Kunda Verbal Extensions

Abstract

The study focuses on the verbal extensions of Kunda, It investigates the expressions and ordering of Kunda extensions. It looks at the main extensions which are the single extensions and the combined extensions. It employs mirror principle theory (MP) proposed by Alsina (1999) and Baker (1985) and morphological template known as CARP template (TM) proposed by Hyman (2003) to account for the order of verbal extensions. The study employs qualitative research design and descriptive in nature. The data used for this analysis is from the Kunda native speakers. A purposive sample of four (4) informants was done. The informants were interviewed and a list of 200 verb roots was used in the study for informants to identify the productive roots to which the verbal extensions were attached. The study analyses how verbal extensions are presented or expressed in Kunda as the morphological process. The results show that Kunda verbal extensions interact with each other although with some restrictions. It is the meaning of a sentence that determines the order (and co-occurrence) of verbal extension morphemes. Kunda combines the Mirror principle and CARP template to determine the order of verbal extensionsand that some orders are fixed although, they violate the CARP template ordering.