A Grammar of Doromu-Koki
Robert L. Bradshaw
SIL International, James Cook University
A Grammar of Doromu-Koki covers major features of this formerly minimally described language of Papua New Guinea. This Papuan language, which has been classified as Southeast Manubaran, is spoken by approximately 2,000 speakers. Half reside in the original community area, located in the Owen Stanley ranges to the east-southeast of the capital, Port Moresby, while the remainder are currently living and working there in the capital. This analysis includes culturally appropriate examples from a corpus collected over a period of 18 years. It follows the Basic Linguistic Theory (Dixon 2010a, 2010b and 2012) and The Art of Grammar (Aikhenvald 2015c) framework. The following core aspects of the language studied include: phonology and morphophonology, word classes, complex predicates and verb phrase structure, clause types and structure, clause combining, discourse-pragmatic devices and features of the lexicon. The analysis seeks to promote the preservation of an already endangered language for the benefit of its speakers, and also for linguistic and anthropological scholarship.
Textual examples are supplemented by forty-two interlinearised texts of several genres. Indices further specify details of these texts and any others cited in the analysis. Various interesting lexical items include: homonyms, lexeme senses, verbal semantics, autochthonous versus borrowed synonyms, idioms, borrowed terms and biblical translation key terms. The work concludes with a vocabulary list of all Doromu-Koki words and affixes found therein.
ISBN 9783969392058 (Hardcover). LINCOM Studies in Pacific Languages 01. 754pp. 2024.
