Author: Matthias Gerner
Publisher: Walter de Gruyter
ISBN: 3110308673
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 577
Book Description
This is the first modern grammar of Nuosu written in English. Nuosu belongs to a little known section of Tibeto-Burman. The 2.5 Million ethnic Nuosu are part of the Yi nationality and live in Sichuan (China). This grammar informs Tibeto-Burman linguists, typologists, scholars of language contact and foreign learners of Nuosu.
A Grammar of Nuosu
Author: Matthias Gerner
Publisher: Walter de Gruyter
ISBN: 3110308673
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 577
Book Description
This is the first modern grammar of Nuosu written in English. Nuosu belongs to a little known section of Tibeto-Burman. The 2.5 Million ethnic Nuosu are part of the Yi nationality and live in Sichuan (China). This grammar informs Tibeto-Burman linguists, typologists, scholars of language contact and foreign learners of Nuosu.
Publisher: Walter de Gruyter
ISBN: 3110308673
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 577
Book Description
This is the first modern grammar of Nuosu written in English. Nuosu belongs to a little known section of Tibeto-Burman. The 2.5 Million ethnic Nuosu are part of the Yi nationality and live in Sichuan (China). This grammar informs Tibeto-Burman linguists, typologists, scholars of language contact and foreign learners of Nuosu.
A Grammar of Khatso
Author: Chris Donlay
Publisher: Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG
ISBN: 3110765802
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 628
Book Description
This is the first grammar in English of Khatso, an endangered language spoken in a single farming village in China by descendants of Kublai Khan’s Mongol soldiers. Based on natural language from dozens of speakers, this analysis captures the way Khatso is spoken in daily life. As a result, it is the most comprehensive description of Khatso yet, providing an in-depth look at the features, structures and systems that comprise this unique language.
Publisher: Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG
ISBN: 3110765802
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 628
Book Description
This is the first grammar in English of Khatso, an endangered language spoken in a single farming village in China by descendants of Kublai Khan’s Mongol soldiers. Based on natural language from dozens of speakers, this analysis captures the way Khatso is spoken in daily life. As a result, it is the most comprehensive description of Khatso yet, providing an in-depth look at the features, structures and systems that comprise this unique language.
The Changing Languages of Guangxi, Southern China
Author: Yang Huang
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield
ISBN: 1793630100
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 301
Book Description
Based on a case study of the evolution of “finish” morphemes in Yue and Zhuang Tai-Kadai, this book examines how an internal factor (grammaticalization) and an external factor (language contact) interacted to produce the polyfunctionality of the specific “finish” morphemes in the languages of Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, Southern China. Arguing that the Central Southern Guangxi Region is a micro-linguistic area, Huang also introduces five unique areal features shared by many of its languages.
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield
ISBN: 1793630100
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 301
Book Description
Based on a case study of the evolution of “finish” morphemes in Yue and Zhuang Tai-Kadai, this book examines how an internal factor (grammaticalization) and an external factor (language contact) interacted to produce the polyfunctionality of the specific “finish” morphemes in the languages of Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, Southern China. Arguing that the Central Southern Guangxi Region is a micro-linguistic area, Huang also introduces five unique areal features shared by many of its languages.
Nominal Arguments and Language Variation
Author: Li Julie Jiang
Publisher:
ISBN: 0190084162
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 385
Book Description
Nominal Arguments in Language Variation investigates nominal arguments in classifier languages, refuting the long-held claim that classifier languages do not have overt article determiners. Li Julie Jiang brings the typologically unique Nuosu Yi, a classifier language that has an overt definite determiner (D), to the forefront of the theoretical investigation. By comparing nominal arguments in Nuosu Yi to those in Mandarin, a well-studied classifier language that has no overt evidence of an article determiner, Jiang provides new accounts of variation among classifier languages and extends the parameters to argument formation in general. In addition to paying particular attention to these two classifier languages, the discussion of nominal arguments also covers a wider range of classifier languages and number marking languages from Romance, Germanic, and Slavic to Hindi. Using a broad cross-linguistic perspective and detailed empirical analysis, Nominal Arguments in Language Variation is an important contribution to research on classifier languages and the fields of theoretical syntax, semantics, language variation, and linguistic typology.
