Intensifiers, Reflexive and Reciprocal Pronouns in Argobba Language, Ethio-Semitic

Abstract

Argobba is a South Ethio-Semitic language which is predominantly used in day-to-day communication by a population of about 140, 134 people in the Argobba Zone (Central Statistical Agency (2008:59), Ethiopia, whose linguistic features were not well described. The Argobba lives in the escarpment slopes of northeastern Shewa and southeastern Wollo, a minority of them are live in the adjoining settlements of the town of Harar in eastern Ethiopia.The Argobba make their living by cultivating plants, by breeding animals, weaving and by trade (Hussein, 2006:416). Most of the Argobba people are followers of Islam. As a result, the Islamic religion greatly influences the culture as well as the living style of the society. The central aim of this paper is to provide a comprehensive description and features of Intensifiers, reflexive and reciprocal pronouns of the Argobba language. The paper is descriptive in natureonly in Argobba language not comparing with other languages, since the study is mainly concerned with describing what is actually being in, and mainly relies on primary linguistic data. The linguistic data, i.e. the elicited grammatical data concerning Intensifiers, reflexive and reciprocal pronouns, was collected from native speakers of the language during 6 months of fieldwork conducted between 2015 and 2016 in five Kebeles and the administrative center of the Argobba. Intensifiers in Argobbaare derived from the noun ‘self’, which has the meaning ‘self’ as intensifier, or its reduplicated form ‘self with self’. Reflexive pronouns are formed by combining ‘self’ with the possessive suffixes while reciprocal pronouns can be formed through a construction consisting of the comitative morpheme, which intersects between the reduplicated noun ‘self’, and the plural possessive suffixes.