A Grammar of the Brahui Language in Comparative Treatment

Mikhail S. Andronov
Institute of Oriental Studies,
The Russian Academy of Sciences

The Brahui language, spoken by some 1.5 million people in Pakistan, Iran and Afghanistan, is the earliest offshoot of the Dravidian stock. Isolated from the kindred languages for several thousand years, it combines ancient features inherited from the Proto-Dravidian ancestor with numerous borrowings from its Iranian and Indo-Aryan neighbours.

Apart from a detailed practical grammar, illustrated with copious examples from Brahui literary texts, the book offers the latest comparative-historical information on the evolution and origin of the main elements of the language. The Brahui phonemes are traced to their Old Dravidian sources, the origins of case suffixes and other nominal desinences are expounded, the Brahui numerals and pronouns are also traced to their ancient archetypes, and so are the personal suffixes in the verb. The primary systems of gender, tense and mood, lost or modified in the contemporary language, are reconstructed in comparison with these of Old Tamil and other classical languages.

The general information on Brahui is given in the Introduction. The history of its study is also briefly outlined there and, in particular, the position of Brahui within the Dravidian family is discussed. A bibliography of earlier works on the Brahui language is appended in the end. The subject index will make the use of the book easier.

[Original and unabridged version, set with a typewriter].

ISBN 9783895864124. LINCOM Language Research 01. 100pp. 2001.

Dravidian Historical Linguistics

Mikhail S. Andronov
Institute of Oriental Studies,
The Russian Academy of Sciences

The book is composed of papers dealing with controversial problems in the history and comparative grammar of the Dravidian languages. A historical overview of Dravidian studies in the 19th and 20th centuries is followed by a detailed discussion of various systems of language classification worked out by leading comparativists in the past two centuries. The major principles of the comparative-historical method are discussed in connection with unceasing attempts to establish genetic relationship between Dravidian and non-Dravidian languages.

The origin and historical evolution ot finite forms of the Dravidian verb are dealt with in several papers, and those of the adjective in Tamil and personal pronouns in Brahui are traced in the other two. A peculiar case of grammar hybridization in Old Malayalam mixed with Sanskrit and cases of structural borrowing in modern Dravidian languages are described and analysed in three papers. Finally, the etymologies of the word 'Dravidian' and a dozen of other ethnonyms are explained. A bibliography of over 300 items indicates the relevant literature, both classical and modern.

[Original and unabridged version, set with a typewriter].

ISBN 9783895864131. LINCOM Language Research 02. 160pp.

A Comparative Grammar of the Dravidian Languages

M.S. Andronov
Institute of Oriental Studies, Moscow

A decisive role played by the Dravidian component in the linguistic history of South Asia, makes the historical study of the Dravidian languages one of the primary tasks of modern South Asian linguistics. Information on the Dravidian language structure at the earliest stage of existence as well as on the course of its development in subsequent periods has become indispensable for the understanding of many fundamental aspects of the evolution of Indo-Aryan, Munda and other languages spoken in this area, not to mention the internal history of the Dravidian family itself.

Modern linguistics operates with data from twenty-six Dravidian languages, viz., Tamil, Malayalam, Kasaba, Kurru, Kota, Toda, Kodagii, Kannada, Kuruba, Tulu, Koraga, Bellari, Telugu, Kolami, Naiki, Parji, Gadaba, Gondi, Konda, Pengo, Manda, Kul, Kuvi, Kurukh, Malto and Brahui. In the absence of a definite boundary between the notions of language and dialect some of the South Dravidian tribal dialects are occasionally treated as independent languages in literature. It seems, however, that there are no sufficient grounds for it as peculiarities of such dialects do not generally exceed dialectisms found elsewhere. Therefore tribal dialects retain their original status in this edition of Comparative Grammar. At the same time there is no confidence that all languages of the Dravidian family have already been discovered and their list will not be expanded in the future.

Dravidian comparative studies have a 140-year-old history. The multiplicity and diversity of collected facts, the complicacy of raised problems and the discrepancy between their conflicting interpretations, on the one hand, and the necessity to restrict the extent of the study to the limits of this book, on the other, called for a careful selection of the material to be examined here.

The work on this book has a long history. Its preliminary stage started in the early fifties when the author studied Bengali, Hindi and especially Tamil at the Moscow Institute of Oriental Studies and, later, at the Tamil Department, University of Madras. The creative part of the work was accomplished in the Institute of Oriental Studies, the Russian Academy of Sgiences, which in 1978 and 1994 brought out two editions of the book in Russian. The present edition incorporates numerous additions and amendments made in the text in the process of its translation.

