Noun Derivation in Izere

Abstract

This research investigates noun derivation in Izere, a central Plateau language of the Benue-Congo language family with the aid of morpho-lexical rules as proposed by Lieber (1980), which relates derived word forms within a lexical category to their base forms with the aid of word formation rules. It descriptively accounts for the morphological derivation of nouns from adjectives, adverbs, verbs and other nouns in the Izere language. The research attempts to fill the conceptual gap that exists in the study of the derivational nominal morphology of the language. Data for the research was collected in Fobur, Jos East Local Government Area of Plateau State, using selected nouns from the Ibadan wordlist of 400 basic items and an adapted list of nouns specifically designed for the research. The selected nouns were collected electronically and then transcribed in such a way that they identified derived noun forms from other word classes. The data was then analyzed descriptively. Morpho-lexical rules were also generated to account for the morphological changes in these nouns from their base forms. The findings of the research indicate that prefixation is the dominant morphological process that accounts for noun derivation in Izere as the prefixes ku-/ri-, i-/a-, ki-/ka- and a-fu- are used in nominalization. When these noun class markers are prefixed to a verb, adjective or adverb, it changes them into nouns. In essence, all derived Izere nouns need to be class marked via prefixation to function as nouns in the language.