The Languages of the "First Nations"

A Comparison of Native American Languages from an Ethnolinguistic Perspective
Stefan Liedtke

As yet there is no satisfactory solution for the attempt to study the immense diversity of the languages of the world systematically and to divide them into related groups. On the contrary, there is an embittered, fruitless controversy between, on the one hand, scholars who - unfortunately often with absolutely inadequate methodology - gather the languages into ever increasing "super groups", and on the other hand, scholars who are bogged down in the - justified - criticism towards this approach and have developed an anxious negative attitude especially towards genetic comparative linguistics (the "splitters"). What is now lacking is 1) fresh stock-taking of the meanwhile available descriptive facts, 2) a strict improvement of comparative methods, and 3) an unbiased attitude.

The book aims in this direction. With the example of the languages of the "First Nations", i.e., the Indian peoples of the American twin continent, it attempts a critical stock-taking of the method of language comparison (genetic, areal and typological).

The author lays great emphasis on the points of content between ethnologists and linguists, in order to encourage a cooperation of these disciplines. The book is thus suitable as introductory reading for people interested in these two related disciplines. Comparable works would be desirable for scholars who specialise in other areas (Africanists etc.). These topics have never before been treated in this summary form in the English-speaking world.

ISBN 9783929075250. LINCOM Handbooks in Linguistics 01. 148pp. 2nd edition. 1997.

Manual de las lenguas indígenas sudamericanas I

(Handbook of South-American Indian Languages)
Alain Fabre

The handbook presents data about 428 contemporary indigenous languages/ethnic groups of South and Central America from onduras to Tierra del Fuego, in the form of dictionary entries arranged according to linguistic groups. After an introduction discussing problems of linguistic grouping and ethnic status of population groups follows a general bibliography of more than 4500 titles, general maps of the countries mentioned, a cross-referenced index of about 3200 names of ethnic groups/subgroups, languages, and varieties. Each entry of the dictionary contains: (1) precise geographical locations, (2) name(s) under which the ethnolinguistic groups are known in the literature, including some considered nowadays obsolete but found in older sources, (3) own name(s) whenever known, (4) number of speakers of the language and/or ethnic group, (5) bibliography of the group, including ethnology, linguistics, ethnohistory and legal rights, (6) observations concerning ethnohistory, linguistic and/or ethnical grouping, including many moot points and first hand observations obtained in personal communications from experienced field workers, anthropologists and linguists. [written in Spanish].

El libro incluye datos acerca de 428 grupos étnicos/lingüísticos indígenas sudamericanos actuales, desde Honduras hasta Tierra del Fuego, en forma entradas ordenadas por familias lingüísticas. Después de una introducción en la se discuten brevemente problemas de pertenencia lingüística y étnica de las poblaciones referidas sigue una bibliografía general de unas 4500 entradas, mapas de los países con población indígena, un índice con referencias cruzadas de unos 3200 nombres de grupos y subgrupos lingüísticos y étnicos. Cada entrada del diccionario contiene (1) localización geográfica detallada, (2) nombre(s) del grupo y subgrupos cuando se conoce, (4) número de hablantes y/o de los integrantes del grupo étnico, (5) bibliografía de la población presentada con temas de etnología, lingüística, ethnohistoria y derechos humanos, (6) obserservaciones diversas elativas a la etnohistoria, subdivisiones étnicas y/o lingüísticas, hacíendo hincapié en numerosos puntos debatidos que aparecen en la literatura referente al grupo étnico, así como datos de primera mano obtenidos en comunicaciones particulares con antropólogos y lingüistas con sólida experiencia en el terreno.

Vol. I. ISBN 9783895862014. LINCOM Handbooks in Linguistics 04. 672pp. 1998.

Manual de las lenguas indígenas sudamericanas II

(Handbook of South-American Indian Languages)
Alain Fabre

The handbook presents data about 428 contemporary indigenous languages/ethnic groups of South and Central America from onduras to Tierra del Fuego, in the form of dictionary entries arranged according to linguistic groups. After an introduction discussing problems of linguistic grouping and ethnic status of population groups follows a general bibliography of more than 4500 titles, general maps of the countries mentioned, a cross-referenced index of about 3200 names of ethnic groups/subgroups, languages, and varieties. Each entry of the dictionary contains: (1) precise geographical locations, (2) name(s) under which the ethnolinguistic groups are known in the literature, including some considered nowadays obsolete but found in older sources, (3) own name(s) whenever known, (4) number of speakers of the language and/or ethnic group, (5) bibliography of the group, including ethnology, linguistics, ethnohistory and legal rights, (6) observations concerning ethnohistory, linguistic and/or ethnical grouping, including many moot points and first hand observations obtained in personal communications from experienced field workers, anthropologists and linguists. [written in Spanish].

