The representation and distribution of conjunctions in selected Sepedi home language textbooks : a corpus-based Investigation

Abstract

Different views exist concerning the function of conjunctions in Sepedi language. The use of a comma with some of Sepedi conjunctions is the most controversial aspect, regarding the usage of conjunctions in this language. While several studies have been conducted on various linguistic aspects within the South African context, there is a lack of research on the usage and meaning of conjunctions in the Sepedi language. Therefore, the aim of the present study was to compare the syntactic and semantic features of Sepedi conjunctions between Specialised Sepedi Corpus and General Sepedi Corpus. The study investigated the syntactic and semantic features of six selected Sepedi conjunctions as observed between Specialised Sepedi Corpus and General Sepedi Corpus. Furthermore, the study sought to determine whether there are similarities and differences in the usage and meaning of Sepedi conjunctions between scholarly sources and the corpora. The study employed corpus-based approach for data analysis and interpretation, and a corpus-query software called ‘LancsBox X’ was used for querying the corpora. This study was grounded in Noam Chomsky's seminal work on generative grammar. Generative grammar is conceived as a structured system of statements and rules aimed at describing and defining grammatically correct utterances within a language, while excluding those that are not well-formed. The findings revealed that the similarities in the syntactic and semantic features of Sepedi conjunctions between the Specialised Sepedi Corpus and General Sepedi Corpus outweigh the differences. The results further indicated that the similarities in the syntactic and semantic features of Sepedi conjunctions between the scholarly sources and the corpora surpass the differences. This, therefore, indicated that the corpus-based approach to investigating linguistic phenomena provides valid, credible and invaluable information that can benefit linguists, language educators, researchers, as well as students.