Contents:

Preface
Abbreviations
Introduction
1. Phonetics
1.1. Phones and phonemes
1.2. Historical development of sounds
1.3. Phonetic correspondences
1.4. Phonetic processes
1.5. Dravidian root structure
2. Morphology
2.1. Nouns
2.2. Numerals
2.3. Pronouns
2.4. Personal nouns
2.5. Adjectives
2.6. Verbs
2.7. Adverbs
2.8. Imitative words
2.9. Echo-words
2.10. Particles
2.11. Postpositions
2.12. Conjunctions
2.13. Interjections
3. Proto-Dravidian Language
4. Bibliographical references
5. Indexes

ISBN 9783895867057. LINCOM Language Research 03. 342 pp. 2003.

A Reference Grammar of the Tamil Language

Mikhail S. Andronov
The Russian Academy of Sciences, Institute of Oriental Studies

Tamil belongs to the Dravidian family of languages, where it is rightfully regarded as their most ancient and typical representative. The number of speakers, which exceeds 70 million, makes Tamil one of the major languages of the world. The groat bulk of Tamils (approx. 90 per cent) live in South India, where Tamil is an official language of Tamilnadu. A few millions of Tamils live in Sri Lanka, mostly in its northern and eastern areas. Tamils also form a sizable portion of the population in South East Asian countries, primarily Malaysia (nearly 1 million), Indonesia (0.5 mill.). Nyanmar (0.2 mill.) and Singapore (0.2 mill.). Many hundred thousand Tamils reside in South Africa, Mauritius and elsewhere. As a second language Tamil is regularly used by tribesmen of Tamilnadu and other Indian bilinguals (ca 4 mill.).

The written history of the Tamil language is known for nearly twenty-two centuries: the earliest specimens of writing Tamil date back to the 2nd century B.C. The earliest extant monuments of Tamil poetry belong to the last quarter of the 1st century A.D. Yet there are evident signs of a long literary tradition that must have preceded their appearance.

CONTENTS: The grammar includes chapters on: Orthography and Orthoepy - Morphology (Nouns - Numerals - Pronouns - Personal nouns - Adjectives - Verbs - Adverbs - ParticlLLR 04: A Reference Grammar of the Tamil Language es - Imitative words - Echo-words - Interjections) - Syntax (Simple sentnce (Subject - Predicate - Agreement between subject and predicate - Attribute - Object - Adverbial modifiers - Homogeneous parts of the sentence - Word order - Inversion - Mononuclear sentences - Incomplete sentences), Composite sentence (Complex sentences - Compound sentences - Parenthetical sentences)). It concludes with an index of sandhi transmutations, an index of inflexions, and References.

The grammar is an unchanged reprint of the English edition (published in Moscow (2003)).

ISBN 9783895868382. LINCOM Language Research 04. 470pp. 2005.

The Phonetics of Nigerian Languages

Clara Ikekeonwu
University of Nigeria, Nsukka

This book presents the sound structure of seven Nigerian languages – Hausa, Igbo, Yoruba, Igala, Efik, Fulfulde and Idoma. The first chapter presents a critical review of the linguistic situation in Nigeria which has an estimated over three hundred and fifty (350) languages with each language representing, as it were, a distinct ethnic group. Chapters two and three handle the issues of speech apparatus and airstream mechanisms respectively. While giving a review of the basic principles and practice associated with the study of phonetics, it also underpins the theoretical framework of the work which leans heavily on linguistic phonetics as enunciated and discussed in Ladefoged, 1971, 1982, 2005 and Maddieson, 1984.

Chapter four discusses phonation especially as it manifests in the languages studied. Chapter five identifies, classifies and discusses the segments – consonants and vowels – used in the languages indicating their combinatory possibilities and aspects of the prosody of these languages. Chapter six investigates patterns of intersegmental co-ordination in the languages while chapter seven details aspects of interference exhibited in the languages especially with regards to the English language which is still used, alongside Hausa, Igbo and Yoruba, as the official language in the country. Chapter eight has the translation of a passage in English ‘the harmattan’ into four of the languages studied. Phonemic transcriptions of the passage are provided as well.

ISBN 9783895867798. LINCOM Language Research 05. 80pp. 2007.

An Introduction to Minoan Linear A

John Marangozis
Professor Emeritus, National Technical University of Athens

This work is a study of the Minoan Linear A language, i.e. the language of Minoan Crete in the Bronze Age. The Linear A materials and data which have been available for examination is composed of only 1400 inscribed clay tablets or fragments, and some stone and metallic objects. The method used in the examination and review of each inscription is the scrutiny of the message each conveyed and the qualitative and quantitative information given, its comparison with other relevant inscriptions, its logical interpretation and correlation, the conclusions allowed to be drawn, and the problems that may be resulting or counter arguments which may have to be contemplated.

