Verbal derivations in Inor

Abstract

This paper is concerned with the verbal derivation of Inor (which is the group’s self-designation), formerly called Ennemor, its Amharic name, a Peripheral Western Gurage language in the southern part of Ethiopia. Conducting research on this topic is a task well worth doing, as a detailed work has not been carried out on this area. Verbal derivation applies to the verb stem and has the function of increasing or decreasing arguments, as well as conveying intensity, reciprocity or reflexivity. It may do so by affixation or by altering the stem’s morpho-phonological properties. However, not all root morphemes of a simplex stem may apply to all the possible derivational processes. The linguistic data have been collected from consultants. The findings show that affixes that are involved in the verbal derivational processes in Inor are the passive prefix tə-, and the causative prefixes a – and at- that are attached to a template (Berhanu & Hetzron 2000: 39–44 for Inor, Rose 2007: 411 for Chaha). Another group of derivational morphemes (internal root-morpheme modification) increases the number of consonants vis-à-vis the simplex by reduplication of root-consonants, and insertion of an additional vowel a after the first or second root-consonant in combination with the passivizer tə-. The findings of this study also show that certain derivations are only applicable to a restricted set of root-morphemes.