American International Journal of Education and Linguistics Research; Vol. 2, No. 1; 2019 ISSN 2641-7987 E-ISSN 2641-7995 Published by American Center of Science and Education, USA 1 Focus Constructions in Ǹjo ̩̀-kóo 1 Simeon O. Olaogun Ph.D Lecturer Department of Linguistics and Languages Adekunle Ajasin University Akungba-Akoko Ondo State, Nigeria E-mail: simeon.olaogun@aaua.edu.ng simeonlaogun2@gmail.com Abstract Focusing is a universal syntactic phenomenon. That is, there is no language in the world that does not have a means of placing prominence on constituents for focus purposes. However, the formal expression of focus differs from one language to another. Some languages express focus morphologically by using distinct morphemes or elements while others employ suprasegmentally means. The paper, therefore examines the focus strategies in Ǹjo ̩̀-Kóo. It gives a detailed description of different constituents that may be focused in the language and the changes that are triggered in the clause as a result of the focusing. Adopting the Minimalist Program of Chomsky (1995) and Cartographic analysis of Rizzi (1997) Split-CP projections within the clausal left periphery, the study investigates how focus clauses are derived in the language and reveals that the syntax of focus in the language involves two probes: focus (foc) and emphasis (emph) each of which can provoke displacement operations. The paper employs information and clause structure evidence to motivate the constituents being focused. It is also observed among other things, that the constituents that could be focused in Ǹjo ̩̀-kóo are subject DP, object DP or object DP of preposition, possessor DP and a whole sentence, and that the language does not distinguish between sentence and verbal focus hence the same strategy is employed for both focus types. Keywords: Cartographic analysis, Clausal left periphery, Focusing, Minimalist program,Split-CP projection 1. Introduction Focusing is a universal phenomenon in that every language has a means of placing prominence on the constituent that is foregrounded. Some languages employ syntactic, morphological or prosodic means for focus purposes. The English language is an example of language that employs prosodic means while most African languages including Ǹjo ̩̀-kóo use distinct items for focus purposes. Gundel (1988) and Givon (1991) claim that hardly can there be any language that uses just one system/means, say, morphology, to code focus information. They argue further that word order variation and special syntactic constructions such as cleft sentences are also used to indicate focus. Most existing works on focus constructions in Nigerian Languages commonly dwell on the constituents being focused or touch on argument on whether focus constructions are sentences or phrases (Awobuluyi, 1978, 1992, and Arokoyo, 2013). As far as I am aware, there is no known work that has employed information structure and clause structure to motivate the constituents being focused in a clause. This being the case, the present paper gives a detailed descriptive and theoretical description of different constituents that may be focused in the language, the changes that are observed in the clause as a result of the focusing, and also employ information and clause structure evidence to motivate the constituent being focused in a clause at any given instance. The article is organized into 1 Ǹjo ̩̀ -Kóo is the name proposed in Olaogun (2016) for a group of relatively mutually intelligible speech forms formally called Amgbè̩ ̩́ /Arigidi-Cluster spoken in the North-western part of Akoko in Ondo State, Nigeria. Ǹjò̩ -Kóo is a language spoken in at least five towns; Òkèàgbè, Ìgás̩̀ í, Àjò̩ wá, Arigidi, and Erús̩̀ ú made up of nine communities; Ìgás̩̀ í, Arigidi, Erus̩̀ ú, Oyín, Urò in Àjò̩ wá, and Àfá, Ùdò, Ògè, Àjè in Òkèàgbè all in Akoko North West local government in Ondo State. Ǹjò̩ -Kóo is a compound name formed from Ǹ jo ̩̀ o and Ǹ Kó o (or Ǹ ghó o the variant of Ǹ kó o used in Urò) which is a form of greeting equivalent to Pè̩ lè̩ ̩́ o in Standard Yoruba. mailto:simeon.olaogun@aaua.edu.ng mailto:simeonlaogun2@gmail.com www.acseusa.org/journal/index.php/aijelr American International Journal of Education and Linguistics Research Vol. 2, No. 1; 2019 2 five sections. The first two sections centre on introduction and theoretical framework respectively. Section three focuses on the constituents that can be focused. The fourth section touches on the derivation of focus constructions while section five concludes the paper. 