Documentation and Descriptions of Traditional Naming among Oromo: The Case of Oromia Special Zone around Finfinne in the Sebeta Awas District (Woreda)
No Thumbnail Available
Date
2015-07
Authors
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Addis Ababa University
Abstract
This study ex plored the tradi tional naming pract ices among the Oromo who live in the
Sebeta Awas Distri ct (Woreda). It has attempted to document describe and analyze the ritual
practices of bestowal of nam ing the ch ildren in Qaalluu In stitution and parentage system. It
also produced some lingui st ic annotation and the 'ELAN' so ftware. Besides, some
phonological and semantica l aspects of A fan Oromo personal names were described. This
study em pl oyed the qu alitat ive method of research. In this case, th e data were gath ered over
three months period through observat ion, interviews, Video, Audio, and image records at
the study sites. Th is study also fou nd th at rite of naming in the Qaalluu in stitution were
innuenced by the expansions of Chri sti anity and Islam reli gions in the stud y area. It was
also found that the tradit ional or the cultural concept of bestowal of naming the children is
heing converted to a mechanica l compounding words whi ch may lose the symbolic
rep resentation of cu ltu re of the Oromo peop le. It is fo und that such mechani cal coinage of
nam ing seems abstract and lacks clari ty. Thus, I would suggest th at a mechani ca l attempts
nam ing sho uld be careful ly bestowed to get clear cultural representation and needs to be
rev ita lized to protect cultural va lue.
Description
Keywords
Linguistics