Segmentally, Gamo phonology operates with a system of twenty-six consonants and five vowel qualities, and in nearly every case a segment may occur short or long.
Consonants in Gamo language
Labial
Dental
Palatal
Velar
Laryngeal
Stops
Glottalized
p’
ɗ
ts’
tʃʼ ⟨čʼ⟩
k’
ʔ
Voiced
b
d
dz
dʒ ⟨j⟩
g
Voiceless
p
t
ts
tʃ ⟨č⟩
k
Fricatives
Voiced
z
Voiceless
s
ʃ ⟨š⟩
h
Sonorants
Nasals
m
n
ɲ ⟨ň⟩
Lateral
l
Vibrant
r
Glides
w
j ⟨y⟩
Vowels sound in Gamo language
palatal
round
high
i
u
mid
e
o
low
a
(Reference page 21/22)
Morphology
Noun plural
The morphology of plural making in Gamo is straightforward and uniform.
In masculine nouns, plural is marked by means of a suffix -t, affixed to the oblique case form. The oblique is also the base for the suffixation of definiteness marking.
Examples of masculine plurals
Gloss
Absolutive singular
Oblique singular
Absolutive plural
'dog'
kaná
kaná
kanatá
'man'
addé
addé
addetá
'thing'
yóó
yóó
yóotá
'tear'
apúntsi
apúntsa
apúntsata
Feminine nouns take a suffix -int to form their plurals. This is affixed to the absolutive singular:
Examples of feminine plurals
Gloss
Absolutive singular
Absolutive plural
Nominative
Oblique
'sister'
miččó
miččointa
miččóinti
miččointa
(Reference page 81)
Adjectives
By comparison with certain other languages of Ethiopia, Gamo has a large vocabulary of adjectives. Like nominals, adjectives fall into declension classes, and although, being adjectives, they do not inflect for nominative case and there is no agreement within the phrase for number or definiteness, the declensional differences relating to oblique case marking do appear in U-declension adjectives when they function attributively.
The correlation between which particular TV an adjective has and its membership of a declension class appears to hold exactly as in nouns; thus, adjectives having a TV-o are always S-declension, adjective having a TV-i are always U-declension, while those having the TVs-a and -e are distributed between the two declensions, although almost all are S-declension.
Adverbial notion however, can be expressed in a wide variety of ways. In terms of syntactic constructions the two most frequent means of expressing adverbial notions are postpositional phrases and converbial clauses.
A number of verb lexemes contain some intrinsic reference to temporal or spatial features. Thus,
Examples:
1 - gam’-‘~k’am’-‘ ‘be(come)/last a long time’
2 - giddotsiss-‘ ‘stay late’
3 - na’at-‘ ‘act childishly’
4 - minétt- ‘act bravely’
5 - miizat- ‘behave naively
6 - godat-‘ ‘behave in a masterly way
Other more examples
1 – K’uma katso wontara oikkadus
Lunch cook-VNO dawn Obl+Pp(-ra) start.Pf-3F
She started cooking lunch very early in the morning
Gamo has very few postpositions; my analysis recognizes just six;
(-n), (-s), (-ppe), (-kko), (-ra) and (-u).
Phonologically, these are fairly minimal and in all cases their phonological structure obliges them to occur as attachments to other words.
There are however, instances where a postposition attaches to other clitic elements, such as to the inclusivity marker (-kka) or to the hypotheticality marker (-kko).
Example
1 - Awokkonka demmakad
locIntPron + UniE+pp(-n)+incl find.impf-2sg-Neg
You won't find (it) anywhere at all
2 - Banga buuts'an keettse kammadis
barley.obi straw.obl+pp(-n)house cover.pf-Sg
I thatched a house with barley straw
The range of senses for the postposition (-s) may not appear to be quite so extensive but perhaps this is because English itself uses the preposition "for" so widely
Personal pronouns have long and short forms, but while, for most of them, the short form can clearly be identified with the leftmost portion of the long form, in the 3rd person singular pronouns the short form consists of the rightmost portion of the long form.
Negation in all subordinate clauses employs the simple-base with (-onta), which is also the form that functions in converbial negation. Since this form shows no agreement with its clause subject, the 'same subject': 'changed subject' marking which distinguishes converbial from subordinate clauses is neutralized. This situation is apparent in sentences (a - c). In other cases a subordinate clause status is made clearer periphrastically by the addition of the perfect or imperfect forms of the inherently negative verb (-agg).
In Gamo, the counting forms are in general identical to the citation (absolutive) forms, except in the case of issinno ‘one’, for which a variant form ista can be used.
Numeral
absolutive
nominative
oblique
1
issinnó ~ istá
issinnóì ~ isstóì
issί
2
nam’á ~ na’’á
nam’áì ~ nam’ί
nam’ί
3
heeddzá
heeddzί
heeddzί
4
oiddá
oiddí
oiddí
5
iččáča ~ iččáč
iččáci
iččáč
6
usúppuna ~ usúppun
usúppuni
usúppun
7
láappuna ~ laappun
láappuni
láappun
8
όspuna ~ όspun
όspuni
όspun
9
uddúpuna ~ uddúpun
uddúpuni
uddúpun
10
támma
támmi
támmi
100
ts’eetá
1000
kúma
The forms denoting multiples of ten are based on tamma, which is preceded by the appropriate cardinal numeral in its pre-nominal oblique case form.
Examples
20 na’í
tamma~nam’í
tam~láatama
30 heeddzí
tamma~heeddzí
tam~heestama
40 oiddí
tamma~oiddí
tam~όitama
50 iččáč
tamma~iččáči
tamma
60 usúppun
tamma~usúppun
tam
70 láappun
tamma~láappun
tam
80 όspun
tamma~όspun
tam
90 uddúpun
tamma~uddúpun
tam
(Reference page 141)
Notes
^Gamo at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015) (subscription required) Gofa at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015) (subscription required) Dawro at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015) (subscription required)
^Raymond G. Gordon Jr., ed. 2005. Ethnologue: Languages of the World. 15th edition. Dallas: Summer Institute of Linguistics.
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