Expressing Intensification in the Chasu Language of Tanzania

While a number of studies have been conducted about expressing intensification in languages such as English, less attention is given to Bantu languages on the topic. This paper, therefore, explores strategies used to express intensity in Chasu, a language of the Bantu family spoken in Same District of Kilimanjaro, Tanzania. The study is guided by the Functional-typological approach which assumes that linguistic structures such as intensifiers are shaped by their communicative and cognitive functions such as emphasis and expressing degree or speaker’s stance. The approach propagates also that the structure of intensifiers is typologically diverse across languages. The study employs a descriptive research approach using data from both spoken and written forms. Spoken data were elicited through sociolinguistic interviews using 30 native speakers of Mamba Myamba Ward of Same District in order to capture conversations of everyday language use. To complement spoken data, written forms were reviewed from a Chasu hymn book to record sentences, phrases, and words with intensifiers. Transcription of recorded data was done using Chasu orthography followed by content analysis. The findings of this study reveal the use of both morphological and lexical strategies. In morphological strategy, intensification in Chasu is expressed by a morpheme –ish-a embedded as a suffix after the verb root and adjectives like in kund-ish-a (love so much) and mbah-ish-a (very big) respectively. From lexical strategy, intensifiers are expressed through adverbs haiwa and pere modifying adjectives and verbs. In addition, ideophonic adverbs, verbal and adjectival reduplication are strategies for expressing intensification in Chasu. Furthermore, there were few incidences of the use of borrowed Swahili intensifiers sana and kabisa. The study recommends more studies on expression of intensification in Bantu languages to widen up the knowledge scope and theoretical understanding. It also recommends a comparative study examining the structural diversity of intensifiers across languages.