C.M. Doke's contribution to Shona linguistic studies

SUMMARY

Doke's work is criticised for occasionally lacking, among other things, principled and rigorous phonological and grammatical theories. Nevertheless, certain things stand clearly to his credit: firstly, his ability to observe, record, analyse and describe fairly accurately the data with which he worked; and, secondly, his boldness in breaking away from the grip of European grammatical tradition and devising a model suitable to some extent at that time for Bantu languages.