Abstract

This study seeks to understand and critically examine how Tense, Aspect and Mood in the Aghem language are realized. I begin with a background to the study, stating the geographical location, historical background and linguistic classification of the language.

Aghem is a Grassfield Bantu language spoken in Wum in the Menchum Division of the North West Region of Cameroon with a total number of about 26700 speakers both at home and abroad, with origins in Munshi, a Tiv area in Central Northern Nigeria. I therefore go through the lexical categories, clauses and sentence structure in the Aghem language.

To gain an insight understanding of the expression of the concept under study. The structure of Aghem verbs was also examined, with the observation that most Aghem verbs take the CVC, CV, CVCV structures.

It is also shown that some verbs in the language can function both transitively and intransitively depending on the context of usage. Concerning sentences, I looked at it based on their structure and functions because it helps us gain an insight on how Tense Aspect and Mood are manifested in the Aghem language. Also, the two types of interrogatives are seen, which are the WH Question and the Yes or No Question types.

I show that both the low and high tone mark questions in Aghem and the WH word in the WH Questions always appear at the end of the question. Aspect is also examined. It is seen that several types exist in the language. They include, Perfective aspect. I looked at the perfective aspect in two ways. This is because the perfective aspect is made up of two types. These are the recent past and the completive aspect both of which are marked by a zero-tense marker /ø/. I equally looked at the Imperfective.

The imperfective aspect is made up of the progressive aspect marked by the suffix /-a/ and the inchoative aspect. I also looked at other aspects like the Habitual aspect, Attenuative aspect, Iterative and Repetitive Aspect. Also, Mood is examined in this language.

There are equally several types of Moods seen in the Aghem language namely, Evidential Mood, Counterfactual Mood. The marker used is /fέ/ labeled CFL1, while a more distant action takes /fɨ̀/ labeled CFL2. I equally looked at the Hypothetical Mood.

The Hypothetical Mood is marked by adding /tɔ̀/ to the very beginning of the entire sentence. Lastly, the Obligational Mood is marked by adding /kí/to the sentence.

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