Publisher:
ISBN: 0190084162
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 385
Book Description
Nominal Arguments in Language Variation investigates nominal arguments in classifier languages, refuting the long-held claim that classifier languages do not have overt article determiners. Li Julie Jiang brings the typologically unique Nuosu Yi, a classifier language that has an overt definite determiner (D), to the forefront of the theoretical investigation. By comparing nominal arguments in Nuosu Yi to those in Mandarin, a well-studied classifier language that has no overt evidence of an article determiner, Jiang provides new accounts of variation among classifier languages and extends the parameters to argument formation in general. In addition to paying particular attention to these two classifier languages, the discussion of nominal arguments also covers a wider range of classifier languages and number marking languages from Romance, Germanic, and Slavic to Hindi. Using a broad cross-linguistic perspective and detailed empirical analysis, Nominal Arguments in Language Variation is an important contribution to research on classifier languages and the fields of theoretical syntax, semantics, language variation, and linguistic typology.
Nominalization in Asian Languages
Author: Foong Ha Yap
Publisher: John Benjamins Publishing
ISBN: 9027206775
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 815
Book Description
Research on nominalization, a process that gives rise to referring expressions, has always played a central role in linguistic investigations. Over the years there has also been growing evidence that nominalization constructions often extend to non-referential domains. They participate in noun-modifying expressions (e.g. genitive and relative clauses), subordinate clauses and topic constructions, finite structures with the nominalizers reanalyzed as TAM markers, and stance constructions with evaluative, attitudinal, evidential and epistemic overtones. This volume brings together historical and crosslinguistic evidence from more than 20 different languages representing six different language families spanning the Asian continent and the Pacific and Indian oceans to elucidate the strategies and grammaticalization pathways that give rise to both referential and non-referential uses of nominalization constructions. This collection highlights the diversity of strategies and at the same time the robust cyclical nature of change within and across languages. The combined diachronic and typological analyses in this volume are particularly valuable for linguistic research on diachronic morphosyntax and linguistic ‘universals’, and are also an important supplementary cross-referencing tool for linguistic investigations of versatile and ubiquitous morphemes in under-documented languages.
Publisher: John Benjamins Publishing
ISBN: 9027206775
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 815
Book Description
Research on nominalization, a process that gives rise to referring expressions, has always played a central role in linguistic investigations. Over the years there has also been growing evidence that nominalization constructions often extend to non-referential domains. They participate in noun-modifying expressions (e.g. genitive and relative clauses), subordinate clauses and topic constructions, finite structures with the nominalizers reanalyzed as TAM markers, and stance constructions with evaluative, attitudinal, evidential and epistemic overtones. This volume brings together historical and crosslinguistic evidence from more than 20 different languages representing six different language families spanning the Asian continent and the Pacific and Indian oceans to elucidate the strategies and grammaticalization pathways that give rise to both referential and non-referential uses of nominalization constructions. This collection highlights the diversity of strategies and at the same time the robust cyclical nature of change within and across languages. The combined diachronic and typological analyses in this volume are particularly valuable for linguistic research on diachronic morphosyntax and linguistic ‘universals’, and are also an important supplementary cross-referencing tool for linguistic investigations of versatile and ubiquitous morphemes in under-documented languages.
The Languages and Linguistics of Mainland Southeast Asia
Author: Paul Sidwell
Publisher: Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG
ISBN: 3110558149
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 983
Book Description
The handbook will offer a survey of the field of linguistics in the early 21st century for the Southeast Asian Linguistic Area. The last half century has seen a great increase in work on language contact, work in genetic, theoretical, and descriptive linguistics, and since the 1990s especially documentation of endangered languages. The book will provide an account of work in these areas, focusing on the achievements of SEAsian linguistics, as well as the challenges and unresolved issues, and provide a survey of the relevant major publications and other available resources. We will address: Survey of the languages of the area, organized along genetic lines, with discussion of relevant political and cultural background issues Theoretical/descriptive and typological issues Genetic classification and historical linguistics Areal and contact linguistics Other areas of interest such as sociolinguistics, semantics, writing systems, etc. Resources (major monographs and monograph series, dictionaries, journals, electronic data bases, etc.) Grammar sketches of languages representative of the genetic and structural diversity of the region.
Publisher: Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG
ISBN: 3110558149
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 983
Book Description
The handbook will offer a survey of the field of linguistics in the early 21st century for the Southeast Asian Linguistic Area. The last half century has seen a great increase in work on language contact, work in genetic, theoretical, and descriptive linguistics, and since the 1990s especially documentation of endangered languages. The book will provide an account of work in these areas, focusing on the achievements of SEAsian linguistics, as well as the challenges and unresolved issues, and provide a survey of the relevant major publications and other available resources. We will address: Survey of the languages of the area, organized along genetic lines, with discussion of relevant political and cultural background issues Theoretical/descriptive and typological issues Genetic classification and historical linguistics Areal and contact linguistics Other areas of interest such as sociolinguistics, semantics, writing systems, etc. Resources (major monographs and monograph series, dictionaries, journals, electronic data bases, etc.) Grammar sketches of languages representative of the genetic and structural diversity of the region.
