Article

Are mountain people aggressive?

January 2002

Authors:

Mountains protect their inhabitants from ethnic and cultural assimilation and allow traditional and hierarchical societies to persist. Mountain dwellers are better at defending themselves than living in peace. Traditional mountain economies have been necessarily diversified but most product exchange took place in hillfoot towns. Discusses economic and national power exerted over uplands from adjacent lowlands, modern weapons make the mountains less easy to defend. Mountain particularity may be expressed in terms of culture and/or religion. Small linguistic groups can survive in the uplands and isolated dialects tend to diverge.

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Article

Linguistic and Sociocultural Diversity Among South Asians

March 2012 · Perspectives on Communication Disorders and Sciences in Culturally and Linguistically Diverse Populations

Yasmeen Faroqi-Shah

The aim of this paper is to provide information about the ethnocultural and linguistic characteristics of South Asians, because South Asians are one of the most rapidly growing groups in North America. This paper overviews demographic and immigration history and describes sociocultural characteristics and major languages used by speakers of South Asian origin, including dialectal differences in ... [Show full abstract] English. I emphasize that, although there are overarching sociocultural similarities among South Asians in terms of family structure and values, there is also considerable heterogeneity depending on specific subgroups, time since migration, and extent of acculturation. Finally, I present guidelines for clinicians who may make service delivery decisions about their South Asian clients.

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Adjectives of Romance origin in the speech of the Biokovo Mountain hinterland

June 2013 · Rasprave Instituta za hrvatski jezik i jezikoslovlje

Numerous linguistic studies have attempted to analyze the presence of Romanisms in the dialect of the central Dalmatian Coast. However, the speech used in the surrounding area (the Dalmatian hinterland) has been less extensively researched and studied. This paper analyses the remnants of Romance influences in the large yet sparsely populated area surrounding Biokovo. In light of the fact that ... [Show full abstract] linguistic borrowings are mostly evident in noun and verb categories, this paper pays particular attention to the morphological characteristics of Romance adjectives, since less research has been carried out in this specific area. The observed corpus was obtained by extracting Romanisms from recent lexicographic works. An overview of the social and historical background of the Biokovo area is provided, which explains how the Romance influences came to be. A lexicographical and etymological analysis of adjectives of Romance origin is provided, followed by an examination of the adaptation of these adjectives.

Article

The vocabulary of Tatar literary language (the first half of the XX century)

January 2014

The article deals with the topic of formation and development of vocabulary of the Tatar literary language in the first half of the XX century. This period is very complex for the life of Russia, which is characterized by revolutions, different innovations, military actions, postwar construction and rehabilitation of national economy etc. The vocabulary records all these processes, as it presents ... [Show full abstract] the most variable layer of language. The study of lexical system at the definite stage of language development provides the rich material not only to linguists, but also to sociologists, historians, cultural experts. As a research task, in this work the authors made an attempt to provide general characteristics of the vocabulary state of the Tatar literary language in the specified period, based on the materials of Tatar-Russian dictionaries.

Article

A Basic Demographic Unit

October 1973 · Current Anthropology

Joseph B. Birdsell

In common with other patrilineal band societies, the Australian dialectical tribe is a nonpolitical product of the system of face-to-face interactions characteristic at this economic level. The components of the density of communication, explored in another place, explain the cellular nature of the relatively homogeneous linguistic communities which are recognized by the natives as tribal units. ... [Show full abstract] The optimum or equilibrium population for such dialectical tribes in Australia statistically approximates 500 persons. Data are here presented to indicate that when such systems are disturbed, through fragmentation resulting from the introduction of new initiatory ceremonies, systematic forces restore these units to their optimum numbers with the passage of time. These are self-defining units, and they provide a basic demographic unit, called the Z-tribe, as a scale interval for measuring the effect of other social phenomena. With multivariant analysis this scale can be extended to measure the impact of various levels of political and social organization as well as patterns of face-to-face interaction based upon differing cultural and environmental variables. Appendices include some examples in which the Z-tribe scale could be usefully employed for further detailed analyses.

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Thematic Roles and Grammatical Features of Cursing and Blessing Speech Acts in Kurdish (Ilami Dialec...

August 2012

Cursing and blessing are two common speech acts seen in many languages. Due to specific nature of these expressions, many linguistic and non-linguistic (e.g. religious) arguments have been proposed in order to study and scrutinize these structures from different perspectives. This article aims to analyze cursing and blessing speech acts in Ilami dialect of Kurdish. In this paper both structural ... [Show full abstract] and semantic components of Ilami cursing and blessing will be discussed. Since the communicative role of such expressions is of a great importance, we tried to distinguish the theta roles of cursing and blessing like agent, patient, function, goal and cause of such speech acts. Results show that blessing and especially cursing are very diverse in this dialect and they can serve several functions and goals while uttered but there can be seen some more frequent patterns in these utterances. It was also concluded that cursing and blessing share some common grammatical features. Affected by cultural and social factors, a large number of cursing and blessing expressions are no longer understood literally and they should be treated as idiomatic expressions.

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Loan words vs. Code-mixing in the shanghai dialect

June 2009 · Dialectologia

Dan Lu

Code-mixing is a common linguistic phenomenon in bilingual societies. However, code-mixing is not a “patented product” of bilingual societies. When two languages come into contact, people may think that one of the two languages has more appropriate lexical items for something they want to express in a particular situation; then these lexical items will be mixed into another language for effective ... [Show full abstract] communication. This paper reports on some observations about ideograph-based code-mixing in the Shanghai dialect. Expressions of this kind appeared in the late 19th century and the early 20th century. Some of them disappeared while some others survived and entered into the standard Chinese vocabulary. The paper gives a brief analysis of this special kind of code-mixing and treats it as a stepping stone to many loan words in the Chinese language.

