Download or read book Switch Reference and Universal Grammar written by John Haiman and published by John Benjamins Publishing. This book was released on 1983-01-01 with total page 358 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Canonical switch-reference is an inflectional category of the verb, which indicates whether or not its subject is identical with the subject of some other verb. Switch-reference may be analyzed from a structural or a functional point of view. Functionally, switch-reference is a device for referential tracking. Formally, switch-reference is almost always a verbal category, similar to the familiar category of verbal concord. In most languages switch-reference marking is indicated by a verbal affix, however in some languages it may be marked by an independent morpheme. The contributions to this volume are concerned with questions of form, function, and genesis of canonical switch-reference systems.
Download or read book Basic Linguistic Theory Volume 2 written by R. M. W. Dixon and published by Oxford University Press on Demand. This book was released on 2010 with total page 508 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In Basic Linguistic Theory R. M. W. Dixon provides a comprehensive guide to the nature of human languages and their description and analysis. The books are a one-stop text for undergraduate and graduate students, the triumphant outcome of a lifetime's immersion in every aspect of language, and a lasting monument to innovative scholarship.
Download or read book The Languages and Linguistics of the New Guinea Area written by Bill Palmer and published by Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG. This book was released on 2017-12-04 with total page 1142 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Languages and Linguistics of the New Guinea Area: A Comprehensive Guide is part of the multi-volume reference work on the languages and linguistics of all major regions of the world. The island of New Guinea and its offshore islands is arguably the most diverse and least documented linguistic hotspot in the world - home to over 1300 languages, almost one fifth of all living languages, in more than 40 separate families, along with numerous isolates. Traditionally one of the least understood linguistic regions, ongoing research allows for the first time a comprehensive guide. Given the vastness of the region and limited previous overviews, this volume focuses on an account of the families and major languages of each area within the region, including brief grammatical descriptions of many of the languages. The volume also includes a typological overview of Papuan languages, and a chapter on Austronesian-Papuan contact. It will make accessible current knowledge on this complex region, and will be the standard reference on the region. It is aimed at typologists, endangered language specialists, graduate and advanced undergraduate students, and all those interested in linguistic diversity and understanding this least known linguistic region.
Download or read book The Papuan Languages of New Guinea written by William A. Foley and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 1986-11-20 with total page 324 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This introduction to the descriptive and historical linguistics of the Papuan languages of New Guinea provide an accessible account of one of the richest and most diverse linguistic situations in the world. The Papuan languages number over 700 (or 20 per cent of the world's total) in more than sixty language families. Less than a quarter of the individual languages have yet been adequately documented, and in this sense William Foley's book might be considered premature. However, in the search for language universals and generalisations in linguistic typology, it would be foolhardy to neglect the information that is available. In this respect alone, the present volume, systematically organised on mainly typology principles, is particularly timely and useful. In addition, the processes of linguistic diffusion are present in New Guinea to an extent probably paralleled elsewhere on the globe. The Papuan Languages of New Guinea will be of interest not only to general and comparative linguists and to typologists, but also to sociolinguists and anthropologists for the information it provides on the social dynamics of language content.
Download or read book Highly complex syllable structure A typological and diachronic study written by Shelece Easterday and published by Language Science Press. This book was released on 2019-11-13 with total page 616 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The syllable is a natural unit of organization in spoken language whose strongest cross-linguistic patterns are often explained in terms of a universal preference for the CV structure. Syllable patterns involving long sequences of consonants are both typologically rare and theoretically marginalized, with few approaches treating these as natural or unproblematic structures. This book is an investigation of the properties of languages with highly complex syllable patterns. The two aims are (i) to establish whether these languages share other linguistic features in common such that they constitute a distinct linguistic type, and (ii) to identify possible diachronic paths and natural mechanisms by which these patterns come about in the history of a language. These issues are investigated in a diversified sample of 100 languages, 25 of which have highly complex syllable patterns. Languages with highly complex syllable structure are characterized by a number of phonetic, phonological, and morphological features which serve to set them apart from languages with simpler syllable patterns. These include specific segmental and suprasegmental properties, a higher prevalence of vowel reduction processes with extreme outcomes, and higher average morpheme/word ratios. The results suggest that highly complex syllable structure is a linguistic type distinct from but sharing some characteristics with other proposed holistic phonological types, including stress-timed and consonantal languages. The results point to word stress and specific patterns of gestural organization as playing important roles in the diachronic development of these patterns out of simpler syllable structures.
Download or read book The Lexical Typology of Semantic Shifts written by Päivi Juvonen and published by Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG. This book was released on 2016-08-08 with total page 608 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The volume focuses on semantic shifts and motivation patterns in the lexicon. Its key feature is its lexico-typological orientation, i.e. a heavy emphasis on systematic cross-linguistic comparison. The book presents current theoretical and methodological trends in the study of semantic shifts and motivational patters based on an abundance of empirical findings across genetically, areally and typologically diverse languages.
Download or read book A Survey of Word Accentual Patterns in the Languages of the World written by Harry van der Hulst and published by Walter de Gruyter. This book was released on 2010 with total page 897 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This volume contains a wealth of information on the word accentual (metrical, stress) phenomena that we encounter in natural languages. Two types of information will be supplied: language profiles in 'tabular form' and survey articles. Of the total of 10 chapters in Part I, 3 are general in nature, while the other 7 describe and analyze word accentual systems in all continents. The volume's point of departure is a database called StressTyp. StressTyp developed into a database on word prosodic systems of the languages of the world. The over 500 languages, representing a wide geographical distribution, taken from the StressTyp database will be represented in this volume. For all these languages, information regarding identity, sources and stress location(s) will be included, accompanied by some examples in nearly all cases. These language data packages will be organized by language family. This information constitutes Part II of the volume.
