Editing Agglutination (section)

== Suffixing or prefixing ==

Although most agglutinative languages in Europe and Asia are predominantly suffixing, the [[Bantu languages]] of eastern and southern Africa are known for a highly complex mixture of prefixes, suffixes and reduplication. A typical feature of this language family is that nouns fall into noun classes. For each noun class, there are specific singular and plural prefixes, which also serve as markers of agreement between the subject and the verb. Moreover, the noun determines prefixes of all words that modify it and subject determines prefixes of other elements in the same verb phrase.

For example, the [[Swahili language|Swahili]] nouns ''-toto'' ("child") and ''-tu'' ("person") fall into class 1, with singular prefix ''m-'' and plural prefix ''wa-''. The noun ''-tabu'' ("book") falls into class 7, with singular prefix ''ki-'' and plural prefix ''vi-''.<ref>The first twelve examples are taken from Fromkin et al. (2007) p. 110, with the following adjustments: I changed sentences, which were originally in present perfect tense (with marker ''-me-'') to sentences in past simple tense (''-li''); I also changed the subject of the last four sentences from ''-kapu'' 'basket' to ''tabu'' 'book', which falls into the same class. The final two examples are taken from Benji Wald: ''Swahili and the Bantu Languages'', p. 1002 in Comrie (1990). For the class 7 prefixes, see the [http://mwanasimba.online.fr Mwana Simba]  {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110504212426/http://mwanasimba.online.fr/ |date=4 May 2011 }}, [http://mwanasimba.online.fr/E_Chap16.htm Chapter 16]  {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110326150007/http://mwanasimba.online.fr/E_Chap16.htm |date=26 March 2011 }}. For the past tense, see [http://mwanasimba.online.fr/E_Chap32.htm Chapter 32]  {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110407183114/http://mwanasimba.online.fr/E_Chap32.htm |date=7 April 2011 }} and the [http://mwanasimba.online.fr/E_verb.htm verb generator] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110721015215/http://mwanasimba.online.fr/E_verb.htm |date=21 July 2011 }}.</ref> The following sentences may be formed:

{| 
| 
* ''m-toto a-li-fika'' 'The child arrived.'
* ''m-toto a-ta-fika'' 'The child will arrive.'
* ''wa-toto wa-li-fika'' 'The children arrived.'
* ''wa-toto wa-ta-fika'' 'The children will arrive.'
|
* ''m-tu a-li-lala'' 'The person slept.'
* ''m-tu a-ta-lala'' 'The person will sleep.'
* ''wa-tu wa-li-lala'' 'The persons slept.'
* ''wa-tu wa-ta-lala'' 'The persons will sleep.'
|
* ''ki-tabu ki-li-anguka'' 'The book fell.'
* ''ki-tabu ki-ta-anguka'' 'The book will fall.'
* ''vi-tabu vi-li-anguka'' 'The books fell.'
* ''vi-tabu vi-ta-anguka'' 'The books will fall.'
|
|}

{{interlinear|indent=3|glossing=no abbr
|yu-le m-tu m-moja m-refu a-li y-e ki-soma ki-le ki-tabu ki-refu
|1SG-that 1SG-person 1SG-one 1SG-tall 1SG-he-past 7SG-REL-it 7SG-read 7SG-that 7SG-book 7SG-long
|'That one tall person who read that long book.'}}

{{interlinear|indent=3|glossing=no abbr
|wa-le wa-tu wa-wili wa-refu wa-li (w)-o vi-soma vi-le vi-tabu vi-refu
|1PL-that 1PL-person 1PL-two 1PL-tall 1PL-he-past 7PL-REL-it 7PL-read 7PL-that 7PL-book 7PL-long
|'Those two tall people who read those long books.'}}