Fuliiru, or Kifuliiru, is a Great Lakes Bantu language spoken by the Fuliiru people (Bafuliiru), also known as the Fuliru, who live north and west of the town of Uvira in Uvira Territory, South Kivu Province in the far eastern part of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC).
[5] Historically, Fuliiru was not written and the language was suppressed in favor of Swahili and French;[6] in addition, Fuliiru has been subjected to significant influence by neighboring languages, to the point that many native speakers use a large number of loanwords or even French word order.
[7] The following treatment, after Van Otterloo (2011), represents the form of the language as it existed prior to such extensive outside influence.
[8] The basic word order of Fuliiru is SVO, although there are a number of exceptions to this rule based on the rhetorical context of a given statement.
[18] Ùyóùyóthat.N+C1múnyérèmú-nyérèC1-girlànáshùbìà-ná-shùbìC1-SQ-AGAINmwágúlámwágúl-áthrow.down-FAífwárángàí=fwárángàAU=C10+money || hálìkóhálìkóbutùyóùyóthat.N+C1mútàbínàmú-tàbánàC1-young.manyêhéy-ê-héC1-CTR.Pàtànázìtwázà.à-tà-ná-zì-twáz-àC1-NEG-SQ-O10-care-FAÙyó múnyérè ànáshùbì mwágúlá ífwárángà {} hálìkó ùyó mútàbínà yêhé àtànázìtwázà.ùyó mú-nyérè à-ná-shùbì mwágúl-á í=fwárángà || hálìkó ùyó mú-tàbánà y-ê-hé à-tà-ná-zì-twáz-àthat.N+C1 C1-girl C1-SQ-AGAIN throw.down-FA AU=C10+money {} but that.N+C1 C1-young.man C1-CTR.P C1-NEG-SQ-O10-care-FA“And that girl again threw down the money, but that young man, he did not pay attention to it.”Alternative pronouns indicate that the referent is different than one that the listener would have incorrectly assumed; these forms are often used at crucial turning points of stories and exemplify the extreme importance of pronoun usage in Fuliiru discourse.
[20] Sìsì=butúmúhyàú=mú-hyàAU=C1-bride || ànásìgálèà-ná-sìgál-èC1-CON-remain-FEhíhí=C16+C5bándábándáshelteryêngwâ.y-êngwâC1-selfSì úmúhyà {} ànásìgálè hí bándá yêngwâ.sì= ú=mú-hyà || à-ná-sìgál-è hí= bándá y-êngwâbut AU=C1-bride {} C1-CON-remain-FE C16+C5 shelter C1-self“But that bride remained behind in the shelter by herself.”Another set of exclusive pronouns, borrowed from the neighboring Kiviira language, has the same meaning as above but is more typical of colloquial speech.
Those common folk, when they greeted [the guests], they also did the same thing.”The breadth of pronominal forms in Fuliiru far exceeds the scope of this article.
[23] Most of these stems communicate very general concepts[22] which are in turn semantically fleshed out by the addition of a noun class prefix that strongly agrees with the referent,[24] as in:[25] múndúmú-ndúC1-personmúbìmú-bìC1-badmúndú múbìmú-ndú mú-bìC1-person C1-bad“bad person”bándúbá-ndúC2-personbábìbá-bìC2-badbándú bábìbá-ndú bá-bìC2-person C2-bad“bad people”The comparative form of an adjective is constructed using the locative prefix ku, as in the example below.
[29] Note that in this category, in addition to the standard noun classes, there are also prefixes corresponding to first/second person singular and plural subjects.
[32] Fuliiru features complex multi-word auxiliary constructions for many TAM forms,[33] including copulas[34] and many progressive expressions.
[38] Note that in this category, in addition to the standard noun classes, there are also prefixes corresponding to first/second person singular and plural objects.
[43] Fuliiru has a rich vocabulary of ideophones – idioms, onomatopoeia and quotatives – that shape narrative and discursive speech acts.
[44] The following is a small selection of this specialized vocabulary:[45] In addition to the numerous ideophones that characterize Fuliiru discourse, reduplication is a pervasive feature of the language.
[46] This linguistic phenomenon, which can occur in any part of speech, expresses various meanings like repetition, extensiveness, emphasis or pejorative.