<HTML><BODY style="word-wrap: break-word; -khtml-nbsp-mode: space; -khtml-line-break: after-white-space; "><DIV>Thanks, Danielle! I like the idea of assigning such words a symbol - you could use the "dagger" footnote symbol or something.</DIV><BR><DIV><DIV>On Nov 17, 2005, at 3:06 AM, Danielle E. Cyr wrote:</DIV><BR class="Apple-interchange-newline"><BLOCKQUOTE type="cite"> Evolutionary phonetic laws are, with very few exceptions, pervasive in a language. So if we can establish concordances between archaic words that are still known or used by contemporary speakers and their present pronunciation, then we should be able to predict how a now unknown word should be pronounced. However, the question will then arise as to what to do with words whose use has not continue until present time. Should we assign them a virtual contemporary pronunciation or should we just transcribe them in a modern orthography that would simply account for their archaic pronunciation (plus, of course, consign their archaic orthography somewhere as well). <BR> <BR> In contemporary Mėgmaq, for many words we still find co-existing archaic and contemporary pronunciations for many words. In our Metallic Mėgmag-English Reference Dictionary we have chosen to enter the two forms as headwords, with the full description, meaning, etc. under the headword in the archaic form, and cross-reference it with the other other more modern form and vice-vers. This was possible because the two forms still co-exist. When they don't coexist, I would suggest to simply enter the archaic form under its corresponding modern orthography, with a symbol indicating that it is no more in use, give its archaic meaning, dated source, archaic orthography and leave it as such. The reason I recommend that is that it will make it easier for the reader/user of the dictionary to search words across time and dialect without bothering with various orthographies in the headwords (which would also be very unaesthetic and somewhat ackward as well). The Shorter OED, among others now uses that strategy and I find it very righ and useful.<BR> <BR> Best regards to all<BR> Danielle Cyr<BR> ______________<BR> <BR> <BLOCKQUOTE><BR> </BLOCKQUOTE>Danielle E. Cyr, Ph.D.<BR> Full Professor<BR> York University<BR> 4700 Keele Street<BR> Toronto, ON, M3J 1P3<BR> Tel. 1-416-736-2100 # 30180<BR> email <A href="mailto:dcyr@yorku.ca">dcyr@yorku.ca</A><BR> <BR> Sabbatical address:<BR> <BR> 339, Boulevard Perron Ouest<BR> New Richmond, QC<BR> Canada G0C 2B0<BR> Tel. 1-418-392-7271<BR> email <A href="mailto:danielle.e.cyr@globetrotter.net">danielle.e.cyr@globetrotter.net</A><BR> <BR> <B>From: </B>Monica Macaulay <<A href="mailto:mmacaula@WISC.EDU">mmacaula@WISC.EDU</A>><BR> <BLOCKQUOTE><B>Reply-To: </B>Monica Macaulay <<A href="mailto:mmacaula@WISC.EDU">mmacaula@WISC.EDU</A>><BR> <B>Date: </B>Mon, 07 Nov 2005 10:38:19 -0600<BR> <B>To: </B><A href="mailto:ALGONQDICT@LISTSERV.LINGUISTLIST.ORG">ALGONQDICT@LISTSERV.LINGUISTLIST.ORG</A><BR> <B>Subject: </B>Re: archaic forms<BR> <BR> </BLOCKQUOTE><BR> <BLOCKQUOTE>David, you raise all sorts of good points. A few responses:<BR> <BR> * I totally agree that it's important to keep the archaic stuff in, for precisely the reasons you lay out. Furthermore, for us - since our comprehensive version will be for the community and for scholars - we know that the scholarly community would want it all there. (Obviously for our beginner's and intermediate versions, and for others whose audience is primarily the community, this would need a different approach.)<BR> <BR> * And, we will definitely put in the original orthography because in a lot of cases I have a feeling we're not going to be able to figure out what the actual pronunciation was.<BR> <BR> And thanks for the ref to Jack's dictionary of Creek - I haven't seen it and will track down a copy.<BR> <BR> - Monica<BR> <BR> On Nov 3, 2005, at 3:10 PM, david costa wrote:<BR> <BR> <BLOCKQUOTE>Monica:<BR> <BR> This is very interesting. I'm very glad you guys seem not to be under pressure to leave out archaic words I've always said that just because a word is archaic now, with the language severely contracted and down to its last handful of speakers, that doesn't mean that community members won't want to know about it anyway when the language is being revitalized. In other words, 20 or 30 years after a language has lost its last native speakers, I doubt any community members will care much whether or not the last speakers found such-and-such a word 'old fashioned'. They'll just want to know all the words.