The Languages Of The Amazon

Author : Robert M. W. Dixon
Publisher : Cambridge University Press
Page : 482 pages
File Size : 47,6 Mb
Release : 1999-09-23
Category : Foreign Language Study
ISBN : 0521570212

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The Amazonian Languages by Robert M. W. Dixon Pdf

The Amazon Basin is arguably both one of the least-known and the most complex linguistic regions in the world. It is the home of some 300 languages belonging to around twenty language families, plus more than a dozen genetic isolates, and many of these languages (often incompletely documented and mostly endangered) show properties that constitute exceptions to received ideas about linguistic universals. This book provides an overview in a single volume of this rich and exciting linguistic area. The editors and contributors have sought to make their descriptions as clear and accessible as possible, in order to provide a basis for further research on the structural characteristics of Amazonian languages and their genetic and areal relationships, as well as a point of entry to important cross-linguistic data for the wider constituency of theoretical linguists.

Author : Aleksandra I︠U︡rʹevna Aĭkhenvalʹd,Alexandra Y. Aikhenvald
Publisher : Oxford University Press
Page : 549 pages
File Size : 53,6 Mb
Release : 2012-05-17
Category : Foreign Language Study
ISBN : 9780199593569

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Languages of the Amazon by Aleksandra I︠U︡rʹevna Aĭkhenvalʹd,Alexandra Y. Aikhenvald Pdf

This guide and introduction to the extraordinary range of languages in Amazonia includes some of the most fascinating in the world and many of which are now teetering on the edge of extinction.

Author : Stephen Fafulas
Publisher : John Benjamins Publishing Company
Page : 313 pages
File Size : 41,6 Mb
Release : 2020-07-15
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN : 9789027261526

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Amazonian Spanish by Stephen Fafulas Pdf

Amazonian Spanish: Language contact and evolution explores the unique origins, linguistic features, and geo-political situation of the Spanish that has emerged in the Amazon. While this region boasts much linguistic diversity, many of the indigenous languages found within its limits are now being replaced by Spanish. This situation of language expansion, contact, and bilingualism is reshaping the sociolinguistic landscape of the Amazon by creating a number of Spanish varieties with innovative linguistic features that require closer scholarly attention. The current book documents this situation in detail. The chapters in this volume include work on distinct geographical regions of the Amazon, with primary data collected using different methodologies and language contact situations. The scholars in this volume specialize in an array of fields, including anthropological linguistics, bilingualism, language contact, dialectology, and language acquisition. Their work represents both formal and functional approaches to linguistics.

Author : Alexandra Y. Aikhenvald
Publisher : Oxford University Press
Page : 128 pages
File Size : 52,7 Mb
Release : 2012-05-18
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN : 9780191007996

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The Languages of the Amazon by Alexandra Y. Aikhenvald Pdf

This is the first guide and introduction to the extraordinary range of languages in Amazonia, which include some of the most the most fascinating in the world and many of which are now teetering on the edge of extinction. Alexandra Aikhenvald, one of the world's leading experts on the region, provides an account of the more than 300 languages. She sets out their main characteristics, compares their common and unique features, and describes the histories and cultures of the people who speak them. The languages abound in rare features. Most have been in contact with each other for many generations, giving rise to complex patterns of linguistic influence. The author draws on her own extensive field research to tease out and analyse the patterns of their genetic and structural diversity. She shows how these patterns reveal the interrelatedness of language and culture; different kinship systems, for example, have different linguistic correlates. Professor Aikhenvald explains the many unusual features of Amazonian languages, which include evidentials, tones, classifiers, and elaborate positional verbs. She ends the book with a glossary of terms, and a full guide for those readers interested in following up a particular language or linguistic phenomenon. The book is free of esoteric terminology, written in its author's characteristically clear style, and brought vividly to life with numerous accounts of her experience in the region. It may be used as a resource in courses in Latin American studies, Amazonian studies, linguistic typology, and general linguistics, and as reference for linguistic and anthropological research.

Author : Desmond C. Derbyshire,Geoffrey K. Pullum
Publisher : Walter de Gruyter
Page : 496 pages
File Size : 40,9 Mb
Release : 1986
Category : Foreign Language Study
ISBN : 311011495X

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Handbook of Amazonian Languages by Desmond C. Derbyshire,Geoffrey K. Pullum Pdf

The fourth volume in a series on the languages of Amazonia. This volume includes grammatical descriptions of Wai Wai, Warekena, a comparative survey of morphosyntactic features of the Tupi-Guarani languages, and a paper on interclausal reference phenomena in Amahuaca.