2. The Theoretical Framework This study adopts the Minimalist Program framework as proposed in Chomsky (1995, 1998 and 2002). Minimalist Program is a theory of grammar which employs minimal linguistic apparatus to form syntactic structures. The apparatus are operations select, merge, and agree. Operation select chooses relevant lexical items from the lexicon and puts them in the numeration for the construction of syntactic structures. Numeration contains the selected lexical items needed for constructing syntactic structures and an index that shows the number of times that each lexical item is used in the derivation. The lexical items in the numeration are therefore put together by operation merge based on their individual features. Following the assumption that operation move is a form of merge and that movement of features has been replaced by agree, the computational system that builds the syntactic tree now consists of two operations, namely, merge and agree. Merge is the operation that combines two syntactic elements to form larger constituents. It is a binary and recursive operation which puts together selected lexical items from the numeration. Operation merge is divided into two, namely, external and internal. External merge involves merge operation that takes an item from the numeration to build a syntactic structure while internal merge is a syntactic operation that affects syntactic objects that are already introduced into the derivation. Agree is a non-lexicalist approach to feature interpretability in the lexicon. The Agree-based method holds the assumption that only [+interpretable] features of lexical elements are already fully specified in the lexicon before they enter the derivation, whereas elements with [- interpretable] features acquire their features in the course of the derivation. According to Hornstein et al. (2005: 317), agree is the operation that establishes a relation between two different linguistic elements, probe and goal, in the syntactic structure through which feature values can be exchanged. A probe is a head with [-interpretable] features, and a goal is an element with matching [+interpretable] features. Some other minimalist assumptions and hypotheses that are relevant to the analysis and derivation of focus constructions in Ǹjo ̩̀-Kóo are discussed below. These assumptions are: Phase impenetrability condition, VP-internal Subject Hypothesis, Theta Role Assignment Principle Phase Impenetrability Condition: According to Radford (2009:398), this is a constraint on grammatical operations which states that the domain of a phase head is inaccessible to an external probe (i.e. a c-commanding probe which lies outside relevant phase) VP-Internal Subject Hypothesis: This hypothesis states that the subject of a TP is base- generated at the Spec of VP, the subject then raised to the Spec - TP to satisfy the EPP feature of the T head. Theta Role Assignment Principle says that arguments receive their theta roles through a merge operation and an argument is theta-marked (i.e. assigned a theta role) via merger with a predicate (Radford 2009:399). Information structure: It has to do with the way speakers package information and transfer to the hearers. This also called information packaging. Clause structure: This has got to do with how constituents are combined in a rule- governed manner to form a convergent and acceptable structure 3. The Constituents in Focus This section discusses the categories of constituents that can be focused in Ǹjo ̩̀-kóo as well as changes that are observed in the rest of the clause consequent upon focusing. The constituents that may be focused in the language are subject DP, object DP, possessor DP, a whole sentence and the verbs2. 3.1Subject DP Focus The focused constituent here is the DP with the grammatical role of subject. When the subject DP is focused, it is fronted and marked with a focus marker úwo ̩̀n and a clause final high tone morpheme. The former immediately 2 For detailed information on verb focus, readers should see Olaogun (2017). www.acseusa.org/journal/index.php/aijelr American International Journal of Education and Linguistics Research Vol. 2, No. 1; 2019 3 follows the focused constituent and the latter occurs in clause final position. This is the difference between simple non-focus clauses in (1a-e) and clauses whose subject DPs are focused in (2a-e). 1. (a) Délé ju ò̩ gè̩ dè̩ Délé eat plantain ‘Ade ate plantain.’ (b) Títí da àju Titi buy yam ‘Titi bought yam.’ (c) Bólú da ìwé Bolu buy book ‘Bolu bought a book.’ (d) Igbée ̩̀ji ópú pu è̩ yè̩ the dog kill snake ‘The dog killed a snake’ (e) S e ̩́gun li Bó̩ lá Segun beat Bólá ‘Se ̩́gun beat Bola’ 2. (a) Adé úwò̩ n ˂Adé˃ 3 ju ò̩ gè̩ dè̩ é̩ Ade FOC Ade eat plantain EMPH ‘ADE ate plantain.’ (b) Títí úwò̩ n ˂Títí˃ da àju ú Titi FOC Titi buy yam EMPH ‘TITI bought a tuber of yam.’ (c) Bólu úwò̩ n˂ Bólú˃ da ìwé Bolu FOC Bolu buy book+EMPH ‘BOLU bought a book.’ (d) Igée ̩̀ji ópú úwo ̩̀n ˂ Igée ̩̀ji ópú ˃ pu è̩ yè̩ e ̩́ the dog FOC Igée ̩̀ji ópú kill snake EMPH ‘The DOG killed a snake’ (e) S e ̩́gun úwo n ˂ S e ̩́gun˃ li Bó̩ lá S e gun FOC Segun beat Bola+EMPH ‘SEGUN beat Bola’ As observed in the examples above, when a subject DP is moved for focus, there is a gap at the extraction site4 . That is, there is nothing that occupies the extraction position of the focused constituent. Also, examples (2c and e) show that when the focused sentence ends with a high toned lexical item, the clause final high tone fuses with the high tone of the lexical item that ends the clause. The reason for this fusion may be to maintain euphony. 3 Given the copy theory of movement, the angle brackets indicate that the element or constituent in the brackets has been moved. It is also important to say that the constituent so moved in each construction occurs in two places. This actually underscores the conception of movement in the current status of the minimalist theory as several occurrences of one constituent. So, when this happens, the highest copy is spelt out and pronounced in the PF component. 4 The fact that nothing occupies the position from where the subject DP is moved appears to be a piece of cross-linguistic evidence which supports Awóbùlúyì’s claim that in SY when the subject is focused there is no resumptive pronoun at the extraction site contrary to some scholars that believe that the high tone syllable ‘Ó’ that normally surfaces in the focus construction such as Olú ni ói ti ra isu is a resumptive pronoun. Part of Awobuluyi’s argument against “o”, the so-called resumptive pronoun is that it does not agree in number and person with the focused subject DP in the language as given below. a OlúIni oi ra isu b Àwai ni oi ra is u Olufoc RP buy yam we foc RP buy yam ‘OLU bought yam’ ‘WE bought yam’ c [Olú àti Adé] i ni ói ra is u d Àwo ni ni ói ra isu Olu and Ade foc RP buy yam they foc RP buy yam . OLU and ADE bought yam’ ‘THEY bought yam’ As evident in the above, the form of the so-called resumptive pronoun does not change with the number and person of the focused subject DPs in examples (a-d). That is, the form remains constant in each case. www.acseusa.org/journal/index.php/aijelr American International Journal of Education and Linguistics Research Vol. 2, No. 1; 2019 4 It is very important to motivate the claim that the subjects are truly focused in the sentences above. There is both information structure and clause structure evidence to prove that the subjects in examples (2a-e) are focused. The focus constituents in these examples are Adé in (2a), Títí in (2b), Bólú in (2c), Igbée ̩̀ji ópú in (2d), and S e ̩́gun in (2e). For example, the speaker who makes the utterance in (2a) is questioning the subject DP in (1a) and accordingly responding to the wh-question Konè̩ è̩ ju ò̩ gè̩ dè̩ ? ‘Who ate banana?’ The fact that somebody ate banana is known to both of the discourse participants thereby constituting the background or existential presupposition of the sentence, whereas the intention of the speaker is to newly inform the hearer that it was Adé that ate banana and not someone else. Thus, the constituent ADÉ conveys the most salient information in the sentence. Put differently, the constituent is non-presupposed but novel to the hearer with regard to the question posed by the speaker which the sentence in (2a) is meant to answer. Similarly, the two occurrences of each of the focused constituents is a compelling attestation to the fact that movement has taken place. The clause structure evidence reveals that the focused constituent is derived while its copy is base generated. For instance, Adé in (2a), Títí in (2b), Bolu in (2c), Igbée ̩̀ji ópú in (2d) and S e ̩́gun in (2e) are base generated before the verbs ju in (1a), dà in (1b and c), pu in (1d) and li in (1e), but each of them later shows up at the beginning of the clauses in (2a-e). Precisely, each of them precedes the focus marker úwo ̩̀n in each focus sentence. 3.2. Object DP Focus These focus constituents concern the DPs with core grammatical function of objects. Examples (3a-e) illustrate this type of focus. 3 (a) O ̩̀ ge ̩̀de ̩̀ úwo ̩̀n Adé ju ˂o ̩̀ge ̩̀de ̩̀˃ ú Plantain FOC Adé eat o ̩̀ge ̩̀de ̩̀ EMPH ‘Ade ate PLANTAIN.’ (b) Àju úwo ̩̀n Títí dà ˂àju˃ á Yam FOC Titi buy yam EMPH ‘Titi bought a tuber of YAM.’ (c) Ìwé úwo ̩̀n Bólú dà ˂ìwé˃ á Book FOC Bolu buy ìwé EMPH ‘Bolu bought a BOOK.’ (d) E ̩̀ yè̩ úwo ̩̀n ópú pu ˂ ópú ˃ ú snake FOC dog kill ópú EMPH ‘The dog killed a SNAKE’ (e) Bó̩ lá úwo n S e ̩́gun lí ˂ Bó̩ lá ˃ í S e gun FOC Segun beat Bola+EMPH ‘Segun beat BOLA’ The focused object DP is fronted and marked with a focus marker in addition to the clause final high tone. The syntactic process here is similar to what happens when a subject DP is focused in that the focused element is preposed and there is nothing that occupies the extraction site where the constituent is focused. Apart from the copy of the focalised constituent traditionally referred to as a gap, no anaphoric or resumptive pronoun is licensed in that position. Again, motivating the fact that it is the object DPs that are focalised in the sentences, (3a-e) is also in order here. As said in respect of subject focalisation, there exists both information structure and clause structure evidence that the objects in examples (3a-e) are focused. The focus constituents in these examples are o ̩̀ge ̩̀de ̩̀ in (3a), àju in (3b), ìwé in (3c), e ̩̀ye ̩̀ in (3d) and Bo ̩́ la ̩́ in (3e). For example, the speaker who makes the utterance in (3a) is questioning the object DP in (1a) and also responding to the wh-question ko Adé yè ju? ‘What did Adé eat?’. The fact that Adé ate something is known to both the speaker and the hearer thereby constituting the background or existential presupposition of the sentence whereas the intention of the speaker is to newly inform the hearer that it was o ̩̀ge ̩̀de ̩̀, www.acseusa.org/journal/index.php/aijelr American International Journal of Education and Linguistics Research Vol. 2, No. 1; 2019 5 ‘plantain’ that Adé ate and not something else. Thus, the constituent O ̩̀ GE ̩̀ DE ̩̀ conveys the most salient information in the sentence. Put differently, the constituent is non-presupposed and novel to the hearer with regard to the question posed by the speaker which the sentence in (3a) answers. Similarly, the two occurrences of each of the focused constituents indicate that movement has actually taken place. The clause structure evidence reveals that the focused constituent is derived while its copy is base generated. For instance, o ̩̀ge ̩̀de ̩̀ in (3a), àju in (3b), ìwé in (3c), e ̩̀ye ̩̀ in (3d) and Bo ̩́ lá in (3e) are base generated after the verbs ju in (1a), dà in (1b and c), pu in (1d) and li in (1e) but each of them later shows up in clause initial position in (3a-e). Precisely, each of them precedes the focus marker úwo ̩̀n in each focus sentence. In more technical terms, the lower occurrence that is not spelt out is said to be found in the IP internal position, while the highest occurrence that is pronounced and spelt out is said to have moved to the left peripheral position. 3.3 Possessor DP Focus In Ǹjo ̩̀-kóo genitive constructions, possessor DPs may also be fronted and focus-marked as the sentences in (4b) and (5b) illustrate. 4 (a) Dàda di ewó Òjó Dada steal money Ojo ‘Dada stole ojo’s money.’ (b) Òjó úwò̩ n Dàda di ewó o 5 ó Ojo FOC Dada steal ewo RP EMPH ‘Dada stole OJO’s money.’ 5 (a) Èdi di ìwé Ayò̩ Thief steal book Ayo ‘The thief stole AYO’s book.’ (b) Ayò̩ úwò̩ n èdi di ìwé e é Ayo FOC thief steal book RP EMPH ‘The thief stole AYO’s money.’ 6 (a) Bó̩ lá da àju Ayò̩ rí aaja Bola buy yam Ayo in market ‘Bola bought Ayo’s yam in the market.’ (b) Ayò̩ úwò̩ n Bó̩ lá da àju ù 6 rí aaja Ayo FOC Bola buy yam Rp in market+EMPH ‘Bola bought AYO’s yam in the market’ As evident in the (b) examples above, when a possessor DP is focused in this language, there is always a resumptive pronoun with 3sg feature that anaphorically refers back to it. It is also observed that the tone on this resumptive pronouns changes depending on the environment where it occurs. Its inherent low tone always rises to mid when it 5 In examples 4b and 5b, the resumptive pronouns o and e are used for the lower occurrences instead of the exact copies of the moved elements in the clausal left periphery. These pronouns which show agreement in number and person anaphorically refer back to their respective moved constituents. The fact that the two occurrences of each of these moved constituents are spelt out and pronounced necessitates the non-use of the angle brackets for the lower occurrences. We can then speculate that when the lower occurrence of a moved constituent is realised as a pronoun, it is also spelt out and pronounced. As we know that languages detest unnecessary repetition, this may be the reason why any lower occurrence that has the same form with the moved element is not pronounced in the language. 