‘A Triune Anthropologist Appears’?:

Gray, Geoffrey. ‘A Triune Anthropologist Appears’?: Gerhardt Laves, Ralph Piddington and Marjorie Piddington, La Grange Bay, 1930 [online]. Australian Aboriginal Studies; Issue 1; 2006; 23. Availability: <http://search.informit.com.au/documentSummary;dn=424197630877346;res=IELHSS> ISSN: 0729-4352. [cited 13 Aug 08].

Colour Universals

Why there are no `colour universals’ in language and thought

Author: Wierzbicka, Anna

Source: The Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute, Volume 14, Number 2, June 2008 , pp. 407-425(19)

Publisher: Blackwell Publishing

 

Abstract:

Do all people live in a world full of colours? Perceptually, yes (unless they are visually impaired), but conceptually, no: there are many languages which have no word for `colour’ and in which the question `what colour is it?’ cannot be asked and presumably does not arise. Yet the powerful and still immensely influential theory of Berlin and Kay assumes otherwise. While building on my earlier work on colour semantics, this article brings new evidence against the Berlin and Kay paradigm, and presents a fundamentally different approach. The new data on which the argument is based come from Australian languages. In particular, the article presents a detailed study of the visual world reflected in the Australian language Warlpiri and in Warlpiri ways of speaking, showing that while Warlpiri people have no `colour-talk’ (and no `colour-practices’), they have a rich visual discourse of other kinds, linked with their own cultural practices. It also offers a methodology for identifying indigenous meanings without the grid of the English concept `colour’, and for revealing `the native’s point of view’. Résumé

Tout le monde vit-il dans un monde plein de couleurs ? Du point de vue de la perception, la réponse est oui (sauf en cas de handicap visuel), mais au niveau des concepts, c’est non : dans de nombreuses langues, le mot « couleur » n’existe pas et la question « de quelle couleur est ceci ? » ne peut pas être posée, et ne se pose probablement même pas. Pourtant, théorie de Berlin et Kay, puissante et encore immensément influente, affirme le contraire. Tout en exploitant ses travaux antérieurs sur la sémantique des couleurs, l’auteur apporte de nouvelles preuves à l’encontre du paradigme de Berlin et Kay et présente une approche fondamentalement différente. Les nouvelles données sur lesquelles se base son argumentation proviennent des langues australiennes. L’article présente en particulier une étude détaillée du monde visuel tel qu’en rend compte la langue australienne warlpiri. Les expressions dans cette langue montrent que bien que les Warlpiri n’aient pas de « langage des couleurs » (ni de « pratique des couleurs »), ils ont un riche discours visuel à propos d’autres propriétés liées à leur propre pratique culturelle. L’article expose également une méthodologie pour identifier les significations indigènes en dehors de la grille du concept occidental de « couleur », et pour révéler « le point de vue indigène ».

Document Type: Research article

DOI: 10.1111/j.1467-9655.2008.00509.x

Language Documentation and Conservation

The latest Issue of Language Documentation and Conservation is out.

Big words, small phrase

http://www.reference-global.com/doi/abs/10.1515/LING.2008.004?cookieSet=1

 

Big words, small phrases: Mismatches between pause units and the polysynthetic word in Dalabon

Nicholas Evans, ¹*

¹University of Melbourne.

nrde@unimelb.edu.au

Janet Fletcher, ²

²University of Melbourne.

Belinda Ross³

³University of Melbourne.

*Correspondence address: Prof. Nick Evans,

Linguistics and Applied Linguistics, School of Languages and Linguistics, University of Melbourne, Parkville, VIC 3010, Australia.

