I. Keep in mind that there is really no ultimately “right” answer; there is only an explana- tion that accounts for all the data you are given, and new data may make us change our hypotheses. So remember that what you are actually doing is hypothesis testing (almost like a word game such as a crossword puzzle or on Wheel of Fortune) and trying to figure out what is going on.
II. First stop and look for minimal pairs.
II a. If you have minimal pairs WITH the same meaning, you have ONE phoneme by the principle of free variation. Stop here.
II b. If you have minimal pairs WITH NOT the same meaning, you have TWO pho- nemes by the principle of contrasting distribution.
III. If you do not have minimal pairs, try looking at similar phonetic environments (for “com- plementary distribution” or “overlapping distribution”).
III a. Your first try here would probably be to look at the initial/medial/final distri- butions. Try making a chart of the forms in question. Put a hash mark or check mark for each case you see if they look something like the following table:
initial medial final
[x] ✓✓✓✓
[y] ✓✓✓
The two for ms do not seem to be occurring in the same environments. Thus, you are probably dealing with two allophones (variants) of one single phoneme (by the principle of complementary distribution—that is, where you find one, you do not find the other). You probably can stop your analysis here.
III b. If your distribution looks something like this table,
initial medial final
[x] ✓✓✓ ✓✓ ✓
[y] ✓✓ ✓✓✓ ✓✓✓
we see that [x] and [y] DO seem to occur in similar environments. That is, they seem to overlap, or be in overlapping distribution. We MIGHT have two dif- ferent phonemes, then, and we might be able to stop here if all else looks fine.
However, we should check to be sure, as there may be some other kinds of distri- butions we have not noticed yet.
III b i. Some examples of distributions to check include looking at the following questions:
1. Does one form occur only initially or finally?
2. Does one form occur only before/after/between/ vowels or certain vowels?
3. Does one form occur only before/after/between/consonants or certain consonants?
III b ii. Some specific things to do:
1. Try writing the forms in isolation from the rest of the word to more easily see what is going on; for example,
aWo tXd #Yo eZ#
aWa kXn #Ya rZ#
eWo kXr #Yr oZ#
In these hypothetical examples, we see that [W] seems to occur between vowels, [X] between consonants, [Y] at the beginning of words, and [Z] at the ends.
2. Check the consonant and vowel charts in Table 3.4 and Figures 3.2 and 3.3.
Go across the rows and columns and see what properties the forms have in common with the sounds around them; this may be a clue to your hypothe- sis. For example, look at the Japanese problem given below. In this data set, what do we find? In the data, we see [m] coming before [b], [p], and [m];
[n] comes before [s], [g], [r], [k], [n], [t], and [š], and at the ends of words.
What is going on here? There doesn’t seem to be much in common among the sounds in this last group, BUT all three in the first group are bilabials (and in the same column in Table 3.4). Thus, our initial hypothesis might
Resource Manual and Study Guide 61 be that there is only one phoneme distributed like this (if you wanted to write formally what we just said above, in words):
Resource Manual and Study Guide 71 if all else looks fi ne. However, we should check to be sure, as there may be some other kinds of distributions we have not noticed yet.
III b i. Some examples of distributions to check include looking at the follow- ing questions:
1. Does one form occur only initially or fi nally?
2. Does one form occur only before/aft er/between/ vowels or certain vowels?
3. Does one form occur only before/aft er/between/consonants or certain consonants?
III b ii. Some specifi c things to do:
1. Try writing the forms in isolation from the rest of the word to more easily see what is going on; for example,
aWo tXd #Yo eZ#
aWa kXn #Ya rZ#
eWo kXr #Yr oZ#
In these hypothetical examples we see that [W] seems to occur be- tween vowels, [X] between consonants, [Y] at the beginning of words, and [Z] at the ends.
2. Check the consonant and vowel charts in Table 3.4 and Figures 3.2 and 3.3. Go across the rows and columns and see what properties the forms have in common with the sounds around them; this may be a clue to your hypothesis. For example, look at the Japanese problem given below. In this data set, what do we fi nd? In the data we see [m]
coming before [b], [p], and [m]; [n] comes before [s], [g], [r], [k], [n], [t], and [š], and at the ends of words. What is going on here? There doesn’t seem to be much in common among the sounds in this last group, BUT all three in the fi rst group are bilabials (and in the same column in Table 3.4). Thus, our initial hypothesis might be that there is only one phoneme distributed like this (if you wanted to write for- mally what we just said above, in words):
⎧ [m] / _b, _p, _m
/N/ =
⎨ (i.e., bilabials) ⎩ [n] / elsewhere
That is, we posit one phoneme, which we will call /N/, which consists of two forms, or allophones: it appears as [m] if it comes before [b], [p], and [m] sounds; it appears as [n] when it comes before anything else (more data could actually make us change this hypothesis later).
