This dissertation examines the Malayic varieties spoken in Kelantan and Terengganu, two Malaysian states located on the northeast coast of the Malay Peninsula. It focuses on three varieties, namely... Show moreThis dissertation examines the Malayic varieties spoken in Kelantan and Terengganu, two Malaysian states located on the northeast coast of the Malay Peninsula. It focuses on three varieties, namely Kelantan Malay, Coastal Terengganu Malay and Inland Terengganu Malay, all belonging to the Malayic subgroup within the Austronesian language family. On the basis of data gathered through linguistic fieldwork undertaken by the author, this dissertation provides the most comprehensive description of these languages to date and offers an analysis of their historical developments.The three Malayic varieties under investigation display notable similarities in their phonological and morphosyntactic patterns, characterised by significant phonological and morphological reduction. Despite these common features, however, it is concluded that these varieties do not form a discrete subgroup within the Malayic languages. The common changes observed in their consonant systems must have followed distinct developments in the vowel systems. Furthermore, the morphological reduction was primarily driven by internal phonological changes, and no clear traces of substrate influences have been found.It is proposed that Inland Terengganu Malay represents a separate variety, distinct from Kelantan Malay and Coastal Terengganu Malay. A two-wave migration pattern is suggested: speakers of Inland Terengganu Malay likely arrived in the region earlier, whereas the speakers of Kelantan Malay and Coastal Terengganu Malay arrived at a later stage. Show less
This dissertation investigates the grammar of Lumun, a Kordofanian language of the Talodi group, spoken in the Nuba Mountains of Sudan. The language has an estimated 15,000 speakers. Volume 1... Show moreThis dissertation investigates the grammar of Lumun, a Kordofanian language of the Talodi group, spoken in the Nuba Mountains of Sudan. The language has an estimated 15,000 speakers. Volume 1 offers a description of the segmental phonology and tone system. It also presents the nominal system of the language as well as verbal inflection. Volume 2 deals, amongst other issues, with pluractionals and the derivation of benefactive, locative-applicative, causative, passive and reciprocal verbs. Other topics include adverbs, conjunctions and question words. The appendices to volume 2 contain some glossed and translated sample texts, as well as a list of ca. 250 basic words. Show less
This book presents an in-depth linguistic description of one Papuan Malay variety, based on fifteen hours of recordings of spontaneous narratives and conversations between Papuan Malay speakers.... Show moreThis book presents an in-depth linguistic description of one Papuan Malay variety, based on fifteen hours of recordings of spontaneous narratives and conversations between Papuan Malay speakers.‘Papuan Malay’ refers to the easternmost varieties of Malay (Austronesian). They are spoken in the coastal areas of West Papua, the western part of the island of New Guinea. The variety described here is spoken along West Papua’s northeast coast.After a general introduction to the language, its setting and its history, this grammar discusses the following topics, building up from smaller grammatical constituents to larger ones: phonology, word formation, noun and prepositional phrases, verbal and nonverbal clauses, non-declarative clauses, and conjunctions and constituent combining. Of special interest to linguists, typologists and Malay specialists are the following in-depth analyses and descriptions: affixation and its productivity across domains of language choice, reduplication and its gesamtbedeutung, personal pronouns and their adnominal uses, demonstratives and locatives and their extended uses, and adnominal possessive relations and their non-canonical uses.This study provides a point of comparison for further studies in other (Papuan) Malay varieties and a starting point for Papuan Malay language development efforts. Show less
This dissertation provides a comprehensive overview of the grammar of Bantawa, a Kiranti (Rai) language spoken in Eastern Nepal. Bantawa is an SOV language featuring rich verbal morphology. In... Show moreThis dissertation provides a comprehensive overview of the grammar of Bantawa, a Kiranti (Rai) language spoken in Eastern Nepal. Bantawa is an SOV language featuring rich verbal morphology. In Bantawa we find both ergative and accusative alignment patterns in verbal affix agreement, and an ergative / absolutive pattern of case marking. The grammar treats the syntax of all major syntactical constructions, including the highly productive verb compounding process, embedding of converbial and finite clauses, nominalisations and evidentiality. The semantics of nominalisations and the aspectual nuances of verbal compounds are discussed in detail. An annotated text corpus, comprehensive paradigm tables and a glossary complete the grammar. Show less
