Bilingual serial verb constructions: A comparative study of Ewe-English and Ewe-French codeswitching

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dc.contributor.authorAmuzu, E.K.
dc.date.accessioned2018-11-28T15:41:55Z
dc.date.available2018-11-28T15:41:55Z
dc.date.issued2013-12
dc.description.abstractThe paper compares serial verb constructions (SVCs) in Ewe-English and Ewe-French codeswitching (CS) spoken in Ghana and Togo respectively. It argues that Ewe, the Matrix Language (ML) in both cases, sets the morphosyntactic frames of bilingual SVCs and, thus, determines their structural possibilities. It demonstrates this by looking at the various properties of SVCs in monolingual Ewe (including monoclausality and the expression of aspect and modality categories) and comparing them to the ones found in Ewe-English and Ewe-French CS structures. It also demonstrates this by looking at the expression of complex motion using Talmy's (2000) typology. Although English and French belong to different types with English being satellite-framed and French being verb-framed, and, although neither language has SVCs, complex motion is expressed in CS with SVCs. The facts are accounted for by using Myers-Scotton's (1993, 2002) Matrix Language Frame model. One major significance of the paper is that it is the first cross-linguistic study of bilingual SVCs. It predicts that for bilingual SVCs to be characteristic of CS, the ML has to have SVCs even if the other language, the embedded language, does not have them. © 2013 Elsevier B.V.en_US
dc.identifier.otherhttps://doi.org/10.1016/j.lingua.2013.08.002
dc.identifier.otherVolume 137, Pages 19-37
dc.identifier.urihttp://ugspace.ug.edu.gh/handle/123456789/25981
dc.language.isoenen_US
dc.publisherLinguaen_US
dc.subjectBilingual serial verb constructionsen_US
dc.subjectCodeswitchingen_US
dc.subjectComplex motionen_US
dc.subjectEwe-Englishen_US
dc.subjectEwe-Frenchen_US
dc.subjectMatrix languageen_US
dc.titleBilingual serial verb constructions: A comparative study of Ewe-English and Ewe-French codeswitchingen_US
dc.typeArticleen_US

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