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Part of
Grammatical and Sociolinguistic Aspects of Ethiopian Languages
Edited by Derib Ado, Almaz Wasse Gelagay and Janne Bondi Johannessen †
[IMPACT: Studies in Language, Culture and Society 48] 2021
► pp. 197–212

Serial verb constructions in Sezo

 | Addis Ababa University
Serial verb constructions in Sezo are formed by simple juxtaposition of two or three verbs without any marker of coordination or subordination. The components of a serial verb construction are always contiguous and do not allow syntactic constituents to intervene between them. They form one intonational group and do not allow multiple marking of grammatical features, such as subject, tense, polarity and other syntactic dependency markers. All serial verb constructions attested in Sezo are asymmetrical because they always consist of one major verb and one or two minor verbs. The major verb which comes from a semantically and grammatically unrestricted class of verbs is always the main verb. The minor verb is either a motion or a posture verb and encodes directional (deictic), valency changing or aspectual information. The minor verbs cannot be treated as auxiliaries, because they are able to occur as lexical verbs outside serial verb constructions.
Keywords: Sezo, serial verb construction, asymmetrical serial verb, major verb, minor verb, direction, valency, aspect
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Sezo and its community of speakers
  • 3.Methodology
  • 4.Serial verb constructions: A cross-linguistic overview
  • 5.Formal properties of serial verb constructions in Sezo
  • 6.The semantics of minor verbs in serial verb constructions of Sezo
    • 6.1Serial verb constructions with directional (deictic) minor verbs
    • 6.2Serial verb constructions with valency changing minor verbs
      • 6.2.1Serial verb constructions with valency increasing minor verbs
      • 6.2.2Serial verb constructions with valency decreasing minor verbs
    • 6.3Serial verb constructions with aspect marking minor verbs
      • 6.3.1Aspectual serial verb constructions with minor verbs in V1 position
      • 6.3.2Aspectual serial verb constructions with minor verbs in V2 position
  • 7.Conclusion
  • Acknowledgements
  • Notes
  • Abbreviations and symbols
  • References
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Published online: 23 April 2021
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https://doi.org/10.1075/impact.48.08men
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