A comparative analysis of dexis in Citonga and English
Date
2012-12-20
Authors
Simbeleko, Webster
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Abstract
This study is a comparative analysis of deixis in Citonga and English. Deixis is a Greek word which means "pointing" using language. The exercise was carried out with a view to establishing the similarities and differences between the deictic systems of these two languages. In particular, five major categories of deixis were examined, namely person deixis, spatial (place) deixis, temporal (time) deixis, social deixis and discourse deixis. In the light of this, five specific objectives were set as follows: (i) to identify categories of deixis in Citonga and English; (ii) to examine the referential distinctions of the Citonga and English spatial deictic systems; (iii) to examine the morphological structures and syntactic positions of Citonga deictic expressions in relation to the English ones; (iv) to investigate the gestural and symbolic usages of deixis in the two languages; and (v) to investigate the situational use of Citonga deictic expressions in various speech events.The study used both the qualitative and quantitative approaches to collect primary and secondary data. However, there was more use of the qualitative paradigm than the quantitative one in both data collection and analysis. The qualitative approach was used to obtain information on how Citonga deictic expressions are used in various communicative events (this was through observation, interviews and video recordings). The quantitative approach was employed to find out the number of demonstratives and locatives that are used in the Citonga deictic system in comparison to those of English (a checklist was used for this purpose). Also this approach was used to indicate whether Citonga shows a three-way referential distinction (i.e. proximal - near the speaker; medial - near the addressee, and distal - far from both) or a four-way referential system in these demonstratives and locatives (i.e. proximate to the speaker; proximate and enveloping the speaker; proximate to the addressee, and remote from both the speaker and the addressee).This study has shown that the Citonga and English deictic systems are similar in some aspects (e.g. categories of deixis, syntactic positions and gestural and symbolic usages of deixis) and different in others (e.g. referential distinctions, morphological structures and syntactic positions). Although the study has given a comprehensive description of the Citonga deictic system, it has raised some issues which need further exploration by future researchers in this phenomenon, namely (i) to compare the Citonga deictic system with that of any other Zambian language; (ii) to investigate the relevance of deixis to the teaching and learning of Citonga in Zambian schools;
(iii) to investigate the extent to which verbal prefixes contribute to the Citonga deictic system;
(iv) to investigate whether prominent writers mix temporal discourse deictic expressions with spatial ones or use them separately and consistently in their writings; and (v) to investigate the possible differences between oral and written deictic usages in Citonga.
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Citonga and English , Linguistic , Grammar, Comparative