAN 1937), WHILE THOMAS (1910) REFERS TO IT AS ÈDÓ. THESE LABELLING DIFFERENCES ARE EXPLAINED BY THE FACT THAT THE LANGUAGE IS SPOKEN IN THE REGION FORMALLY KNOWN AS THE BENIN EMPIRE WHICH HAD ITS CAPITAL IN THE CITY ÈDÓ.

TYPE CRAFT

-A TOOL FOR ANNOTATION AND SHARING NATURAL LANGUAGE PARADIGMS ONLINE.

-THE MAIN PURPOSE OF ANNOTATION IS TO DESCRIBE THE MEANING AND GRAMMATICAL STRUCTURE OF LANGUAGES.

-TYPE CRAFT FEATURES A TIER FOR LATIN ORTHOGRAPY IF THE LANGUAGE UNDER DESCRIPTION HAS OTHER ORTHOGRAPY, A TIER FOR MORHOLOGICAL ANALYSIS, A TIER FOR MEANING, A TIER FOR GLOSSING OF MORPHOLOGICAL FEATURES AND A TIER FOR PART OF SPEECH INFORMATION. IN THE EXAMPLE BELOW, THE FIRST AND SECOND TIER ARE IDENTICAL SINCE ÈDÓ USES THE LATIN ORTHOGRAPHY. HYPHENS SEPERATING WORDS INDICATE THE INTERNAL STRUCTURE OF A WORD AS CONSISTING OF A STEM AND AN AFFIX WHILE SPACES INDICATE WORD BOUNDARIES. THE THIRD TIER PROVIDES MORPHOLOGICAL ANALYSIS. THE FOURTH TIER PROVIDES INFORMATION ON THE LITERAL MEANING OF A WORD/MORPHEME AS WELL AS GLOSSING OF MORHOLOGICAL FEATURES. THE FIFTH TIER PROVIDE INFORMATION ABOUT THE PARTS OF SPEECH OF THE LEXICAL ITEMS AND LASTLY THE SIXTH TIER PROVIDES THE FREE TRANSLATION.

ÈDÓ

-TYPE CRAFT PROVIDES A SET OF GLOBAL TAGS THAT ALLOWS FOR CLASSIFICATION IN TERMS OF SYNTACTIC AND SEMANTIC PROPERTIES SUCH AS CONSTITUENT TYPE, CORE CONSTITUENT VS ADJUNCT, TRANSITIVITY, THEMATIC ROLES, SITUATION AND ASPECT TYPES AND POLARITY.

-ÈDÓ LANGAUGE HAS BEEN DOCUMENTED OVER A HUNDRED YEARS BUT WITH LITTLE FOCUS ON IN-DEPT ANNOTATION OF DATA. ALSO MOST OF THE DOCUMENTS ARE EITHER OUT OF PRINT OR NOT EASILY ACCESSIBLE. THIS PROJECT IS THE FIRST IN-DEPTH ANNOTATION FOR ÈDÓ AND WILL BE EASILY AVAILABLE FOR LANGUAGE RESEARCHERS/TEACHERS/STUDENTS ALL OVER THE WORLD.

ÈDÓ:SOME BASIC FACTS

ÈDÓ IS A TONE LANGUAGE WITH AN SVO STRUCTURE. THERE ARE TWO BASIC TONES IN ÈDÓ: HIGH (  ) AND LOW (  ). NOMINAL HEADS BEAR CONSTANT TONES WHILE VERBAL HEADS BEAR RELATIVE TONES. BY RELATIVE TONES, I MEAN GRAMMATICALLY AND LEXICALLY CONSTRAINED TONAL REALIZATION. TENSE IN ÈDÓ MAY BE REALIZED AS TONES: PAST TENSE (  ) AND PRESENT TENSE (  ) OR (  ), A SUFFIX: PAST –RV, OR A LEXICAL ITEM: FUTURE TENSE GHÁ. WITH RESPECT TO SYLLABIC STRUCTURE ÈDÓ HAS AN OPEN SYLLABLE SYSTEM WITH NO CONSONANT CLUSTERS. ALL NOUNS BEGIN WITH VOWELS AND ALL VERBS WITH CONSONANTS.

