Warimisɛn

Comparative constructions with ye

In the video, we hear:

Warimisɛnko, Bamako yan, bi, à ka gɛlɛn ni fɛn bɛɛ ye.

"The matter of change, here in Bamako, today, it is more difficult than all (other) things"

This can be boiled down to a simpler sentence:

Warimisɛnko ka gɛlɛn ni fɛn bɛɛ ye

"The matter of change is more difficult than all things"

(Roughly, "The matter of change is difficult more than all things")

This sentence is an example of one kind of comparative construction that allows you to say that something is "more" something than another (e.g., "more expensive", "more fun", but also "taller", "bigger", etc.)

The underlying construction is (ni) X ye and it appears after qualitative verbs (e.g., ɲi, bon, jan, etc).

Let's look at the fuller form first. For example:

N ka jan ni i ye I AM TALL ni YOU ye

"I am taller than you"

Notice that there is no change to jan ('tall'). Instead you simply place ni ... ye around the thing which is "less" tall.

The use of ni in this kind construction is optional. You can drop it if you like and the meaning is identical. For instance:

N ka jan i ye I AM TALL YOU ye

"I am taller than you"

Here's another example:

Bɔbɔ ka di (ni) Bamakɔ ye

"Bobo is nicer than Bamako"

You can also use this construction in negative constructions with qualitative verbs. For instance:

To man di (ni) cɛkɛ ye

"Tô isn't tastier than attiéké"

Or:

I ka warimisɛn ka ca (ni) ne ta ye!

"Your small change is more abundant than mine!"

(as in, "You have got more change than me!")

Note that Bambara/Jula does not have a direct grammatical equivalent to "less than" (what linguists might call a "lesser degree comparative"). Instead, you would talk around it. For instance:

I ka warimisɛn ka dɔgɔ (ni) ne ta ye

"Your change is smaller than mine!"

(as in, "You have less change than me!")

(NOTE: There is another way to build comparative sentences. It's with ka tɛmɛ X kan. We will cover it very soon!)

Expressing "to occur/happen/be" with ka kɛ

In the video, we heard the following:

I jilaja warimisɛn ka kɛ i bolo!

"Strive to have money!"

This is an example of the verb ka kɛ being used to express something like "to occur" but in a special way that allows you to express the idea of "to have".

(NOTE: Remember that the verb kɛ can also be transitive [k'à kɛ] where it generally means "to do something".)

Let's simplify it for our purposes:

Warimisɛn ka kɛ i bolo!

"Money should be on [your] hand"

(as in, "You should have money!")

Recall that you originally learned that Bambara doesn't have a formal verb equivalent to the English verb"to be" (or être in French, etc). Instead it uses a series of distinct constructions depending on what is being done in the sentence:

• Presentatives with don/tɛ

  Warimisɛn don!

  "It's small.change!"

• Qualitative Constructions (using ka/man and a qualitative verb)

  Warimisɛnko ka gɛlɛn!

  "The small.change.affair is difficult!"

• Equatives with ye/tɛ ... ye

  Warimisɛko tɛ fɛn fitinin ye

  "The small.change.affair isn't a little thing"

• Situatives with bɛ/tɛ

  Warimisɛn tɛ Bamakɔ

  "Small.change isn't in Bamako"

Since none of these construction are technically verbal, you cannot conjugate them like normal verbs (using predicate markers like bɛ, tɛ, ye, ma, etc).

But it turns out that you can often use the verb ka kɛ as a kind of helper verb to express the idea of "to be" if you need to do so for something that has occurred or will occur, etc.

For instance, you can use ka kɛ X ye like so in place of a presentative:

Baara don!

"It's work!"

(as in, "It's a chore!")

→

À bɛna kɛ baara ye!

"It will be work!"

(as in, "It will be a chore!")

Or you can use ka kɛ by itself in place of a situative:

Fɛti bɛ yen bi!

"There's a party today!"

→

Fɛti bɛna kɛ sini!

"The party will be/occur tomorrow!"

As we saw with our example from the video, this applies to situative constructions that express possession as well. For example:

Warimisɛn bɛ n bolo bi small.change is.located my arm today

"I have small.change today"

→

Warimisɛn bɛna kɛ n bolo kɔfɛ small.change will occur my arm later

"I will have small.change later"

The verb ka kɛ can also be used on its own to simply mean "to occur/happen". For instance, imagine that you went to the market and came back empty-handed. You might have an exchange like follows:

– N ma se ka sanni kɛ! – Mun kɛra? – Warimisɛn tun tɛ n bolo!

– I wasn't able to make a purchase! – What happened? – I didn't have any change!

In some cases, it can make sense though to translate such usages with "to be" though. For instance:

– N bɛna dɛsɛ ka bamanankan dege! – Sabali! À tɛna kɛ ten!

– I am going to fail to learn Bambara! – Come one! It's not going to be like that!

The suffix -la/na for places

In the video we heard the following:

… walasa i ka se ka wasa sɔrɔ i ka sanni kɔnɔna na

"… so that you can be satisfied with your purchase"

Lit. "… in order (that) you can obtain satisfaction inside of your buying"

In this sentence, we have an example of the of the place or locative suffix -la/na being attached the postposition kɔnɔ "inside".

Let's simplify and change it a bit to make it easier to see:

I ma wasa sɔrɔ i ka sanni kɔnɔna

"You didn't obtain satisfaction inside.of your purchase"

Here, I have glossed the suffix as meaning "of". But that's just for convenience's sake in this context.

At its simplest, the -la (or -na when it follows a nasal sound) is attached to proper name to create the name of a place.

For instance:

Ture "the last name Touré [French spelling]"

→

Turela "the neighborhood of a town or village that is considered the home of Touré people"

It can also be used with common nouns that are associated with particular people:

tubabu "white person; Westerner"

→

tubabula "white person land" (as in, "the place that white people live" [or potentially "the West" or "Europe", etc])

Or:

cɛ "man; husband"

→

cɛla "the husband's home" (This refers to the parental/family household or courtyard of the husband. Traditionally, after marriage, the wife moves into this home, which becomes her new home. This contrasts with her own birth home, which she leaves upon marriage.)

In our example though, we see that the place suffix -la can also be applied to postpositions to make nouns:

kɔnɔ "inside"

→

kɔnɔna

"the inside; the interior"

In come cases, this leads to seemingly redundant turns of phrase:

À bɛ so kɔfɛla la

"It is at the backside of the house"

VS

À bɛ so kɔfɛ

"It's behind the house"

(NOTE: In my experience, the frequent use of -la in expressions like kɔfɛla la or sanfɛla la "in the sky-space" instead of simply san fɛ "in the sky" is much more frequent in Malian Bambara than in Ivoirian or Burkinabè Jula where the less complex form is more typical.)

The suffix is also sometimes used with time expressions that include postpositions as well:

tile fɛ

"during the day"

→

tilɛfɛla

"daytime"