Nico Nassenstein* Pluractional marking in Bunia Swahili (Ituri Kingwana) DOI 10.1515/stuf-2017-0010 Abstract: The concept of pluractionality is less common in Bantu languages than in other language families, such as Chadic (Afro-Asiatic) and various Nilo- Saharan languages. Yet many Bantu languages reveal patterns of habituals, combinations of verbal extensions and reduplication patterns that can function in pluractional-like ways in order to mark “plurality or multiplicity of the verb’s action” (Nurse 2008, Tense and aspect in Bantu. Oxford: Oxford University Press: 314). Bunia Swahili, an un(der)documented variety of Swahili spoken in Eastern DR Congo, has undergone contact-induced change that can be traced back to Central Sudanic languages, and has developed fluid registers of socially moti- vated realization. It contains different habitual markers expressing deviating semantic concepts, while habitual markers can also be combined in order to express evidentiality. Reduplication patterns as markers for pluractionality and their co-occurrence with habituals as gradual semantic continua are both taken into account in this preliminary overview. It is therefore proposed that ‘semantic aspect’ plays a predominant role in pluractional constructions in Bunia Swahili. Keywords: Bunia Swahili, pluractionality, habitual markers, evidentiality, semantic aspect 1 Introduction and state of the art Bunia Swahili (hereafter referred to as BS) 1 has sometimes been labeled ‘Ituri Kingwana’ throughout its history (since it is spoken in the Ituri District of the Province Orientale, DRC), and as ‘Kingwana (profond)’ (‘deep Kingwana’) by its *Corresponding author: Nico Nassenstein, Institute for African Studies and Egyptology, University of Cologne, Albertus-Magnus-Platz, 50923 Köln, Germany, E-mail: nico.nassenstein@uni-koeln.de. 1 BS can be classified as a regiolectal variety of Kiswahili (Bantu G40), together with three other varieties often labeled as ‘Congo Swahili’, or ‘Western Swahili’. The more standardized varieties from the East African coast are in the following abbreviated to ECS (East Coast Swahili). The data corpus on Bunia Swahili was collected during several research stays in the Great Lakes Region, mostly in Eastern DR Congo and Kampala, Uganda. STUF 2017; 70(1): 195–213 Brought to you by | Universitäts- und Stadtbibliothek Köln Authenticated Download Date | 4/5/17 12:29 PM