Current Progress in Afro-Asiatic Linguistics

Current Progress in Afro-Asiatic Linguistics
Author: James Bynon
Publisher: John Benjamins Publishing
Total Pages: 519
Release: 1984-01-01
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 9027280150

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The papers in this volume derive from the Third Hamito-Semitic Congress, which took place in London in 1978. The papers, loosely grouped according to language families and theoretical issues, are in a number of cases considerably expanded and updated version of those presented at the conference. The papers in the earlier part of the volume tend to be more substantive and to present primary evidence, the subsequent ones focus more on specific issues within particular languages, are surveys of the field, or deal with questions of methodology. Together they provide an overview of the current state of affairs in the subject.

Historical Linguistics and the Comparative Study of African Languages

Historical Linguistics and the Comparative Study of African Languages
Author: Gerrit J. Dimmendaal
Publisher: John Benjamins Publishing
Total Pages: 441
Release: 2011-06-08
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 9027287228

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This advanced historical linguistics course book deals with the historical and comparative study of African languages. The first part functions as an elementary introduction to the comparative method, involving the establishment of lexical and grammatical cognates, the reconstruction of their historical development, techniques for the subclassification of related languages, and the use of language-internal evidence, more specifically the application of internal reconstruction. Part II addresses language contact phenomena and the status of language in a wider, cultural-historical and ecological context. Part III deals with the relationship between comparative linguistics and other disciplines. In this rich course book, the author presents valuable views on a number of issues in the comparative study of African languages, more specifically concerning genetic diversity on the African continent, the status of pidginised and creolised languages, language mixing, and grammaticalisation.

Development of Tense/Aspect in Semitic in the Context of Afro-Asiatic Languages

Development of Tense/Aspect in Semitic in the Context of Afro-Asiatic Languages
Author: Vit Bubenik
Publisher: John Benjamins Publishing Company
Total Pages: 250
Release: 2017-04-15
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 9027265836

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The author applies the comparative method for the reconstruction of earlier aspectual systems in the Afro-Asiatic phylum of languages. Moving ‘upstream’ from the documented systems of Semitic, Berber and Old Cushitic the state of affairs during the common stage of Proto-Semito-Berbero-Cushitic is reconstructed. With the addition of Egyptian and Chadic data important conclusions regarding the elusive Proto-Afro-Asiatic are reached. Moving ‘downstream’ the trajectory of individual aspectual systems through their later stages is analyzed. A central piece of the monograph is the reconstruction of intermediate stages reflecting the long-term developments of aspectual and temporal categories of individual languages from the Old towards their Middle periods. The continuity and innovation in the aspectual systems towards the contemporary state of affairs in analytic (serial) constructions of Modern Aramaic and Arabic vernacular languages is explicated. The author demonstrates that it is imperative to work in a larger typological framework and that in the field of Afro-Asiatic linguistics valuable insights can be gained from the study of parallel phenomena in Indo-European languages. At the same time, Indo-Europeanists will profit from the study of typologically earlier aspect-prominent systems of Afro-Asiatic languages. The monograph offers important contributions to our understanding of universals and to the typology and diachrony of tense and aspect.

Research in Afroasiatic Grammar

Research in Afroasiatic Grammar
Author: Jacqueline Lecarme
Publisher: John Benjamins Publishing
Total Pages: 395
Release: 2000-06-15
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 9027299560

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This volume presents a selection of papers from the 3rd Conference on Afroasiatic Languages, held in Sophia Antipolis, France, in 1996. The languages discussed include (varieties of) Arabic, Hebrew, Berber, Chaha, Wolof, and Old Egyptian.

