SIFFANTAWA DA FAƊAƊAR MA’ANAR KALMAR “JA” A HAUSA

Abstract

The title of the paper is in Hausa “Siffantawa da faɗaɗar ma’anar kalmar ‘Ja’ a Hausa. In English it is metaphorical extension of meaning of the word ‘Ja’ in Hausa. The paper fundamentally discusses how the meaning of word ‘ja’ extended to several meanings, the paper l uses, the cognitive semantics theory to analyse, how Hausa native speaker extend the meaning of some verbs such as ‘ja’ in their daily language usage. Some are unconscious to know that the word meaning is extended metaphorically, but this paper will use both primary and secondary source of data to explain that the word as it is a common source of metaphorical extension in Hausa. It will also address the semantic role of the element that relate to the verb in a continuation. Finally the paper found that the verb ‘ja’ which means to pull, the physical sense can be extended metaphorically to encode: ‘Drag,’ ’ Attract/attentio’ ‘Compete with’, ‘Tease or provoke’ ‘Led to’ etc. The paper is a contribution to the previous literature of Hausa cognitive semantics and generally to the field of African language studies.