UCLA

This paper investigates the emphatic meaning of object marker doubling (OMD) constructions—constructionsin which a DP object and an associated object marker (OM) co-occur—in Cinyungwe, a Bantu language spoken in Mozambique. I propose that OMD has two licensing conditions: first, that an argument DP in the sentence is salient, and second, that the prejacent of the sentence addresses the Question Under Discussion (QUD). If these conditions are met, OMD introduces a manner implicature that the prejacent is atypical in some way. I provide original Cinyungwe data to support this analysis. I also discuss a previous approach to Bantu OMD (as introducing a mirative and/or verum conventional implicature), and I draw comparisons between OMD and another means of marking emphasis in Cinyungwe, as well as between OMD and Indo-European clitic doubling. Cinyungwe is an understudied language; as such, this research contributes not only to our understanding of Cinyungwe object marking but also to our understanding of the diversity of emphasis marking strategies crosslinguistically.