THE PRONOUN AND HOW IT BEHAVES IN T’KURMI LANGUAGE

Abstract

This work carries out a contrastive analysis of T’kurmi and English pronouns. As an area of linguistic investigation, this study attempts to explore the differences and similarities in forms and structures of the pronouns of T’kurmi and English and how they are used. There is a contact and communication between the languages under study because both languages are assessable to the author; while the former is a native language, the latter is a second language. For this reason, introspection method among other procedures is employed in data generation in T’kurmi, based on competence and native intuition. Apart from the use of English grammar texts, data (especially) for T’kurmi pronouns were obtained through the researcher’s L1 ability as a speaker of T’kurmi, complemented with rapid anonymous observation of the speech of Akurmi speakers with a view to collecting the pronouns of the language. The data was also forwarded to some Akurmi elders for authentication in order to avoid shallowness. The study observes that though there are several theories of contrastive analysis, the structural theory of linguistics is the basis for the analysis of the data in this research. The research reveals that though we have pronouns in both English and T’kurmi, they do not totally behave in the same way, despite the resounding similarity. Like most second language speakers of English language, Akurmi speakers sometimes transfer the patterning of T’kurmi pronouns into the English language which affects the structure of their English language usage and renders it incorrect. This poses a problem to the acquisition and use of English language in general. As such, this study, apart from serving as a literature of T’kurmi language literacy also forms a study in contribution to grammar of African languages and the field of linguistics in general.