Author : Aleksandra I︠U︡rʹevna Aĭkhenvalʹd,Alexandra Y. Aikhenvald
Publisher : Oxford University Press
Page : 549 pages
File Size : 55,9 Mb
Release : 2012-05-17
Category : Foreign Language Study
ISBN : 9780199593569

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Languages of the Amazon by Aleksandra I︠U︡rʹevna Aĭkhenvalʹd,Alexandra Y. Aikhenvald Pdf

This guide and introduction to the extraordinary range of languages in Amazonia includes some of the most fascinating in the world and many of which are now teetering on the edge of extinction.

Author : Doris L. Payne
Publisher : University of Texas Press
Page : 585 pages
File Size : 41,6 Mb
Release : 2014-06-23
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN : 9780292786110

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Amazonian Linguistics by Doris L. Payne Pdf

Lowland South American languages have been among the least studied ln the world. Consequently, their previous contribution to linguistic theory and language universals has been small. However, as this volume demonstrates, tremendous diversity and significance are found in the languages of this region. These nineteen essays, originally presented at a conference on Amazonian languages held at the University of Oregon, offer new information on the Tupian, Cariban, Jivaroan, Nambiquaran, Arawakan, Tucanoan, and Makuan languages and new analyses of previously recalcitrant Tupí-Guaraní verb agreement systems. The studies are descriptive, but typological and theoretical implications are consistently considered. Authors invariably indicate where previous claims must be adjusted based on the new information presented. This is true in the areas of nonlinear phonological theory, verb agreement systems and ergativity, grammatical relations and incorporation, and the uniqueness of Amazonian noun classification systems. The studies also contribute to the now extensive interest in grammatical change.

Author : Daniel Everett
Publisher : Profile Books
Page : 320 pages
File Size : 54,5 Mb
Release : 2012-03-22
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN : 9781847654151

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Language by Daniel Everett Pdf

Like other tools, language was invented, can be reinvented or lost, and shows significant variation across cultures. It's as essential to survival as fire - and, like fire, is found in all human societies. Language presents the bold and controversial idea that language is not an innate component of the brain, as has been famously argued by Chomsky and Pinker. Rather, it's a cultural tool which varies much more across different societies than the innateness view suggests. Fusing adventure, anthropology, linguistics and psychology, and drawing on Everett's pioneering research with the Amazonian Pirahs, Language argues that language is embedded within - and is inseparable from - its specific culture. This book is like a fire that will generate much light. And much heat.

Author : Willem F. H. Adelaar
Publisher : Cambridge University Press
Page : 746 pages
File Size : 53,6 Mb
Release : 2004-06-10
Category : Foreign Language Study
ISBN : 9781139451123

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The Languages of the Andes by Willem F. H. Adelaar Pdf

The Andean and Pacific regions of South America are home to a remarkable variety of languages and language families, with a range of typological differences. This linguistic diversity results from a complex historical background, comprising periods of greater communication between different peoples and languages, and periods of fragmentation and individual development. The Languages of the Andes documents in a single volume the indigenous languages spoken and formerly spoken in this linguistically rich region, as well as in adjacent areas. Grouping the languages into different cultural spheres, it describes their characteristics in terms of language typology, language contact, and the social perspectives of present-day languages. The authors provide both historical and contemporary information, and illustrate the languages with detailed grammatical sketches. Written in a clear and accessible style, this book will be a valuable source for students and scholars of linguistics and anthropology alike.

Author : Mily Crevels,Pieter Muysken
Publisher : Oxford University Press
Page : 384 pages
File Size : 52,5 Mb
Release : 2020-07-25
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN : 9780191035753

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Language Dispersal, Diversification, and Contact by Mily Crevels,Pieter Muysken Pdf

This book addresses the complex question of how and why languages have spread across the globe: why do we find large language families distributed over a wide area in some regions, while elsewhere we find clusters of very small families or language isolates? What roles have agriculture, geography, climate, ethnic identity, and language ideologies played in language spread? In this volume, international experts in the field provide new answers to these and related questions, drawing on the increasingly large databases available and on novel analytical research techniques. The first part of the volume outlines some general issues and approaches in the study of language dispersal, diversification, and contact. In the rest of the volume, chapters compare the language and population histories of three major regions - Island Southeast Asia/Oceania, Africa, and South America - which show particularly interesting contrasts in the distribution of languages and language families. The volume is interdisciplinary in approach, with insights from archaeology, genetics, anthropology, and geography, and will be of interest to a wide range of scholars interested in language diversity and contact.