<BR> <BR> That said, I can't see the harm in marking the different shadings of obsolescence. It would probably be best if the marking was visually discreet, using some kind of code, rather than actually writing something like 'used to be archaic still archaic' next to each such entry. <BR> <BR> To me, the most important part of all this would be setting your policy on how to mark words that you were not able to re-elicit -- that is, words that NO modern speaker knew. For words like that, you have to take it on Bloomfield's or Hoffman's authority as to how the word was pronounced. That fact has to be in there somehow, tho I assume you've already made some provision for that. Words only found in pre-modern sources like Hoffman (how many such words are there?) should probably contain the original transcription somewhere, alongside your best guess as to how the word really was pronounced.<BR> <BR> If there are also differences between the pronunciation of words between now and the 1920's, how you indicate archaic pronunciations would have to factor into this as well.<BR> <BR> The problem is that there are very few precedents for handling these kinds of problems in dictionaries of American Indian languages. If you haven't already looked at it, Jack Martin's recent Creek dictionary is a splendid example of how to tackle the problem of marking original written sources and archaic words. <BR> <BR> best,<BR> Dave Costa<BR> <BR> <BR> -----Original Message-----<BR> From: Monica Macaulay <<A href="mailto:mmacaula@WISC.EDU">mmacaula@WISC.EDU</A>><BR> Sent: Nov 3, 2005 10:01 AM<BR> To: <A href="mailto:ALGONQDICT@listserv.linguistlist.org">ALGONQDICT@listserv.linguistlist.org</A><BR> Subject: archaic forms<BR> <BR> Posoh fellow Algonquian dictionary compilers...<BR> <BR> As promised, I'm going to throw out a topic for discussion. This has <BR> arisen in the context of our Menominee dictionary. We of course have <BR> used Bloomfield's Lexicon as a base, and sometimes he marks things as <BR> "archaic." We put a checkbox into our database and checked it when <BR> he made that notation. However, it dawned on me that there was <BR> another, similar situation, which was when we asked our speakers <BR> about a word from the Lexicon, and they didn't know it. We were <BR> putting that in our notes field as "not familiar." So I started <BR> wondering if we should check "archaic" for those, or have a new <BR> checkbox, or what. It seemed important to me to have a record of <BR> what Bloomfield found to be archaic in the 1920s and to keep that <BR> distinct from what the speakers today are not familiar with. I think <BR> there's a difference between words that were archaic in the 1920s <BR> when there was still a viable community of speakers, and words which <BR> are unknown today, when there are very few speakers and the language <BR> is in a severe state of attrition. Furthermore, there is definite <BR> register compression (to use Ives' term), with the elders constantly <BR> saying "oh, that's that High Menominee, which we didn't learn." We <BR> started a project-internal discussion of it and Becky Shields wrote <BR> this long message laying out a huge list of possibilities (which I'll <BR> paste in below), and now we're stumped about how much to include. So <BR> I thought I'd ask the list, and see if anyone else has considered <BR> this issue. Here's Becky's message:<BR> <BR> Thanks for the discussion ? I think I see the complexity of the issue <BR> more clearly now. And I now agree that it would be useful to <BR> distinguish between various types of ?unknown? words.<BR> <BR> Here?s the way I see it now (sorry if I?m repeating a lot of what you <BR> just said ? just trying to systematize it in a way that makes sense <BR> to me):<BR> <BR> There are at least two different issues:<BR> <BR> 1) there are colloquial and formal registers, and the formal <BR> register may contain archaic words which (presumably) used to be in <BR> the colloquial register in the past, but now survive only in prayers, <BR> storytelling, etc. Speakers familiar with the formal register know <BR> these words, but do not use them in everyday conversation.<BR> 2) there are words that have totally fallen out of use (in all <BR> registers). These are ?unknown? words.<BR> <BR> In addition, the data we are analyzing come from two distinct time <BR> periods:<BR> A) 1920?s<BR> B) contemporary (1980?s-present, if we include data gathered by <BR> Tim Guile, etc.?)<BR> <BR> In principle, there could be distinct sets of both archaic and <BR> unknown words at each time period. So there are four possibilities:<BR> 1A) archaic words in the 1920s ? words LB found in use only in the <BR> formal register, presumably the ones he calls ?archaic? in the lexicon<BR> 2A) unknown words in the 1920s ? words from earlier sources (like <BR> Hoffman?) that LB?s speakers did not know. If LB didn?t do this type <BR> of elicitation, we may not be aware of any of these.<BR> 1B) contemporary archaic words ? words that speakers currently know, <BR> but use only in formal registers like prayers. Lavina and Marie may <BR> not know this register much at all, but perhaps some male speakers <BR> (Joe Beaver?) do, or perhaps there are some prayers or stories on the <BR> pre-2000 tapes. I have definitely heard Marie and Sarah say about <BR> certain words that they recognized them only from some prayer, so <BR> this set certainly has some members.