3. Look at voicing, labial- ness, stop- ness, nasality, vowel height, and vowel distance (front or back); these are some of the most common proper- ties that contribute to the analysis of phonemics problems.
IV. Rewrite your given phonetic data now in phonemic terms, using the pho- neme(s) you have hypothesized. This is just simple substitution of your
9780813349541-text.indd 71 5/28/14 12:36 PM
WThat is, we posit one phoneme, which we will call /N/, which consists of two forms, or allophones: it appears as [m] if it comes before [b], [p], and [m] sounds; it appears as [n] when it comes before anything else (more data could actually make us change this hypothesis later).
3. Look at voicing, labial- ness, stop- ness, nasality, vowel height, and vowel distance (front or back); these are some of the most common properties that contribute to the analysis of phonemics problems.
IV. Rewrite your given phonetic data now in phonemic terms, using the phoneme(s) you have hypothesized. This is just simple substitution of your chosen phoneme symbols for the forms in the original data corpus. For example, if you think [t] and [d] are allophones of /T/, rewrite the words [ta] and [da] now as /Ta/.
Sample problem (Japanese): Practice checking overlapping distribution. Consider the data below. What is the status of the [m] sounds and [n] sounds? Do you think they are two pho- nemes or one? Either way, what are the distributions?
šimpi mystery šimpuku sincerity
šinsan hardships šinsecu new theory
šimbō patience šinčoku progress, advance
šingō traffic signal šimpan referee, judge
šinri mind, heart šimpu bride
šimbun newspaper šimmise new store
šimpai worry šingi deliberation
šinkon newly married šinnin trust
šinka evolution šimbi appreciating beauty
šimpo advance, progress šintō “way of the Gods”
šinkō advance, drive šinšin mind
Problem 1
Based on Wonderly (1951a and 1951b), this problem is taken from Zoque, a language spoken in southern Mexico that belongs to the Mixe- Zoque group of languages. Among the sounds of Zoque are [c], a voiceless alveolar affricate (similar to the consonants in the word tsetse [fly]), and [ʒ], a voiced alveolar affricate. From the data given here—to be taken as representative of the language—are [c] and [ʒ] allophones of one phoneme (that is, are they in complementary distribution), or are they assignable to two different phonemes (that is, do they contrast)? Sup- port your conclusion.
1. ʔakaʔŋʒʌhk- “to be round”
2. ʔaŋʒoŋu “he answered”
3. camʒamnayu “he chatted”
4. cap “sky”
5. caʔ “stone”
6. cima “calabash”
7. nʒʌhku “I did it”
8. nʒima “my calabash”
9. nʒin “my pine”
10. pac “skunk”
11. puci “trash”
12. wanʒʌʔyu “he quit singing”
Problem 2
Czech is a West Slavic language of the Indo- European language family, spoken in the Czech Republic. In Czech, among the various stops (plosives) are two alveodental stops, [t] and [d], articulated by the tongue tip against the boundary between the upper incisors and the alveolar ridge behind them, and two palatal stops, [ty] and [dy]. To how many phonemes are these four sounds assignable? Consider the following data and support your conclusion.
1. dej “give!”
2. dyedyit “to inherit”
3. dyej “action”
4. dyelo “cannon”
5. kotel “kettle”
6. kotye “kitten”
7. tedi “hence”
8. tele “calf (animal)”
9. tyelo “body”
10. teta “aunt”
11. tikat “to be on a first- name basis”
12. titul “title”
13. tyikat “to tick (clock)”
14. vada “flaw”
15. vana “bathtub”
16. vata “absorbent cotton”
Problem 3
Based on Echeverría and Contreras (1965), this problem is taken from Araucanian, a language spoken by Native Americans of Argentina and Chile. Is the main stress, marked by [´], distinc- tive, or is it predictable by rule? Support your conclusion.
1. elúmuyu “give us!”
2. kimúfaluwulay “he pretended not to know”
3. kurám “egg”
4. nawél “tiger”
5. putún “to drink”
6. θuŋúlan “I do not speak”
7. wuyá “yesterday”
Problem 4
Based on Postal (1969), this problem is from Mohawk, the Iroquoian language of a Native American people who live mainly in southern Ontario and extreme northern New York state.
On the basis of the following data, what is the status of vowel length—is it predictable or is it distinctive? Length is indicated by doubling a symbol—that is, éé is a long e; [ʔ] is the glottal stop; [´] marks stress; [ʌ] is an unrounded back lower mid vowel, as in the English word bud;
and [ɔ] is a rounded back lower mid vowel.
