Focus marking in Ikale and the final-over-final condition

Abstract This paper investigates ex-situ focalization in Ìkálẹ̀, a Yorùbá dialect of Nigeria, which appears to violate the Final-Over-Final Condition (FOFC) due to its clause-final morphological focus marking. Starting with a description of focus realization in the language, I propose that Ìkálẹ̀’s ex-situ focus particle realizes a head-final FocP, which dominates a head-initial TP. I argue that such a FOFC-violating structure is best analyzed using the phase-based approach to FOFC’s enforcement (à la Richards 2016 , Erlewine 2017 ), rather than through extended projections. I further discuss two prominent alternative approaches to FOFC, ( Biberauer et al.’s (2014) & Biberauer’s (2017a) asymmetric approach and Zeijlstra’s (2023) symmetric approach), and the potential challenges they face. I then propose that the current analysis may be extended to two other Benue-Congo languages (Igede and Nupe) and two other dialects of Yorùbá (Oǹdó and Òkı̀tı̀pupa) with similar ex-situ clause-final morphological focus marking.