From Space to Time

Eugene Casad’s posthumous monograph is an in-depth study of the TIME IS SPACE metaphor in Cora – an Uto-Aztecan language spoken in the state of Nayarit, Mexico – within the framework of Ronald Langacker’s Cognitive Grammar. The author provides an introduction to Cora speakers and their history, and traces the evolution of Cora locative expressions, comparing them with cognate or corresponding expressions in other Uto-Aztecan languages, e.g. Huichol, to reconstruct the development of Cora temporal meanings. Based on a meticulous analysis of synchronic and diachronic data, Casad postulates distinct Cora models of time, grammatical aspect, and event structure, among which the topographically based model of time is especially prominent. This important book can be regarded as the opus magnum of the author. It should be of interest to scholars working in conceptual metaphor theory, grammaticalization, and the history and typology of Uto-Aztecan languages.

Dorothea Hoffmann, University of Chicago, in Anthropological Linguistics Vol. 55:3 (2014), pp. 301-304:
Overall, Eugene H. Casad has produced a comprehensive account of Cora’s unique locative system and its extensions to the temporal domain from a diachronic and synchronic point of view. Given the precarious status of the language, and Casad’s long-term commitment to the study and description of Cora, this book will become an invaluable source of reference for linguists interested in Uto-Atztecan languages, typology, and, most of all, cognitive linguistics.