Serial Verb Constructions in Goemai

Abstract This chapter discusses serial verb constructions in Goemai, a West Chadic language (Afroasiatic, Chadic, West Chadic A, Angas-Goemai, Southern Branch) spoken in the Jos Plateau area of Central Nigeria. Although serialization is not a typical feature of Chadic languages, it is sometimes argued that many present-day deictic particles, spatial prepositions, and directional verbal extensions can be traced back to the serialization of motion verbs (Frajzyngier 1987a, 1987b, 1987c). The motivation for this type of serialization is said to lie in the semantics of Chadic verbs and prepositions: while parameters such as source, goal, or path are commonly lexicalized in verbs, prepositions do not differentiate between them. That is, in order to indicate the directionality of any event, the verb coding the main event has to combine with a motion verb, for example in the form of a serial structure. Alternatively, serialization may have originated from language contact: so far, it is only attested in present-day Chadic languages that are spoken in contact areas. For example, in the Jos Plateau area, long-term contact has led to the establishment of a Sprach-bund in which Chadic and Benue-Congo languages share numerous lexical and grammatical features —including serialization (Gerhardt and Wolff 1977; Hoffmann 1970; Jungraithmayr 1963b). These two scenarios —retention of serial structures from proto-Chadic and contact-induced development —arenot necessarily mutually exclusive.