Work Description

README FILE FOR CLIFFS JENAAMA LEXICAL SPREADSHEETS

Bozo languages are a division of the Mande family. J. Heath has worked on four Bozo languages: Kelenga, Cliffs Jenaama, Jenaama/Sorogaama of Djenné, and Tigemaxo. Reference grammars for these languages are published online at Zenodo with backup copies at Deep Blue Documents. As of 08/2024 only Tigemaxo remains to be published. Details on the first three grammars are these: Funding was from the National Science Foundation.
Kelenga: https://zenodo.org/records/7699838
Jenaama/Sorogaama (Djenné): https://zenodo.org/records/7312207
Cliffs Jenaama: https://zenodo.org/records/7127001

The spreadsheet format divides lexicon into five categories: nouns, adjectives, numerals, other, and verbs. “Other” includes adverbs, adpositions, and other grammatical elements. In the xlsx version, these are distinct worksheets belonging to a single spreadsheet. In the csv version, each sheet is its own document. The division into multiple sheets allows each category to be formatted in a customized manner with whatever columns of information are appropriate. Users can sort each sheet by any combination of columns. The details are given for each sheet below. In the xlsx version, some cells are greyed out to indicate that the inflectional category in question is not applicable, because of properties (e.g. plural only, intransitive only) of the stem.

NOUNS
“melody” tone pattern for the stem, e.g. H[igh], L[ow], M[id], HL, LHL, ML, …
“tones” syllable by syllable, e.g. LLHL
“shape” in consonant & vowel (c, v) formulae, or “cpd” or “n+adj” for composite forms
“noun stems” (singular)
Plurals”
“category” kin, bo[dy], various fl[ora] and fa[una] categories
“English”
“French”
“comments”
(and for natural species terms:)
“biological order/family”
“species”

ADJECTIVES
“tones” e.g. M-M (mid-toned stem and suffix)
“suffix”
“cpd” (flags compounds)
“rdp” (flags redulicatives)
“pred type” type of predicate: inch[oative], ps-refl (pseudo-reflexive), ppl (participle), id-ppl (identificational with participle)
“pseudo-refl” (a characteristic clause type in this languages, explained in the grammar) with 3Sg pronominal subject
“inchoative pref Pff” (perfective, e.g. ‘became red’) with 3Sg pronominal subject
“stative pred” stative predicate (e.g. ‘is red’) with 3Sg pronominal subject
“adj (sg)” singular modifying form after a noun
“adj (pl)” plural modifying form after a noun
“English”
“French”
“comments”

NUMERALS
“modifying” form after a noun
“counting” form used in counting recitation (“one, two, three, …”) if different from modifying form
“English”
“French”
“comment”

OTHER
“category” adv[erb], aspect, case, compar[ative], compl[ementizer], conj[unction], dem[onstrative], disc[ourse marker], emph[atic], greeting, interrog[ative], like, modal, neg[ative], postp[osition], pred[icate], prepos[ition], pron[oun], purp[osive], quant[ifier], recip[rocal], rel[ative clause], simil[arity]
“form”
“English”
“French”
“comment”

VERBS
“valency” intr[ansitive], tr[annsitive], ditr[ansitive], intr+pp (plus postpositional phrase), intr+n (plus noun), caus[ative], ppl (participle), refl[exive], stat[ive], rdp (reduplicative)
“shape” in CV (consonant-vowel) formulae
“Pfv” perfective stem
“Ipfv” imperfective stem
“Pfv/Ipfv” tonal relationships between perfective and imperfective stem, e.g. L/LM (perfective L-toned, imperfective LM-toned)
“English”
“French”
“comment”

LICENSE

These documents are made available under a Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication (CC-0). Please see: https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/ for more information.