L’item « yɛ » du miyobé (Togo/Bénin) : verbe plein, auxiliaire ou auxiliant ?

Abstract

In Miyobe, a language spoken in Togo and Benin, “yɛ” is often considered as a syntactic unit whose linguistic identification is as yet unclear. It is translated either as "to be", or "auxiliant" or again "auxiliary". In addition, though "yɛ" appears to be essential in any verbal sentence we notice that it can be omitted in some cases. It can also occur in a sentence without being followed by a verbal form. Hence the question of its real identity. The purpose of this study is to clarify the linguistic nature of "yɛ" based on morphosyntactic and semantic criteria. This means carrying out a systematic study of its use in different contexts and in different sentences obtained from field data.

Keywords

• context
• auxiliant
• description
• auxiliary
• yɛ
• Miyobe