Multimedia analysis in documentation projects: Kinship, interrogatives and reciprocals in ǂ Akhoe Hai ǁ om
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Thomas Widlok
Abstract
This contribution emphasizes the role of multimedia data not only for archiving languages but also for creating opportunities for innovative analyses. In the case at hand, video material was collected as part of the documentation of Akhoe Haiom, a Khoisan language spoken in northern Namibia. The multimedia documentation project brought together linguistic and anthropological work to highlight connections between specialized domains, namely kinship terminology, interrogatives and reciprocals. These connections would have gone unnoticed or undocumented in more conventional modes of language description. It is suggested that such an approach may be particularly appropriate for the documentation of endangered languages since it directs the focus of attention away from isolated traits of languages towards more complex practices of communication that are also frequently threatened with extinction.
Abstract
This contribution emphasizes the role of multimedia data not only for archiving languages but also for creating opportunities for innovative analyses. In the case at hand, video material was collected as part of the documentation of Akhoe Haiom, a Khoisan language spoken in northern Namibia. The multimedia documentation project brought together linguistic and anthropological work to highlight connections between specialized domains, namely kinship terminology, interrogatives and reciprocals. These connections would have gone unnoticed or undocumented in more conventional modes of language description. It is suggested that such an approach may be particularly appropriate for the documentation of endangered languages since it directs the focus of attention away from isolated traits of languages towards more complex practices of communication that are also frequently threatened with extinction.
Chapters in this book
- Prelim pages i
- Table of contents v
- A world of many voices: Editors' introduction 1
- Sri Lanka Malay revisited: Genesis and classification 13
- Working Together: The interface between researchers and the native people - The Trumai case 43
- Tense, Aspect and Mood in Awetí verb-paradigms: Analytic and synthetic forms. 67
- Tonogenesis in Southeastern Monguor. 111
- Language, ritual and historical reconstruction: Towards a linguistic, ethnographical and archaeological account of Upper Xingu Society 129
- Endangered Caucasian languages in Georgia: Linguistic parameters of language endangerment 159
- Contact, attrition and shift in two Chaco languages: The cases of Tapiete and Vilela 195
- Tofa language change and terminal generation speakers 243
- Hocank's challenge to morphological theory 271
- A Preliminary study of same-turn self-repair initiation in Wichita conversation 317
- Multimedia analysis in documentation projects: Kinship, interrogatives and reciprocals in ǂ Akhoe Hai ǁ om 355
- Index 371
Chapters in this book
- Prelim pages i
- Table of contents v
- A world of many voices: Editors' introduction 1
- Sri Lanka Malay revisited: Genesis and classification 13
- Working Together: The interface between researchers and the native people - The Trumai case 43
- Tense, Aspect and Mood in Awetí verb-paradigms: Analytic and synthetic forms. 67
- Tonogenesis in Southeastern Monguor. 111
- Language, ritual and historical reconstruction: Towards a linguistic, ethnographical and archaeological account of Upper Xingu Society 129
- Endangered Caucasian languages in Georgia: Linguistic parameters of language endangerment 159
- Contact, attrition and shift in two Chaco languages: The cases of Tapiete and Vilela 195
- Tofa language change and terminal generation speakers 243
- Hocank's challenge to morphological theory 271
- A Preliminary study of same-turn self-repair initiation in Wichita conversation 317
- Multimedia analysis in documentation projects: Kinship, interrogatives and reciprocals in ǂ Akhoe Hai ǁ om 355
- Index 371
