A SEMANTIC ANALYSIS OF COOKING VERBS IN ETSAKO.

ABSTRACT

This study was carried out on “A Semantic Analysis of Cooking Verbs in ETSAKO Language”. The primary motivation for the study is to determine what the semantic properties of cooking verbs in Etsako language are and also to identify the Lexical field Etsako cooking verbs using Levi-Strauss culinary triangle model. Qualitative method of data collection was employed, interviews were conducted with native speakers of the language, other relevantliteraturewerealsoexamined. Levi-Strauss’ culinary triangle model was employed to group Estako cooking verbs into lexical fields. The descriptive linguistics framework was also employed for data analysis. Levi- Strauss’ culinary triangle models states that there are 3 main method of cooking, they are boiling, roasting and smoking and all other methodofcookinglieinthem.Thecookingverbsweregroupedinto specific action during cooking process and they were further grouped into lexical fields for proper analysis and also to ascertain ifStraussmodelwasright. The findings of this paper is that although Levi-Strauss culinary triangleholdssometruth,itdoesn’t fullyapplytoESTAKOcooking verbs, not all cooking activities require the traditional method of cooking. The model failed to realize also that there are some cooking activities specific to the culture of the Estako people (Gwo andOwhumi).