6 For example, ‘his book’ and ‘his money’ in the language are rendered respectively as ‘ìwé è’ and ‘ewó ò’ meaning that the original/inherent tone on this third person singular pronoun in the language is a low tone www.acseusa.org/journal/index.php/aijelr American International Journal of Education and Linguistics Research Vol. 2, No. 1; 2019 6 occurs between two high tones as examples (4b) and (5b) show. But in example (6b), the original low tone is retained on the resumptive pronoun. 3.4 Preposition DP Focus The DP that performs the grammatical function of object of preposition is the concern of focus in this section. In African languages, when the object DP of a preposition is focused, at least three strategies are involved: (1) the prepositional head may be stranded, (2) it may be pied-piped, and (3) it may disappear completely. For instance, in Yorùbá the prepositional heads could be stranded or pied-piped with their DP objects 3 . However, in Ǹjo ̩̀-kóo, prepositional heads are never stranded or pied-piped. They simply disappear as the ungrammaticality of (7b) and (7c) on the one hand, and grammaticality of (7d) on the other, show below: 7. a. Bó̩ lá da àju Ayò̩ rí aaja Bola buy yam Ayo in market ‘Bola bought ayo’s yam in the market.’ b. * (rí aaja) úwò̩ n Bó̩ lá da àju Ayò̩ ˂ rí aaja ˃ ó̩ Prep. market FOC Bola buy yam Ayo in market EMPH ‘Bola bought Ayo’s yam in the MARKET.’ c. *Áájá úwò̩ n Bó̩ lá da àju Ayò̩ rí ˂ áájá ˃ Market FOC Bola buy yam Ayo prep market+EMPH. ‘Bola bought ayo’ yam in the MARKET.’ d. Áájá úwò̩ n Bó̩ lá da àju Ayo ̩̀ ˂ áájá ˃ o ̩́ Market FOC Bola buy yam Ayo market EMPH ‘Bola bought Ayo’s yam in the MARKET.’ 3.5 Verb Focus In Ǹjo ̩̀-kóo, the process of verb focus in the language is that the verb to be focused will be nominalised attaching the morpheme ‘à-’ to its root word. When a verb is focused, a copy of the nominalised verb which is focused is left in- situ i.e. in its IP- internal base generated position. The language has no mechanism to license a gap as demonstrated by the ungrammaticality of (8e-h). 8. (a) Àju úwò̩ n Adé ju 7 ò̩ gè̩ dè̩ é̩ Nom-eat FOC Ade eat plantain EMPH ‘Ade ATE plantain.’ (b) Àdà úwò̩ n Adé da ìwé Nom-buy FOC Ade buy book +EMPH ‘Ade BOUGHT a book.’ (c) Àro ùwo n mò̩ mó̩ ro e te é̩ Nom-grind FOC mummy grind pepper EMPH ‘Mummy GROUND pepper (d) Àli úwo n S e ̩́gun li Bo ̩́ lá Nom-beat FOC S egun beat Bola+EMPH ‘S egun BEAT Bola’ (e) *Àjui úwò̩ n Adé - ò̩ gè̩ dè̩ e ̩́ 7 The difference in the form of the lower and the highest occurrences of the focused verb necessitates the spell out and the pronunciation of both of them. www.acseusa.org/journal/index.php/aijelr American International Journal of Education and Linguistics Research Vol. 2, No. 1; 2019 7 Non-eat FOC Ade plantain EMPH ‘Ade ATE plantain.’ (f) *Àdà úwo ̩̀n Adé – ìwé Nom-buy foc Adé book+emph ‘Ade BOUGHT a book.’ (g) *Àro ùwo n mò̩ mó̩ - e te é̩ Nom-grind FOC mummy pepper EMPH ‘Mummy GROUND pepper (h) *Àli úwo n S e ̩́gun - Bo ̩́ lá Nom-beat FOC S egun Bó̩ lá+EMPH ‘S egun BEAT Bola’ 3.6 Sentence Focus The language employs the same strategy for the verb focus in sentence focusing. The verb of the sentence is copied, nominalised and fronted as the sentence in (9b) shows. 9. (a) Kó̩ lá ju àran Kola eat meat ‘Kola ate meat’ (b) Àju úwò̩ n Kó̩ lá ju àran án Nom-eat FOC Kola eat meat EMPH ‘Kola ATE meat’ 4. Derivation of Focus Constructions In Ǹjo ̩̀-kóo, just like in many African languages, there is a condition that every potential focus constituent must fulfill. The constituent to be focused must enter the derivation via internal merge while the focus marker must enter the derivation through external merge. The reason is that all the ɸ –features of the element or constituent to be focused must be valued and deleted appropriately for the movement of that item to take place. This requirement is subsumed under what is called focus constituent condition which says: all the ɸ-features of a potential focus constituent must be valued within the TP (that is the minimal/simplex sentence that contains it). Therefore, the sample derivation of focus constructions below is in line with this assumption. 