Rhymes

[ROOD DAVID S]

May I remind us of Del Hymes' extensive work with what he calls
"ethnopoetics"?  His claim is that many, many of the texts that are
recorded in Native American languages as straight prose are really much
more like epic poems.  The clues are in the repeated use of conjunctions
or other kinds of discourse particles.  Richard Lungstrum's dissertation
was an attempt to apply the idea to Lakhota texts -- with some success, I
think.  The "poetry" lies, then, not in the structure of the lines or in
rhythm or sound effects, but in the timing of the report of events and
ideas.  See Hymes' book "In vain I tried to tell you..." for a place to
start.

David

David S. Rood
Dept. of Linguistics
Univ. of Colorado
295 UCB
Boulder, CO 80309-0295
USA
rood at colorado.edu