Check back soon for more information about our upcoming presentation
by Prof. Laura McPherson (Dartmouth College): http://www.dartmouth.edu/~mcpherson/.
Partially funded by your Student Activities fee.
The Department of Romance Studies and the African Studies Center are
co-sponsoring her talk:
“Plural formation in Seeku (Mande, Burkina Faso)”
Wednesday, March 4, 2015 at 5:30 pm in Stone B50.
Abstract: This talk focuses on nominal plural formation in Seeku, a Mande language spoken in Burkina Faso. Plural forms are distinguished from singular forms by both tonal and vocalic changes, lending the appearance that there is no affixation involved. However, I will argue that both tonal and vocalic changes result from the suffixation of sub-segmental phonological features, which dock to the root and trigger the phonological changes seen on the surface. In this talk, I provide an introduction to Seeku and phonological feature theory then show how features can behave as independent affixes in the morphology that contrast with regular segmental affixes.
This is also a Facebook event: https://www.facebook.com/events/1437554106535119/. RSVP’s are appreciated, but not required.