Download or read book Phonological Typology written by Matthew K. Gordon and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2016-05-06 with total page 384 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book provides an overview of phonological typology: the study of how sounds are distributed across the languages of the world and why they display these distributions and patterns. It examines major phonological phenomena such as phoneme inventories, syllable structure, phonological alternations, stress, tone, intonation, and prosodic morphology, and investigates issues including how common certain types of sounds are cross-linguistically and why; how many languages differentiate questions and statements using intonation; which areas of the world tend to be associated with more complex tone distinctions; and the relationship between cross-linguistic and language-internal frequency. Data are drawn from existing typologies, from the results of a survey of various phonological patterns in the 100-language sample from the World Atlas of Language Structures, and from corpora of individual languages. Matthew Gordon analyses these data and explores the correlations between different - often superficially unrelated - phonological properties to gain insight into the driving forces behind these phenomena. He provides an overview of synchronic and diachronic explanations for the patterns observed and discusses how formal phonological theory has attempted to model the typological data. One of relatively few typological works devoted to phonology, this book will be a valuable resource for phonologists and phoneticians from advanced undergraduate level upwards, as well all those with an interest in language typology.
Download or read book Co Compounds and Natural Coordination written by Bernhard Wälchli and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2009-06-11 with total page 353 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This typological survey and analysis of co-compounds considers topics such as the notion of word, markedness, the syntax and semantics of coordination, grammaticalization, and lexical semantics, and draws on the author's original research on a wide range of languages.
Download or read book Indonesian as a Unifying Language of Wider Communication written by Darrell T. Tryon and published by . This book was released on 1987 with total page 820 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Word written by R. M. W. Dixon and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2003-01-02 with total page 308 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In some languages words tend to be rather short but in others they may be dauntingly long. In this book, a distinguished international group of scholars discuss the concept 'word' and its applicability in a range of typologically diverse languages. An introductory chapter sets the parameters of variation for 'word'. The nine chapters that follow then study the character of 'word' in individual languages, including Amazonian, Australian Aboriginal, Eskimo, Native North American, West African, Balkan and Caucasian languages, and Indo-Pakistani Sign Language. These languages exhibit a huge range of phonological and grammatical characteristics, the close study of which enables the contributors to refine our understanding of what can constitute a 'word'. An epilogue explores the status and cross-linguistic properties of 'word'. The book will be an invaluable resource for scholars of linguistic typology and of morphology and phonology.
Download or read book History of Number written by Kay Owens and published by Springer. This book was released on 2017-10-24 with total page 478 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This unique volume presents an ecocultural and embodied perspective on understanding numbers and their history in indigenous communities. The book focuses on research carried out in Papua New Guinea and Oceania, and will help educators understand humanity's use of numbers, and their development and change. The authors focus on indigenous mathematics education in the early years and shine light on the unique processes and number systems of non-European styled cultural classrooms. This new perspective for mathematics education challenges educators who have not heard about the history of number outside of Western traditions, and can help them develop a rich cultural competence in their own practice and a new vision of foundational number concepts such as large numbers, groups, and systems. Featured in this invaluable resource are some data and analyses that chief researcher Glendon Angove Lean collected while living in Papua New Guinea before his death in 1995. Among the topics covered: The diversity of counting system cycles, where they were established, and how they may have developed. A detailed exploration of number systems other than base 10 systems including: 2-cycle, 5-cycle, 4- and 6-cycle systems, and body-part tally systems. Research collected from major studies such as Geoff Smith's and Sue Holzknecht’s studies of Morobe Province's multiple counting systems, Charly Muke's study of counting in the Wahgi Valley in the Jiwaka Province, and Patricia Paraide's documentation of the number and measurement knowledge of her Tolai community. The implications of viewing early numeracy in the light of this book’s research, and ways of catering to diversity in mathematics education. In this volume Kay Owens draws on recent research from diverse fields such as linguistics and archaeology to present their exegesis on the history of number reaching back ten thousand years ago. Researchers and educators interested in the history of mathematical sciences will find History of Number: Evidence from Papua New Guinea and Oceania to be an invaluable resource.
Download or read book Papers in Australian Linguistics written by and published by . This book was released on 1967 with total page 142 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Papers in Linguistics of Melanesia written by and published by . This book was released on 1967 with total page 82 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Pacific Languages written by John Lynch and published by University of Hawaii Press. This book was released on 2016-06-01 with total page 380 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Almost one-quarter of the world's languages are (or were) spoken in the Pacific, making it linguistically the most complex region in the world. Although numerous technical books on groups of Pacific or Australian languages have been published, and descriptions of individual languages are available, until now there has been no single book that attempts a wide regional coverage for a general audience. Pacific Languages introduces readers to the grammatical features of Oceanic, Papuan, and Australian languages as well as to the semantic structures of these languages. For readers without a formal linguistic background, a brief introduction to descriptive linguistics is provided. In addition to describing the structure of Pacific languages, this volume places them in their historical and geographical context, discusses the linguistic evidence for the settlement of the Pacific, and speculates on the reason for the region's many languages. It devotes considerable attention to the effects of contact between speakers of different languages and to the development of pidgin and creole languages in the Pacific. Throughout, technical language is kept to a minimum without oversimplifying the concepts or the issues involved. A glossary of technical terms, maps, and diagrams help identify a language geographically or genetically; reading lists and a language index guide the researcher interested in a particular language or group to other sources of information. Here at last is a clear and straightforward overview of Pacific languages for linguists and anyone interested in the history of sociology of the Pacific.
Download or read book Pacific Linguistics written by and published by . This book was released on 1987 with total page 782 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Papers in Pidgin and Creole Linguistics written by and published by . This book was released on 1978 with total page 546 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
