Semantic Implications of Tone and Vowel Length to Non-Native Hausa Speakers

Citation: Abdulmalik Aminu (2017). Semantic Implications of Tone and Vowel Length to Non-Native Hausa Speakers. Yobe Journal of Language, Literature and Culture (YOJOLLAC), Vol. 5. Department of African Languages and Linguistics, Yobe State University, Damaturu, Nigeria. ISSN 2449-0660

SEMANTIC IMPLICATIONS OF TONE AND VOWEL LENGTH TO NON-NATIVE HAUSA SPEAKERS

By

ABDULMALIK AMINU

ABSTRACT

‘Semantic Implications of Tone and Vowel Length to Non-native Hausa Speakers’ is a descriptive linguistic research that is aimed at studying the effects of some phonological features of Hausa language, such as tone and vowel length, on the meanings of the words as perceived by the non-native speakers.It is observed that the non-native speakers of the language often fail to recognize the right word at the right context, which results to ambiguity in meaning. The paper therefore suggests that tone and vowel length should be marked on Hausa orthography to avoid ambiguity in meaning by the non-native speakers.

1.0 INTRODUCTION

In languages we communicate: verbally or non-verbally through the use of sounds or signs and symbols respectively. Language is a collection of structurally similar or mutually intelligible dialects (Janda and Joseph 2003: 54). Language is spoken by all including animals. Thus, human beings use languages through sound making which is well arranged in sequences for effective communication.

Greenberg (1963) classified African languages into four phyla: Afro-asiatic, Nilo Saharan, Niger Kordofanian and Khoisan. Hausa language cited at West Chadic of Afro-Asiatic phylum. Hausa language is spoken as first language in large areas of Northern Nigeria. It is also spoken in countries such as Benin, Burkina Faso, Cameroun, Central African Republic, Chad, Congo, Eritrea, Ghana, Sudan and Togo.

Linguistics as a scientific study of language has four major branches that observe and experiment the different levels which utterance undergoes for communication to be effective. These are: i) Phonetics/Phonology which studies the description of sounds of a particular language and the rules governing the distribution of those sounds. ii) Morphology which studies the word formation through the use of morpheme construction. iii) Syntax which studies sentence and the rules governing the formation of the sentences. iv) Semantics which studies the meaning of words.

Semantics as a branch of linguistics which studies the meaning of words has philosophical approach, linguistic approach and general semantics. The linguistics approach constitutes the descriptive semantics and theoretical semantics. The theoretical semantics deals with general theories of meaning such as contextual meaning, referential, image, ideational and behavioral meaning. The contextual theory of meaning expresses that the meaning and interpretation of lexical items can be left for context to determine. On the other hand, the referential theory of meaning is predetermined by documentation and therefore, context should not be allowed to determine (Nelsen (1975).This paper will therefore investigate solution to non-native Hausa speakers, the complicating patterning of tone and lengthening of vowel which changes the meaning of the words and even sentences.

2.0 SEMANTICS

Semantics is a branch of linguistics that studies the meaning of words. Nelsen (1975) asserts that general semantics is concerned with practical matters such as the improvement of communication through better word usage. It works basically with performance rather than competence. Semantic features are universal while phonology and syntax are language specific. It is through semantic features that we can determine how closely various lexical items are related to each other. For instance in Hausa language, the word ‘ráanáa’ sun or day, ‘ƙásáa’ country or sand, wátàa, month or moon. Language acquisition either first or second, can be expressed in terms of semantic features because in the acquisition of a new language, it is often that a person knows almost but not quite all the features of a particular word or expression.

Asher (1994) describes a general problem (for any) of philosophical theory of meaning to account for instances of communication where more than, or something different from, the information semantically encoded in a sentence is conveyed. Irony, figuration and hyperbole are familiar examples and meaning shifts with intonational contour, stress pattern, vowel lengthening, and so forth are well talked about.

Grice (1989) proposed a distinction between what is said and in an utterance, as determined by the semantic properties of the words uttered and what is conventionally implicated; those implications which arise not from conventional meaning but from certain general features of discourse. When related to Hausa language, it can be exemplified as in the case of second future, general past and subjunctive tenses of the language as considered by Galadanci (1976) to its semantic properties as follows:

Example 1:

a. yâa tàfi kàasuwaa ‘he will go to market’ (second future tense)

b.  yáa tàfi kàasuwaa‘he went to market’ (general past tense)

c. yà tàfi kàasuwaa‘he should go to market’ (subjunctive tense).

