Contrastive Analysis of Lexical Standardization in Amharic and Hadiyya
No Thumbnail Available
Date
2017-01
Authors
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Addis Ababa University
Abstract
This dissertation compares lexical standardization in Amharic and Hadiyya. The selected
research sides were Addis Ababa and the Hadiyya Zone. Language data were gathered from
textbooks and dictionaries, which were supplemented by semi-structured interview and focus
group discussions.
The study found that the overrepresentation of sounds, i.e. /h/, /s/, /s’/ and vowels, became a
problem of standardization of Amharic spelling. When the writing system for Amharic
developed from the Ge’ez script, it retained unnecessary symbols which caused spelling
variation. In Amharic, spelling variation is attested in compounds and loanwords. Regarding
orthography reform, the addition of graphemes was successful for Amharic and Hadiyya.
However, the proposal for the reduction of extra symbols for Amharic was unsuccessful. The
Roman-based Hadiyya orthography violates the principle of economy and transfer. The
gemination of digraphs reduces economy while the assignment of different phonetic values to
some of the Hadiyya and English sounds negatively affects the transfer of reading and writing
skills. In Hadiyya, the graphemes <zh> /ʒ/ and <ny> /ɲ/ are overrepresentations.
As regards lexical elaboration strategies, language internal and external resources were
extensively used. The strategies of semantic transfer and compounding are predominantly used
methods for lexical elaboration in both languages, while abbreviation and blending are less
common. Comparatively, Hadiyya is more active than Amharic in extensively employing
semantic transfer method. Borrowing and loan translations are identified as the most productive
language external means of lexical elaboration in both Amharic and Hadiyya. Amharic and
Hadiyya borrowed words mainly with modifications; unmodified borrowing was rarely found in
Amharic, but not attested in Hadiyya. In relation to source languages, Amharic and Hadiyya
depend more on foreign languages, such as English, Arabic, French and Italian, than on
Ethiopian languages. Amharic exploited the genetically related language Ge’ez to enrich its
vocabulary, whereas Hadiyya does not exploit related Cushitic languages. Most of the European
loanwords entered Hadiyya via Amharic. English is used as a source language of loan
translations for Amharic while English and Amharic are used as source languages for Hadiyya
Description
Keywords
Language data were gathered from textbooks and dictionaries