Linguistic Matls IN the language of study

[d_z_o]

Hi Mia, Back in Futa Jalon, Guinea in the mid-80's I think I saw a 
grammar of Pular in Pular. I know I saw a monolingual dictionary in 
Pular, done by a grad student in linguistics, typed and stenciled a 
few years earlier (I regret that I couldn't get a copy and hope that 
there is at least one still extant! Unfortunately don't have the 
reference handy).

There may be more of such materials in some major languages of 
Africa - there is a university in SW Nigeria for instance where one 
can write theses in Yoruba, and it wouldn't surprise me if one has 
pertained to the language itself. This should be possible to verify 
if of interest.

One last point is tangential, but when studying Chinese, I got the 
impression that the grammar as presented conformed to Western 
categories, whereas in a few instances I thought the feature of 
Chinese in question was more similar to an African language I know 
(one example is "present - past" vs. "accomplished - 
nonaccomplished" in verb tenses - the latter of which helped me 
understand the use of "le" better than the attempts to explain in 
terms of present & past). This in turn made me wonder if the Chinese 
materials in Chinese use original Chinese categories or whether they 
too conform to Western categories but in translation. So that might 
be another level of analysis beneath the language of presentation 
(but certainly you've thought of that already).  

Don


Quoting Mia Kalish <MiaKalish at LEARNINGFORPEOPLE.US>:
> Hi,
>
>
>
> Does anyone know of any cases where the results of linguistic 
study of
> Indigenous language have been codified IN the language of study? 
That would
> be a grammar actually written in, for example, Navajo or 
Jicarilla, rather
> than in English, Spanish, Dutch, Russian, etc?
>
>
>
> Thanks for your help. I am currently writing in my dissertation 
that there
> are no known cases. . . . I've never seen one, but maybe in Maori? 
Hawaiian?
> Quecha?
>
>
>
> Mia
>
>
>
>
>
>