Citation Information. Linguistics. Volume 46, Issue 1, Pages 89–129, ISSN (Online) 1613-396X, ISSN (Print) 0024-3949, DOI: 10.1515/LING.2008.004, January 2008

Publication history: 30 07 2004 09 05 2005

Abstract

This article uses instrumental data from natural speech to examine the phenomenon of pause placement within the verbal word in Dalabon, a polysynthetic Australian language of Arnhem Land. Though the phenomenon is incipient and in two sample texts occurs in only around 4% of verbs, there are clear possibilities for interrupting the grammatical word by pause after the pronominal prefix and some associated material at the left edge, though these within-word pauses are significantly shorter, on average, than those between words. Within-word pause placement is not random, but is restricted to certain affix boundaries; it requires that the paused-after material be at least dimoraic, and that the remaining material in the verbal word be at least disyllabic. Bininj Gun-wok, another polysynthetic language closely related to Dalabon, does not allow pauses to interrupt the verbal word, and the Dalabon development appears to be tied up with certain morphological innovations that have increased the proportion of closed syllables in the pronominal prefix zone of the verb. Though only incipient and not yet phonologized, pause placement in Dalabon verbs suggests a phonology-driven route by which polysynthetic languages may ultimately become less morphologically complex by fracturing into smaller units.

Morphological and abstract case

 

Linguistic Inquiry

 

Winter 2008, Vol. 39, No. 1, Pages 55-101

Posted Online January 4, 2008.

(doi:10.1162/ling.2008.39.1.55)

Morphological and Abstract Case

Julie Anne Legate

Department of Linguistics, 217 Morrill Hall, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY 14853. jal252@cornell.edu

 

This article examines the relationship between abstract and morphological case, arguing that morphological case realizes abstract Case features in a postsyntactic morphology, according to the Elsewhere Condition. A class of prima facie ergative-absolutive languages is identified wherein intransitive subjects receive abstract nominative Case and transitive objects receive abstract accusative Case; these are realized through a morphological default, which is often mislabeled as absolutive. Further support comes from split ergativity based on a nominal hierarchy, which is shown to have a morphological source. Proposals that case and agreement are purely morphological phenomena are critiqued.

Centre for Aboriginal Economic Policy Research

CAEPR’s DSpace site at ANU.

East Kimberley Population Profiles

ANU DSpace, Population Profiles for Developmental Planning in the Northern East Kimberley.

Construing Confrontation

Construing confrontation: Grammar in the construction of a key historical narrative in Umpithamu

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JEAN-CHRISTOPHE  VERSTRAETE  ^a1 and BARBARA  DE COCK  ^a2
a1 Fund for Scientific Research-Flanders and, Department of Linguistics, University of Leuven, Blijde-Inkomststraat 21, 3000 Leuven, Belgium, jean-christophe.verstraete@arts.kuleuven.be
^a2 Department of Linguistics, University of Leuven, Blijde-Inkomststraat 21, 3000 Leuven, Belgium, barbara.decock@arts.kuleuven.be

Article author query

verstraete j  

de cock b  

Abstract

This study provides a linguistic perspective on the structure and the interpretation of a key historical narrative in Umpithamu (a Pama-Nyungan language of Cape York Peninsula, Australia), against the background of a larger corpus of narrative texts in Umpithamu. The analysis focuses on the role of participant tracking devices in the macro-structure of the narrative, and the role of case marking in the build-up of narrative motifs. It is argued not only that marked types of participant tracking serve to mark the boundaries of episodes, as often noted in the literature, but also that some types have additional functions within episodes, which leads to a proposal for refinement of Fox’s (1987) Principle of Morphosyntactic Markedness. On a micro-structural level, it is shown how a rare system of case marking is used by the narrator to construe white–Aboriginal interactions as events in which the Aboriginal participants experience an extreme lack of control. ^a

(Received October 10 2006)
(Revised April 20 2007)
(Accepted March 12 2007)
Key Words: episode structure; participant tracking; information structure; case marking; Australian Aboriginal narrative; Umpithamu.

Australian languages: a singular vision

Review of Dixon’s Australian Languages: their nature and development

 

PETER SUTTON^{a1 c1} and HAROLD KOCH^{a2 c2}

^a1 University of Adelaide/South Australian Museum

^a2 Australian National University

Journal of Linguistics (2008), 44: 471-504 Cambridge University Press

doi:10.1017/S0022226708005185

Published online by Cambridge University Press 19 Jun 2008