Zulu Simple Sentences: First Person Singular

Unit 2: First Person Singular Subject in Simple Sentences

• This unit focuses on using the first-person singular subject in Zulu simple sentences, indicative mood, present tense and positive.
• It covers using short and long forms of the present tense correctly in simple statements and questions.

Simple sentences

• A simple sentence contains a single independent clause without any subordinate clauses.
• It expresses a single idea, containing a subject and a predicate.

Basic Zulu Word Order

• Zulu has SVO word order, similar to other languages.
• When an adverb is included, it goes at the end, resulting in SVOA order.
• Nouns and pronouns can function as subjects or objects.
• The course focuses on the usage of personal pronouns as sentence subjects.

Short forms in verbs

• "Mina" is the singular first-person pronoun (I).
• "ngi-" is the subject morpheme which represents the subject in the verb
• The subject morpheme always forms a part of the verb.
• Every subject in Zulu has its own subject morpheme
• The morphological structure of the short form contains a subject morpheme, verb root and verbal final morpheme.
• The verb is always followed by an object or adverb.
• The verb excludes the present tense morpheme -ya-.
• For example: Mina ngiphuza amanzi (‘I, I drink water’) and Mina ngisika isinkwa (‘I, I cut the bread’)

Long forms in verbs

• In the long form, the verb becomes the last word in the sentence, which changes the structure to SV. This means that objects and adverbs are not included.
• "-ya-" is the present tense morpheme, found between the subject morpheme ngi- and the verb stem.
• For example: Mina ngiyaphuza (‘I, I drink’) and Mina ngiyasika (‘I, I cut’).
• The verb is characterised by the morpheme -ya-, and tends to be the last word in the sentence

Verb stems

• Here is a list of nouns and verb stems in Zulu:
  • Nouns:
    • Isinkwa 'bread'
    • Inyama 'meat'
    • Uphaya 'Pie'
    • Inhlanzi 'fish'
    • Itiye 'tea'
    • Amanzi 'water'
    • Utshwala 'alcohol'
    • Iqanda 'egg'
    • Ukudla 'food'
  • Verb stems:
  • -thanda 'love/like'
  • -thenga 'buy'
  • -thengisa 'sell'
  • -enza 'make/do'
  • -pheka 'cook'
  • -sika 'sika'
  • -osa 'roast'
  • -phuza 'drink'
  • -cela 'ask/request'

Verbs starting with vowels

• "-enza" and "-osa" are two verb stems which begin with Zulu vowels
• They can cause vowel juxtaposition issues.
• For example: ngi+enza> ngenza and ngi+osa> ngosa.
• To prevent this, the initial vowel of the verb stem cancels the last vowel of the subject morpheme.

Unit 3: First and Second Person Singular

• This unit will discuss using first and second person singular as subjects in simple positive and negative statements and questions with the question form -ni

Learning objectives:

• Use first and second person singular as subject in simple statements or questions, in the indicative mood, present tense, positive and negative.
• Use first and second person singular as subject in simple questions with -ni in the indicative mood, present tense, positive and be able to supply appropriate answers to these questions.

Second person singular

• 'Wena' represents 'you 'in English
• u- represents the subject morpheme in Zulu.
• 'u-' represents the subject 'wena' within the verb.
• Verbs are followed by objects in the short form.
• If an adverb is added, it becomes the last word in the sentence.
• The second person pronoun 'wena' may be omitted if the subject morpheme 'u' is not emphasised.
• The morphological structure of the short form verb contains the subject morpheme, a verb root and verbal final morpheme

Long forms

• Similar to the first person, verbs in the long form will contain the present tense morpheme -ya-.
• Sentences end on the verb, with new information contained there.
• e.g. wena udla inyama> wena uyadla.
• The morphological structure of the long form verb contains the subject morpheme, the present tense morpheme, the verb root, and verbal final morpheme

Second person vowels

• When using the verb stems '-enza' and '-osa', vowel juxtaposition can occur with second person singular.
• For example: wena uosa inyama ('you, you roast meat') and wena uenza ukudla ('you, you make food').
• The subject morpheme 'u-' is often substituted by the semi-vowel 'w-' to address this.
  • Hence: wena wosa inyama ('you, you roast meat').