Fwd: new Naxi dictionary

[Randy LaPolla]

> ==========================================
> 
> A Naxi-Chinese-English Dictionary
> edited by Tom Pinson (2012) – Naxi (ISO: nbf)
>  
> ·         Pinson, Thomas M. 2012. A Naxi-Chinese-English Dictionary. Yunnan Nationalities Publishing House: Kunming, Yunnan. ISBN: 978-7-5367-5471-3.
>  
> This 2012 dictionary contains:
> ·         It contains over 6000 entries and sub-entries.
> ·         There are over 1000 illustrative sentences.
> ·         The data comes from several sub-dialects, and includes cross-references to the most common form.
> ·         There are also cross references to synonyms, antonyms and words which are closely related semantically.
> ·         For many of the entries there are phonological and/or grammatical comments regarding the word usage.
>  
> Feel free to contact Tom Pinson or Cynthia Shum directly if you would like to get a copy of this brand new Naxi dictionary. The book is approximately 1.5 kg and would cost about 65 USD to have it mailed from East Asia – or you could make arrangements for copies to be hand-carried.
>  
> ================================
> Introduction to the Naxi Language
> by Tom Pinson (2012)
>  
> Naxi is a Tibeto-Burman language traditionally grouped under the Burmic language branch.  There is some disagreement between linguists as to whether Naxi belongs  this branch. Without making a claim about Naxi’s genetic relationship to the Loloish languages, we note the similarity between Naxi and some of these other languages: Yi, Hani, Lisu, Lahu, etc. There has been quite a bit of recent work on the classifying of Naxi by French linguist Alexis Michaud and others. Their work is pointing to Naxi being grouped under the Qiangic branch. But much work still remains to be done.
>  
> Naxi is spoken by about 300,000 people, but in this relatively small group there are many diverse varieties which are divided into two main dialect areas: Western and Eastern.  This dictionary is based on sub-dialects spoken in the Western dialect area.
>  
> The Naxi people live mostly in northwest Yunnan province.  There are also some Naxi in southeast Tibet and southwest Sichuan province.  Lijiang County of Yunnan Province is considered the cultural center of the Naxi, and it contains the highest concentration of the Naxi population. The sub-dialects that this dictionary deals with are all spoken within the area formerly considered Lijiang County. (This area now consists of Yulong County and Lijiang Ancient City.) 
>  
> Grammatically, Naxi is typically Tibeto-Burman in many ways.  The verb is sentence final.  There are several postpositional case markers, including an ablative and an anti-ablative marker.  The noun phrase structure is noun-adjective-demonstrative-numeral-classifier.  Naxi relative clauses employ the “gap” strategy with external head nouns following the relative clause.  The Naxi verb phrase patterns with the non-Yi Loloish, languages (i.e. Hani, Lisu, and Lahu) as an “OV concatenating” language.  Namely, the main verb tends to be last in the concatenated string with only auxiliary verbs, aspect and modal particles following.  Naxi has no passive, though some have claimed that it does.
>  
> Phonologically, Naxi syllable structure is in essence strictly CV.  There are some apparent violations to this, but the exceptions are mostly Chinese borrowings.  Some sub-dialects of Naxi have retained a four-way distinction in syllable onset timing.
>  
> The varieties of Naxi represented in this dictionary have four tones:  a high level /55/, mid level /33/, low /21/ and a low rising /13/.  The mid level is the most common, occurring in about twice as many syllables as the next most common.  The low rising tone is the rarest, primarily occurring with Chinese borrowed words.  There is some tone sandhi in Naxi, but it is not as productive as Mandarin tone sandhi.

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://listserv.linguistlist.org/pipermail/tibeto-burman-linguistics/attachments/20130109/a9db20a4/attachment.htm>
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: image001.jpg
Type: image/jpeg
Size: 17959 bytes
Desc: not available
URL: <http://listserv.linguistlist.org/pipermail/tibeto-burman-linguistics/attachments/20130109/a9db20a4/attachment.jpg>
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: image003.jpg
Type: image/jpeg
Size: 14451 bytes
Desc: not available
URL: <http://listserv.linguistlist.org/pipermail/tibeto-burman-linguistics/attachments/20130109/a9db20a4/attachment-0001.jpg>