Argument preposing in Ibibio

This study examines argument preposing in Ibibio, a Lower-Cross language spoken in Akwa Ibom State, Nigeria, from its base-generated position to a case feature position and then to the left periphery of the sentence. It used the Minimalist Program (MP) as its theoretical model to explain the syntactic and semantic causes of argument preposing in overt syntax. According to the MP, sentence derivation is the process of combining meaning and sound while adhering to specific economic rules. Fifty-two sentences were elicited from fourteen native speakers in addition to the researchers’ intuitive knowledge. Findings reveal that interrogative, topicalised, left-dislocated and cleft structures show evidence of argument preposing. The work establishes that Ibibio displays both the in-situ and non-in-situ patterns concerning the position of wh-operators. The preposing of the object wh-operators is obligatorily followed by a base-generated "ke" focus marker. Topic arguments are probed by the ke particle. Left dislocation is characterised by an overt trace in the form of a resumptive pronoun. Clefting process also utilises the ké particle as a relativiser to introduce the clause that modifies the cleft argument in the language. Argument preposing in Ibibio is basically a strategy for focusing.