Leti: Language of Southwest Maluku"Leti is spoken on the island with the same name near the Indonesian-East Timorese border. This small Austronesian language became known among linguists for the complex patterns of metathesis permeating its entire grammar." "Besides little discussed topics, like its intricate deictic system and lexical parallelism, this book provides information on intriguing features of the Leti language that remained undescribed, such as singing, naming, storytelling and the semantics of the indexer clitic." "A complete version of the Sailfish myth that underlies the structures of all Southwest Malukan island communities has been added. The entire text is provided with interlinear glosses. All lexical items in the text and in the description have been inserted in a wordlist together with all lexical parallels." "Being the first exhaustive study of a Southwest Malukan language, this description is a valuable contribution to the topological study of East Indonesia and East Timor and to Austronesian linguistics. The abundance of examples makes it of interest also for linguists with a theoretical orientation in phonology, syntax and semantics. The 'insider's perspective' approach provides essential information for students of ethnolinguistics and oral traditions in the region."--BOOK JACKET.Title Summary field provided by Blackwell North America, Inc. All Rights Reserved |
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Common terms and phrases
action adverbs allomorph allow analysis argument aspect attested attitudinal deictics become bivalent boat brother called clan clauses clitic combine complement conjunction consonant constituents construction coordination core counterpart dative object deictic depicted designate determiner directive discussion displays dynamic verbs elaborated encoded Engelenhoven entity event example exemplified final function head human implies indexer indicated inflection initial Island kind labelled languages Leti lexical lexical parallel linguistic look Luang Malay Maluku marked marker means modified monovalent mood morpheme nominal non-human noun nvene oblique object Observe occur pair participant periphery person person deictic phrase plural possessive preceding predicate prefix pronominal pronouns reduplication referent relation requires respectively resultative sail scene shows side signals simultaneous slot speaker specifies speech suffix syllable Table Timor tion topic transitive Tutukei verbal verbs village vowel Whereas