1. ranahéézʌs “he trusts her”
2. ragéédas “he scrapes”
Resource Manual and Study Guide 63 3. rayʌ́thos “he plants”
4. waháágedeʔ “he scraped”
5. wísk “five”
6. rehyááraʔs “he remembers”
7. wahrehyááraʔneʔ “he remembered”
8. ɔwadunizaʔáshegeʔ “it will be ripening repeatedly”
9. yékreks “I push it”
10. royóʔdeʔ “he works”
Problem 5
Based on Fromkin and Rodman (1988), this problem is from Korean, a language whose affilia- tion is disputed. The sounds [l] and [r] are in complementary distribution. On the basis of the following data, what is the form of the suffix meaning “of (the)”? What change do noun stems undergo when the suffix is attached, and under what circumstances does the change occur?
What are the two mutually exclusive environments (complementary distribution) in which the sounds [l] and [r] occur?
1. pal “foot”
2. paruy “of the foot”
3. kul “oyster”
4. il “day”
5. rupi “ruby”
6. ratio “radio”
7. mul “water”
8. muruy “of the water”
9. saram “person”
10. saramuy “of the person”
11. multok “water jug”
12. ipalsa “barber”
Problem 6
Based on Fromkin and Rodman (1988), this problem is taken from a Bantu language spoken in Angola, Africa. This language is a member of the Niger- Congo language family. The alveolar segments [t, s, z] in complementary distribution with their palatal counterparts [č, š, ž] are assignable to three phonemes. What is the distribution of each of the corresponding pairs of allophones, that is, [t] and [č], [s] and [š], and [z] and [ž]? Which of the phonetic symbols from the first pair, [t, č], would you choose to represent the phoneme, and why?
1. tobola “to bore a hole”
2. tanu “five”
3. kesoka “to be cut”
4. kasu “emaciation”
5. kunezulu “heaven”
6. zevo “then”
7. zenga “to cut”
8. nselele “termite”
9. čina “to cut”
10. čiba “banana”
11. nkoši “lion”
12. ažimola “alms”
13. lolonži “to wash the house”
14. žima “to stretch”
Problem 7
Desperanto is spoken in an as yet unexplored tropical forest. Among the Desperanto words are the following nouns and noun phrases (long vowels are represented by double letters, short vowels by single letters).
1. muumu “home fried potatoes”
2. kaka “scrambled eggs”
3. wowo “bikini swimsuit”
4. kakaa “used bicycle”
5. mumu “garlic ice cream”
6. woowoo “banana split”
Is vowel length phonemic? ___ yes ____ no.
In your answer (one sentence should suffice), justify your choice:
__________________________________________________________________________
_________________________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________________________
Problem 8
Among the sounds of Czech are [k] and [x] ([x] is the sound written ch in the name of the composer J. S. Bach). On the basis of the Czech words listed below, are these two sounds two separate phonemes or two allophones of one phoneme?
1. [prak] “slingshot”
2. [puk] “puck”
3. [xrxel] “spittle”
4. [krkoun] “cheapskate”
5. [prax] “dust”
6. [xroust] “June bug”
7. [kras] “limestone region with caverns”
8. [pux] “stench”
____ two separate phonemes or ____ two allophones of one phoneme. Justify your decision:
__________________________________________________________________________
_________________________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________________________
Answer Key
True- false test: 1- F, 2- F, 3- T, 4- T, 5- T, 6- T, 7- F, 8- T, 9- T, 10- F Multiple- choice questions: 1- A, 2- D, 3- C, 4- C, 5- B
Completions: 1. tone, 2. phone, phonemes, allophones
Problem 1. The sounds [c] and [ʒ] in Zoque are allophones of a phoneme because they are phonetically similar (both are affricates) and in complementary distribution: the voiced alveolar affricate [ʒ] occurs after nasal consonants ŋ, m, and n (as in 1, 2, 3, 7, 8, 9, and 12), the voiceless alveolar affricate [c] elsewhere (as in 3–6, 10, and 11). The rule could be written as follows: /c/
→ [+ voiced]/N___ (where N = any nasal).
Problem 2. All of the four Czech stops, [t, d, ty, dy], are separate phonemes, /t, d, ty, dy/, because they contrast, as is evident from the existence of minimal pairs in the sample (as in 1 and 3, 4 and 9, 11 and 13, and 14 and 16).
Resource Manual and Study Guide 65 Problem 3. The main stress in Araucanian is on the second vowel of a word and hence is predictable.
Problem 4. Vowel length in Mohawk is predictable: All vowels are short except those that are stressed and followed by a single consonant (as in 1, 2, 4, 6, and 7). Vowel length is therefore not distinctive.