MULTI-VERB CONSTRUCTIONS IN ÈDÓ

-MULTI-VERB CONSTRUCTIONS PROVIDE USEFUL INSIGHT INTO THE QUESTION OF HOW LANGUAGES DISTINGUISH BETWEEN ADJUNCTION AND COMPLEMENTATION. THE TERM MULTI-VERB CONSTRUCTIONS IS DEFINED AS CONSISTING OF VERBS IN SERIES THAT CAN FUNCTION AS INDEPENDENT VERBS IN SIMPLE SENTENCES, WITH AT LEAST ONE SHARED ARGUMENT AND NO MARKING OF SYNTACTIC DEPENDENCY (CF. AMAKA 2005:2).

-MULTI-VERB CONSTRUCTIONS ARE ATTESTED IN THE KWA AND GUR LANGUAGE FAMILIES OF WEST AFRICA, THE CARIBBEAN CREOLES, SOUTH ASIAN AND SOUTH EAST ASIAN LANGUAGES, OCEANIC AND SOME NORTHERN AMERICAN LANGUAGES (MISUMALPAN).

-THE STUDY EXAMINES MULTI-VERB CONSTRUCTIONS IN ÈDÓ. THE STUDY ALSO EXAMINES MULTI-VERB CONSTRUCTIONS IN THE FOLLOWING LANGUAGES OF THE NIGER-CONGO: IGBO AND YORUBA (BENUE-CONGO), GURENNE (OTI-VOLTA), GA, BAULE, AKAN AND EWE (KWA) AND SITUATE PROPERTIES OF EDO MULTI-VERB CONSTRUCTIONS WITHIN TYPOLOGY COMMON TO THESE LANGUAGES.

ÈDÓ

IGBO

AKAN

YORUBA

EWE

BAULE

GURENNE

MULTI-VERBS IDENTIFIED INCLUDE SERIAL VERB CONSTRUCTIONS IN ALL THE LANGUAGES DISCUSSED, CONSECUTIVE CONSTRUCTIONS AND OVERLAPPING CONSTRUCTIONS IN EWE AND COVERT CO-ORDINATION IN ÈDÓ, IGBO AND BAULE. TYPOLOGICAL FEATURES USED FOR IDENTIFICATION INCLUDE: TENSE, MOOD, ASPECT, NEGATION, ADVERB DISTRIBUTION, PREDICATE CLEFT AND ARGUMENT SHARING PATTERNS. THE FINDINGS SHOW THAT THE TYPOLOGICAL FEATURES OF A LANGUAGE DETERMINE THE TYPE OF MULTI-VERB CONSTRUCTION IT LICENSES. ALSO WHILE, INFLECTION MAY DEMARCATE MULTI-VERB TYPES WITHIN A LANGUAGE, THE PATTERN OBSERVED FOR A LANGUAGE MAY NOT MAP ONTO ANOTHER LANGUAGE.

TYPE CRAFT AS AN ANNOTATION TOOL

- IT ALLOWS FOR SEARCH AND CLASSIFICATION OF DATA ALONG DIFFERENT MOPHOLOGICAL, SYNTACTIC AND SEMANTIC CRITERIA.IT IS POSSIBLE TO SEARCH FOR PHRASES OR TEXTS. IN THE DATA ABOVE I HAVE USED THE SEARCH FOR PHRASE TOOL AND SERCHED FOR PHRASES OF THE TYPE SERIAL VERB.

- THE GLOBAL TAGS PROVIDED BY TYPE CRAFT THOUGH NOT PROVIDING ALL THE RANGES OF DESCRIPTIONS I NEEDED FOR THE ANALYSIS OF THE TYPOLOGICAL FEATURES FOR THE DATA IN MY THESIS, PROVIDED THE MAJOR SYNTACTIC AND SEMANTIC TAGS NEEDED FOR MY CLASSIFICATION. WORK IS CURRENTLY BEING DONE TO BROADEN THE SCOPE OF COVERAGE.

-IT ALLOWS FOR LINEALIZED GLOSSING OF DATA.

-IT PROVIDES ANNOTATION TOOLS THAT AIDS LINGUISTIC DESCRIPTION. THE TOOLS MAY BE SUPPLIMENTED TO ACCOMODATE NEW DATA.

-IT IS EASY TO IMPORT FONTS THAT ARE NEED FOR DESCRIPTION.

-IT IS A SAFE ACHIVE FOR DATA PRESERVATION.

-IT IS ACCESSIBLE WHEREEVER THERE IS INTERNET SERVICES.

-IT ALLOWS FOR DATA SHARING AND COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS.

-IT ALLOWS FOR DISSEMINATION OF RESEARCH FINDINGS.

-DATA CAN BE IMPORTED AND EXPORTED OUT OF TYPE CRAFT AND CONVERTED TO PREFERED FORMAT.