Parallelism in Kinyankole folksongs.

Abstract

This study analyses the language used in Kinyankore folk songs, focusing particularly on the parallel features which are structural, semantic and phonological. These features are used both in composition and performance. To handle this analysis, I used Roman Jacobson’s proposition that “a literary text exists independent of any particular reader and, in a sense, has a fixed meaning.” I used the theoretical approach of formalism of practical criticism which focuses on the text’s structure as an entity of meaning. The major findings include the instances of structural, semantic and phonological parallelism that bring out the aesthetic value of folk songs as a genre of oral literature.