Author : R. M. W. Dixon
Publisher : Oxford University Press
Page : 208 pages
File Size : 44,7 Mb
Release : 2016-04-28
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN : 9780191079412

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Are Some Languages Better than Others? by R. M. W. Dixon Pdf

This book sets out to answer a question that many linguists have been hesitant to ask: are some languages better than others? Can we say, for instance, that because German has three genders and French only two, German is a better language in this respect? Jarawara, spoken in the Amazonian jungle, has two ways of showing possession: one for a part (e.g. 'Father's foot') and the other for something which is owned and can be given away or sold (e.g. 'Father's knife'); is it thus a better language, in this respect, than English, which marks all possession in the same way? R. M. W. Dixon begins by outlining what he feels are the essential components of any language, such as the ability to pose questions, command actions, and provide statements. He then discusses desirable features including gender agreement, tenses, and articles, before concluding with his view of what the ideal language would look like - and an explanation of why it does not and probably never will exist. Written in the author's usual accessible and engaging style, and full of personal anecdotes and unusual linguistic phenomena, the book will be of interest to all general language enthusiasts as well as to a linguistics student audience, and particularly to anyone with an interest in linguistic typology.

Author : Sarah Shulist
Publisher : University of Toronto Press
Page : 262 pages
File Size : 43,8 Mb
Release : 2018-03-01
Category : Social Science
ISBN : 9781487516215

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Transforming Indigeneity by Sarah Shulist Pdf

Transforming Indigeneity is an examination of the role that language revitalization efforts play in cultural politics in the small city of São Gabriel da Cachoeira, located in the Brazilian Amazon. Sarah Shulist concentrates on how debates, discussions, and practices aimed at providing support for the Indigenous languages of the region shed light on both global issues of language revitalization and on the meaning of Indigeneity in contemporary Brazil. With 19 Indigenous languages still spoken today, São Gabriel is characterized by a high proportion of Indigenous people and an extraordinary amount of linguistic diversity. Shulist investigates what it means to be Indigenous in this setting of urbanization, multilingualism, and state intervention, and how that relates to the use and transmission of Indigenous languages. Drawing on perspectives from Indigenous and non-Indigenous political leaders, educators, students, and state agents, and by examining the experiences of urban populations, Transforming Indigeneity provides insight on the revitalization of Amazonian Indigenous languages amidst large social change.

Author : Anonim
Publisher : Unknown
Page : 300 pages
File Size : 50,5 Mb
Release : 1997
Category : Amazon River Region
ISBN : STANFORD:36105113332071

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The Journal of Amazonian Languages by Anonim Pdf

Author : Johannes Kabatek,Albert Wall
Publisher : Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG
Page : 710 pages
File Size : 54,5 Mb
Release : 2022-10-24
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN : 9783110406061

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Manual of Brazilian Portuguese Linguistics by Johannes Kabatek,Albert Wall Pdf

This manual is the first comprehensive account of Brazilian Portuguese linguistics written in English, offering not only linguists but also historians and social scientists new insights gained from the intensive research carried out over the last decades on the linguistic reality of this vast territory. In the 20 overview chapters, internationally renowned experts give detailed yet concise information on a wide range of language-internal as well as external synchronic and diachronic topics. Most of this information is the fruit of large-scale language documentation and description projects, such as the project on the linguistic norm of educated speakers (NURC), the project “Grammar of spoken Portuguese”, and the project “Towards a History of Brazilian Portuguese” (PHPB), among others. Further chapters of high contemporary interest and relevance include the study of linguistic policies and psycholinguistics. The manual offers theoretical insights of general interest, not least since many chapters present the linguistic data in the light of a combination of formal, functional, generative and sociolinguistic approaches. This rather unique feature of the volume is achieved by the double authorship of some of the relevant chapters, thus bringing together and synthesizing different perspectives.

Author : Ellen B. Basso
Publisher : University of Arizona Press
Page : 125 pages
File Size : 53,6 Mb
Release : 1977
Category : History
ISBN : 9780816504930

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Carib-Speaking Indians by Ellen B. Basso Pdf

The Anthropological Papers of the University of Arizona is a peer-reviewed monograph series sponsored by the School of Anthropology. Established in 1959, the series publishes archaeological and ethnographic papers that use contemporary method and theory to investigate problems of anthropological importance in the southwestern United States, Mexico, and related areas.