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Tewolde Yohannes, Tesfay

DPs, Phi-features and Tense in the Context of Abyssinian, Eritrean and Ethiopian, Semitic Languages : a Window for Further Research

2016 - Firenze University Press

xiv, 310 p.

  • This study discusses DPs, Phi-features and Tense in Abyssinian Semitic languages. DPs and TPs have parallel structures. Their subjects are generated within the projection of lexical categories which move to Spec positions of associated non-lexical categories (Fukui 2006). Aspect is indicated by inserting different vowel patterns into the roots of base stems. Tense, however, is indicated by different forms of verb to be (Jelinek 2002). In North Abyssinian Semitic languages, verbs and nouns have similar patterns to indicate plurality and this is due to an economy constraint on the grammar (Siddiqi 2009). Phi-features in the affixes and independent pronouns are closely related (Buccellati 1996). We may assume the development of the latter into the former or vice versa via a clitic stage (Fufl 2005). DPs, Phi-features and Tense in the Context of Abyssinian (Eritrean and Ethiopian) Semitic Languages by Tewolde Yohannes,
  • Tesfay is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribuzione-Non commerciale-Non opere derivate 3.0 Italia License. Based on a work at www.fupress.com. Tesfay Tewolde Yohannes taught Linguistics at the University of Addis Abeba and at the College of Arts and Social Sciences in Eritrea. Currently, he is working as an instructor and expert of Ethio-Eritrean Semitic languages at the University of Florence. Among his publications, he authored A Modern Grammar of Tigrinya (2002). [Publisher's text]
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