Language/Wolof/Grammar/Pronouns-and-How-to-ask-questions

Pronouns. Pronouns & how to ask questions

We will introduce two types of pronouns here, the independent pronouns and the Object Emphasis

With the completion of this lesson, consider investigating these related pages: Static verbs, Conjugation, Basic Sentence Structure & Clitic Pronouns.

The independent pronouns

• The former has not much grammatical impact and to better understand we give the French here because it is similarly in Wolof.

Man, jangalekat laa. Moi, je suis un professeur. Me, I’m a trainer. Yow, wolunteer la. Toi, tu es un volontaire. You, you are a volunteer. Ñun, baykat lanu. Nous, nous sommes des fermiers. Us, we are farmers.

Object Emphasis

• The latter is called Object Emphasis Pronouns:

In English the sentence “Faatu goes to the market today” could be the answer to several different questions:

• Where does Faatu go today? Faatu goes to the market today
• When does Faatu go to the market? Faatu goes to the market today
• What does fatou do today? Faatu goes to the market today
• Who goes to the market today? Faatu goes to the market today

In English, one part or another of the sentence is emphasized by stress or intonation; the structure or the pronoun doesn’t necesseraly change. In Wolof specific pronouns are used to highlight or focus a part of the sentence. Here are the same questions above answered in Wolof.

• Faatu, fan lay dem? Faatu, marse lay dem tey (Object emphasis)

where does Faatu go today? It’s to the market that Faatu goes today

• Fatou, kañ lay dem mares? Faatu, tey lay dem mares (Object emphasis)

when does Faatu go to the market? It’s today that Faatu goes to the market

• Faatu, lan lay def tey? Faatu dafay dem marse tey (Verbal emphasis)

What does Faatu do today? Faatu goes to the market today

• Kan mooy dem marse tey? Faatu mooy dem marse tey (Subject emphasis)

Who goes to the market today? It’s Faatu who goes to the market today

Source

http://publish.illinois.edu/wolof201fall14/files/2014/08/NEW_WOLOF_BOOK.pdf

Other Lessons

• Pronouns
• Conjugation
• Future Tense
• Conditional Mood
• Possessive pronouns
• Negation
• Plural Nouns — Indefinite article
• Nouns
• The possessive expressed by “U”