Verb Phrases

The serial verb construction, also known as (verb) serialization or verb stacking, is a syntactic phenomenon in which two or more verbs or verb phrases are strung together in a single clause.

aladi kpa adʒuwɛ dʒɛ Aladi kill chicken eats Aladi killed and ate the chicken

aladi	kpa	adʒuwɛ	dʒɛ
Aladi	kill	chicken	eats
'Aladi	killed	and	ate		ate	the	chicken	(D:207).

A cognate object (or cognate accusative) is a verb's object that is etymologically related to the verb. More specifically, the verb is one that is ordinarily intransitive (lacking any object), and the cognate object is simply the verb's noun form.

u l(e) t(i) ona dʒidʒi ɛɹɛ 1SG walk(V) to path long trek(N) He walked a long walk (D: 207).

The split verb is a verb that sentence-finally appears as one word, however can be split so part of the verb appears earlier in the sentence.

dokas kp ɔna lɛ fɔ /dokas kpɔ ɔna lɛ fɔ/ Dorcas break door DEF.DIST break Dorcas, break the door!