A Pragmatic Analysis of Maccaa Oromo Marriage Proverbs: Horro Guduru in Focu

Abstract

The purpose of the study is to analyze the pragmatic aspects of Maccaa Oromo marriage proverbs using Searle’s speech act theory in whcich speakers’ intention is the core. This study employed a descriptive qualitative method in which the proverbs data were collected through interviews and observation. Twenty five proverbs were systematically identified and translated from Afaan Oromo to English language using a communicative translation approach. The analysis of the twenty five proverbs was based on eight contextualized themes: basic faith, omens, upbringing, morals or ethics, caution/advise, wisdom/foolishness, kinship and status. The study attempted to identify the types of the illocutionary acts, the illocutionary forces and the perlocutionary effects of the proverbs on the hearer in their real contexts. The study reveals that Maccaa Oromo marriage proverbs are a combination of direct and indirect illocutionary acts which are mainly assertive illocutionary forces that are direct illocutionary acts and most of them are directive illocutionary forces that are indirect illocutionary acts. The study also shows that perlocutionary acts in the proverbs can be categorized into two: the psychological consequence (of persuading, invoking, convincing, frightening, bad omens, inspiring, good omens, humiliating, and pleasing,) and getting the hearer to do or realize something such as considering, reminding, causing, and character assessment. The study concluded that there are five types of illocutionary acts performed in Maccaa Oromo marriage proverbs, namely, assertive, directive, commissive, expressive and declaration. Moreover, the study concluded that there are many illocutionary forces accomplished in Maccaa Oromo marriage proverbs such as asserting, informing, criticizing, advising, warning, hoping, approving, confirming, praising, regretting, counseling, validating and complimenting. Furthermore, this study also concluded that there are two kinds of perlocutionary effects that Macccaa Oromo marriage proverbs can produce on the hearer. Finally, the results of this study would initiate researchers to conduct further applications of pragmatic speech act therories on Oromo proverbs like politeness strategies. The proverbs could also be studied from psychological, philosophical, sociological and anthropological perspectives to document the indigenous knowledge of the speech community related to Maccaa Oromo marriage prover