Linguist List Issue: Amazonian Languages, Phonology and Syntax

Sun Aug 5 15:15:17 UTC 2007

Message1:  Amazonian Languages, Phonology and Syntax
Date:03-Aug-2007
From:Leo Wetzels wlm.wetzels at let.vu.nl
LINGUIST List issue http://linguistlist.org/issues/18/18-2327.html 

Amazonian Languages, Phonology and Syntax 

Date: 03-Dec-2007 - 08-Dec-2007 
Location: Manaus Amazonas, Brazil 
Contact: Frantomé Pacheco 
Contact Email: frantome at uol.com.br 

Linguistic Field(s): General Linguistics 

Meeting Description: 

This conference is the first of a series of three meetings, as part of an internationalization project between the research centers CELIA Paris, INPA Manaus, UFAM Manaus, Leiden University, and the VU University Amsterdam. The themes to be discussed at the first meeting are 'morpho-syntactic alignment' and 'nasal harmony'. Although the nature of the meeting is that of a seminar for which most of the contributors are individually invited, there is space in the program for 5 or 6 more speakers, which we hope to be able to invite as a result of this announcement. Also, the meeting is open for students and scholars that are interested in assisting without presenting a paper. 
Description of the conference themes:

The term '' vowel harmony '' is generally used either to designate long distance nasal spreading (i.e. spreading of the nasal feature beyond the immediately contiguous segment), or to refer to a type of contrastive nasality in languages where the nasal feature seems to characterize a prosodic constituent or a morpheme, rather than a segment. Nasal harmony systems are regularly found in South-American languages, where their presence often goes hand in hand with the existence of contour stops comprising a nasal and an oral phase in syllables with an oral nucleus, which, in turn, typically arise in consonant systems in which a triple voiceless-voiced-nasal contrast is lacking. 

Recent research on nasal harmony has aimed at identifying the relevant phonological and morphological parameters involved in nasal harmony systems, often based on secondary data. In addition, various proposals were made to explain the emergence of contour segments as the manifestation of underlying sonority, or as the phonetic enhancement of voicing. For the African language Ikwere, Clements and Osu have demonstrated the relevance of a class of non-obstruent sounds which 'naturally' combine with nasality. 

In the light of Clements and Osu's findings, it seems worthwhile to study the aerodynamic properties of voiced stops in South-American languages that have nasal harmony, to see if the Ikwere explanation can be extended to these languages. For this conference, papers featuring research based on primary data and careful laboratory analysis that could shed new light on the parameters and properties of nasal harmony systems in South-American lowland languages, on the relation (if any) between the underlying consonant system and the emergence of contour stops, or on the aerodynamic properties of segments that are targets for nasal spreading are solicited. 

Despite the notable increase in recent years in the number of detailed descriptions of the languages of the South-American lowlands, the impact of the now available knowledge of their grammars on the theoretical debate has remained less profound than one would expect. The integration of the data that were gathered into the theoretical discussion is urgent, since most of these languages are threatened with extinction, and a return to the sources might only be possible within a very limited span of time. Aside from the four bigger linguistic families, Arawak, Karib, Tupi and Jê, this region hosts a multitude of smaller families, as well as many isolates. This diversity is also reflected in the existing alignment systems because, besides the classical accusative, ergative and active types, multiple splits affect intransitivity (lexically, the Aktionsart of verbs, syntactically, the aspect of predicates, for example) as well as transitivity (split ergativity, differential object marking, differential subject marking, hierarchical agreement, inverse). 

In addition, the often-observed relation between clause structure and noun-phrase structure (transitive predicate and genitive phrase, subordination and nominalization) requires an effort of systematization that warrants serious attention. Where comparison is possible, the comparative approach has indicated promising trails for the understanding of diachronic and structural relations these types and sub-types maintain with one another. Such insights might prove useful for the exploration of linguistic domains where comparison is either limited (small families) or impossible (isolates). It is of utmost importance for scholars to systematically share and analyze the various hypotheses and results produced in the recent past, in order to achieve a more in-depth understanding of the linguistic structures relating to this part of grammar.

For information about hotels in Manaus, please contact the local organizing committee

Also you can take a look at it by visiting 
http://linguistlist.org/issues/18/18-2327.html

Read other LINGUIST List posts:
http://linguistlist.org/issues/index.html

Get your own free subscription to The LINGUIST List:
http://linguistlist.org/LL/subs-index.cfm

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://listserv.linguistlist.org/pipermail/etnolinguistica/attachments/20070805/5820e805/attachment.htm>