I am wondering what does cogo min and cogo minna means. I’ve heard it in series and It’s hard to give a precise example because I can’t identify if it refers to the sentence before or after its usage. I ni ce.
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I ni ce @mauve et welcome to the Forum!
The expression cogo min (na) is a combination of the “content” word cogo (‘manner; way’) and the “grammatical” word min which is the relative marker.
The na that optionally appears after it is a general postposition of location la/na that also shows up in sentences like N bɛ Mali la (‘I am in Mali’).
Translated literally, it is roughly something like this:
cogo min (na)
“manner (in) which”
In practical terms in English it often lines up more with the word “how” in sentences like “I like how you said it”. Notice how you could technically replace how with “the manner in which” and it would still make sense:
I like how you said it
I like the manner in which you said it
In Bambara, this sentence would have been:
I y’à fɔ cogo min (na), à ka di n ye
As you can see, this sentence is made up of two clauses (1. “I like it”; 2. “You said it”) that are fused together via a relative construction using min. This explains why you couldn’t identify whether cogo min (na) belongs to the first or second “sentence” (that is, “clause”) that you were hearing. It belongs to both. It actually is the glue that has fused the two together.
Hope that helps!