Syllable structure and phonotactics of SiWU

Abstract

This study investigates the syllable structure of Siwu and its language-specific rules on syllabification in an attempt to contribute to efforts to document minority languages. In a multilingual setting dominated by a few major languages like Ghana, it is expected that languages spoken by minority groups will face endangerment if their data is not preserved through research. Siwu and other Ghana-Togo Mountain languages are such a group of languages in a subregion dominated by a major lingua franca, Ewe. This study begins with a review of existing works on the Siwu syllable as well as a study of available literature on four other GTM languages in order to determine the scope of the study and to enable a comparative study of these languages. The main focus of the study involves using data from the FCBH Global Bible (2008) to identify all possible syllable types that constitute Siwu’s inventory, examine the sub-constituents of the Siwu syllable, and analyse permissible and non-permissible sequences in Siwu complex onsets. One of my findings is that although some closed syllables are in the language, the majority of Siwu’s syllables are without the coda. Syllables with codas are mostly restricted to ideophones or loan/coined words. Regarding clusters, I find that there is an unequal preference for one of the two segments that occupy the C2 position of Siwu clusters. [r] is more freely distributed than [l]. I provide an analysis of restrictions on onset clusters that makes reference to both sonority and place features within the framework of feature geometry. The comparative study of syllable structure in Siwu and four other GTM languages also reveals that GTM languages have more similarities than differences in their syllable constitution. This study is significant because it is the first to provide a detailed description and analysis of the Siwu syllable.