Locative enclitics in Ruruuli-Lunyala, Runyankore-Rukiga and Luganda: Form and functions

• Published in: South African Journal of African Languages Vol. 40; no. 3; pp. 342 - 350
• Main Authors: Katushemererwe, Fridah, Namyalo, Saudah
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Pretoria Routledge 01-09-2020; Taylor & Francis Ltd
• Subjects: Adverbials; Bantu languages; Clitics; Idioms; Politeness; Tense
• ISSN: 0257-2117; 2305-1159
• DOI: 10.1080/02572117.2020.1855728

In this article, we describe the form and functions of locative enclitics in Ruruuli-Lunyala, Runyankore-Rukiga and Luganda. We demonstrate that although locative enclitics play the role of locative references, there are other non-locative functions which have not yet been reported in these three languages. The article pursues two objectives: (1) To describe the form of locative enclitics in the three languages; and (2) to describe the locative and non-locative functions of enclitics. Data for Luganda and Runyankore-Rukiga were collected using interviews and focus group discussions. For Ruruuli-Lunyala, examples were drawn from a spoken corpus of Ruruuli-Lunyala, a Ruruuli-Lunyala dictionary and elicitations from two native speakers. The findings show that locative enclitics in Ruruuli-Lunyala, Runyankore-Rukiga and Luganda play the role of locative reference in addition to non-locative functions. The non-locative functions attested in the three languages include partitive, politeness, comparative, adverbial, tense and aspect. Some encliticised words have become lexicalised, while others are used in idiomatic expressions.