IMPORTANCE OF TONE MARKS IN YORUBA

The importance of language is for effective communication and when this is not achieved (maybe by one or both speakers’ inability to speak the language, inability to pronounce some words correctly or inability to understand the language being communicated correctly) there is always a misrepresentation of information. Yoruba as a language has so many words that are closely related; for instance, words that are the written the same way, almost pronounced the same way but different meanings, if such words are not pronounced on the premise of their tone marks (Àmì ohùn) then another meaning would be conveyed to the second person being communicated to, hence, the usefulness of tone marks in Yoruba language.

Tone marks otherwise called Àmì ohùn aids our understanding of the Yoruba language better because Yoruba language is one of the most interesting languages in the world, however, without tone marks it would be difficult to comprehend. Yoruba language is tonal, hence meaning of words and conversations are best conveyed using different pitch/tone of sounds while talking. These different tones are called Tone marks (Àmì ohùn). Tone marks (Àmì ohùn) are placed on the vowels (a e ẹ i o ọ u) in every syllable of Yoruba words or phrases, therefore, we can say our placement of tone marks is dependent on our level of knowledge of the Yoruba syllables.

There are three types of tone marks (Àmì ohùn) and they show the different types of tone/pitch they accompany. They include;

1. Do (\) : Low type of tone represented with a graving accent
2. Re (-): This is the mid flat tone that has no accent.
3. Mi (/): This high rising type of tone and it is represented with sharp acute accent.

An example of this is;

1. Owó (Re -, mi /) which is money
2. Òwò (Do \, Do \) which is trade.

The knowledge of our Tone marks (Àmì ohùn) cannot be overemphasized as it helps us attain fluency in speaking the Yoruba language; it helps us in reading the language comfortably and also writing the language in a readable fashion.

Click https://alawiiyeyoruba.com/learn-yoruba/ to learn more about Tone marks (Àmì ohùn) and Yoruba language in general.