A neurolinguistic approach to pronominal resumption in Akan focus constructions

The current project explored the phonological and syntactic aspects of Akan pronominal resumption. The grammatical tone features of the resumptive pronoun and the clause determiner were assessed in Akan speakers with agrammatism. We found that the resumptive pronoun worsens wh-question comprehension in agrammatic speakers. However, the production of pronominal resumption was relatively spared. The ERP study investigated Akan native speakers’ sensitivity to the distribution of the resumptive pronoun by creating word-order and animacy violations. Our study represents a novel addition to the sentence processing field, as it looks into the interface between syntax, semantics, and phonology in Akan pronominal resumption.