The above sentences have three different senses from the semantic effects of the third person singular masculine ‘ya’ due to the tonal variation and vowel lengthening.

3.0 TONE AND VOWEL LENGTH

A number of scholars attempting to trace the historical development or origin of tone in widely separated languages have understood that different vowels may give rise to contrasting tone. Hyman (1975) stated that tone assignment of verbs and of noun plurals in Hausa is largely predictable from the height of the final vowel. A high (versus low) final vowel predicts a high (versus low) tone. This analysis however has been criticized by Hausa scholars (Cowan and Schuh1976)

Cowan and Schuh (1976) show that final vowels are short before full NP (Nominal Phrase) objects but lengthened before pronouns.

Example 2:

àjìyè ƙánìnkì ‘put down your little brother’

àjìyéeshí ‘put him down’

Cowan and Schuh (1976) further express that certain amount of tonal behavior is rule governed. Example the copular nee/ceewhich are masculine/plural and feminine respectively exhibits ‘polar tone’ that is, its tone is always the opposite of that on the preceding syllable.

Example 3:

shíi Áudù née ‘he is Audu’

ítá Kàndé cèe ‘she is Kande’

Geoffrey (1985) cited that Hausa is a Chadic language spoken primarily in Nigeria. It has two tones: high (H) and low (L) and a falling tone which can be analyzed underlyingly as a sequence of these two tones H and L. These tones are lexical, that is to say, they are specified arbitrarily in underlying representation and function to maintain lexical contrast.

Example 4:

kúukáa ‘crying’

kúukàa ‘baobab tree’

Hombert (1978a) asserts that when syllables are lost in a tone language, the tones carried by these syllables are not necessarily lost. They are sometimes recombined with neighboring tones creating new tone shapes.

Example 5:

káayìi → kâi ‘head’

ráayìi→ râi ‘soul’

If two tones are similar phonetically, they can either move away from each other in the tone space or merge. In languages like Swahili and Nyakusa (Kohler 1981), the tone system completely disappeared as the result of such process.

Homber (1978a) quoting Matisoff (1973:115) saying “and change said “let the consonants guarding the vowels to the left and the right contribute some of their phonetic features to the vowel in the name of selfless inter segmental love, even if the consonants thereby be themselves diminished and lost some of their own substance. For their decay or loss will be the sacrifice through which tone will be brought into the world that linguist in some future time may rejoice”. 

Intonation being the series of ‘pitches’ that are found in longer utterances, is the acoustic result of the speed of the vibration of the vocal cord in the voice part of the utterance. The pitch pattern of yes-no question differs both globally and locally from those of statements. Hausa declarative sentences are marked by the global phenomenon of ‘down drift’ by which a H tone is lowered when it followed a L tone. According to Kraft and Kirk-green (1973), the last H tone will jump to a pitch level at least one step higher (in the range of five steps which they use to describe intonation pattern) than the pitch level of the previous H tone syllable. If the final syllable is H, it will slur from the very high level to level at least one step lower. A following L tone will drop only one step rather than all the way down to level one.

Example 6: i) statement 

ii) yes-no question

kánàa láafíyàa.      kánàa láafíyâa?

5 ka      5 ka    fi

4 laafi   4 laayaa?

3 naa    3 naa

2     2

1yaa      1

4.0 NON-NATIVE HAUSA SPEAKERS

Saying something in a language involves, but does not reduce to knowing the requisite pieces of that language. The speaker is here and now employing what he has previously acquired and still possesses. He is now in act of operating with things of which, he has perhaps for years,been the possessor.

A non-native Hausa speaker is a person that speaks Hausa as a second language. A non-native Hausa speaker might also be a person that speaks Hausa language as spoken by his parents and people around him probably with rules of his parent mother tongue’s background.

In the early 1900s, an anthropologist by the name Benjamin Lee Whorf developed the idea that the way human perceive the world around them is influenced by the language they happen to speak. The Hausa non-native speakers impart the rules of their various ‘mother tongues’ into Hausa language which in turn yield different semantic interpretations.

