Revisiting Tohono O’odham high vowels
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Colleen M. Fitzgerald
Abstract
Tohono O’odham is a language of much phonological interest from a typological perspective. For example, the language has pre-aspiration, multiple patterns of reduplication, morphological truncation, and displays prosodic inconsistency with a quantity-insensitive stress system that nonetheless employs multiple strategies in the prosodic morphology to enhance that prominent syllable. This paper utilizes a variety of sources of evidence, spanning multiple generations of speakers, including Hill and Zepeda’s massive work documenting Tohono O’odham dialects in the 1980s, which remains unpublished for the most part. I focus on the phonological features and distribution of vowels in Tohono O’odham – and argue that the features [high] and [front] interact in this language in previously undocumented ways.
Abstract
Tohono O’odham is a language of much phonological interest from a typological perspective. For example, the language has pre-aspiration, multiple patterns of reduplication, morphological truncation, and displays prosodic inconsistency with a quantity-insensitive stress system that nonetheless employs multiple strategies in the prosodic morphology to enhance that prominent syllable. This paper utilizes a variety of sources of evidence, spanning multiple generations of speakers, including Hill and Zepeda’s massive work documenting Tohono O’odham dialects in the 1980s, which remains unpublished for the most part. I focus on the phonological features and distribution of vowels in Tohono O’odham – and argue that the features [high] and [front] interact in this language in previously undocumented ways.
Chapters in this book
- Prelim pages i
- Table of contents v
- Foreword vii
- Preface xi
- Introduction xxi
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Section 1. Approaches to the study of the indigenous languages of the Americas
- The diachrony of Ute case-marking 3
- Language contact as an inhibitor of sound change 29
- Stress in Yucatec Maya 53
- The phonetic correlates of Southern Ute stress 85
- Revisiting Tohono O’odham high vowels 107
- Head-marking inflection and the architecture of grammatical theory 133
- A case-study in grass roots development of web resources for language workers 175
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Section 2. Approaches to the study of voices and ideologies
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Language contact, shift, and endangerment – implications for policy
- Spanish in contact with indigenous tongues 203
- How can a language with 7 million speakers be endangered? 229
- A documentary ethnography of a Blackfoot language course 257
- Syncretic speech, linguistic ideology, and intertextuality 291
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Racism in discourse – analyses of practice
- Narrative discriminations in Central California’s indigenous narrative traditions 321
- The voice of (White) reason 339
- Double-voicing in the everyday language of Brazilian black activism 365
- Uptake (un)limited 389
- The silken cord 415
- Afterword 425
- Language index 431
- Subject index 433
Chapters in this book
- Prelim pages i
- Table of contents v
- Foreword vii
- Preface xi
- Introduction xxi
-
Section 1. Approaches to the study of the indigenous languages of the Americas
- The diachrony of Ute case-marking 3
- Language contact as an inhibitor of sound change 29
- Stress in Yucatec Maya 53
- The phonetic correlates of Southern Ute stress 85
- Revisiting Tohono O’odham high vowels 107
- Head-marking inflection and the architecture of grammatical theory 133
- A case-study in grass roots development of web resources for language workers 175
-
Section 2. Approaches to the study of voices and ideologies
-
Language contact, shift, and endangerment – implications for policy
- Spanish in contact with indigenous tongues 203
- How can a language with 7 million speakers be endangered? 229
- A documentary ethnography of a Blackfoot language course 257
- Syncretic speech, linguistic ideology, and intertextuality 291
-
Racism in discourse – analyses of practice
- Narrative discriminations in Central California’s indigenous narrative traditions 321
- The voice of (White) reason 339
- Double-voicing in the everyday language of Brazilian black activism 365
- Uptake (un)limited 389
- The silken cord 415
- Afterword 425
- Language index 431
- Subject index 433