El libro incluye datos acerca de 428 grupos étnicos/lingüísticos indígenas sudamericanos actuales, desde Honduras hasta Tierra del Fuego, en forma entradas ordenadas por familias lingüísticas. Después de una introducción en la se discuten brevemente problemas de pertenencia lingüística y étnica de las poblaciones referidas sigue una bibliografía general de unas 4500 entradas, mapas de los países con población indígena, un índice con referencias cruzadas de unos 3200 nombres de grupos y subgrupos lingüísticos y étnicos. Cada entrada del diccionario contiene (1) localización geográfica detallada, (2) nombre(s) del grupo y subgrupos cuando se conoce, (4) número de hablantes y/o de los integrantes del grupo étnico, (5) bibliografía de la población presentada con temas de etnología, lingüística, ethnohistoria y derechos humanos, (6) obserservaciones diversas elativas a la etnohistoria, subdivisiones étnicas y/o lingüísticas, hacíendo hincapié en numerosos puntos debatidos que aparecen en la literatura referente al grupo étnico, así como datos de primera mano obtenidos en comunicaciones particulares con antropólogos y lingüistas con sólida experiencia en el terreno.

Vol. II. ISBN 9783895862021. LINCOM Handbooks in Linguistics 05. 668pp. 1998.

The Nilo-Saharan Languages

M. Lionel Bender
University of Southern Illinois-Carbondale

The Nilo-Saharan Phylum is the most controversial outcome of Greenberg's genetic classification of African languages dating from 1963. It combines a number of previous "isolates" and its coherence as against the other phyla (Afrasian, Niger-Congo, and Khoisan) has not been satisfactorily demonstrated. In this volume, the author undertakes the demonstration, taking as a starting point major groupings he established in previous morphological comparisons and then examining a lexical data base of over 600 items from all the documented languages. The large Central Sudanic and East Sudanic families are represented by reconstructed forms from previous and forthcoming publications respectively.

The outcome is a set of 359 reconstructed items divided among Nilo-Saharan isoglosses (174 in number), isoglosses for subfamilies (83), symbolic forms (21), areal items (35), items linking Nilo-Saharan and Niger-Congo (30), and items linking Nilo-Saharan and Afrasian (26). The last four groups are not evidence for establishment of Nilo-Saharan as a genetic family, but are equally important in delimiting the phylum and setting it off from other phyla, a task which has not been given proper weight in the past.

The book begins with a lengthy and valuable Introduction covering purpose and method, an annotated list of languages genetically arranged, a demographic and cultural overview summary of speakers, and typological and areal overviews. A history of Nilo-Saharan studies is included and in a separate chapter a detailed comparison with the only competing classification (Ch. Ehret, forthcoming).

The main body of the text consists of the establishment of proto-Nilo-Saharan segments and modern reflexes, consideration of the role of morphology, and representation of the 359 reconstructed forms. Four indices allow the reader to locate items by semantic set, English gloss, reconstructed head-forms in alphabetical order, and selected secondary reconstructions under head-forms.

ISBN 9783895860454. LINCOM Handbooks in Linguistics 06. 270pp. 3 maps. 1997.

Mathematical and Computational Linguistics

H. Mark Hubey
Montclair State University

As Lass (1980) has remarked, "system" is something talked about constantly in linguistics but never beyond paying just lip-service to the concept. This book shows how linguistics constitutes a "system". Linguists (except those who study Formal Language Theory) are confronted with a dilemma. What they study is partially based on physics and is in many respects mathematical; yet the mathematics books are divorced from linguistics and linguistics books are divorced from mathematics and physics. There are no books that teach mathematics for linguists or linguistics with mathematics. This book goes a long way toward accomplishing the integration of mathematics, physics and linguistics into a whole, in other words "a system", just like those that are studied by others in the quantitative disciplines such as physics, engineering, computer science or economics.

The methods of mathematics which are used in the books to elucidate system concepts and others that are needed in linguistics includes boolean algebra, differential equations, and fuzzy logic.