The Linear A syllabary, revised and enriched, was compared to the Luwian hieroglyphic signs; 15 out of 78 signs have a Luwian counterpart; thus no claim of complete similarity can be made. The Linear A glossary contains about 1025 whole or broken words. Most of them are not understood yet. Among those which are understood, 45 words have a Luwian counterpart. Inscriptions on votive offerings are dedications to divinities, like to goddess A.SA.SA.RA (the Madonna of the Luwians) or to DA.MA.TE (the Earth Mother or Demeter). The Linear A Glossary reveals a glossary of terms in food and agricultural products, on metals, vessels and artefacts and on a number of place names and personal names. Most of the technical words were terms borrowed from Sumerian, Semitic or Akkadian languages.

The Hagia Triada tablets are a wealth of information on many subjects. There is a series of tablets relating to Minoan religious sanctuaries dedicated to Adu, Tinita and Akaru, indicating the worship in Crete of deities from the Syropalestinian coast. Large quantities of wheat, wine and oil, also of seeds and figs were delivered to these sanctuaries. The Phaistos Disk was continued to be read as a Luwian hieroglyphic document and the information obtained was critically analysed for internal consistency.

ISBN 9783895863868. LINCOM Language Research 06. 150pp. 2007.

The Kui Language

Mikhail S. Andronov

Kui is a nonliterary tribal language spoken by more than six hundred thousand people in the valley of the river Mahanadi in the Indian state of Orissa and in some areas of the neighboring Andhra Pradesh state. Most Kui speakers are hunters, fishermen and collectors. Some of them, however, practise agriculture and some work as plantation labourers in Assam and West Bengal.

The Kui language belongs to the northern group of the Dravidian language family. Its speakers call themselves kui (i.e. ‘highlanders’), while their neighbors call them kondho. Many of the Kui people are bilingual, their second language being Oriya. This fact accounts for the strong Oriya influence on Kui. In the past some Kui primers were published in the Roman and Oriya script, but they didn’t become popular, and the language is still unwritten. The present book contains a sketch of Kui phonetics and morphology (written in Russian).

ISBN 9783895865961. LINCOM Language Research 07. 29pp. 2009.

Punjabi Intonation:  An Experimental Study

Chander Shekhar Singh
University of Delhi

The concept of intonation covers a remarkably wide domain, embracing aspects of the speech technology, speech pathology and language teaching. These are the domains where intonation or its analysis has a crucial role. The present study demonstrates clearly the different aspects of intonation in Punjabi language by taking into consideration the three types of sentences- declarative, imperative and interrogative.

What is new about this work is that it not only includes the acoustic parameters to measure intonation patterns in Punjabi language but also provides the phonological assumptions of intonation in the language. This study implicates that any research on intonation patterns should obtain evidence through instrumental investigation and statistical processing for the refinement of the results. This work maintains a scientific approach, i.e., investigation and asks other investigators to perform new operations on intonation. Seen in this light, the present work is an attempt to connect the phonetics and phonology in a way that experimental phoneticians propagate the theoretical assumptions and implications of their work, and that phonologists deal with empirical methods for cultivating evidences.

ISBN 9783862885558. LINCOM Language Research 08. 280pp. 2014.

L’harmonie vocalique dans les langues du Senegal

Dame Ndao
Université Cheikh Anta Diop de Dakar-Sénégal

Il existe dans les langues du Sénégal, une contrainte de similarité ou d’assimilation régulière qui peut jouer sur plusieurs voyelles d’un même mot. Le choix d’une ou de plusieurs voyelles dans une position donnée n’est pas libre, mais il est déterminé par l’harmonie vocalique. Elle peut avoir comme fondement des traits ou des critères et des corrélations articulatoires et acoustiques tels que l’aperture (voyelles fermées / voyelles ouvertes), la tension (voyelles tendues / voyelles lâches) et l’ATR (avancée/recul de la racine de la langue).

Dans l’optique d’une meilleur connaissance du fonctionnement de l’harmonie vocalique, nous présentons dans ce travail, les règles de l’impossibilité de deux groupes de voyelles de coexister dans un mots et de rendre compte des problèmes de l’application de ces règles. Nous présentons d’une part les fonctions phonologiques et morphophonologiques de l’harmonie vocalique. D’autre part, nous examinons quelques aspects acoustiques des contrastes qualitatifs des deux groupes. Dans cette réflexion, nous donnons des indications sur quelques-unes des langues du Sénégal et en particulier le wolof avec ses variétés locales.

ISBN 9783862885893. LINCOM Language Research 09. 109pp. 2014.