5.0 SYLLABLE STRUCTURE

Syllables are minimum unit of pronunciation which are larger than sounds but smaller than words. Syllables are made up of consonants (c) and vowels (v). Hausa syllable structure can either be short or long, open or closed. The short or long can otherwise be called light or heavy syllables respectively. The short syllable can be structurally represented as a consonant and a vowel. Example: ‘ya’ cv, ‘kya’ cv while long syllable is made up of consonant and two vowels. Example: ‘zaa’ cvv, kwaacvv. The open syllable ends with vowel(s) as in cv(v)while the closed syllable ends with a consonant, which normally occurs at the middle position of a word and in the final position of borrowed words and idiophones. Example: fensir ‘pencil’ cvc-cvc. Wuluk ‘very black’ cv-cvc. The syllable structure constitute the beginning consonant known as ‘onset’, the middle vowel known as ‘nucleus’ and the final consonant known as ‘coda’.

Hausa words can be monosyllabic, disyllabic, trisyllabic or polysyllabic.

These are:

Monosyllabic: ji ‘hear’ cv

Disyllabic: jikii Ɗji-kiiɗ ‘body’ cv-cvv

Trisyllabic: karaatuu Ɗka-raa-tuuɗ ‘reading’ cv-cvv-cvv

Polysyllabic: makaranta Ɗma-ka-ran-taaɗ ‘school’ cv-cv-cvc-cvv.

6.0 HAUSA AS A TONE LANGUAGE

Tone is a pitch of voice in an individual syllable. Hausa language is made up of high tone (H), low tone (L) and the combination of the high and low forming the falling tone (F). Tones are marked on vowels according to the pitch of voice on each syllable. The distinction in the pitch of voice in an individual syllable in the language may differentiate completely different word or grammatical function of a word. Hausa language has exhibits more high tone than low and falling (Hyman 1975). In some few Hausa examples given in books written in English and dictionaries, low and falling tones are marked with the lengthening of vowels. Thus, high tone is not marked because of its frequent appearance in the language.

Baba (1998:12-13) considers the tonal variation of the grades of the verbs forms yield different semantic interpretations as follows:

Example 7:

túuràa ‘send’ HL grade I →tùuráa ‘push’ LH grade II

zúbàa ‘pour’ HL grade I → zùbá ‘leak’ LH grade III

ríƙàa ‘hold for’ HL grade I →rìƙáa ‘look after’ LH grade II

záagàa ‘go round’ HL grade I →zàagáa ‘abuse’ LH grade II

yáafàa ‘throw clothes over shoulder’ HL grade I →yàafáa ‘forgive’ LH grade II

7.0 SUMMARY

Tone variation and vowel lengthening can often lead to ambiguity in the meaning of words. Since it is not shown in the standard orthography, a lot of learners get confused. Tone is an aspect that requires practical demonstration. A non-native speaker often gets confused to say or recognize words according to the right tone of each syllable. This may result into changing the meaning of a word or even render it meaningless. Example of a word ‘fari’ can have three or several senses according to the variation of toneand vowel length as in: /fáríi/ ‘white’ with HH tone, /fárìi/ ‘drought’ with HL tone /fáarìi/ ‘beginning’ with HL long vowel and /fàaríi/ ‘grasshoppers’ with LH long vowel. Also a word as ‘jaka’ can be formed as /jàakáa/ ‘ass’ with long middle and long ending vowel, /jàkáa/ ‘bag’ with short middle and long ending vowel.

Intonation which is often described as a series of pitches that are used with longer utterances, involve the specification and modification of different kinds of tone patterns of the words in a sentence. Considering the declarative and the interrogative forms of sentences, the declarative is the one which is not associated with question while the interrogative may or may not include interrogative words such as /wàanée/ ‘who’ /mèenée/ ‘what’ /ìnáa/ ‘where’ and /yàushée/ ‘when’ in Hausa language. That is to say, questions may be asked without interrogative words. Example, /shíiyázô/ ‘is he the one that came?’ with the falling tone on the last word. Hence, it can be difficult to distinguish the interrogative and the declarativewithout the tonal or punctuation mark.

8.0 CONCLUSION

This paper may benefit those that speak Hausa as a second language. It may also benefit the first speakers of the language by improving their reading and writing Hausa orthography with the right tone and vowel length. The paper can therefore enhance the non-native speakers of Hausa language to speak and listen consciously to the tonal change and vowel length that occur in the language. The paper stresses that tone and vowel length convey different meaning of words when not use appropriately. It therefore encourages efficient orthography with tone marking and vowel lengthening for message conveyance and effective communication.

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