Tone in Yongning Na
Author: Alexis Michaud
Publisher: Language Science Press
ISBN: 3946234860
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 614
Book Description
Yongning Na, also known as Mosuo, is a Sino-Tibetan language spoken in Southwest China. This book provides a description and analysis of its tone system, progressing from lexical tones towards morphotonology. Tonal changes permeate numerous aspects of the morphosyntax of Yongning Na; they are not the product of a small set of phonological rules, but of a host of rules that are restricted to specific morphosyntactic contexts. Rich morphotonological systems have been reported in this area of Sino-Tibetan, but book-length descriptions remain few. This study of an endangered language contributes to a better understanding of the diversity of prosodic systems in East Asia. The analysis is based on original fieldwork data (made available online), collected over the course of ten years, commencing in 2006.
Publisher: Language Science Press
ISBN: 3946234860
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 614
Book Description
Yongning Na, also known as Mosuo, is a Sino-Tibetan language spoken in Southwest China. This book provides a description and analysis of its tone system, progressing from lexical tones towards morphotonology. Tonal changes permeate numerous aspects of the morphosyntax of Yongning Na; they are not the product of a small set of phonological rules, but of a host of rules that are restricted to specific morphosyntactic contexts. Rich morphotonological systems have been reported in this area of Sino-Tibetan, but book-length descriptions remain few. This study of an endangered language contributes to a better understanding of the diversity of prosodic systems in East Asia. The analysis is based on original fieldwork data (made available online), collected over the course of ten years, commencing in 2006.
Act-Based Conceptions of Propositional Content
Author: Friederike Moltmann
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0199373582
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 409
Book Description
The notion of a propositional content plays a central role in contemporary philosophy of language. Propositional content makes up both the meaning of sentences and the content of propositional attitudes such as belief. One particular view about propositional content has been dominant in analytic philosophy, namely the Fregean conception of propositions as abstract mind-independent objects that come with truth conditions. But propositions in this sense raise a range of issues, which have become a center of debate in current philosophy of language. In particular, how should propositions as abstract objects be understood and how can they represent things and be true or false? A number of philosophers in contemporary analytic philosophy as well as in early analytic philosophy and phenomenology have approached the notion of a propositional content in a different way, not by starting out with an abstract truth berarer, but by focusing on cognitive acts of agents, such as acts of judging. It is in terms of such acts that the notion of a propositional content, on their view, should be understood. The act-based perspective historically goes back to the work of Central European philosophers, in particular that of Husserl, Twardowski, Meinong, and Reinach. However, their work has been unduly neglected and is in fact largely inaccessible to contemporary analytic philosophers. The volume presents a central selection of work of these philosophers that bear on an act-based conception of philosophical content, some of which in new translations (one paper by Reinach), some of which published in English for the very first time (two papers by Twardowski). In addition, the volume presents new work by leading contemporary philosophers of language pursuing or discussing an act-based conception of propositional content. Moreover, the book contains a crosslinguistic study of nominalizations for actions and products, a distinction that plays a central role in the philosophy of language of Twardowski.
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0199373582
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 409
Book Description
The notion of a propositional content plays a central role in contemporary philosophy of language. Propositional content makes up both the meaning of sentences and the content of propositional attitudes such as belief. One particular view about propositional content has been dominant in analytic philosophy, namely the Fregean conception of propositions as abstract mind-independent objects that come with truth conditions. But propositions in this sense raise a range of issues, which have become a center of debate in current philosophy of language. In particular, how should propositions as abstract objects be understood and how can they represent things and be true or false? A number of philosophers in contemporary analytic philosophy as well as in early analytic philosophy and phenomenology have approached the notion of a propositional content in a different way, not by starting out with an abstract truth berarer, but by focusing on cognitive acts of agents, such as acts of judging. It is in terms of such acts that the notion of a propositional content, on their view, should be understood. The act-based perspective historically goes back to the work of Central European philosophers, in particular that of Husserl, Twardowski, Meinong, and Reinach. However, their work has been unduly neglected and is in fact largely inaccessible to contemporary analytic philosophers. The volume presents a central selection of work of these philosophers that bear on an act-based conception of philosophical content, some of which in new translations (one paper by Reinach), some of which published in English for the very first time (two papers by Twardowski). In addition, the volume presents new work by leading contemporary philosophers of language pursuing or discussing an act-based conception of propositional content. Moreover, the book contains a crosslinguistic study of nominalizations for actions and products, a distinction that plays a central role in the philosophy of language of Twardowski.
