Reflexive constructions in Jóola Fóoñi
Domain:
natural language processingRecord type:
paper
Creator:
Bas
BasEditor:
DynUni
Publisher:
CCSD
Host:
International audience
The reflexive constructions of Jóola Fóoñi (an Atlantic language spoken in south western Senegal) are characterized by a sharp distinction between subject-object coreference, which requires the use of derived forms of the verb, and other possible coreference relationships within the clause, which are not treated differently from coreference in discourse. Three verbal suffixes are involved in the coding of subject-object coreference, none of which is specialized in reflexive function:
-ɔɔr (productive in reciprocal function, very marginally involved in reflexivization), -ɔ (productive in decausative and quasi-reflexive function, also used to encode reflexivization with body-care verbs), and -ɔɔrɔ (the default marker of subject-object coreference, also used to mark self-intensification of the subject).