Abstract

Reduplication is a morphological process in Eggon, a Plateau Benue-Congo language. This paper studies the morphological process of reduplication in Eggon, spoken in Nigeria, West Africa. The study was motivated by the fact that reduplication in Eggon has special features which have not been given the needed attention by scholars. It is observed that many scholars have side lined triplication as a feature of reduplication by concentrating on complete and partial reduplication. Thus, the need for the present study to fill the existing gap. The study presents data collated from documented sources, participant observation of native speakers and introspection. The research aims at exposing the structure, types and functions of reduplication in Eggon. The findings show that reduplication is a productive word formation process in the language. A number of features are attested in Eggon language reduplication: complete reduplication, partial reduplication, triplicate reduplication, rhyming reduplication, and alternation. The structure of Eggon reduplication involves the reduplicate being attached at word initial, medial or final positions. The construction morphology schema <[[Y]j [X]i ]k↔[property of being related to SEMi]k> can be used to account for the structure of reduplication in the language. Phonological structure of Eggon reduplication include repeating words that are monosyllabic, disyllabic, and polysyllabic. Lastly the findings also show that reduplicate perform derivational and inflectional functions in the language. This study hopes to add to scholarship on African languages’ morphological structure and linguistics study in general.

Keywords: Reduplication, Triplication, Eggon, Morphological Process, Benue-Congo