Semantic-pragmatic change in Bantu -no demonstrative forms

Demonstrative forms consisting of a noun class concord plus a demonstrative root -no (or a phonologically very similar form) are found in a number of Bantu languages. The root star-no indicating proximity to the speaker has been reconstructed for Proto-Bantu, and in a survey of 99 Bantu languages almost all of the -no demonstrative forms indicate a closer degree of proximity to the speaker than any of the other demonstratives attested in each language. In this paper, I consider a range of additional meanings associated with -no demonstrative forms in various languages, and the loss (partial or complete) of spatial-deictic meaning. These changes are correlated with differences in semantic-pragmatic scope (from scope over an entity, through scope over a proposition, to scope over a larger discourse unit), and will be analysed as examples of different stages in a diachronic process.