Somali-Proverbs on Kapchits.Online

Some results of the Somali paremiological experiment in Berlin and Arhus

Thu, 10 Apr 2003 00:00:00 +0000

Paper read at the 4th International Conference of Cushitic and Omotic Languages, Leiden, 10–12 April 2003.

Paremia is a Greek word which means saying, parable; paremiology refers to the philological branch of science dealing with proverbs, proverbial phrases and so on. The youngest branch of the science concerning proverbs, empirical paremiology, which operates statistical methods of analysis, is directed at the establishing of paremiological minima of different cultures. The paremiological minimum is a minimal set of proverbs, sayings and other paremias, the learning of which is necessary for the understanding of any language, whether native or foreign. The fact is that paremias not only decorate speech, but also serve as a convenient means of expressing typical real or thinkable situations, the signs and model of which they are.

Variants and Variations of Somali Proverbs

Thu, 01 Jan 2004 00:00:00 +0000

Paper read at the 9th Congress of the Somali Studies International Association, Aalborg, 2004, subtitled “Some results of the paremiological experiment in Berlin and Aarhus”.

Paremia is a Greek word which means “saying”, “parable”; paremiology refers to the philological branch of science dealing with proverbs, proverbial phrases and other proverbial clichés. Between 1999 and 2001 a Somali paremiological experiment was accomplished by me in Berlin and the Danish city of Aarhus. The experiment had two major goals:

Paremias without sentence particles

Thu, 01 Jan 2004 00:00:00 +0000

Paper read at the 7th International Semito-Hamitic Congress, Berlin, 2004.

In his review of my first book Andrzejewski attracted the attention of linguists to

“archaic grammatical forms which, paradoxically enough, form part of everyday language and are commonly used in conversations and in the mass media. A good example of this are those verbal and verbal-adjectival forms which exclude the occurrence of focus indicators (baa, ayaa, waxaa and waa) in declarative sentences such as for example Ayax teg eelna reeb — Locusts go away but leave damage behind and Tuug wax ka tuhun badan — A thief is more suspicious than anyone else. In Kapchits’ collection 7 per cent of all the items contain such grammatical forms, while normally focus indicators are obligatory in all declarative sentences.”¹

Men and Women in the Somali Narrative Folklore

Sat, 03 Mar 2007 00:00:00 +0000

The paper for the Buranbur conference in San Diego — 3 March 2007.

I am going to remind you of some Somali proverbs about women, their role in the traditional society and their relationships with men. Each proverb carries a message of the Somali ancestors to the present generation of the Somalis. Some of them are very funny and I hope you will enjoy them.

According to the following proverb, men are desperate about women. They say: Naago ama u samir, ama ka samir — Either suffer from women or suffer without them. But men understand that they badly need them: Naag waa belaayo loo baahan yahay — Woman is a disaster one cannot do without.

On Some Peculiarities of the Somali Language, Proverbs and Folktales

Sat, 03 Mar 2007 00:00:00 +0000

The paper for the Buranbur conference in San Diego — 3 March 2007.

I

Somali is a very rich language from the point of view of phonetics, syntax and vocabulary. In its “Northern variant” (maxaad tidhi) it is a tonal accent language. The main classes of words in Somali are nouns and verbs.

Some words with attributive meanings belong to the class of verbs: dheer — to be long, cad — to be white, etc. The majority of words with adverbial meaning belong to the class of nouns: hoos-ta — bottom, si-da — mode, mean.