Project

Modality in Swahili – Variation, Change and Transfer

Code
42X08924
Duration
01 January 2025 → 31 December 2027
Funding
Funding by bilateral agreement (private and foundations)
Other information
Research disciplines
  • Humanities and the arts
    • Contact linguistics
    • Contrastive linguistics
    • Corpus linguistics
    • Diachronic linguistics
    • Dialectology
    • Grammar
    • Historical linguistics
    • Semantics
    • Synchronic linguistics
Keywords
modality Swahili Bantu
 
Project description

This project aims to describe and analyze the use of modal expressions (such as can, must, and maybe) in Swahili, focusing on variation and change across time and space. Spoken widely throughout multilingual East Africa, Swahili is a large language with numerous second-language speakers and regional varieties. A central aspect is to investigate language contact and how modal constructions have been borrowed into and out of Swahili.


The project combines corpus-based research –including the development of the world's largest diachronic Swahili corpus – with comparative-typological work (including fieldwork) on East African languages ​​that display Swahili influence in their modal systems. In this way, we combine and expand upon the growing research interests around modality in Bantu, and Swahili-related linguistic variation and change.