Vowel Serialization: A Derivation Contextualized Phenomenon in Yorùbá Morphology

Abstract

The paper argues against the linguistic contextualisation of vowel serialization as basic phenomenon in the appraisal of Yorùbá concatenation morphology. Its findings are based on lexical derivation hypothesis of the lexical morphology theory to be able to account for the phonology and etymology of specified examples of vowel sequence in the language. Primary and secondary data were collected and subjected to analysis. Two sequence of vowel serialization as a morpho-phonological process in the word formation are identified: the VVCV, VCVV and CVV sequence. Vowel serialization frequently occurs consequent on the deletion of the first intervocalic segment and assimilation process between V1 and V2 in Yorùbá VVCV word sequence. Ideophonic words like gbòò, fòò, sàà, wàà and so on also undergo the similar processes. Also, functors such as kì í, má à, and tí ì comprise two seperate syntactic units each which mark two different functional categories in the language. Therefore, they are to be written seperately. Keywords: Vowel sequence, transformation, Yorubá, lexical morphology, syllabic structures