Cebuano children's nouns and noun phrases

A Descriptive Analysis of Cebuano Children’s Nouns and Noun Phrases

Don Enricuso

Theoretical background and related studies

• Acquistional principles in lexical development (Clark, 1991)

• First 50 words produced by children (Clark, 1979a; Goldin Meado, Seligman, & Gelman, 1976; Nelson, 1973) as cited by Clark (1991)

• Cebuano noun phrase structure (Tanangkangsingsing, 2005)

Schematic diagram

The problem and sub-problems• To investigate Cebuano children’s nouns and

noun phrases

The problem and sub-problems• To investigate Cebuano children’s nouns and

noun phrases– What are the categories of noun present in a

Cebuano child’s utterances?– What are the noun phrase structures utilized by a

Cebuano child?

Methodology

• Method– Triangulation of qualitative and quantitative styles– Verbatim transcription (Ashmore & Reed, 2000;

Pomerantz & Fehr, 1997)

Methodology



• Environment– Respondents’ respective residence in Dumingag,

Zamboanga del Sur– Mostly in the bedroom

Methodology



• Environment– Respondents’ respective residence in Dumingag,

Zamboanga del Sur– Mostly in the bedroom

• Participants– Two children aged 2, 3 (child A) and 3, 8 (child B)

and their respective mother– Cebuano is the first language

• Instrument and tools– Checklist; audio tracks; transcribed

conversations– Mobile phones with a voice recorder

• Instrument and tools– Checklist; audio tracks; transcribed

conversations– Mobile phones with a voice recorder

• Data gathering– Combination of purposive and convenience non-

probability sampling procedures (Rosal, 2008)– Naturalistic recording during bedtime and

breakfast– 45 minute talk for child A and 26 for child B

• Definition of terms– Nouns are words that refer to people, animals,

objects, places and ideas.– Noun phrase is a grammatical unit that combines

a marker and a noun. The former usually precedes the latter.

– Marker is a grammatical unit that introduces a noun.

• Definition of terms– Nouns are words that refer to people, animals,

objects, places and ideas.– Noun phrase is a grammatical unit that combines

a marker and a noun. The former usually precedes the latter.

– Marker is a grammatical unit that introduces a noun.

• Treatment of data– Audio tracks were transcribed and grouped

according to noun types and noun phrase structures

– two sets of tallies - one for child A and his mother; another for child B and her mothers

Data

Findings• Other word classes (child A): basakan ‘farm’; simpol

‘swimming pool’; balay ‘house’; ugahip ‘a kind of skin disease’; ilong ‘nose’; kamot ‘hand’; load (mobile phone load credit



• Other word classes (child B): nawong ‘face’; church; Molave (proper noun for a town)



• Other word classes (child B): nawong ‘face’; church; Molave (proper noun for a town)

• “People” was the most prevalent category.

Sample utterances

• Child A with his mother Good morning baby. Asa man ang kiss ni mommy beh.

-Ba-ba.Kinsa ni? Daddy?bilin?

Asa si ate ____?

-Ila balay

Asa dapit ila balay?

-Dadto oh, nahan.

Kinsa man ni balay?

-Kani balay? Mama Chat

Kinsa textsan nimo?

-Janet

Kabalo diay ka magtext?

-Asa bola?

Wala pa man ring.Pila na kabook imo ball oi?

-Duha

Hala duha na kabook?kinsa ga buy ana?

-Asa ni buy?

Gaisano

• Child B with her mother

Unya mag unsa man ta unya inig katulog nato, before ta mag sleep.mag unsa man ta?

-Mag pray

Asa man ta mag pray?kang?

-Kang…

Aha man ta magpray?kang?

-Jesus

Aw,kang jesus!dayon,very good diay ka?

-Oh

Dayon, sige daw,try daw mag pray beh.sige daw…

-Jesus, please watch nanay, tatay, tita,daddy, tatay john mark, mommy Checkky, ate twylyt,amen!

Tomorrow, muadto man ta sa birthday ni tatay alo.mag unsa man ta didto?

-Magkaon!

What else?

-Mag swimming!