Furthermore it also explains in an intuitive manner,those concepts are not only from mathematics but also from the underlying physics and engineering up to and including acoustic theory of speech, speech recognition, and even nonlinearity/catastrophe theory and quantality of phonemic systems.

All the mathematics needed to form the mathematical foundations of linguistics is illustrated with examples from linguistics and thus may be thought of as "theories", those that should replace the standard literary linguistics tradition in the same way that literary economics is no longer the de facto standard. Physical/acoustic theory of speech is blended naturally into the phonological and phonetic standard, and the standard works are used as springboards to the development of vector space concepts that are necessary for comprehension of new works in speech synthesis and speech recognition. It is rather easy then to show how seemingly nonrelated topics such as sonority scales, child language development, and various linguistics processes such as assimilation, metathesis, fortition/lenition can be seen to be a part of the greater whole. Historical processes are also treated in terms of sound change and also in terms of the most basic ideas which are needed for a thorough understanding of the problems such as multiple scale phenomena, distance and similarity, probability theory, and stochastic processes. A book of this length cannot possibly discuss all of the mathematics necessary in detail, however, there is sufficient material to motivate the topics, and furthermore to point in the direction of further study.

Table of Contents:
0: INTRODUCTORY PRELIMINARIES
0.1. Continuous Nature of Speech
0.2. Functions and Mappings
0.3. Stochastic and Fuzzy Functions
0.4. Linear Operators, Relations, and Black Boxes
0.5. Discretization -- Numerical and Closed formSolutions
0.6. Representation, Meaning, and Definition
0.7. Significance, Precision, Accuracy, and Error
0.8. Beads on a String
0.9. Discretization of Speech
0.10. Simple Discretization
0.11. Mappings, Functions, Perception, and Excessive Mentalism
0.12. Binary, Ternary, or Infinity
0.13. Universal Distinctive Features
Appendix 0.A Sets, Classes, Relations, and Functions; Phonemes, Allophones, Semantics, Orthography; Appendix 0.B Dialogue
I: OPPOSITIONS, RELATIONS, GROUPS, AND LATTICES
I.1. Features, Binary Oppositions and Binary Relations
I.2. Simple Structures: Semigroups, Monoids, Groups, Isomorphisms, and Distances
I.3. More Complex Structures: Partial Ordering, Posets, N-cubes, Lattices, Hasse Diagram
I.4. `Lattice' of Vowels: Cardinal Vowel Diagrams, Ladefoged's Modification, Discrete Distance Metric, Trubetzkoy vowels
Appendix I.A Number Systems and Codes:The Binary System, K-maps, Gray codes; Appendix I.B Boolean Algebras
II: PRIVATE AND UNIVERSAL VOWEL SPACES
II.1. Cycles, Distance, Linear Ordering, and Hilbert Curves
II.2. Bloch and Trager Private Spaces
II.3. Chomsky & Halle Private Spaces
II.4. Complement of a Graph
II.5. Pure Vowels in 3-D
II.6. Discrete Universal Spaces
II.7. Karnaugh Maps and Finnish Vowels
II.8. American English Vowels
II.9. Other Spaces -- Stanford Phonology Archive
II.10. Binarity and Simplicity
III: COMPOUND VOWELS, DIPTHONGS, AND VECTORS
III.1. Vector Spaces and Phonemes
III.2. Time Domain Compositions -- Dipthongs and Glides
III.3. Dipthong = Vowel + Vowel
III.4. Dipthong = Vowel + Semivowel
III.5. Vectors and Dependency Phonology
III.6. Trubetzkoy and Stevens
III.7. Nonorthogonality of Features and Fant
IV: SPECTRAL DOMAIN DESCRIPTIONS
IV.1. Time-domain Signals
IV.2. Frequency Domain Descriptions
IV.3. Power Spectrum, Noise, and Autocorrelation
IV.4. Source and Filter
IV.5. Formant Functions and Approximations
IV.6 Dipthongs and Glides
IV.7. Compound Vowels
IV.8. Orthographic Projection of the Vocalic Phonemes of a Generic Language
IV.9. Formant Functions Again
IV.10. Formant Plots and Their Description
IV.11. Summary of Results
IV.12. Further Refinements of the Method
