Section
Horned Animals
Lion and Hamerkop
Hyena and
Pied Crow
Elephant and
Nightjar Fisherman Mother
and child
Archbishop Ákalimanya
Orientation section
1–2 1–2
1 1–3
1–7 1–3
1–2 1–6
Inciting episode
3–5 3–4
2–6 4–6
8–9 4–6
3 7–9
Developmental episodes
6–8 5–8
7–11 7
10–17 7–10
4–5 10–16
10 9–13
12– 15
8–16 18–29
– 6–7
17–20 11–13
14–17 16–
17 17–19
30–34 –
– 21–24
14–17 18
18– 21
20–23 –
– –
25–27 –
– –
24–27 –
– –
28–35 36–39
Peak 18a–c
19–21 22–
25 28–32
35 11–12
8–9 40–42
Denouement 18d–e
23 26
33 36
13–15 10
43–45 Conclusion
19 22;24
27 34
37 16
11 46–48
1.1 The orientation section
An orientation section is there to create a mental picture for the audience of the setting in which the drama is going to develop: time and place, participants, key themes can all be presented. In Makonde
folktales, however, very little is obligatory. The very few ‘absolutes’ for the orientation section of a folktale include an absence of direct speech, a presentation of the key theme, and the presentation of at
least one major participant.
In common with other Bantu languages, the following features may be present in the orientation of a folktale:
• a past tense of the verb kupagwa ‘to be, exist’ • a postposed subject only with the verb kupagwa
• a numeral; this is not always attached to the protagonist; it can refer to anything thematically
prominent, such as a story itself, or the location of the story see 09 Ákalimanya 02. It is not always the number one; in 04 Elephant and Nightjar 01, for example, the narrator says he wants
to tell a story of two animals, nkongo wavakoko vavili. An example with all of these features is shown below:
01 Horned Animals use of kupagwa, postposed subject and numeral in orientation
1. Nangu
ngulota kuvalanga nkongo umo
wavanyama. I
want to tell story one
of.animals. 2.
[
AFTER VERB
] Vandípagwa
vanyama vadimembe. S
They.existed animals of.horns
I want to tell you a tale about animals. Once there were animals with horns.
However, many folktales do not start with these features. Those that do not start with a kupagwa + postposed subject construction tend to start straight in with a conjoint structure see section 6.3.2, a ni
construction see section 6.3.3, or a past imperfective, describing major participants who are known characters, such as: lion, hyena, elephant etc, and often introducing key thematic material directly
without preamble.
02 Lion and Hamerkop use of present conjoint in orientation
1a. Ntumi
ava
PRES CONJ
nkoko Lion
is animal
1b. ánamamena
dinyama .
who.eats meats.
Lion is an animal that eats meat. One feature that appears in some other Bantu languages is locative inversion for the introduction of
participants, where the verb agrees with one of the locative noun classes rather than the noun class of the participant.
2
We do not find this occurring in our text corpus in Makonde. Relative clauses and associative structures in blue in these charts may occur but are not obligatory
in the orientations of Makonde folktales, although they are frequently attached to the introduction of one of the main participants. 02 Lion and hamerkop see example above has a subject relative clause
describing the protagonist, for example; and in both 01 Horned Animals and 04 Elephant and Nightjar we find the protagonist described by an object relative clause and an associative structure respectively see
below.
01 Horned Animals object relative clause describing protagonist in orientation section
6a. Napanelo
[AFTER VERB]
kupagwa nyama jumo S
Now existed
animal one 6b.
wavanshamanga shingula
whom.they.call rabbit
Now there was once an animal called Rabbit….
2
van Otterloo, R. 2011 section 1.2.1.
04 Elephant and Nightjar associative structure describing protagonist in orientation section
3b. na
Nalubwabwa ni
shuni and
Nightjar it.is
bird 3c.
wakunyambikanga namene
of.being.despised very.
….and Nightjar is a bird, of no significance at all. For the use of demonstratives following the introduction of major participants, see section 4.2.2.v.1.
For the use of topic frames in the orientation section see section 2.4. While the introductory features referred to above are all optional, what does seem to be obligatory
in our text corpus is a presentation of the key theme. This is presented in many different ways, there is no standardized formula; however, there is often a more highly stylized type of discourse used to draw
attention to the thematic material with features such as argument focus sentences see section 6.3, parallelism, repetition, ni structures see section 6.3.3, and topic frames see section 2.4.
In the example below from the orientation section of 04 Elephant and Nightjar, the contrast between the relative sizes, and power, of the Elephant and the Nightjar is highlighted by parallel clauses each using
a ni copula. The contrast is thematically significant in the story.
04 Elephant and Nightjar parallelism using the ni copula highlighting thematically significant contrast
3a. Nnembo aju
ni nkoko nkumene
namene katika mumwitu uti
pakati pavanyama Elephant this
it.is animal big very
concerning in.bush all among the.animals
3b. na
Nalubwabwa ni
shuni and
Nightjar it.is
bird 3c.
wakunyambikanga namene
of.being.despised very.
The Elephant is a huge animal, the biggest of all the animals of the bush—and Nightjar is a bird, of no significance at all.
The orientation sections of true, real-life stories are, perhaps unexpectedly, slightly more formulaic than those of folktales. None of the above features such as the use of kupagwa, postposed subjects, etc. is
seen. Instead, the orientation starts with an author presentation such as ‘I want to tell the story of…’; this can occur in folktales see 01 Horned Animals, 04 Elephant and Nightjar but there it is optional. This is
then followed by a fairly exact reference to the time and place of the event being narrated; no folktale gives any specific details about time or location. It is also much more common for real-life stories to
include a relative clause directly as the story opens. All of the real-life stories in this text corpus have relative clauses in either the first or the second line, attached to thematic material rather than to the
introduction of a participant.
The examples below show author presentations, specific references to time and place, and relative clauses. In the first example, from 07 Mother and child, the author presentation in 01 gives thematically
important material—it is a story set during the war—and then sentence 02, involving a relative clause, gives the time and place.
07 Mother and child true story showing author presentation, time, place and relative clause
1. ---
Ngulota kuvalanganga
maimyo apaingondo.
I.want to.tell story of.time.war.
2a. Maimyo ala
apaingondo ni
ingondo ailá itandi Story this
of.time.war it.is
war that first 2b.
itandéke akuno ku
Moshambiki yavyaka kumi.
that.happened here in Mozambique
of.years ten. I want to tell a story about something that happened during the war.
This story took place at the time of the first war here in Mozambique—the ten-year war.
3
In the example below from 08 Archbishop, the author presentation in 01 gives the time, and the place comes immediately afterwards—‘here’, i.e., the location of which the narrator is when speaking—
in the first clause of sentence 02. The relative, in 1a, stresses the eyewitness aspect of the narrative. Sentence 02 has been analyzed here as part of the orientation section, but it shares some features with
the inciting episode which starts properly in 03, such as a use of the default narrative and the verb ‘came’ see 1.2 below, and could be viewed as bridging the two episodes.
08 Archbishop true story showing author presentation, time, place and relative clause
1a. Nangu
ngulota kuvalanganga shinu
I I.want to.tell
thing 1b.
shangugwéne mumwaka elfu
mbili na saba. that.I.saw
in.year thousand two and seven.
2a. Nangolo bispo Luis Simão
kwida akuno
Old.one bishop Luis Simão came
here, I want to tell you about something that I saw myself in 2007.
The Archbishop Luis Simão came here… In many ways the true-story conclusions reflect their orientation sections see section 1.6 below.
1.2 The inciting episode
