Serial Verbs (Oxford Studies in Typology and Linguistic Theory)

Reference

Aikhenvald, Alexandra Y.

Words, Language & Grammar

Oxford University Press

Classifiers: A Typology of Noun Categorization Devices (Oxford Studies in Typology and Linguistic Theory)

Almost all languages have some grammatical means for categorizing nouns. This book provides a comprehensive and original analysis of noun categorization devices all over the world. It will interest typologists, those working in the fields of morphosyntactic variation and lexical semantics, as well as anthropologists and all other scholars interested in the mechanisms of human cognition.

Foreign Language Study & Reference

This is the first guide and introduction to the extraordinary range of languages in Amazonia, which include some of the most the most fascinating in the world and many of which are now teetering on the edge of extinction. Alexandra Aikhenvald, one of the world's leading experts on the region, provides an account of the more than 300 languages, comparing their common and unique features, setting out their main characteristics, and describing the histories and cultures of the people who speak them. The languages abound in rare features and in most cases have been in contact with each other for generations, giving rise to complex patterns of linguistic influence. The author draws on her own extensive field research to tease out and analyse the patterns of their genetic and structural diversity. In the process she shows how they reflect the interrelations of language and culture: different kinship systems, for example, produce different linguistic outcomes. She also explains the roles and workings of their unusual features including evidentials, tones and whistles, and elaborate positional verbs. The book ends with a glossary of terms, and a comprehensive list of references for those interested in following up a language or linguistic phenomenon. Alexandra Aikhenvald's fascinating book is aimed at a wide readership, including linguists and anthropologists. It is unburdened by esoteric terminology, written in her characteristically straightforward style, and brought vividly to life with numerous anaecdotes of her experience in the region. It may be used as reference for research and as an introduction for courses in Latin American studies, Amazonian studies, linguistic typology, and general linguistics.

Languages of the Amazon (Oxford Linguistics)

History

Americas

This is a book about the multi-faceted notion of gender. Gender differences form the basis for family life, patterns of socialization, distribution of tasks, and spheres of responsibilities. The way gender is articulated shapes the world of individuals, and of the societies they live in. Gender has three faces: Linguistic Gender-the original sense of 'gender'-is a feature of many languages and reflects the division of nouns into grammatical classes or genders (feminine, masculine,This is a book about the multi-faceted notion of gender. Gender differences form the basis for family life, patterns of socialization, distribution of tasks, and spheres of responsibilities. The way gender is articulated shapes the world of individuals, and of the societies they live in. Gender has three faces: Linguistic Gender-the original sense of 'gender'-is a feature of many languages and reflects the division of nouns into grammatical classes or genders (feminine, masculine, neuter, and so on); Natural Gender, or sex, refers to the division of animates into males and females; and Social Gender reflects the social implications and norms of being a man or a woman (or perhaps something else). Women and men may talk and behave differently, depending on conventions within the societies they live in, and their role in language maintenance can also vary. The book focuses on how gender in its many guises is reflected in human languages, how it features in myths and metaphors, and the role it plays in human cognition. Examples are drawn from all over the world, with a special focus on Aikhenvald's extensive fieldwork in Amazonia and New Guinea.

How Gender Shapes the World

Politics & Social Sciences

Social Sciences

This book provides an in-depth typological account of the forms, functions, and histories of serial verb constructions. Serial verbs, in which several verbs combine to form a single predicate, describe what is conceptualized as a single event. The verbs in the construction have the same tense, aspect, mood, modality, and evidentiality values, cannot be negated or questioned separately, and usually share the same subject and object. They are a powerful means of portraying various facets of one event, and can express grammatical meanings such as aspect, direction, and causation, particularly in languages where few other means are available. In this volume, Alexandra Aikhenvald seeks to answer unresolved questions such as: What are the parameters of variation in serial verbs? How do serial verbs differ from other, superficially similar multi-verb constructions? How do serial verbs emerge, and what happens to them over time? What role do they play in the representation of event structure? The book uses an inductively-based framework for the analysis and draws on data from languages with different typological profiles and genetic affiliations. It will be of interest to researchers and students from a wide range of fields of linguistics, especially typology, anthropological linguistics, and language contact.

A Guide to Gender and Classifiers

Anthropology

In a number of languages, scattered across the world, every statement must contain a specification of the type of evidence on which it is based--whether the speaker saw it, or heard it, or inferred it from indirect evidence, or learnt it from somebody else. Of interest to any grammarian, the book discusses evidentiality, and the cognitive and sociolinguistic consequences of evidentiality in a language.

Evidentiality

This is the first cross-linguistic study of imperatives, and commands of other kinds, across the world's languages. It makes a significant and original contribution to the understanding of their morphological, syntactic, semantic, and pragmatic characteristics. The author discusses the role imperatives and commands play in human cognition and how they are deployed in different cultures, and in doing so offers fresh insights on patterns of human interaction and communcation.Alexandra Aikhenvald examines the ways of framing commands, or command strategies, in languages that do not have special imperative forms. She analyses the grammatical and semantic properties of positive and negative imperatives and shows how these correlate with categories such as tense, information source, and politeness. She looks at the relation of command pragmatics to cultural practices, assessing, for example, the basis for Margaret Mead's assumption that the harsher the people the more frequently they use imperatives. Professor Aikhenvald covers a wide range of language families, including many relatively neglected examples from North America, Amazonia, and New Guinea. The book is accompanied by illustrations of some conventional command signs.Written and presented with the author's characteristic clarity, this book will be welcomed by linguists of all theoretical persuasions. It will appeal to social and cultural anthropologists and cognitive and behavioural scientists.

Imperatives and Commands (Oxford Studies in Typology and Linguistic Theory)

In a number of languages, scattered across the world, every statement must contain a specification of the type of evidence on which it is based--whether the speaker saw it, or heard it, or inferred it from indirect evidence, or learnt it from somebody else. Of interest to any grammarian, the book discusses evidentiality, and the cognitive and sociolinguistic consequences of evidentiality in a language.

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Aikhenvald, Alexandra Y.. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Books by Aikhenvald, Alexandra Y.

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Aikhenvald, Alexandra Y.. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Serial Verbs (Oxford Studies in Typology and Linguistic Theory)

Classifiers: A Typology of Noun Categorization Devices (Oxford Studies in Typology and Linguistic Theory)

Languages of the Amazon (Oxford Linguistics)

How Gender Shapes the World

Serial Verbs (Oxford Studies in Typology and Linguistic Theory)

How Gender Shapes the World

A Guide to Gender and Classifiers

Evidentiality

Imperatives and Commands (Oxford Studies in Typology and Linguistic Theory)

Evidentiality