ON EFIK PREFIXING MORPHOLOGY

Abstract

Prefixation is a grammatical devise that involves the attachment of a bound morpheme to the left of a root element or stem. It functions to signal certain grammatical relationships involving categories like tense, negation, person, number, and aspect. It can also trigger off the creation of new words from existing ones. The focus of this paper is to analyse the forms and structure of Efik prefixes in relation to the different phonological and morphosyntactic operations they can signal in the language. The paper also examines the various word formation strategies involving prefixation in the language. The basic assumption, however, is that the structure of Efik prefixes vary according to agreement, and is determined by the principle of vowel harmony. The study discovers that Efik prefixes have systematic and rule-governed structures and that certain conditions, such as the phonology of the stem, the stem’s lexical category and the semantic value of prefixes stipulate their position. We wish to interpret the following abbreviations in order to facilitate our analyses: Adv(erb), Asp(ect), Aux(illiary), Conj(unction), Fut(ure tense), Mod(ality), Neg(ation), N(oun), NP (Noun Phrase), Pres(ent tense), PT(Past tense), Pro(noun), Pfx (Prefix) SC (Subject Concord), Spec(ifier), Tn (tense) and V(erb).