The NdaʔNdaʔ Noun Class System

Abstract

This paper discusses the specificities of noun classes in Ndaʔndaʔ. Our main objective is to analyze the structure of the noun and propose a more reliable classification of the Ndaʔndaʔ nouns. The data is collected through a questionnaire, transcribed with the International Phonetic Alphabet and analyzed within the framework of structuralism (Saussure: 1916). As far as the noun structure is concerned, a thorough description of all the syllable structures and the tone patterns of the Ndaʔndaʔ name is carried out. We revised Ngantchui’s (1989) classification and proposed |o -| and |w-| as concord prefix for class one nouns instead of |o -| and |y-|. Her claims that tones were relevant in distinguishing classes in the language is also disproved. As for gender, four double class genders and four single-class genders have been identified. The double class genders included 1/2, 3/4, 3/6 and 5/4 and the single class genders 1, 2, 3 and 6. We also took a closer look at the relational pattern existing between the constituents of the nominal construction in terms of distribution and agreement.