Demonstratives in Afaan Oromoo

Abstract

This study explores demonstratives in Afaan Oromoo, focusing on morphosyntactic, semantic classes and pragmatic aspects. It also examines that the choice of demonstratives is determined not solely by the speaker’s desired attention, but also by morphosyntactic features. Data were collected for two years, from 2021-22, from Afaan Oromoo textbooks (grades 9-12), native speakers (mainly Western variety) and introspection. The findings show that the language has demonstratives which are categorized into four classes: demonstrative pronouns, determiners/adjectives, identifiers, and adverbs. Pronouns indicate referent position, while determiners regulate noun phrases. Identifiers draw attention to referents in non-verbal clauses. Adverbs denote referent location, with complex forms involving adpositions and interrogative pronouns. Concerning the semantic features, speakers use demonstratives to show deictic features such as proximity of referents to them. The conversational situations indicate whether referents are human or nonhuman by qualitative features such as ontology and animacy. The language also employs demonstratives for three pragmatic functions: exophoric, recognitional, and endophoric. Exophoric uses direct the listener’s attention, recognitional uses recall shared information, and endophoric uses help interlocutors to focus on a discourse referent. Anaphors denote entities, while discourse-deictic uses focus on expression meaning. Generally, demonstratives have complex linguistic features to show the encyclopedic knowledge of Afaan Oromoo speakers.

Keywords

• Afaan Oromoo
• demonstratives
• deictic features
• endophoric functions
• exophoric functions
• Jeroen van de Weijer, College of International Studies, Shenzhen University, Shenzhen, Guangdong, China