Chapter

History, including changes in progress

January 2007

Robert McColl Millar

This chapter returns to the linguistic history of the region, paying particular attention to the effects of language contact and language shift. It shows that the dialects of northern Scotland and of the Northern Isles are fairly well preserved — at least in comparison with the traditional dialects of central Scotland. But this should not be taken as an invitation for self-satisfaction. The ... [Show full abstract] effects of the inclusion of these areas into a globalised culture and economy have been considerable and have already led to a significant loss of traditional usage — in sound, lexis and structure — which was in daily use until very recently. There is also a danger that some aspects of dialect use — such as their employment in cultural activities — may heritigise the local dialect, sundering it from its former everyday use.

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Sociolinguistics: The Study of Speakers' Choices

May 2005

Florian Coulmas

This accessible new textbook provides a clear introduction to sociolinguistics, the study of why we speak the way we do, and the social factors that influence our linguistic decisions. Topics covered include dialects, gender and age specific speech forms, professional jargons, diglossia, bilingualism, code-switching, pidgin languages, and language planning, all of which are unified by the common ... [Show full abstract] theme that speakers create their language by making choices. The volume draws on linguistic variation from an extensive range of societies and their languages.

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Linguistic features of Cantonese classifiers in medical description

January 1970

(Uncorrected OCR) Abstract This dissertation looks into the linguistic features and usage of Cantonese classifiers in medical description. A classifier is obligatory in a nominal expression when it co-occurs with a number or quantifier and noun. In the medical description, especially in the absence of the quantifiers or numbers, the use of the Cantonese classifiers is highly varied. In this ... [Show full abstract] study, Cantonese classifiers j| zek3 and f|K go3 were found to be commonly used in the description of body parts and their symptoms in both the questionnaire and clinical observation studies. Concerning the description of the sputum, Cantonese classifiers M duk1 and Dj�daam6 were common choices in the questionnaires, and Ufl^J di1 was the most common one used in the clinical setting. Compared with the questionnaire study, classifiers were however much infrequently used in the clinical setting in both the description of discomfort of body parts and sputum. Explanation based on Principle of Economy (PE) of Chomsky� Minimalist Program (MP) (1995) was proposed here. The study of the effect of cognitive factors in the use of Cantonese classifiers in symptom reporting in clinical setting was also conducted, based on the framework of the weak version of the Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis (Allan 2001). In general, the result was inconclusive. Only very few patients did use classifiers to reflect their perception and feelings about their diseases. But further studies are required before denying such possibility. Other discussions include the other semantic features and properties of the Cantonese classifiers H gau3,)t pin3 U^J di1 and f|K go3, and the potential role of the use of Cantonese classifiers in semantic ambiguity.

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South Estonian Literature: A New Phenomenon with a Centuries-long History

July 2015 · Interlitteraria

Mart Velsker

The focus of the article is on South Estonian literature, with an aim to provide a survey of the phenomenon while discussing problems that arise in describing it. These problems are related to the small size of the literary corpus, transformation of modes of description through history, and variations in concepts. Irrespective of the problems, it seems useful to treat South Estonian literature as ... [Show full abstract] a separate set of texts; taking the use of South Estonian language as the defining characteristic appears to be the most productive approach. The administrative and linguistic history of South Estonia is different from that of North Estonia and has influenced the development of regional identities. Starting from the 17th century, texts in South Estonian would be published mostly in the form of religious literature, and a South Estonian literary language based on the Tartu dialect was formed. The tradition based on religious literature disappeared at the beginning of the 20th century, while other, and more explicitly literary, opportunities to employ South Estonian language arose. A new wave of South Estonian poetry introduced the second period of South Estonian literature in 1917, during which it was mostly considered as a dialectal branch of Estonian literature. 1987 marked the beginning of a third period that has been characterised by the emergence of literature written in the Võru dialect and the spread of the Võru cultural movement. This most recent stage has brought about changes in the interpretative framework within which South Estonian literature is being discussed.

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Separatistické konflikty na jižním Kavkaze z pohledu politicko-bezpečnostní situace v regionu

January 2013

The aim of our study is to map an important part of the history of the Caucasus, when the conflicts in the breakaway regions escalated, and when the government de facto States and their mother countries were trying to find a peaceful resolution of the post-war situation. For the purpose of this study, we chose a historical and analytical-descriptive approach. From a methodological point of view ... [Show full abstract] it is an area study. The aim is not primarily a comparison of the studied cases, but the understanding of certain processes that occurred in the South Caucasus region. The text is structured as follows, first we deal with linguistic, ethnic and religious background of the conflict in Abkhazia, then we move to the escalation of the conflict, and consequently the course of the peace process in this de facto state. The same structure is then applied to South Ossetia and Nagorno-Karabakh.

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Economic Integration in China: Politics versus Culture

August 2013 · Journal of Comparative Economics

The aim of the paper is to explicitly disentangle the role of political and cultural boundaries as factors of fragmentation of economies within large countries. On the one hand, local protection-ism plays a substantial role in many federations and decentralized states. On the other hand, if the country exhibits high level of cultural heterogeneity, it may also contribute to the economic ... [Show full abstract] fragmentation; however, this topic has received significantly less attention in the literature. This paper looks at the case of China and proxies the cultural heterogeneity by the heterogeneity of local dialects. It shows that the effect of political borders differs across China. In the coastal provinces of the East intra-provincial economies are integrated, but the provincial borders disrupt economic ties. In terms of culture, we find significant economic integration both within and across cultural zones. However, even if the regions fall into the same linguistic zones, it does not allow them to overcome the effects of political borders (in the parts of China these effects are present), with some exceptions.