Edinah Mose Gesare, Nandelenga Henry Simiyu & Ayieko Gerry2024-07-152024-07-152019-06Edinah M. G., Nandelenga H. S. & Ayieko G. (2019): Ekegusii Phonemic Inventory Constraints on Borrowing: An Optimality Perspective.: The International Journal of Humanities & Social Studies.: DOI No.: 10.24940/ theijhss/ 2019/ v7/ i6/HS1906-0152321 - 9203https://repository.daystar.ac.ke/handle/123456789/4714Journal ArticleSound adaptat ion is a phenomenon that languages cannot escape in bor rowing. This is because phonemic inventor ies differ significant ly. This paper explores how Ekegusii nat ive speakers map foreign segments from English so that they conform to the inventory const raints of Ekegusii. In this paper , couched in Opt imality Theory (OT) , it is demonst rated that English vowels are mapped to Ekegusii front and back vowels respect ively const rained by shared features while consonant adaptat ion is guided by shared features as well. This is to ensure that segments that are unmarked cross linguist ically are adapted over the marked ones. OT’s markedness const raints largely dominate the faithfulness const raints because modificat ions must occur when English loanwords are different from their Ekegusii counterpar ts in the mapping process.enConst raintsfaithfulnessmarkednessoptimaladaptationArticle