Shekhawati

Lakhan Gusain
Centre of Rajasthani Studies, Purabsar

Shekhawati is a dialect of Rajasthani language of Indo-Aryan family and is spoken by about three million speakers in Churu, Jhunjhunu and Sikar districts of Rajasthan. Though a very important dialect from the grammatical and literary points of view, yet very little work is carried out on it.

This grammar describes basic information on the phonology, morphology, syntax of the language. In addition there is a short text with interlinear tranlation. The introduction remarks outline a geographic and sociolinguistic sketch of the Shekhawati and its speakers, linguistic relations with other dialects of Rajasthani. The chapter on phonology includes vowels, consonants, diphthongs and suprasegmentals. The murmur vowels are highlighted. Retroflexion is an important feature. The chapter on morphology describes nominal and verbal morphology. There are two numbers, two genders, and three cases. Nouns are declined to their final segments. Case marking is postpositional. The third person pronouns are distinguished on the proximity/remoteness dimension in each gender. Adjectives either end in /-o/ or not. There are three tenses and four moods. Intransitive verbs can be passivised. The chapter on syntax describes sentence types, word order, coordination, subordination, and particles. Free and interlinear translations are used in the chapter of sample text.

ISBN 9783895863998. Languages of the World/Materials 385. 88pp. 2001.

Mewati

Lakhan Gusain
University of Michigan, Ann Arbor

Mewati, a dialect of Rajasthani language of Indo-Aryan family, is spoken by about five million speakers in Alwar, Bharatpur and Dholpur districts of Rajasthan, and Faridabad and Gurgaon districts of Haryana states of India. Extensive linguistic research work has not carried out on this dialect so far. It had contributed profoundly to Rajasthani literature in medieval periods.
This grammar includes chapters on phonology, morphology, syntax, and sample texts. The introductory section includes information on Mewati, its speakers, and geographic and sociolinguistic data on Mewati and its subdialects. There are 9 vowels, 31 consonants, and 2 diphthongs. Suprasegmentals are not so prominent as they are in the other dialects of Rajasthani. There are two numbers--singular and plural, two genders--masculine and feminine; and three cases--direct, oblique, and vocative. The nouns decline according to their final segments. Case marking is postpositional. Pronouns are traditional in nature and are inflected for number and case. Gender is not distinguished in pronouns. Two types of adjectives are there. There are three tenses--past, present, and future. Participles function as adjectives. Sentence types, word order, coordination, subordination, and particles have been described analytically. The chapter sample texts presents free and interlinear translations of some selected texts.

ISBN 9783895864001. Languages of the World/Materials 386. 88pp. 2003.

A Short Grammar of Tetun Dili

Catharina Williams-van Klinken, John Hajek & Rachel Nordlinger
University of Melbourne

Tetun has been selected as the national language for the emerging nation of East Timor. It has two main varieties, known within East Timor as Tetun Dili and Tetun Terik. While the latter is a relatively conservative Austronesian language, Tetun Dili shows strong Portuguese influence after centuries of contact.
On the one hand, Tetun Dili has in many respects been simplified relative to Tetun Terik, for instance in having less productive derivational morphology, no subject marking on verbs, and a loss of Tetun consonant clusters such as /kt/. On the other hand the large influx of vocabulary from Portuguese has resulted in new phonological patterns and new models of word formation, while Portuguese influence has also resulted in new possibilities for a number of grammatical constructions, including complementation.
There is large variation within Tetun Dili, in pronunciation, vocabulary, and grammar. The present sketch notes such variation, commenting where possible on the conditions under which each option is preferred, and illustrating this variability in brief texts. The sketch overviews Tetun phonology and morphology before presenting the major grammatical constructions used. Emphasis is on the language as it is spoken in East Timor's capital Dili; nevertheless where constructions used in speech are avoided in writing, this is noted.

ISBN 9783895864292. Languages of the World/Materials 388. 62pp. 2002.

Polish

Ronald Feldstein & Steven Franks
Indiana University, Bloomington

A reference grammar which covers the essential points of Polish phonology, morphology, and syntax. Written to be usable by the general reader, not just the linguistics professional. Phonological information is presented from a combined phonogical and orthographical perspective, in order to introduce the Polish spelling system and its phonological values within a single chapter. Includes Polish minimal pairs and comparisons to English. Morphophonemic alternations are then set up, followed by individual sections on nominal, pronominal, adjectival, and verbal morphology. Verbal morphology is organized on the basis of a new application of the Jakobsonian one-stem system. Individual sections deal with specific semantic topics unfamiliar to English speakers, including verbal aspect, motion verbs, and numerals.

The syntax section deals with general descriptive problems, but should also be of interest to more sophisticated users. Topics covered include issues of case and government, the use of pronominal clitics, the formation of questions and other sentence types, verbal agreement patterns, and verbal categories such as voice, mood, and aspect.

ISBN 9783895864384. Languages of the World/Materials 393. 118pp. 2002.