Clausal ellipsis ocurs in a question-anwer process in a dialogue. Accoridng to Halliday (1994) two types of clausal ellipsis are distinguished, i.e. the yes/no ellipsis and he WH-
ellipsis. Both kinds of clausal ellipsis allow for substitution. In Tswana this kind of ellipsis is also evident.
The yes/no ellipsis can be explained in two ways, i.e. they yes/ no involving the whole clause and the yes/ no involving part of the clause.
Yes/No
(i) Yes/No = the whole clause
(49) “A o ne a swa?” go botsa Ezinma.
“Nnyaa,” ga araba Ekwefi.
(Monyaise, 1991: 77) ‘Did he die?’asked Ezinma.
‘No, ‘replied Ekwefi’.
(Achebe, 1986: 71)
The answer nnyaa ‘no’ involves the whole clause. The complete and rhetoric answer could have been
“Nnyaa, ga a a ka a swa”
‘No, he didn’t die’.
To enable the reader/listener to be absorbed in what is being said or read, omission must take place. The reader has to go back to the preceding text to capture the meaning of nnyaa ‘no’ and this promotes anaphoric cohesion.
(ii) Yes/No ellipsis = part of the clause
(50) “A ga oa utlwa jaaka monna yo mosweu a gaitse Abame?”
ga botsa Obierika.
“Ke utlwile,” Okonkwo a fetola”.
(Monyaise, 1991: 138)
“Have you not heard how the white man wiped out Abame?’
asked Obierika.
‘I have heard, ‘ said Okonkwo”.
(Achebe, 1986: 126)
The answer ke utlwile ‘I have hard’ indicates that not the whole clause is omitted but only prt thereof because o a utlwa is repeated in the answer, ke utlwile.
WH- ellipsis
The kinds of WH-ellipssis are distinguished, i.e.
(i) The WH- sequence whereby he entire clause is omitted except for the WH-element:
(51) ‘Ke banna ba le bakae ba ba go etetseng go tloga fa kgaitsadiake a re o batla go go nyala?’
‘Ga go ope’.
(Monyaise, 1991: 103) ‘How many men have lain with you since
my brother first expressed the desire to marry you?’
‘None’.
(Achebe, 1986: 95)
This means ga go ope is the WH-element and the rest of the clause ‘wa banna yo o nketetseng go tloga fa kgaitsedio are o batla go go nnyala ‘none (of the men has lain with me since your brother first expressed the desire to marry me’) is left our.
Ba jele eng?
- Dijo (Ba jele dijo ) is omitted
‘What did they eat?
- Food (They ate food)’
(ii) The WH- sequence whereby only part of the clause is omitted e.g.
Ba dira jalo?
- Bo mang (ba dira jalo)
‘They do like that?
- Who (does like that)’
Bo mang ‘who’ refers to ba ‘ they’ which is part of the clause, so it means ba is included in bo mang.
4.5 CONCLUSION
Ellipsis involves omission. A noun, a verb phrase or a clause can be completely deleted;
hence the three categories of ellipsis are nominal, verbal and clausal. The dele tion of an element encourages one to refer backward in the text; therefore ellipsis also functions anaphorically and it avoids repetition. In nominal ellipsis the omitted element is usually the head noun. The verbal ellipsis omits all or part of the verb phrase while clausal ellipsis occurs in a question and answer process where the answer is only ‘yes’ or ‘no’
instead of first repeating the question and then giving the answer. In such a process, omission can include the whole clause or part of the clause.
CHAPTER 5: SUBSTITUTION
5.1 INSTRODUCTION
Substitution occurs when one linguistic item replace another and adds some information which contrasts with the original ‘antecedent’ idea, e.g.
(52) ‘Baesekele ya me e tsofetse. Ke batla e ntšha’.
‘My bicycle is old. I want a new one’.
E ntšha ‘a new one’ replaces baesekele ‘bicycle’ and also contrasts with tsofetse ‘old’.
Substation also establishes a cohesive bond by supplying an item of the same
grammatical class as the item necessary for interpretation, therefore it is seen as a more pure grammatical relationship. Substitution occurs on nominal, verbal and clausal levels.
Halliday (1994: 317) states that:
The substitute serves as a place –holding device,
Showing where something has been omitted and what its grammatical function would be.
Substitution, just like ellipsis, sets up a relationship at a lexicogrammatical level.
Halliday (1994: 322) says that with substitution, the implication is:
Go back and retrieve the missing words.
To clarify Halliday’s definition consider the following example.
(53) Kuane ya gago e kae? Where is your hat?
- Ga ke e bone - I can’t find it.
- Tsaya e. - Take this one.
In (53) the answer ga ke e bone ‘I can’t find it’ will only make sense when one goes back to the preceding text and retrieves the missing word kuane ’hat’. If the sentence just started with ga ke e bone , the listener/reader will be confused because there is no point of reference. Now that kuane ‘hat’ was mentioned at the beginning of the sentence, for the answer ga ke e bone ‘ I can’t find it’ to make sense, one has to go back and retrieve the missing word which in this instance will be kuane ‘hat’. The example illustrates that substitution is confined to the immediately preceding clause, unlike reference, which may extend over a long passage as was shown in Chapter 2 (2.1)
The following example also shows that the proximity within which substitution occurs, is very close.
(54) Ke feletswe ke lentswe . I’ve lost my voice.
- Batla le lengwe - Get a new one.
In the above example, the response batla le lengwe ‘get a new one’ follows immediately after the speaker has mentioned that he has lost his voice. Therefore the answer le lengwe
‘ a new one’ is very close to the statement in space and in tike and tat is what proximity means. This example also shows that substitution occurs mostly in dialogues.
Halliday (1994: 322) wraps up:
In ellipses-substitution the typical meaning is not one of Co-reference. There is always some significant difference Between the second instance and the first
(between presupposing item and presupposed).
Substitution is subdivided into three groups in English according to their grammatical functions. This division is also applicable in Tswana. The three types of substitution are substitution of the nominal group, substitution of the verbal group and substitution of the clause.