IV.13. The Formant Plots
IV.14. Nonlinearity, Quantality, and Catastrophe Theory
IV.15. Nonlinear Differential Equations and Quantality in Phonetics
Appendix IV.A: Fourier Analysis; Appendix IV.B: Convolution, Correlation, Spectral Density; Appendix IV.C Ordinary Linear Differential Equations; Appendix IV.D Orthogonal Functions; Appendix IV.E: Other Normalizations; Appendix IV.F Exponential Formant Approximations.
V: 3-D VECTOR PHASE SPACE FOR SPEECH
V.1. Properties of Consonants
V.2. Towards a Space
V.3. Consonant Vector Space
V.4. Dimensional Analysis and Buckingham Pi Theorem
V.5. Natural Groupings
V.6. Path Integrals and Minimization
V.7. Acoustic and Auditory Correlates in the Phase Space
V.8. Phones, Phonemes and Allophones
V.9. Sonority, Lenition, Fortition
V.10. Child Language Development and Aphasia
V.11. Vowels in Phase Space
V.12. Distance and Birth of New Phonemes
V.13. Experimental Evidence from Dipthongs
V.14. Implications for Phonological Space
V.15. The Ordinal Vowel Cube
V.16. Sonority Scales
V.17. Vector Representation
V.18. Dynamic Stochastic Processes and Speech Realization
V.19. Forced Binary Discrimination Tests and Probability Theory
V.20. The Ambiguity Function: Another Interpretation
V.21. Entropy, Uncertainty, and Information Theory
V.22. Fuzzy Sets and Catastrophe Theory
V.23. Fuzzy Functions for Multiple Discriminations along a Single Stimulus
V.24. Binary Discriminations for Multiple Stimuli and Stochastic Proceses
VI: UPPER-LEVEL DISTANCE METRICS
VI.1. Consonant Clusters
VI.2. Turkish Vowel Harmony
VI.3. Grammar for Transitions
VI.4. Turkish Syllabification
VI.5. Word Level Measures
VI.6. Topology of Vowel Spaces of Languages Examples from Arabic, English, Chinese, French,German, Italian, Latin, Sanskrit, Irish and Tamil
VI.7. Word Formation Rules and Borrowing
VI.8. Residues of Languages and Distance Functions--Sprachbunde and Sprachfamilien.
VI.9. Propagation, Waves and Diffusion of Innovation
VI.10. Semitic Word Formation Examples
VII: MULTIDIMENSIONAL INHERITANCE
VII.0. Introduction
VII.1. Temporal and Spatial Scaling
VII.2. Time Complexity vs Space Complexity -- Compute vs Memory Bound Processes
VII.3. Order of Magnitude and Complexity
VII.4. Intensive and Extensive Parameters
VII.5. Measurement Scales: Absolute and Relative Measures
VII.6. Stability, Relaxation Time and Correlation Time
VII.7. Process vs State
VII.8. Open Systems vs Closed Systems
VII.9. Time Scales and Linguistics
VII.10 Word Orders and Artificial Non-natural Languages
VII.11. Prehistoric Times and Language
VII.12. Change: Is it infinite ?
VII.13. Family Trees
VII.14. Distance Functions
VII.15. Matching Lexemes and Semantemes
VII.16. Dynamic Stochastic Processes and Language
VII.17. Summary
Appendix VII.A Cognates or Not; Appendix VII.B: Differential Equations Initial Value Problems, Stability and Equilibrium, Static vs Dynamic Equilibrium (Steady State) Appendix VII.C Stochastic Processes; Randomness, Mass and Density Functions, Averaging, Stochastic Differential Equations, Stationarity
VIII: PHONOLOGY, MORPHOLOGY, AND SYNTAX
VIII.0. Modularity
VIII.1. Upper Level Syntactic Structure of the World's Languages
VIII.2. Permutations, Reflections, and Rotations
VIII.3. Same Set Permutations
VIII.4. Tree Traversals and Permutation Groups
VIII.5. Phonology and Morphology
VIII.6. Postfixing Morphology and Morphophonology
VIII.7. Premorphing Languages and Phonology
VIII.8. Transformational Grammar and the H-operators
VIII.9. Infixing and Erase and Replace
VIII.10.Combined Inmorphing and Endmorphing
VII.11. Indonesian and German
VIII.12.Simplicity Metric
Appendix VIII.A: String Quasi-Algebra
IX: SYNTACTIC AND SEMANTIC STRUCTURE OF NEAR NATURAL LANGUAGES
IX.1. Prologue
IX.2. Graphs
IX.3. Binary Trees and Their Growth Patterns
IX.4. Trees and Tree Traversals
IX.5. Operands, Operators and Operations
IX.6. Formal Language Theory
IX.7. Another Kind of Space for Sentences

ISBN 9783895866395. LINCOM Handbooks in Linguistics 09. 450pp.1999.

