A Grammar of Mombo Songho Dialect

Unlike other Dogon languages Mombo lacks a verb with the meaning ‘to hunt’.However it has word dà:ná which means both ‘hunt’ and ‘hunter’. The meaning ‘tohunt’ is expressed by construction dà:ná kání ‘do hunt’.Recall that dà:ná ‘hunter’ forms the plural following the tonal pattern peculiar tocompounds (dà:ná-gé ‘hunters’). See §4.1.1.1 and § 5.1xxx for details.4.3.7 Expressive iterationExpressive adverbials (including intensifiers) with iterated (fully reduplicated) form4.4 Pronouns4.4.1 Basic personal pronounsLike the majority of Dogon languages, Mombo expresses non-focalized and nontopicalizedpronominal subjects by pronominal affixes on the verb:(xx1) ànnà ń-sɛḿɛ̀sheep.L 1SG-slaughter.PFV‘I slaughtered (a) sheep’A verbal subject marker can be a prefix or a suffix depending verb inflectioncategory. The 3SG subject remains unexpressed (overtly) for the most of categories:(xx2) ànnà sɛḿɛ́sheep.L slaughter.PFV‘s/he slaughtered (a) sheep’The only exception is the prospective declarative, which has marked 3SG formsboth in the positive and in the negative. See §10.xx for details.The 3PL subject in most cases is expressed by a non-harmonic suffix -yV, with thevowel varying from one aspectual category to another. The suffix is peculiar for itsoccurrence even in prefixing paradigms. Thus, the simple perfective expresses first andsecond person subjects by adding prefixes (recall example (xx1)) but adds suffix -yè inthe third plural:(xxy) ànnà sɛḿ-yèsheep.L slaughter-3PL.PFV‘They slaughtered a sheep’The 3PL prospective positive suffix -mbyà historically contains the same -yV suffix.There is also a special 3PL prospective negative suffix -ndà. See § 10.xxx for details onboth morphemes.39