4.1 Derivation of Subject DP Focusing A focus construction such as (10) is derived as given in (11) 10. Òjó úwo ̩̀n ˂Òjó˃ bo ùji í Ojo FOC drink water EMPH ‘ÒJÓ drank water’ www.acseusa.org/journal/index.php/aijelr American International Journal of Education and Linguistics Research Vol. 2, No. 1; 2019 8 11. The syntax of focus projections involves two probes: foc and emph each of which is capable of triggering a displacement operation. From the minimalist perspective, the structure is derived by first merging the verb bo to its complement ùji in order to satisfy its c-selection requirement while the subject DP Òjó is second merged with the same verb in the Spec-VP (in line with VP-internal Subject Hypothesis) so as to satisfy the EPP requirement of the head verb. In line with the TRAP (i.e the Theta Role Assignment Principle that some scholars labelled Predicate- Internal theta –marking Hypothesis), it is assumed that the external argument Òjó receives its theta role when it is merged in the spec-VP shell assuming further that arguments check their case features outside their theta domain. The subject DP Òjó is raised to check its case feature in the Spec-TP. If we assume that phi-features of arguments are [+interpretable/valued] and case features are unvalued/uninterpretable while the phi-features of T are [– interpretable/unvalued] but the case features on them are valued, then, following operation Agree, T becomes the active probe by virtue of having [–interpretable] phi-features while the subject DP Òjó in its c-command domain automatically becomes the goal because of its unvalued case feature. So, the external argument being the active goal with phi-complete features of T, is thereby attracted to Spec-TP to fulfill the focused condition. The derivation proceeds by externally merging the emph head (which is morphologically realized as a clause final high tone morpheme) to the TP in order to satisfy its c-selection requirement thereby projecting an emph-bar. The emph head has an EPP/edge feature which is why it projects EmphP by pied-piping the whole TP to its specifier position. There are both empirical and theoretical reasons why the pied-piping to the spec of EmphP is licensed in this structure. Given phase impenetrability condition, if the focused constituent is moved before the pied-piping, the FocP EmphP Emph 1 Emph ú̩wo ̩̀n Foc1 Foc TP Òjó VP V 1 OBJ DP Òjó T 1 vP T v 1 ùji VP v V 1 DP V V bo T Ø DP Ø T 1 T VP V 1 ùji V V V T bo í www.acseusa.org/journal/index.php/aijelr American International Journal of Education and Linguistics Research Vol. 2, No. 1; 2019 9 phase domain of the emph head will undergo transfer and will no longer be accessible for any syntactic operation. So, the pied-piping comes before the movement of the focused constituent. Also, if the pied-piping is not done, the correct word order will not be realized. After this, the foc head úwo ̩̀n is also externally merged with EmphP to also satisfy its c-selection requirement thereby becoming the probe at this point which begins to search for its c- command domain for an active goal, that is, the constituent with a matching focus feature. In Agree-based system, for a movement operation to take place, there must be an agreement relation between a probe and its potential goal, i.e. the probe must possess interpretable/unvalued feature while the goal should have a corresponding valued/+interpretable feature. On the basis of this agreement condition, the reasoning is that the subject DP Òjó has [+focus] feature which has been valued before it entered the derivation i.e. it acquires the +interpretable focus feature as it enters the numeration while the foc head has an unvalued/uninterpretable [ focus-EPP] feature which was acquired in the course of the derivation. It should be stated that the requirement for a foc constituent like úwò̩ n to have a specifier is said to be a consequence of foc carrying an [EPP] feature requiring it to project a specifier. The [EPP] condition specifies that an uninterpretable EPP feature on a probe is deleted by movement of the closest active goal of the relevant type to become the specifier of the probe. Therefore, the probe foc attracts the goal to its specifier position in order to value the unvalued focus-EPP feature and subsequently deletes it because unvalued/uninterpretable features are not legible at LF component. The fact that the focused constituent acquires its focus feature before it is introduced to the derivation whereas the focus-EPP feature of the probe is introduced after entering the derivation is compatible with the assumption that unvalued features are on-line features while valued features are offline features (Christano 2004). Given that all of the constituents within the TP are in the c-commanding domain of the probe of foc, the question arises as to how the goal of the focus head probe would be determined since all of the nouns and verbal expressions are in the c-commanding domain of the probes and, each of them is active for movement operations because each of them has one undeleted [-interpretable] feature or the other. Put differently, what then determines the constituent to be focalised? Apart from attract closest condition which says that, a head which attracts a given kind of constituent attracts the closest constituent of the relevant kind. The subject