Mathematical Foundations of Linguistics

H. Mark Hubey
Montclair State University

Only a few decades ago, only mathematicians, physicists and engineers took calculus courses, and calculus was tailored for them using examples from physics. This made it difficult for students from the life sciences including biology, economics, and psychology to learn mathematics. Recently books using examples from the life sciences and economics have become more popular for such students. Such a math book does not exist for linguists. Even the computational linguistics books (Formal Language Theory) are written for mathematicians and computer scientists.

This book is for linguists. It is intended to teach the required math for a student to be a scientific linguist and to make linguistics a science on par with economics, and computer science.

There are many concepts that are central to the sciences. Most students never see these in one place and if they do, they have to wait until graduate school to obtain them in the often-dreaded "quantitative" courses. As a result sometimes it takes years or even decades before learners are able to integrate what they have learned into a whole, if ever. We have little time and much to do.

In addition to all of these problems we are now awash in data and information. It is now that the general public should be made aware of the solution to all of these problems. The answer is obviously "knowledge compression". Knowledge is structured information; it is a system not merely a collection of interesting facts.

What this book does, and what all other math books do is teach people the tools with which they can structure and thus compress information and knowledge around them. It has also been said that mathematics is the science of patterns; it is exactly by finding such patterns that we compress knowledge. We can say that mathematics is the science of knowledge compression or information compression.

This book provides the basic tools for mathematics (even including a short and intuitive explanation of differential and integral calculus). The broad areas of linguistics, probability theory, speech synthesis, speech recognition, computational linguistics (formal languages and machines), historical linguistics require mathematics of counting/combinatorics, Bayesian theory, correlation-regression analysis, stochastic processes, differential equations, vectors/tensors. These in turn are based on set theory, logic, measurement theory, graph theory, algebra, Boolean algebra, harmonic analysis etc.

The mathematical fields introduced here are all common ideas from one which one can branch off into more advanced study in any of these fields thus this book brings together ideas from many disparate fields of mathematics which would not normally be put together into a single course. This is what makes this a book especially written for linguists.

Table of Contents:

