ABSTRACT
The aim of this study is to contribute to the research on Fulfulde through a scientific approach; hence the decision is to carry out a comparative study on Fulfulde and French syntagmatic movements. This is to facilitate the study of French language for Fulfulde natives. This work also analyses the Fulfulde phrase structure in comparison to that of French. Fulfulde is a language spoken in almost all the countries of Africa I.e. In countries like Senegal, Cameroon, Congo, Mauritania etc. Furthermore, this language comprises of several dialect. Arnot was able to identify six principal dialects, but we decided to limit our research on the "Hirnangereye" dialect of Adamawa State of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. This decision is based on the inadequate accessibility of research materials on the other above mentioned dialects. In the course of this study, it was observed that Fulfulde and French language converge and differ in some aspects of grammar. The generative theory of Naomi Chomsky was very significant in the course of this study because it helped in representing sentences in (schematic representations arborescence) (schema) and also depict the syntagmatic movements where the verb moves to the "INFL" constituent or vice versa for the verb to obtain its gender and number marks. This movement doesn‟t transform the sentence structure, but rather the verb alone. Both languages also share similarities in the "QSN" movement. In this case, the interrogative work (Mot d‟interrogation) is moved from the end of the sentence to the beginning under the major constituent "SN" (Nominal Segment). This movement is done to obtain an interrogative structure in both languages therein. 8 The "SN" movement was also seen in both languages. The "SN" nominal segment is moved from the end of the sentence to the head where there is a space that caudexes with the moved segment. The "r‘Âgle" to obtain a correct and acceptable structure. The "Sprep" movement differs in both languages. In french, the "Sprep" movement is moved from the end of the sentence to the beginning where there is a space that caudexes with the moved segment under the "Sprep" constituent. The "r‘Âgle" of pronominalisation is applied to attain the surface structure of the sentence. Thus, this movement does exist in fulfulde. It is also important to note that both languages in the "r‘Âgle" of inversion of subject and auxiliary, and the insertion of "T support" is only applicable in French structural sentences
