[Linganth] Idea for AAA session

[Buckner, Margaret L]

I've just noticed that the deadline for submitting proposals for the AAA meeting has been extended until April 4, at midnight.  If there's still time, I'd like to see if anyone in interested in joining me for a panel on the linguistics/grammar/discourse of causality.

My contribution would be "The Grammar of Causality:  Zande Witchcraft Revisited".  I've looked at Zande discourse in actual, lived episodes, and found that what Evans-Pritchard calls "sensitive cause" appears as a noun or nominal (like the English "cause"), and that what he calls "mystical cause" appears as a proposition (like the English "reason").  The Zande also have two separate words which refer to these two separate grammatical "levels" of causality.

It would be interesting to see whether this type of distinction is made elsewhere (besides English and Zande), and, if not, what other types of grammatical constructions are used in talking about causality--which of course is at the heart of any discussion of magic, religion, and science.

If this sort of thing appeals to anyone, please respond quickly so we can get something orgranized.

> Margaret Buckner
>
> Dept. of Sociology and Anthropology
> Southwest Missouri State University
> 901 S. National Ave.
> Springfield, MO 65804
> (417) 836-6165
> mlb211f at smsu.edu