1. Generic Building Blocks
Layering
Numerals, Multiplication, Constants and Variables
Summation--Gauss
Zeno's Paradox and Euler
Continuous Products
Decision Trees, Prisoner's Dilemma
CPM/PERT Methods
2. Symbolic Computation, Iteration and Recursion
Algorithmic Definition of Integers
Parallel and Serial Choices
Multiplicative vs. Additive Intelligence
Strong vs. Long Chain Trade-off
Recursion/Iteration and Solution of a Nonlinear Equation
Programming Charts
Learning Iteration
Frequency vs. Wavelength
3. Basic Counting and Reasoning Principles
Product, Series
Logical-AND Rule
4. Hazards of Doing Science
Dimensionless Numbers
Mass vs. Surface Area
5. Normalization
Grade Normalization, Boxing Normalization
Extensive vs. Intensive Variables
Gymnastics & Diving
Boyle's Law and Charles's Law
Color Space & Vectors
Torque
Brain and Body Mass
6. Accuracy and Precision
Significant Digits
Paleontology
7. Reliability and Validity
Ratio Scale
Distance
Hamming Distance
Phonological Distance -- Distinctive Features
Vowels and Consonants- Ordinal Cube
What's a Bird?
Interval Scale
Temperature Scale
Ordinal Scale
Likert Scale
Nominal Scale
Sets, and Categorization
8. Sets: An Introduction
Languages
Cardinality, Empty Set
Union, Intersection, Partition, Power Set, Complement, Difference
Characteristic Bitstrings (functions)
9. Graphs: An Introduction
Subgraphs, Unions & Intersections of Graphs
Graph Representation: Incidence, Adjacency, Degree, Paths, Digraphs
Hypercubes, Complete Graphs, Bipartite Graphs
Multiple Comparisons of Historical Linguistics
Representation: Incidence and Adjacency
Matrices
Euler Circuits
10. Objects & Spaces
Cartesian Products, Vectors, Matrices, Tensors
Matrix Multiplication
Zero-One Matrices, Toeplitz matrices
Markov Matrices, Leontieff Matrices, Phonotactics Matrices
Rotation Matrices of Computer Graphics
Sonority Scale and Vectors
Venn Diagrams (Set Independence?)
11. Algebra: How many kinds are there?
Arithmetic
Language Capability
Substitutes and complements
Intelligence Theory and Testing
12. Boolean algebra
Infinity Arithmetic
Electrical Circuits and Infinity
Parallel Circuits vs. Series Circuits
XOR, EQ
Representation of Integers
Hamming Distance and XOR
Phoneme Maps
13. Propositional Logic
Implication
Hempel's Raven paradox
Paradoxes of Logic
Rules of Inference
Fallacies
Integers: Division Algorithm
Divisibility
Fundamental Theorem of Arithmetic
gcd, and lcm
Mod, Div, and All that (methods of proof)
Congruence Mod m
Pseudo-Random Number Generators
Caesar Cipher, ROT13, Comparative Method
Fuzzy Logic
Appendix: Axiomatizations of Logic
14. Quantification
Syllogisms
Continuous Products & Continuous Sums
Predicates
Quantification of Two Variables
Mathematical Induction
Time-Space Super-Liar Paradox
15. Relations
Reflexive, Symmetric, Anti-symmetric, Transitive relations
Representation of Relations
Set-theoretic representation
Matrix-representation
Graph-theoretic representation
16. Boolean Matrices and Relations
Composition of Relations--associative operation
Powers of Matrices of Relations
Equivalence Relation
Inverses
Operators and Operands (see Section 26: Operator Theory)
17. Partially Ordered Sets: partitions
Hasse Diagrams -- prerequisite structure of this book
Lattices, Subsets
18. Functions, Graphs, Vectors
One-to-One Functions
Onto Functions
One-to-one correspondence
Function Inverse
Graph Isomorphism
Minimal Spanning Trees
Family Trees
Cladistics
Genetic Tree of Indo-European Languages and Isoglosses
Vector Functions
Distances on Vectors, Weighted Distances
Intelligence Measurement
Systems of Equations -- Algebraic Modeling
19. Asymptotic Analysis and Limits
Big-O notation
20. Fuzzy Logic
Axioms
Invariants of Logic
Continuous Logics
Generalized Idempotent and Continuous Max-Min Operators
21. Counting Principles
Pigeonhole Principle
Sound Changes
Permutations
Combinations
Words, Subsets, Sentences, Constrained Sentences
Queues, Books, Phonotactics, Length constraints
Distributing Objects to Containers
Vervet Languages
Distribution of Meanings
Pascal's Identity, Vandermonde's Identity, Binomial Theorem
Inclusion-Exclusion Theorem
False Cognacy Problem
22. Induction, Recursion, Summation
23. Recurrence, Iteration, Counting
Linear homogeneous first-order difference equation
Fibonacci Series
False Cognacy Problem
Coupled Difference Equations
Bitstrings and Polynomials
Polya's Method of Counting
24. Formal Language Theory
Real Human Languages
Finite State Automata and Regular Languages
Context-Free Languages
Context-Sensitive Languages and Natural Languages
25. Simple Calculus
Rates
Integration from Summation
26. Probability Fundamentals
Addition Theorem
Multiplication Theorem
Independence And Conditional Probability
27. Discrete Probability Theory from Counting
28. Bayes Theorem
29. Operator Theory (see Chapter 17)
Linear Operators
Commutativity
Integration and Differentiation
30. Statistics
Histogram
Correlation-Regression
31. Expectation Operator & Density Functions
Expectation and Moments
32. Discrete Probability Functions (Mass Functions)
Uniform
Geometric - Bernoulli
Binomial
Hypergeometric
Poisson
Birthday Problem
33. Continuous Probability Density Functions
Uniform
Exponential
Gamma Density and Chi-Square Density
Gaussian Density and the Central Limit Theorem
34. Joint and Marginal Density Functions
35. Stochastic Processes
Stationarity
Markov Processes
Chapman-Kolmogorov Equations
Speech Recognition
Random Walk
36. Harmonic Analysis
Delta function
Fourier Series and Fourier Transform
37. Differential Equations, Green's Function and the Convolution Integral
Complete solution of the First Order Linear DE
Carbon Dating
Menzerath's Law
Altmann's Law
Damped Harmonic Oscillator
38. Time and Ensemble Moments - Stationarity and Ergodicity
Stationarity
Ensemble Correlation Functions
Time Averages and Ergodicity
39. Characteristic Functions, Moments and Cumulants
40. Stochastic Response of Linear Systems
Example of Word Production in a Language
Stochastic Excitation of the DHO
41. Fokker-Planck- Kolmogorov Methods
Generalization of the Random Walk
Replacement of a General Process by a Markov Process
Appendices; Calculation of some integrals; References.