<BR> 2B) contemporary unknown words ? words not in use by contemporary <BR> speakers. As you point out, we have a very limited set of <BR> contemporary speakers, even if tapes from the 80s and 90s are <BR> included. This limits our data set, and in addition contemporary <BR> speakers probably have a smaller vocabulary than speakers in the 20s, <BR> due to the moribund status of the language. This is just a fact of <BR> life though, and I don?t know what we can do about it, other than be <BR> very very sad! We are certainly obligated to report what we actually <BR> observe, and not what we wish we had observed. And definitely not try <BR> to pretend we observed what LB observed. Accurately documenting <BR> language attrition could also be very useful.<BR> <BR> The sets obviously might overlap ? so words in 1A may now be in 1B, <BR> 2B, or even have become known (although this seems unlikely). So <BR> actually for any given word there are multiple possibilities. These <BR> seem the most likely combinations to me:<BR> - 1A-1B (used to be archaic ? still archaic)<BR> - 1A-2B (used to be archaic ? now unknown)<BR> - 2A-2B (used to be unknown ? still unknown)<BR> - 1B (used to be colloquial ? now archaic)<BR> - 2B (used to be colloquial ? now unknown)<BR> - (and of course the unmarked case ? used to be colloquial ? <BR> still colloquial)<BR> <BR> Maybe that?s more detail than anybody needs or wants, I don?t know. J <BR> But as you guys pointed out, this info could be useful to historical/ <BR> comparative linguists, and community members interested in bringing <BR> back older words, and also people studying language death.<BR> <BR> -becky<BR> <BR> So we would be very interested to hear what y'all have to say on the <BR> matter.<BR> <BR> Thanks!<BR> <BR> Monica Macaulay<BR> Department of Linguistics<BR> 1168 Van Hise Hall<BR> 1220 Linden Drive<BR> Madison, WI 53706<BR> phone (608) 262-2292<BR> fax (608) 265-3193<BR> <A href="http://ling.wisc.edu/~macaulay/monica.html">http://ling.wisc.edu/~macaulay/monica.html</A><BR> <BR> <BR> </BLOCKQUOTE><BR> <BR> <BR> <FONT face="Helvetica">Department of Linguistics<BR> </FONT><BR> University of Wisconsin<BR> <BR> <FONT face="Helvetica">1168 Van Hise Hall; 1220 Linden Drive<BR> </FONT><BR> <FONT face="Helvetica">Madison, WI 53706<BR> </FONT><BR> <FONT face="Helvetica">phone (608) 262-2292; fax (608) 265-3193<BR> </FONT><BR> <FONT face="Helvetica"><A href="http://ling.wisc.edu/~macaulay/monica.html">http://ling.wisc.edu/~macaulay/monica.html</A><BR> </FONT> <BR> <BR> <BR> </BLOCKQUOTE><BR> </BLOCKQUOTE></DIV><BR><DIV> <SPAN class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: separate; border-spacing: 0px 0px; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: normal; text-align: auto; -khtml-text-decorations-in-effect: none; text-indent: 0px; -apple-text-size-adjust: auto; text-transform: none; orphans: 2; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; "><SPAN class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: separate; border-spacing: 0px 0px; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: normal; text-align: auto; -khtml-text-decorations-in-effect: none; text-indent: 0px; -apple-text-size-adjust: auto; text-transform: none; orphans: 2; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; "><P style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px">Monica Macaulay</P><P style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px"><FONT face="Helvetica" size="3" style="font: 12.0px Helvetica">Department of Linguistics</FONT></P><P style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px">University of Wisconsin</P><P style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px"><FONT face="Helvetica" size="3" style="font: 12.0px Helvetica">1168 Van Hise Hall; </FONT><FONT face="Helvetica" size="3" style="font: 12.0px Helvetica">1220 Linden Drive</FONT></P><P style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px"><FONT face="Helvetica" size="3" style="font: 12.0px Helvetica">Madison, WI<SPAN class="Apple-converted-space"> <SPAN class="Apple-converted-space"> </SPAN></SPAN>53706</FONT></P><P style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px"><FONT face="Helvetica" size="3" style="font: 12.0px Helvetica">phone (608) 262-2292; </FONT><FONT face="Helvetica" size="3" style="font: 12.0px Helvetica">fax (608) 265-3193</FONT></P><P style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px"><FONT face="Helvetica" size="3" style="font: 12.0px Helvetica"><A href="http://ling.wisc.edu/~macaulay/monica.html">http://ling.wisc.edu/~macaulay/monica.html</A></FONT></P><BR class="Apple-interchange-newline"></SPAN></SPAN> </DIV><BR></BODY></HTML>