Swimming, unsa may suoton nimo kung mag swimming ta tomorrow?

-Katong…katong…

Color?

-Color pink!

Katong pink?katong two piece?

-Nay bra, dayon nay panty

Findings• Child A: PERSONAL PRONOUN nominative +

NOUN, as in: “Ikaw baby” (Ikaw = PERSONAL PRONOUN nominative;

baby= NOUN)



baby= NOUN)• Child B: CASE MARKER nominative + NOUN, as

in: “Si Pretty” (Si = CASE MARKER nominative; Pretty = noun)





• Cebuano children preferred the simplest syntactic form (marker + noun).





• Cebuano children preferred the simplest syntactic form (marker + noun).

• The noun paired with the preferred grammatical marker is always under the word class, “People”.

• Simplicity of noun “People” combination– PERSONAL PRONOUN nominative for respondent A– CASE MARKER nominative for respondent B

• Simplicity of noun “People” combination– PERSONAL PRONOUN nominative for respondent A– CASE MARKER nominative for respondent B

• Transparency– Able to expand the ability their use of NPs– Even more complex structures, with the same set of nouns

• PERSONAL PRONOUN locative + NOUN + CASE MARKER genitive + NOUN as in: “Sa balay ni nanay” (as uttered by respondent A)

• PERSONAL PRONOUN possessive + ‘bya’ + DEMONSTRATIVE nominative + LINKER + NOUN + CASE MARKER nominative + noun as in: “Ako bya tong manghod Si baby Rain” (as uttered by respondent B)

• Productivity– Respondents’ nouns and noun phrases were also in their

mother’s utterances– However, It is impossible to conclude on productivity based

on the recorded conversation, “for it remains a major factor in determining speakers’ choices for adults as well as children”.

• Productivity– Respondents’ nouns and noun phrases were also in their

mother’s utterances– However, It is impossible to conclude on productivity based on

the recorded conversation, “for it remains a major factor in determining speakers’ choices for adults as well as children”.

• Additional findings:• Respondent A used a demonstrative ‘kani’ [highlighted in

appendix A], which is apparently a variant of ‘kini’ in the inventory of Tanangkangsingsing (2009).

• Respondent B uttered ‘ka’ as in: ‘ka tatay Ronnie’, which seems to be a variant, yet again, of the recognized dative ‘kang’.

Conclusion

• The category of people is the most prevalent in Cebuano children’s conversation with their mother.

Conclusion


• Noun phrases are formed by children under the principles of simplicity, transparency and productivity, although the latter is not well manifested as children explore on the nouns they already know.

Conclusion



• In forming noun phrases, children also use various combinations, and the most common ones are those with personal nouns paired with either a personal pronoun or case marker.

Conclusion



• In forming noun phrases, children also use various combinations, and the most common ones are those with personal nouns paired with either a personal pronoun or case marker.

• They only utilize what is already available and experiment on what is simple, transparent and productive

Recommendations• Researchers especially those interested in Cebuano

grammar could make use of the existing data on the various noun phrase structures in investigating syntactic features and possible movements based on Chomsky’s transformational grammar.



• A study on noun bias in Cebuano would have a better route from the data gathered in this study.



• A study on noun bias in Cebuano would have a better route from the data gathered in this study.

• Acquisition of nouns and verbs and their interrelationship would be of great interest in studying Cebuano.

• The relationship between mother/caregiver input and the linguistic features of Cebuano is of great interest for a new research.


• Since this study has mainly explored on the structure of Cebuano that could somehow provide insights in looking into possibilities of noun bias in learning the language, a longitudinal study on the characteristics of mother/caregiver – directed speech in Cebuano would be a good empirical complement.


• Since this study has mainly explored on the structure of Cebuano that could somehow provide insights in looking into possibilities of noun bias in learning the language, a longitudinal study on the characteristics of mother/caregiver – directed speech in Cebuano would be a good empirical complement.

• A study that correlates mother’s input and child’s utterances in terms of the types of noun and noun phrase structures would bring the significance of this study on to another level.

THANK YOU!

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Cebuano children's nouns and noun phrases