ISBN 9783895866418. LINCOM Handbooks in Linguistics 10. 260pp.1999.

A Manual of Linguistic Field Work and Indian Language Structures

Anvita Abbi
Center of Linguistics and English, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi
& Max Planck Institute of Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig, Germany

This is a manual on linguistic field methodology with special reference to Indian language structures. It covers all that one needs to know about eliciting data from native speaker informants of South Asian languages. The book contains step by step information about collection, collation, analysis, description, presentation and explanation of linguistic data. The author has drawn a large number of first-hand collected examples from lesser-known and 'tribal' languages of India to expose the readers to the variety and diversity of linguistic data available in the subcontinent. In addition to the discussion on elicitation on phonological, morphological, syntactic, semantic and sociolinguistic information, the author has discussed the linguistic characteristic features of each language family of India. The book makes the reader aware of areal features of the languages under consideration and the contact phenomena to facilitate fieldwork. Each topic is followed by the 'elicitation tips' and interrogation techniques for the field worker as well as practical issues, problems and solutions as regards collection of data. Sets of questionnaires on commonly investigated topics are included in the 'appendix' to facilitate field worker to come to grips with the theoretical and structural aspects of languages in general and Indian languages in specific. Numerous figures, maps and tables.

Table of Contents: 

1 Linguistic Fieldwork and the Indian Scene 
1.1 All about Linguistic Field Research
1.1.1 Field Linguistics as an Input System to other fields 
1.1.2 What does it involve? 
1.1.3 Participatory in character 
1.1.4 Theory independent 
1.2 The Composition of the Language Scene in India
1.2.1. The Constitution 
1.2.2. The Minority languages 
1.3 The Hierarchical Structure of Indian Society 
1.4 Bilingualism and Indian Society 
1.4.1 The Rural Scene 
1.4.2 The Urban Scene 
1.4.3 Mahanagar (The Cosmopolitan cities of India) 
1.4.4 Bilingualism and Education 
1.4.5 Language Loyalty, Language Shift And Language Adoption 
1.5. The Contact Languages of India 
1.5.1 All India 
1.5.2 Our field experience 
1.5.3 Other Studies 

2 Indian languages and India as a Linguistic Area
2.1 Individual Language Features
2.1.1 Indo-Aryan
2.1.2 Dravidian
2.1.3 Austro-Asiatic
2.1.4 Tibeto-Burman
2.1.5 Andamanese
2.2 Areal Typology of Indian Languages
2.2.1 Sound System
2.2.2 Morphology 
2.2.3 Syntax and Semantics
2.2.4 Discourse Strategies
3 The Preparation

3.0 The first Stage 
3.1. Budgeting and reservation 
3.1.l Travel 
3.1.2 Board and Lodging 
3.1.3 Remuneration for the Informants 
3.1.4 Communication Network charges 
3.1.5 Stationary 
3.1.6 Equipment and Accessories 
3.1.7 Data Processing 
3.1.8 Word Processing/Typing 
3.1.9 Reprographic Services/Xeroxing 
3.1.10 Printing 
3.1.11 Books and Journals 
3.1.12 Contingencies 
3.1.13 Overheads 
3.2 Your Luggage 
3.2.1 Materials to Take Along 
3.2.2 Dress Code 
3.3 Ethnic, Linguistic, Social, Political and Economic Status of The Informants/Area to be studied 
3.3.1 Literature study 
3.3.2 Ethnology 
3.3.3 Language study in big cities 
3.4 Field Work in the Class room 
3.5 Preparation of the Questionnaire 
3.5.1 Goals should be clear 
3.5.2 Each questionnaire should be numbered. 
3.5.3 Language of the Questionnaire 
3.5.4 Length of the questionnaire 
3.5.5 Information regarding the informant 
3.6 Contacts in the field 
3.7 The Second Stage: In the field 
3.7.1 What Language to Use for Eliciting Data? 
3.8 Choosing Informants 
3.8.1 Begin at School 
3.8.2 Avoid a Language Teacher 
3.8.3. Choose Both Male and Female Informants 
3.8.4. Choose All Age Groups But Not Below Twelve 
3.8.5. Choose All Sections of the Stratified Society 
3.8.6 One Willing Informant is Better Than Ten Unwilling Ones 
3.9 The Role of the Interpreter 
3.10 Your Own Behaviour in the Field 
3.10.1 The Investigator 
3.11 Being a woman is a Blessing 

