Tense-Aspect Categories and Standard Negation in Five Bamileke Languages of Cameroon: A Descriptive and Comparative Study

This thesis is a study of tense-aspect and standard negation in five Bamileke languages: Ngiemboon, Feʔfeʔ, Ghomalaʔ, Ngombale, and Medumba. It aims at a detailed description of the mechanisms for expressing tense-aspect categories and standard negation in each of the five languages under investigation and a comparison of the tense-aspect systems and standard negation across the languages analysed. The ultimate aim of the comparison is to test previous scholars’ claims that aspects of grammar largely exhibit the same properties from one Bamileke language to the other (Nissim 1975, Sonkoue 2014). The study is mainly synchronic and is based on working sessions with language consultants, using a questionnaire and a list of topics for collecting short oral texts. The conceptual framework that guided the analysis and interpretation of the data relies basically on the works by Comrie (1976, 1985) and Dahl (1985) on tense-aspect and Miestamo (2000, 2003, 2005) on negation. The main findings of the study are: (i) tense and aspect are encoded differently in each of the languages analysed. Verb forms may either lack an overt tense or aspect marking, they may exhibit a single marker, or a construction including at least two elements (for example, two tense markers following each other). Tense-aspect markers may also have one or more basic uses. (ii) Tense-aspect and standard negation interact in an interesting way in the languages analysed; and (iii) on close inspection, both the similarities and differences between the five languages analysed with respect to tense-aspect and standard negation prove to be considerable. Thus, this study departs from previous scholars’ claims and argues that Bamileke languages show a high degree of similarity in the basics of their tense-aspect systems and standard negation. Nevertheless, when deep analyses are carried out in each individual language within these domains of grammar, comparing the languages indicates that they have both, similarities and differences and thus, neither should be de-emphasised. In addition, the study indicates that various hypotheses about diachronic change relating to tense-aspect systems and standard negation in the languages under investigation, and to a certain extent in related languages outside the Bamileke group, can be advanced. For example, it is posited in the study that the near past markers (kà in Ngiemboon, kə̄ in Feʔfeʔ and Ghomalaʔ, and kə̀ in Ngombale) are probably derived from the same source. The study closes with recommendations for future research. It recommends, for instance, an analysis of the extended functions of tense-aspect categories in each of the languages analysed.