Semito-Hamitic Festschrift for A.B. Dolgopolsky and H. Jungraithmayr

Semito-Hamitic Festschrift for A.B. Dolgopolsky and H. Jungraithmayr
Author: A. B. Dolgopolʹskij
Publisher: Dietrich Reimer
Total Pages: 398
Release: 2008
Genre: Art
ISBN:

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The volume is a collection of contributions by colleagues from Europe and North America to celebrate the 75th jubilee of two outstanding scholars in the domain of Semito-Hamitic (Afro-Asiatic) comparative linguistics. They are Professor Aharon B. Dolgopolsky (Haifa) and Professor Herrmann Jungraithmayr (Frankfurt am Main). who have so much in common in their approach to a better reconstruction of Semito-Hamitic. These studies by well-known specialists of Semitic, Berber, Cushitic and Omotic as well as Chadic linguistics are both comparative and descriptive in nature and focus primarily on the lexicon.

Research in Afroasiatic Grammar II

Research in Afroasiatic Grammar II
Author: Jacqueline Lecarme
Publisher: John Benjamins Publishing
Total Pages: 558
Release: 2003-10-16
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 9027296340

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This volume contains 22 of the papers presented at the 5th Conference on Afroasiatic Languages (CAL 5) held at Université Paris VII in June 2000. The authors report their latest research on the syntax, morphology, and phonology of quite a number of languages (Arabic, Hebrew, Amharic, Tigrinya, Coptic Egyptian, Berber, Hausa, Beja, Somali, Gamo). The articles discuss new solutions to familiar questions such as the free state/construct state alternation of nouns, the Semitic template system, and the morphosyntax of nominal and verbal plurality. Ten of the papers center on morphology, especially the relation of phonology to syntax and morphology; others address questions at the syntax/semantics/pragmatics interface; two papers also offer comparative and historical perspectives. Taken as a whole, the papers provide an accurate picture of the state of current research in Afroasiatic linguistics, containing important new data and new analyses. Given its coverage, the book is a valuable resource for anyone interested in Afroasiatic languages and theoretical linguistics.

Toward Proto-Nostratic

Toward Proto-Nostratic
Author: Allan R. Bomhard
Publisher: John Benjamins Publishing
Total Pages: 370
Release: 1984-01-01
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 9027280169

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This book represents the culmination of the author’s work to date – it incorporates and updates previous articles and adds much new material. This book is not – nor was it ever intended to be – a comparative grammar of either the Indo-European or the Afroasiatic language families. It is, rather, a comparison of Proto-Indo-European with Proto-Afroasiatic. While this is not the first attempt to demonstrate that Proto-Indo-European and Proto-Afroasiatic are genetically related, it is the first to use the radical revision of the Proto-Indo-European consonantal system proposed by Thomas V. Gamkrelidze, Paul J. Hopper, and Vjačeslav V. Ivanov. Moreover, unlike previous endeavors, this is the first to make extensive use of data from the non-Semitic branches of Afroasiatic. The assumptions underlying this investigation of the possibility of the common genetic origin of Proto-Indo-European and Proto-Afroasiatic differ considerably from the assumptions made in other works on "Nostratic"; the methodological approach followed in this monograph has been one of rigorous adherence to the time-honored principles of comparative reconstruction.

Afroasiatic

Afroasiatic
Author: Mauro Tosco
Publisher: John Benjamins Publishing Company
Total Pages: 296
Release: 2018-01-15
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 9027264570

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The articles in the present volume offer an updated view of the breadth of theoretical and empirical research being carried on in the different subgroups of the Afroasiatic phylum. They are written by leading specialists and are representative of widely different perspectives and interests, from the analysis of data from scarcely known varieties to the reappraisal of old debates (such as the value of the Classical Arabic verbal forms). Reflecting a great diversity of language structures and functions, the articles are grouped into three broad areas: the phylum as such in its classificatory and typological aspects; the analysis of the intricate morphology of Afroasiatic and its developments; and the syntax of Afroasiatic in its widest sense, from the clause to the sentence and beyond. They witness how Afroasiatic, with its unsurpassed historical depth and immense geographical breadth, keeps representing a constant source of fascinating data and implications for linguistic theory.