Syntactic properties of Ikalanga infinitives

• Published in: Studies in African linguistics Vol. 52; no. Supplement 13
• Main Author: Rose Letsholo-Tafila
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: LibraryPress@UF 01.12.2023
• Subjects: infinitives, syntactic properties, nominal properties, verbal properties, categorial status
• ISSN: 0039-3533; 2154-428X

The infinitive has been quite topical in recent Bantu literature. The majority of Bantuists who have written on this topic sweepingly refer to all ku- forms as the ‘infinitive’ and contend that the infinitive has dual characteristics – clausal and nominal. This paper aims to investigate the types of ku-categories in Ikalanga and to determine whether they all display the same syntactic properties. Using tests from the literature, the paper established that ku-categories which are sweepingly termed ínfinitives’ actually belong to different categories – nominal, poss-ing, and infinitives themselves. The paper also determined that while all three categories identified in Ikalanga display clausal properties, only nominal and poss-ing types display nominal properties. In addition, the paper also demonstrated that while both nominal and poss-ing display nominal properties, they differ in some ways. The findings in this paper suggest that to refer to all ku-categories sweepingly as infinitives is misleading.