Reference cohesion within the complex sentence in the Swahili of Nairobi

Abstract

This paper focuses on reference cohesion within a complex sentence in the day-to-day Kiswahili of Nairobi. The thrust of its argumentation is that although earlier research inspired by Halliday and Hasan (1976) has been of the view that higher discourse organization beyond the sentence is the locus of cohesion, a Kiswahili complex sentence exhibits a complex within-sentence cohesion structure that cannot be ignored. Clauses in the Kiswahili complex sentence are tied and reinforced by reference expressions like personal pronouns and relative pronouns. Through such cohesive devices, reference cohesion is created or reinforced within the sentence, as the information structure is revealed more clearly while at the same time being expressed in an economical way