YORUBA BASIC COURSE LAS, dys © This work was compiled and pub lished with the support of the Office of Education, Department of Health, Education and Welfare, United States of America. EARL W. STEVICK, OLALEYE AREMU FOREIGN SERVICE INSTITUTE WASHINGTON, D.C. 1963 DEPARTM EN T OF STATEFOREIGN SERVICE INSTITUTE BASIC COURSE SERIES Edited by CARLETON T. HODGE Tea mania TERE ES 4hYORUBA PREFACE Yoruba, unlike most African languages, has been made the subject of careful study by a number of competent scholars, who have produced for it highly useful dictionaries and grammatical studies. ‘The primary goal of this book is therefore not so much to describe asto inculcate speech habits; matters of pronunciation and grammar which have, for the most part, been described thoroughly by previous writ~ ers are made the subject of an extensive set of drill materials, both printed and recorded. is volume was prepared under an agreement with the Office of Education, Department of Health, Education and Welfare, under the National Defense Educa- tion Act. The lessons which it contains were designed in the first instance for study with professional supervision and Yorubaespeaking instructors. The set of tapes which accompanies the course will be of value in supplementing work with a native teacher, and may also be used for study or review where no native spe: of the language is available. ‘The tapes were prepared in the laboratory of the Fore eign Service Institute, under the direction of Gabriel Cordova. Most of the Yoruba sentences in this course were provided by Qlaleyg Aremu ‘and Josiah Simargn, with some additional materials being provided by Alexander Edwards and Samuel Adebangjo. In addition, Argmu and Edwards assumed impor tant measures of responsibility in the revision of the original draft. The linguist in charge of the project was Earl W. Stevick, coordinator of the Special African Language Program. ‘The FSI staff members who have worked on the Yoruba text wish to express their gratitude for the existence of the dictionaries and other studies prepared in earlier years by Ida C. Nard, E. C. Rowlands, R. C. Abraham, Hans Wolff, and the Church Missionary Society. Consultations with Robert Armstrong and Mark Hanna Watkins also proved most helpful. Without the labors of all these scholars, this book could not have appeared. The Foreign Service Institute of course assumes responsibility for the present work. Howard E. Sollenberger, Dean School of Language and Arca Studies Foreign Service Institute Department of State iat