Makonde Leach 2015:34 18 Shuni do: “Nangu mwanda, nkongwe wandikulakela
ajo, mali anikulakela ala.”
bird thus I journey wife
whom.I.leave.you this riches that.I.leave.you these ‘The bird said, “I need to go, [but] I’m leaving this wife for you, [and] I’m leaving all these good
things for you.”’ Since juxtaposition is the norm, connectives are used with specific functions. This applies to all
connectives, including the comitative marker na and cognate forms, which is usually glossed as ‘and’ or ‘with’. Although na is one of the most widespread connectives in eastern Bantu languages, it is
nonetheless rare in narrative texts: in Kabwa, only one out of five texts uses inter-clausal na; in Malila, two out of six texts have inter-clausal na; in Suba-Simbiti na occurs only four times in the entire text
corpus; and in Makonde its frequency varies between approximately one sentence in seven in one text to three texts in which inter-clausal na does not occur at all. In Kwaya and Digo, na occurs primarily in
direct speech in Digo all but one of the occurrences of na occurs in direct speech.
Given that na has such a restricted distribution, when it does occur, its occurrence indicates that a particular relation holds between the conjoined clauses. Three relations in particular are signaled by the
presence of na: 1 it connects non-sequential events, when the norm is for events in narrative texts to occur sequentially; 2 it introduces the most important event in a sequence of events, or gives
prominence to a whole conjunct; and 3 it indicates contrast between participants in conjoined clauses, as in the following example:
Makonde Leach 2015:43–44 19 Nnembo aju ni nkoko nkumene namene katika mumwitu uti pakati pavanyama
Elephant this it.is animal big very
about in.bush all among the.animals
na Nalubwabwa ni shuni wakunyambikanga namene.
but Nightjar it.is bird of.being.despised very
‘The elephant is the biggest of all the animals of the bush and [whereas] Nightjar is a bird, of no significance at all.’
3.2 Adversatives and concessives
Contrast can be and often is expressed through juxtaposition or by clauses joined with na as in example 19 above. However, contrast can also be expressed by specific connectives which indicate that the
clause which they introduce counters another idea, either by directly contradicting an idea which has been explicitly expressed in the case of adversatives or by countering an inference or expectation
generated by other material in the case of concessives. Whereas some languages make use of a variety of adversative and concessive expressions such as English but, although, nevertheless, however, instead, on
the other hand, adversatives and concessives in eastern Bantu languages are typically few in number and infrequent.
In Suba-Simbiti there is only one adversative or concessive, kasi ‘but’, which occurs in only three texts. In two of these, kasi indicates that the following clause contains surprising or unexpected events.
In the other text, kasi is used to indicate a contrast between two wives: Suba-Simbiti Masatu 2015:13
20 Ömöntö uyö a-a-hansh-irë
uwömwë 1.person 1.
DEM
_
REF
3
SG
-
PST
-love-
PROX
1.one
kasi uwöndë oora te-ya-a-mo-hansh-irë
hë. but 1.other 1.
DEM
_
DIST NEG
-3
SG
-
PST
-3
SG
-love-
PROX NEG
‘That person loved one wife but he didn’t love the other.’
Makonde has a concessive kanji; where kanji expresses direct contradiction rather than contradicting an implicit proposition, the clause which it introduces is more important than the
preceding clause, as in the following example: Makonde Leach 2015:38
21 Litunu namu Nashove, vanu ava kudyavalananga Hyena and Pied Crow people these they.were.friends
kanji Nashove hashiwanawananga
vila. but
Pied Crow he-was.not.going.around only
‘Hyena and Pied Crow were friends, but Pied Crow was not happy in their friendship.’
The only adversative or concessive in Kwaya out of seventeen connectives found in the Kwaya text corpus is rakiini, which is borrowed from Swahili lakini which in turn is derived from the Arabic
conjunction lakin ‘but’. Digo, Kabwa, Malila, Bena and Rangi also have connectives cognate with lakini. A number of these languages also use another adversative connective. Malila
ɨleelo ‘but’ and Bena lino ‘but, now’ do not appear to be borrowed and may express less direct contrast than the term that is
cognate with Swahili lakini. Digo ela ‘but’ is probably derived—through Swahili—from the Arabic preposition illa meaning ‘exceptbut forapart from’; there is no noticeable difference in meaning
between ela and lakini. The Rangi connective maa expresses consecutive events in clause-initial position but indicates a “new direction” in a narrative in second position in a clause, where it can usually be
translated as ‘however’ Stegen 2011:229. In Ekoti, the connective masi ‘but’ is derived from Portuguese mas see line 7b in Appendix 1.
The language in this study with the largest inventory of concessives is Jita with nawe, tari and lakini, all of which are translated as ‘but.’ Nawe, which can be used both inter-clausally and inter-sententially, is
the most common. Tari occurs only once in the corpus in a speech clause. One possible reason for the greater variety of concessives in Jita as opposed to the other languages studied is that larger inventories
of concessives tend to occur in languages spoken by communities with frequent and prolonged contact with outsiders, some of whom learn the language as adults, whereas languages with small inventories of
concessives tend to be spoken by small, isolated communities with tight social networks. Within the Mara Region, Kabwa has a population of 14,000, Suba-Sibiti 113,000 and Kwaya 115,000; Jita, on the
other hand, has a population of over 205,000 2005 figure cited in Ethnologue 17th edition and speakers of other Mara Region languages are more likely to learn Jita than Jita speakers are to learn other
languages except Swahili and the local Language of Wider Communication Sukuma.
9
3.3 Text-structuring connectives
