MORPHOPHONEMIC ALTERNATIONS OF EKEGUSII NOMINAL DERIVATION: AN OPTIMALITY APPROACH

The study examined the morphophonemic alternations in derivation of nouns in Ekegusii to describe the types of derived nouns, the phonological processes involved in the nominal derivation and to formulate phonological constraints of prefixation. A descriptive research design was employed to collect, analyze and describe data. A list of 50 derived nominal was generated, Rogooro dialect speakers of Ekegusii in Moi University were identified to verify data. Sample data were obtained from each noun class through purposive sampling which were analyzed and coded into semantic classes and explained using Transderivational AntiFaithfulness (TAF) Theory. Findings of the study indicate that nominal derivation forms deverbal, deadjectival, diminutive and abstract nominals. Noun Class prefixes induce vowel deletion, alternation and lengthening, consonant mutation, deletion and nasal assimilation because of unfaithful mappings of inputs to the outputs as a result of the interaction of markedness and faithfulness constraints in Optimality and TAF Theories.