Abstract

This thesis aims at analysing the nominal and verbal tonal systems of the Namwera dialect of Ciyao. The data was collected from 6 respondents in Namwera area, Traditional Authority Jalasi in Mangochi district, Malawi, over a period of four days using an interview schedule. Some of the major tonal findings of the study in the verbal system are the following: a) verb stems in Namwera Ciyao, like in most other studied dialects, are toneless; b) the realisation of a high tone (H) is determined by morphology particularly, Tense/Aspect/Mood (TAM) and object markers as well as verbal clause types which may introduce a high tone in various positions in the verb stem; c) some subject markers (SMs) and all tense markers (TMs) are underlyingly H-toned but the H tone may be deleted and hence fail to appear on the surface due to the effect of particular constraints; d) all object markers (OMs) are underlyingly toneless; e) the prefix H does not double to OMs or the first Mora (M) of the verb stem; f) the Mora and not the vowel or the syllable is the Tone Bearing Unit (TBU); g) a number of tone rules, including those involving tone doubling and tone shifting, apply in both the nominal and verbal systems; h) tone doubling/spreading is non-iterative and it is blocked in a macrostem domain as well as the final mora of the verb stem; i) the size of the verb stem matters in the application of tone rules. The study also found that Namwera Ciyao verb stems have five major tone patterns, with some dialectical variations, whereby underyling high tones, normally referred to in the tone literature as Melodic tones, are placed in various positions of the verb stem. These locations are primarily, the first, second and the final mora of the verb stem, but they may also be a combination of the first and the final morae or the second and the final morae. The thesis has adopted Optimality Theory and its use of constraint rankings to account for these tone patterns. It is shown in various parts of the study that by adopting general and independently motivated constraints and a few which are language-specific, we are able to fully account for the complex tone patterns of Namwera Ciyao including some dialectal variations.

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School	: School of Law, Economics and Government
Issued Date	: 2025

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