The Manambu Language of East Sepik, Papua New GuineaThis book presents the first comprehensive description of the Manambu language of Papua New Guinea. Manambu belongs to the Ndu language family, and is spoken by about 2,500 people in five villages: Avatip, Yawabak, Malu, Apa:n, and Yambon (Yuanab) in East Sepik Province, Ambunti district. About 200-400 speakers live in the cities of Port Moresby, Wewak, Lae, and Madang; and a few live in Kokopo and Mount Hagen. The book is based entirely on the author's fieldwork. After an introductory account of the language and its speakers, Professor Aikhenvald devotes chapters to phonology, grammatical relations, word classes, gender, semantics, number, case, possession, derivation and compounding, pronouns, morphology, verbs, mood and modality, negation, clauses, pragmatics, discourse, semantics, the lexicon, current directions of change, and genetic relationship to other languages. The description is presented in a clear style in a framework that will be comprehensible to all linguists and linguistic anthropologists. |
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The Manambu Language of East Sepik, Papua New Guinea Alexandra Y. Aikhenvald No preview available - 2008 |
Common terms and phrases
Abelam action adjectives adverb agreement Aikhenvald ambitransitive ambitransitive verb Ambunti argument Avatip bound directionals child clan clause contains code-switches comitative complex predicates component compounds constituent constructions context copula complement cross-referencing dative dependent clause desiderative different-subject discussed expressed feminine function Gala grammatical Harrison 1990a highlighting focus Iatmul inected inherently directional verb intransitive involving irrealis Kwoma lexicalized Linguistics linker main clause Malu Manambu marked marker masculine mawul meaning medial clause modality modifier Ndu languages negated negative nominal noun phrase occur person imperative Personal pronouns phonological word plural polysemous postposed reactivated topic demonstrative reduplicated refers relative clause sago same-subject purposive second person semantic Sepik River sequence similar example speaker speech report stay story structure suffix support verb syllable ta:kw Table third person Tok Pisin transitive verb uninected unmarked verb root verbal village vitr vowel woman Yuanab