Clusivity
Author: Elena Filimonova
Publisher: John Benjamins Publishing
ISBN: 9027293880
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 452
Book Description
This book presents a collection of papers on clusivity, a newly coined term for the inclusive–exclusive distinction. Clusivity is a widespread feature familiar from descriptive grammars and frequently figuring in typological schemes and diachronic scenarios. However, no comprehensive exploration of it has been available so far. This book is intended to make the first step towards a better understanding of the inclusive–exclusive opposition, by documenting the current linguistic knowledge on the topic. The issues discussed include the categorial and paradigmatic status of the opposition, its geographical distribution, realization in free vs bound pronouns, inclusive imperatives, clusivity in the 2nd person, honorific uses of the distinction, etc. These case studies are complemented by the analysis of the opposition in American Sign Language as opposed to spoken languages. In-depth areal and family surveys of clusivity consider this opposition in Austronesian, Tibeto-Burman, central-western South American, Turkic languages, and in Mosetenan and Shuswap.
Publisher: John Benjamins Publishing
ISBN: 9027293880
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 452
Book Description
This book presents a collection of papers on clusivity, a newly coined term for the inclusive–exclusive distinction. Clusivity is a widespread feature familiar from descriptive grammars and frequently figuring in typological schemes and diachronic scenarios. However, no comprehensive exploration of it has been available so far. This book is intended to make the first step towards a better understanding of the inclusive–exclusive opposition, by documenting the current linguistic knowledge on the topic. The issues discussed include the categorial and paradigmatic status of the opposition, its geographical distribution, realization in free vs bound pronouns, inclusive imperatives, clusivity in the 2nd person, honorific uses of the distinction, etc. These case studies are complemented by the analysis of the opposition in American Sign Language as opposed to spoken languages. In-depth areal and family surveys of clusivity consider this opposition in Austronesian, Tibeto-Burman, central-western South American, Turkic languages, and in Mosetenan and Shuswap.
A Reference Grammar of Caijia
Author: Shanshan Lü
Publisher: Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG
ISBN: 3110724804
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 628
Book Description
Caijia, [meŋ21ni33ŋoŋ33] ‘Caijia speech’, is an endangered language in the Sino-Tibetan family with less than 1000 speakers in Hezhang and Weining counties in northwest in Guizhou Province in Southwest China. Its sub-classification remains unclear. It was almost four decades ago when the Caijia language was officially reported for the first time in 1982 by the Language Team of Bureau of Ethnic Identification in Bijie, yet this language has nevertheless remained neither well-described nor studied. This book, a linguistic description of the Xingfa variety of Caijia based on the fieldwork data in Xingfa township of Hezhang county, is the first reference grammar of the Caijia language, covering its sound system, word formation, parts of speech and syntactic structures in fifteen chapters. Being analytic, Caijia presents many common grammatical features attested in East and Southeast Asian languages, for example, compounds, quadrisyllabic idiomatic expressions or elaborate expressions, lack of inflection, a classifier system, a strong relationship between nominalization and relativization, pro-drop and grammaticalization of verbs. Moreover, Caijia shares more similarities with Sinitic languages. Apart from these common areal features, this book will also reveal some special features of Caijia.
Publisher: Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG
ISBN: 3110724804
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 628
Book Description
Caijia, [meŋ21ni33ŋoŋ33] ‘Caijia speech’, is an endangered language in the Sino-Tibetan family with less than 1000 speakers in Hezhang and Weining counties in northwest in Guizhou Province in Southwest China. Its sub-classification remains unclear. It was almost four decades ago when the Caijia language was officially reported for the first time in 1982 by the Language Team of Bureau of Ethnic Identification in Bijie, yet this language has nevertheless remained neither well-described nor studied. This book, a linguistic description of the Xingfa variety of Caijia based on the fieldwork data in Xingfa township of Hezhang county, is the first reference grammar of the Caijia language, covering its sound system, word formation, parts of speech and syntactic structures in fifteen chapters. Being analytic, Caijia presents many common grammatical features attested in East and Southeast Asian languages, for example, compounds, quadrisyllabic idiomatic expressions or elaborate expressions, lack of inflection, a classifier system, a strong relationship between nominalization and relativization, pro-drop and grammaticalization of verbs. Moreover, Caijia shares more similarities with Sinitic languages. Apart from these common areal features, this book will also reveal some special features of Caijia.