The syllabic structure in the Hmongic language, Hmu (spoken by nearly one million people), is examined, based on the dialect of Hmu spoken in the town of Yanghao in the Southeast Guizhou Miao-Dong Autonomous District of southern China. The discussion is based entirely on data presented by Wang (1979). From the examination, two rules with the…

This collection contains five papers on discourse in a variety of languages. "A Stratificational Perspective on the Discourse Structure of Limos Kalinga" by Hartmut Wiens demonstrates the value of the stratificational model in looking at language in relatively small portions at various levels while also showing how its structural aspects…

In an attempt to determine some of the shared phonological traits among Pueblo Indians of the American Southwest, this paper compares the sound systems of Pueblo languages. The languages within the scope of this research are Zuni, Keresan (Acoma and Santa Ana), and Tanoan (Sandia, Taos, Jemez, and Santa Clara). It is noted that Pueblo Indians have…

An analysis of the phonological phenomenon of "isinkalakahliso" or palatalization in Xhosa, a Bantu language, is presented, focusing on its occurrence in the passive form of verbs. First, earlier theories about the phenomenon are discussed and compared, and a new analysis is offered. It is concluded that this conceptualization of…

A case of corpus cultivation language planning is reported: the 1990 Luso-Brazilian Orthographic Accord for the seven Portuguese-speaking countries discussed here, signed by representatives of all seven countries that have Portuguese as their official language. Socio-historical background is provided about Portuguese standardization and spread,…

A study examines evidence concerning whether Amazonian languages have moved historically from earlier ergative-absolutive systems to nominative-accusative or mixed systems, or whether the change has been in the other direction. The main focus is on the Cariban language family. After a review of relevant literature, data from three of these…

A study examined the presence or absence of the article with proper names for people in the Bible's book of Acts, using four categories of description, including: (1) the unmarked patterns involving the first mention of a participant and further references to the participant in the same incident; (2) the reintroduction of participants after an…

An analysis of pronouns in Proto-Algic, the ancestor of Proto-Algonquian and other languages, revealed that the Proto-Algic demonstrative roots and locatives had three inflectional endings, referring to spatial or temporal distributions of entities, which evolve into the gender systems of Yurok and Algonquian. Proto-Algic had two discourse…

In an anniversary tribute to Paul Diderichsen, this report suggests that the theories and analyses put forth by Diderichsen in 1935 are central to both the general and empirical research on the Germanic languages. Particular emphasis is placed on the proposal to analyze the "verb-second-analysis" phenomenon in Germanic languages.…

The nature of semantic roles and grammatical relations are explored from the perspective of Role and Reference Grammar (RRG). It is proposed that unraveling the relational aspects of grammar involves the recognition that semantic roles fall into two types, thematic relations and macroroles, and that grammatical relations are not universal and are…

This is a questionnaire to be filled out by any institution having at least one sound recording in an uncommonly taught language. The questionnaire will be used in the second of a series of inquiries designed to facilitate information exchange among members of NALLD. (AM)

This analysis of repeated utterances in Japanese conversational discourse focuses on repetition as an expression of iconicity. In the analysis of a 30-minute conversation among 4 Japanese speakers, the iconic meanings expressed by both reduplication and conversational repetition are highlighted. The iconicity characteristic of conversational data…

Difficulties in transcription from the Hebrew to the Roman alphabet are discussed. The resolution of some of the problems in Judeo-Spanish texts using the "aljamiado" writing system are reviewed, including the use of some Hebrew consonants as vowels, representation of Judeo-Spanish sounds non-existent in Hebrew, and phonetic variations…

In both French and Macedonian there are constructions that are reminiscent of the passive but their meaning is active. In French this occurs with participial statements that appear to have either an instrumental relationship or be a chronological marker (e.g., "le dejeuner fini,..."). In Macedonian, one only adds a marker showing…

A lexicon for Tuvaluan, a Polynesian language spoken in the Gilbert and Ellice Islands, contains two parts, a lexicon and a word finder. The lexicon has a traditional format, in which Tuvaluan words are listed alphabetically and defined in English, and in which all additional information on structure, usage, and dialect can be found. The second…