Aspects of simple connectives in Ikwere

Abstract

This work on aspects of simple connectives in Ikwere, an Igboid language spoken in Rivers State was undertaken because the subject matter of connectives in Ikwere has received very little attention. This study was thus carried out to investigate the structure of simple connectives in Ikwere, ascertain the syntactic relevance of connectives in Ikwere and determine the semantic import of these connectives. The work is based on the Ò̟muanwa dialect of Ikwere Data for the work were obtained through unstructured elicitation interviews with competent language consultants of Ikwere and through participant observation. Data gathered were analyzed using the descriptive method of interlinear morpheme-to-morpheme glossing. Simple connectives in Ikwere were divided into Simple coordinators and Simple Subordinators. Simple coordinators in Ikwere were semantically split into additive, adversative and alternative while simple subordinators were functionally divided into subordinators in noun, relative and adverbial clauses. Our findings revealed that some simple connectives (simple adversatives) in Ikwere are optional as contrastive clauses are better linked without such connectives while some others are homophonous.

Keywords: conjunctions, connectives, coordinators, subordinators