DP Òjó is the only constituent that fulfills the focus constituent condition. Besides, there are two other factors that also determine the constituent to be focused, namely, information structure factor as well as clause structure factor. Discourse factor or information structure factor requires that the focused constituent in the tree diagram above can only be a felicitous answer to the wh-question konè̩ è̩ bò̩ ùji? So, if any constituent other than the subject DP is focused, the response will be inappropriate. Similarly, the clause –structure, demands that the clause final high tone morpheme which superimposes on the vowel of the immediately preceding lexical item be spelt out as í. Therefore, if any constituent other than the subject DP is focalised, the right word order and the desired meaning will not be realised as shown by the ungrammaticality of the focus construction below in (12) 12. * Ùji úwo ̩̀n Òjó bo o ̩́ water FOC Ojo drink EMPH ‘Ojo drank WATER.’ One might quickly want to dismiss the claim that all of the constituents in the c-commanding domain of the foc probe are potential goals on the alleged ground that the EPP feature of the foc head is [+N] and the verb dà has [–N] feature. Well, cross-linguistic evidence shows that this observation might not hold water in that there are some languages whereby the spec, FocP can host –N or +N constituent. That is, there are some languages where foc head does not have [+N] EPP feature www.acseusa.org/journal/index.php/aijelr American International Journal of Education and Linguistics Research Vol. 2, No. 1; 2019 10 2 Derivation of Object DP focus 13. The derivation of object DP focus also meets the phi-feature valuation condition as well as theta marking requirement. The object DP ùji receives its internal theta role within the contentful/main VP when it is merged with V as TRAP demands. It also checks its accusative features in the spec of outer vP-shell in line with Chomsky (1999) MSH and VP-Shell analysis. Having fulfilled this condition, it is well able to be focused or moved to spec of FocP for scopal reason. The structure is derived by first merging the verb bo to its complement ùji in order to satisfy its C-selection requirement while the subject DP Òjó is second merged with the same verb in the Spec-VP (in line with VP-internal Subject Hypothesis) so as to satisfy the EPP requirement of the head verb. Given TRAP (i.e. the Theta Role Assignment Principle that some scholars labelled Predicate-Internal theta –marking Hypothesis), it is assumed that the external argument Òjó receives its theta role when it is merged in the spec-vP shell assuming further that arguments check their case features outside their theta domain. The subject DP Òjó is raised to check its case feature in the Spec-TP. Assuming that phi-features of arguments are +interpretable/valued but case features are unvalued/uninterpretable while the phi-features of T are – interpretable/unvalued but the case features on them are valued, then, following operation Agree, T becomes the active probe by virtue of having –interpretable phi-features while the subject DP Òjó in its c-command domain ó̩ Emph 1 Emph TP Ø Òjó T 1 T VP V 1 V VP V 1 Òjó V OBJ V T bo EmphP úwòn Foc1 Foc FocP Ùji Òjó T 1 vP T v 1 ùji VP v V 1 V V OBJ V bo T Ø www.acseusa.org/journal/index.php/aijelr American International Journal of Education and Linguistics Research Vol. 2, No. 1; 2019 11 automatically becomes the goal because of its unvalued case feature. So, the external argument being the active goal with phi-complete features of T, is thereby attracted to Spec-TP to fulfill the focused condition. The derivation proceeds by externally merging the emph head (which is morphologically realised as a clause final high tone) to the TP in order to satisfy its C-selection requirement thereby projecting an emph-bar. The emph head has an EPP or edge feature which is why it projects EmphP by pied-piping the whole TP to its specifier position. There are both empirical and theoretical reasons why the pied-piping to the spec of EmphP is licensed in this structure. Given phase impenetrability condition, if the focused constituent is moved before the pied-piping, the phase domain of the emph head will undergo transfer and will no longer be accessible for any syntactic operation. So, the pied-piping comes before the movement of the focused constituent. Also, if the pied-piping is not done, the correct word order will not be realised. After this, the foc head úwo ̩̀n is also externally merged with EmphP to also satisfy its c-selection requirement thereby becoming the probe at this point which begins to search its c-command