4 Elicitation 
4.1. Various Methods 
4.1.1 Observation Method 
4.1.2 Interview Method 
4.1.3 Sending Questionnaire Method 
4.1.4 Documentary Source Method 
4.2 Interviewing Informants 
4.3 Interrogation Techniques 
4.3.1 Translation 
4.3.2 Contact Language 
4.3.3 Pictorial Representation 
4.3.4 Substitution Interrogation 
4.3.5 Associative Interrogation 
4.3.6 Paraphrase 
4.3.7 Cross Interrogation 
4.3.8 Stimulus Interrogation 
4.3.9 Examples and Illustrations 
4.4 Transcription 
4.4.1 Narrow or Broad 
4.4.2 IPA or American 
4.5 Data Collection: Various Stages 
4.5.1 Stage I: Basic Word List 
4.5.2 Stage II: 400 Word List 
4.5.3 Stage III: Small Phrases 
4.6. Morphological Topics 
4.7. Dichotomy between Noun and Verb 

5 Word formation Processes
5.0 General Remarks 
5.1 Mostly Inflection 
5.1.1 Noun Morphology 
5.1.2 Pronoun Morphology 
5.1.3 Case Markings and Postpositions 
5.1.4 Morphology of Adjectives 
5.1.5 Stage IV: Simple Sentences 
5.1.6 Morphology and Syntax of Adverbs 
5.1.7 Verb Morphology 
5.1.8 Stage V: Complex Sentences 
5.2 Derivation 
5.2.1 Particle –wala 
5.2.2 Morphological Causatives 
5.3 Reduplication 
5.3.1 Morphological 
5.3.2 Lexical 
5.4 Compounds 
5.4.1 Endocentric 
5.4.2 Exocentric 
5.4.3 Appositional or Associative 

6 Language Aspects
6.0 Introduction 
6.1 Inquiring into Syntax, Semantics Pragmatics and Sociolinguistics 
6.2 Word Order Typology 
6.2.1 Characteristic Features of SOV 
6.3 Topic and Focus 
6.4 Interrogation 
6.5 Negation 
6.5.1 Salient Features 
6.5.2 Negative Verbs 
6.5.3 Deletion 
6.5.4 Scope of Negation 
6.5.5 Other Related Features 
6.6 Complex Predicates 
6.7 Explicator Compound Verbs 
6.7.1 Aspectual
6.7.2 Adverbial
6.7.3 Attitudinal
6.8 Dative Subjects
6.8.1 Experiential
6.8.2 Non Experiential
6.8.3 Subject properties
6.9 Complementation
6.9.1 Types of Complements
6.10 Converbs/Conjunctive Participles
6.10.1 Semantic Features
6.10.2 Clause Chaining
6.11 Anaphora
6.11.1 Definition
6.11.2 Reflexives
6.11.3 Emphatic
6.11.4 Reciprocals
6.12 Coordination
6.12.1 Conjunctive
6.12.2 Disjunctive
6.12.3 Adversative/Contrastive
6.12.4 Causal
6.13 Kinship Terms
6.13.1 Non-Affinal
6.13.2 Affinal 
6.14 Forms of Address and Reference
6.15 Politeness Strategies
6.16 Domain Analysis
6.17 Language Shift, Retention and Death

Appendices
This will include various charts, blank phono-logical and morphological tables and different questionnaires mentioned in the text. It will include among others the following:
 

• Basic Word List of 400 Words
• Basic Sentences
• IPA Phonetic Chart For Vowels and Consonants
• Blank Chart For Vowels And Consonants
• Basic Syntactic And Morphological Information
• Questionnaire on Word Order
• Questionnaire on Negation
• Questionnaire on Interrogation
• Questionnaire on Complementation
• Questionnaire on Compound Verbs
• Questionnaire on Dative Subjects
• Questionnaire on Reduplication
• Questionnaire on Tense, Aspect and Mood
• Questionnaire on Domain Analysis
• Questionnaire on Language Shift, Retention And Death
• Questionnaire on Testing Acceptability Level of A Language


• ISBN 9783895864018. LINCOM Handbooks in Linguistics 17. 360p. 2001.