This book presents the first comprehensive study of Dime, an endangered Omotic language spoken by about 5400 speakers in south-west Ethiopia. The study presents analysis of the phonology,... Show moreThis book presents the first comprehensive study of Dime, an endangered Omotic language spoken by about 5400 speakers in south-west Ethiopia. The study presents analysis of the phonology, morphology and syntax of the language as well as a sample of ten texts and an extensive word list. The author identifies a number of interesting comparative and typological phenomena. These include a series of uvular and velar fricatives which have not been reported in related languages. Dime has a two-way grammatical gender distinction and a special plural-agreement, both manifested on modifying categories. Rather than inflecting the same base pronoun-forms for various cases, as is common in other Omotic languages, Dime uses distinct subject pronoun sets that are formally different from object, dative and other pronoun types. Phrasal word-order is flexible; there is also a degree of flexibility in marking grammatical morphemes such as number, definiteness and case which may be marked either on the head noun or on the modifier or on both. Sentence-type distinction between interrogative and declarative clauses is partly expressed through morpheme reduction on the verb. That is, in the declarative, person-agreement morphemes are obligatory whereas these must be dropped in the interrogative. These and a number of other issues discussed in the study make the work interesting for specialists on Omotic and Afroasiatic studies as well as to general linguists interested in language typology. Show less
This dissertation describes Thangmi, a Tibeto-Burman language spoken in eastern Nepal, primarily in the districts of Dolakha and Sindhupalcok, as well as in Darjeeling district of West Bengal,... Show moreThis dissertation describes Thangmi, a Tibeto-Burman language spoken in eastern Nepal, primarily in the districts of Dolakha and Sindhupalcok, as well as in Darjeeling district of West Bengal, India. The grammar focuses on the Dolakha (Eastern) dialect of the language, although contrastive examples and specific features of the Sindhupalcok (Western) dialect are also discussed. While the Thangmi ethnic group number around 40,000, speakers of the language do not amount to more than 20,000. In terms of genetic affiliation, Thangmi appears to be closely related to Newar and Baram, which together form the ‘Newaric’ linguistic grouping. Thangmi is also related to the so-called ‘complex pronominalised’ Kiranti languages, which together with Newaric form the Mahakiranti group within Tibeto-Burman. The Thangmi refer to themselves as Thangmi, while shamans who are the sole religious practitioners in the community call themselves Thani. In Nepali the Thangmi community and their language continue to be referred to as Thami. This 862-page book contains a grammatical analysis of the Thangmi language, forty-five analysed texts with interlinear morpheme glosses and translations, a trilingual Thangmi-English-Nepali lexicon, a graphic representation of Thangmi kinship terminology and a comprehensive bibliography. The linguistic description is based on fieldwork conducted between 1997 and 2004 on a series of trips to Nepal and India. The grammar of Thangmi, which makes up the first third of the book, is divided into seven chapters. Chapter One deals with the changing historical classifications of Thangmi within the Tibeto-Burman language family, and particular attention is paid to lexical correspondences with Newar. Chapter Two offers an introduction to Thangmi culture and society, and addresses earlier research and scholarship on the Thangmi and their language. Thangmi toponyms, ethnonyms, clan names, kinship terms, mythology and history are all discussed in this chapter. Chapter Three deals with the Thangmi sound system and phonology, while Chapter Four addresses morphophonology. The fifth chapter focuses on nominal morphology, word classes and derivation. Thangmi nominals are characterised by a large number of postpositions. There is no grammatical gender in Thangmi and adjectives do not agree with the nominals they modify. A particularly interesting feature of Thangmi is the complexity of the verbal agreement system which is the subject of Chapters Six and Seven. Chapter Six offers a detailed morphological analysis of Thangmi simplex forms which are intransitive, transitive or reflexive verbal strings showing agreement with one or more actants and containing a tense morpheme. Complex verbal forms, including periphrastic constructions, imperative forms and other modals make up Chapter Seven. Gerunds along with the two intransitive verbs which correspond to the English verb ‘to be’ are also discussed in this final chapter. In common with other Tibeto-Burman languages, with the exception of Chinese and Karen, Thangmi exhibits SOV word order. Show less