domain for an active goal, that is, the constituent with a matching focus feature. for a movement operation to take place, there must be an agreement relation between a probe and its potential goal i.e. the probe must possess [– interpretable/unvalued] feature while the goal should have a corresponding [valued/+interpretable] feature. On the basis of this agreement condition, the reasoning is that the object DP ùji has [+focus] feature which has been valued before it entered the derivation i.e., it acquires the [+interpretable] focus feature as it enters the numeration while the foc head has an unvalued/uninterpretable [ focus-EPP] feature which was acquired in the course of the derivation. It should be stated that the requirement for a foc constituent like úwò̩ n to have a specifier is said to be a consequence of foc carrying an [EEP] feature requiring it to project a specifier. The [EPP] condition specifies that an uninterpretable EPP feature on a probe is deleted by movement of the closest active goal of the relevant type to become the specifier of the probe. Therefore, the probe foc attracts the goal to its specifier position in order to value the unvalued focus-EPP feature and subsequently delete it because unvalued/uninterpretable features are not legible at LF component. The fact that the focused constituent acquires its focus feature before it is introduced to the derivation whereas the focus-EPP feature of the probe is introduced after entering the derivation is compatible with the assumption that unvalued features are on-line feature while valued features are offline features (Christano 2004). Given that all of the constituents with the TP are in the c-commanding domain of the probe foc, what then determines the constituent to be focalised? Apart from attract closest condition which states that, a head which attracts a given kind of constituent attracts the closest constituent of the relevant kind. The subject DP Òjó is the only constituent that fulfills the focus constituent condition. Besides, there are two factors that also determine the constituent to be focused namely; information structure factor as well as clause structure factor. Discourse factor or information structure factor requires that the focused constituent in the tree diagram in (13) can only be a felicitous answer to the wh-question Ko Òjó yè bò̩ ? So, if any constituent other than the subject DP is focused, the response will be inappropriate. Similarly, the clause structure demands that the clause final high tone morpheme be spelt out as ú which bears on the vowel of the preceding lexical item. Therefore, if any constituent other than the subject DP is focalised, the right word order and the desired semantic interpretation will not be realised as shown by the ungrammaticality of the example sentence in (14). 14. * Òjó úwo ̩̀n bo ùji í Ojo FOC buy water EMPH ‘Ojo drank WATER’ One might quickly want to dismiss the claim that all of the constituents in the c-commanding domain of the foc probe are potential goals on the alleged ground that the EPP feature of the foc head is [+N] and the verb dà is –N feature. Well, cross-linguistic evidence shows that this observation might not hold water in that there are some languages whereby the spec, FocP can host –N or +N constituent. That is, there are some languages where foc head does not have [+N] EPP feature 5. Conclusion The paper examined the focus strategies in Ǹjo ̩̀-kóo. It gives a detailed description of different constituents that may be focused in the language and the changes that are triggered in the clause as a result of the focusing. The article reveals that the syntax of focus in the language involves two probes: focus (foc) and emphasis (emph), each of which can provoke displacement operations. The paper also employs both information and clause structure evidence www.acseusa.org/journal/index.php/aijelr American International Journal of Education and Linguistics Research Vol. 2, No. 1; 2019 12 to motivate the constituent that is being focused. It is discovered that the language does not distinguish between sentence and verbal focus. That is, one and the same focus strategy is employed for both sentence and verbal focus. References Arokoyo, B. (2013). Unlocking Focus Construction. Ilorin: Chridamel Publishing House. Awobuluyi, O. (1978). Focus Constructions as Noun Phrases. Linguistics Analysis, 4(2). Awobuluyi, O. (1992). 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Dordrecht: kluwer. 281-337 Copyrights Copyright for this article is retained by the author(s), with first publication rights granted to the journal. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).