Fwd: South pacific language question

[Mark Hale]

Just one more note, since I have somehow managed
to find some of my notes from working through the
German materials and Delaporte (see
http://www.trussel.com/kir/naudel.htm) some years ago.
It certainly looks like Nauruan fails to show several
pretty critical developments from POC to PMc, including
the merger of *nt and *nd (*nd merges with *d instead,
which I think is unknown in Micronesia, not that it couldn't
be a secondary development, of course) and the merger
of *ns and *j (it looks like *s merges with *j instead, to
the exclusion of *ns).

As I said earlier, the materials are difficult to interpret
the phonetics of, so I wouldn't put much stock in these
statements without someone checking with an actual
speaker, but unless someone has some real linguistic
data which supports grouping Nauruan with the Micronesian
family, I strongly advise against speculation regarding
settlement history based on the informal passing statements
which appear in the literature. I have no particular theory
of the settlement of the area to defend; my only concern
is that the linguistics be kept as close to the empirical
evidence as we can manage.

Mark

On Wed, Oct 28, 2009 at 2:10 AM, Mark Hale
<historical.linguist at gmail.com> wrote:
> Hi,
>
> If you mean the Proto-Micronesian reconstructions papers,
> in OcLing 2003, I don't recall them even mentioning Nauruan,
> nor citing any Nauruan cognates in any of the reconstructions
> (though of course some cognates exist and are fairly well
> known). I just realized as I wrote this that I could do a quick
> search of the pdf version; it gives no hits for Nauruan (though
> maybe ProjectMuse does not very competent OCR on their
> pdfs), for either of the two Bender et al. articles.
>
> The Maggie Jacob reference is new information for me.
> Harvard's library doesn't own it---is there a source whereby
> one might get one's hands on it?
>
> Mark
>
> On Wed, Oct 28, 2009 at 1:51 AM, Paul Geraghty <geraghty_p at usp.ac.fj> wrote:
>> I believe the two articles in Oceanic Linguistics 2001, by Bender et al, on
>> Proto Micronesian (and references therein) will explain the relationship of
>> Nauruan with other Micronesian languages.
>>
>> Other works on Nauruan:
>>
>> Jacob, Maggie. 1996. Nauru language dictionary. Nauru, computer printout.
>> Kayser, Alois. 1993. Nauruan grammar. Ed Karl H Rensch. Yarralumla (ACT):
>> Embassy of the Federal Republic of Germany.
>>
>> These have some Nauruan words and/or glossaries:
>>
>> Detudamo, Timothy. 2008 [1938]. Legends, tradiitons & tales of Nauru. Suva:
>> Institute of Pacific Studies, USP.
>> Kayser, Alois. 2002. Nauru one hundred years ago. 1. Pandanus [and others in
>> this series]. Suva: Institute of Pacific Studies, USP.
>> Petit-Skinner, Solange. 1981. The Nauruans. San Francisco: MacDuff Press.
>> Petit-Skinner, Solange. 1982. Pecheurs de Nauru - the Nauruan fishermen.
>> Paris: NEL.
>>
>> Paul
>>
>>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: an-lang-bounces at anu.edu.au [mailto:an-lang-bounces at anu.edu.au] On
>> Behalf Of Mark Hale
>> Sent: Wednesday, October 28, 2009 9:53 AM
>> To: Bill Palmer
>> Cc: an-lang at anu.edu.au; wechsler at mail.utexas.edu
>> Subject: Re: [An-lang] Fwd: South pacific language question
>>
>> Hi all,
>>
>> The most up-to-date reference is, to my knowledge,
>>
>> Geoffrey Nathan, 'Nauruan in the Austronesian language family',
>> Oceanic Linguistics 12 (1973): 479-501
>>
>> And there is quite extensive, though (as usual with these volumes)
>> difficult to interpret data in
>> the reports of the German Südsee-Expedition (Hambruch 1914).
>>
>> I realize that it is pretty standard to say that Nauruan is closely
>> related to the Micronesian languages,
>> but, frankly, I couldn't find a drop of evidence for this view when I
>> worked through the German materials
>> in some detail a few years ago. Could someone tell me which of the
>> defining characteristics of the
>> Micronesian branch Nauruan is supposed so share? In the absence of any
>> compelling linguistic evidence
>> (but maybe I'm wrong about that) I would be very hesitant about
>> expressing opinions on dispersal
>> timing.
>>
>> Mark
>>
>> On Tue, Oct 27, 2009 at 4:58 PM, Bill Palmer
>> <Bill.Palmer at newcastle.edu.au> wrote:
>>> Hi Steve
>>>
>>> The linguistic evidence suggests Nauru was settled very early in the human
>> occupation of Micronesia. It appears to be a first-order branch of the
>> Micronesian subgroup of Oceanic languages, either as the first offshot from
>> the proto language that also gave rise to the other Micronesian subgroup
>> languages, or as a sister of Proto Micronesian. This alone suggests that
>> either Nauru was the first stepping stone on the way to populate Micronesia,
>> or was the first island settled away from the Micronesian homeland (propably
>> in Kiribati, possibly Kosrae). The time depth for Micronesia overall is
>> probably roughly right for Nauru.
>>>
>>> However, despite Nauruan appearing to be a highly interesting and
>> divergent language, and being very highly endangered (fewer than 50% of the
>> population of Nauru speak Nauruan - less than about 3000 speakers in total),
>> little is known about it. In 1993 the German Embassy in Canberra published a
>> facsimile of a set of typewritten 1930s missionary notes on the language by
>> one Father Alois Kayser. Apart from that, no descriptive work has been
>> published on the language that I am aware of.
>>>
>>> Bill Palmer
>>>
>>> Dr Bill Palmer
>>> Convenor, Pacific Languages Research Group
>>> Linguistics Research Higher Degree and Honours coordinator
>>> School of Humanities and Social Science
>>> University of Newcastle
>>> Callaghan NSW 2308
>>> Australia
>>> email bill.palmer at newcastle.edu.au
>>>>>> Stephen Wechsler <wechsler at mail.utexas.edu> 28/10/09 1:17 AM >>>
>>> Can anyone help with this question (from a non-linguist friend) about
>> Nauru
>>> and Nauruan?
>>> Thanks.
>>>
>>> Steve
>>>
>>> ---------- Forwarded message ----------
>>>
>>> Howdy!  I'm writing an essay about the role of history in understanding
>>> ecosystems at the supplying fringe of urban areas, and I'm using Nauru for
>>> my example.  I haven't yet found references that say how long people have
>>> been on Nauru, but I have found sources that say most of Micronesia became
>>> populated around 3,500 years ago.  Also, Nauru has its own unique
>> language.
>>>  I wonder, are you aware of any work on their language and the degree to
>>> which it has diverged from whatever gave rise to it that could be used as
>>> evidence for how long people have been on the island?
>>> Thanks!
>>> -KP
>>>
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>>
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>

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