A Study On The Morphology Of Mehri Of Qishn Dialect In Yemen
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Date
2007-05
Authors
Alfadly, Hassan Obeid Abdulla
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Abstract
This study describes the morphology of Mehri Qishn (henceforth, MQ) in
Yemen. MQ is one of the six Modern South Arabian unwritten languages,
related to the southern branch of the western Semitic family. It is considered as
an endangered language. Specifically, this descriptive study aimed: (1) to
identify the morphological items (morphemes, morphs, etc.) of Mehri Qishn
dialect, (2) to describe the phonemic shapes of Mehri Qishn dialect
morphemes, (3) to describe how Mehri Qishn dialect morphemes are internally
formed and distributed. The study adopted the ethnographic qualitative design.
It involved 10 key informants out of 35 of different ages selected by judgment
sampling. The data on MQ morphology were elicited by following Swadesh list,
informal interview, participant observation, and oral morphology questionnaire
which were designed and adapted from Dahl's, (1985) and Bouquiaux and
Thomas questionnaires (1992). A number of models and a theory were
adopted as the basis for research design and for describing the morphological
data of the study. They include Nonconcatenative Theory of Semitic
Morphology (Root and Pattern Morphology), Synchronic Descriptive
Experimental Model, and Item and Process (henceforth, IP) and Word and
Paradigm (henceforth, WP) Eclectic Approach. The elicited morphological data
of the study revealed that MQ is based on a tri-consonantal root system within
Root and Pattern Morphology. Roots themselves have no definite meaning, but
rather a root set of three consonants carries a range of potential meanings
(Kramer, 2005). A root must be placed into a derivational pattern, which
consists of vowels between each consonant and sometimes the addition of
affixes, in order for the meaning to be realized. Additionally, MQ has a second
word-formation device i.e. the stem-and-suffix structure, which attaches a suffix
to a base, usually a word, as in English. The findings showed that MQ is a
highly synthetic Semitic language with a rich morphology. The verbal and
nominal systems are highly inflectional, with prefixes and suffixes indicating
categories such as person, number, gender and tense for verbs. Derivational
morphology is also rich and varied with a large array of derivational affixes of
various structures and with an extremely complex root, stem and affix
allomorphy. Finally, pedagogical implications and further research are
suggested to reach a more comprehensive understanding of the linguistic
system and situation of MQ and a guideline towards MQ preservation.
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Keywords
To identify the morphological items , of Mehri Qishn dialect