Problem 5. From the word pairs 1 and 2, 7 and 8, and 9 and 10, the form of the suffix meaning
“of (the)” is -uy. Stem- final [l] changes to [r] before the suffix (as in 1 and 2 and 7 and 8). [r] and [l] are allophones of the same phoneme: [r] occurs initially (as in 5 and 6) and intervocalically, that is, between vowels (as in 2, 8, 9, and 10), and [l] occurs finally (as in 1, 3, 4, and 7) and before a consonant (as in 11 and 12).
Problem 6. The alveolar segments [t, s, z] occur before the vowels /e, a, o, u/ (as in 1–8); the palatal segments [č, š, ž] occur before /i/, that is, before a high front vowel (as in 9–14). The phonemic symbol /t/ would be preferable to /č/ because its occurrence is less restricted. It may be expected to occur before the four vowels /e, a, o, u/; in this small sample it occurs only before /o/ and /a/ (as in 1 and 2) and therefore more frequently than the /č/ that occurs only before /i/
(as in 9 and 10). (This choice also happens to be more practical because t is one of the standard keys on American keyboards, whereas č is not; if one were to choose č, the háček [ˇ] diacritical mark would have to be selected from a separate typeface menu, requiring extra steps, and added above the letter c whenever the č occurred.)
Problem 7. Vowel length is phonemic; there are minimal pairs that differ only by vowel length (as in 1 and 5, 2 and 4, and 3 and 6).
Problem 8. The Czech sounds [k] and [x] are two separate phonemes /k/ and /x/; two word pairs of the sample, 1 and 5, and 2 and 8, differ only by virtue of these two consonants.
Notes and Suggestions for Further Reading
Textbooks of linguistics are numerous, and most carry some explanations of phonology and phonemics, often along with exercises. The two classics are Sapir (1921) and Bloomfield (1933).
Two excellent postwar but pre- Chomskyan introductions to linguistics are Hockett (1958) and Gleason (1961). Some representative contemporary standard texts are Akmajian, Demers, Farmer, and Harnish (2010) and O’Grady, Archibald, Aronoff, and Rees- Miller (2009). An eclectic set of problems can be found in Bergmann, Hall, and Ross (2007) or Dawson and Phelan (2016). Zsiga (2013), Hayes (2008), and Reetz and Jongman (2009) are standard treat- ments from a mostly linguistics perspective. Vanderweide, Rees- Miller, and Aronoff (2010) is a problem book to accompany the O’Grady et al. text mentioned above but stands on its own. For general reference, one may wish to consult Crystal (1997) and especially the excellent Crystal (2010). For more specialized topics, see Ladefoged and Johnson (2010) on phonetics, Hayes (2008) on phonology, and Chomsky and Halle (1968) on the phonology of English. Small (2016) offers a good student introduction to phonology and phonetics. Bright’s four- volume encyclopedia (1992) is an excellent and reliable source on all aspects of linguistics.
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4
The “Nuts and Bolts” of Linguistic Anthropology II:
Structure of Words and Sentences
LEARNING OBJECTIVES
• Describe the importance of linguistic formalism for studying culture and society
• Define morphemes, and explain the different kinds
• Explain some basic morphological processes such as case, aspect, and reduplication
• Gain some facility in approaching basic problems in morphology and syntax
• Describe some of the basic ideas behind Chomsky’s generative project
We have not eaten all our linguistic vegetables yet! We are going to talk about some more technical nuts and bolts of linguistic anthropology in this chapter. To see why this is im- portant and necessary, let’s briefly discuss life and language in the Navajo universe. Navajo cosmology is quite different from Western cosmology in many ways, especially regarding assumptions about how the world works. First, for the Navajo, objects in the world are ranked in order of how they can control things. For example, humans can control large animals, large animals can control medium- sized animals, and medium- sized animals con- trol small animals. Animals control insects. Next in the order are natural forces, plants, and inanimate objects. Abstractions come last. Also, within these categories, things in motion control things that are stationary. Things that speak control things that can’t.
You might at first think that this hierarchy is not that odd. After all, we make our dogs sit, dogs chase cats, cats eat mice, mice chew on cheese, and so on. But for the Navajo, when we say control, we really mean control. In the Navajo worldview, it is absurd and almost inconceivable for, say, mice to control cats, cats to control dogs, or dogs to control humans.
But in the world, this actually happens all the time. For example, dogs escape from their
owners, horses kick their riders, and a cornered mouse might bite the careless cat. These things are natural in the English- speaking universe; that’s part of life. But how might a Navajo explain these things? In the case of the cat, “careless” might be the key word here.
The Navajo believe the cat is really more controlling than the mouse, but the cat through its own volition—carelessness, playfulness, kindness, or whatever—somehow allowed itself to get bitten.
But how do we know this? These kinds of questions are not easy for informants to answer, because most people in most cultures rarely reflect on everyday life in such an ab- stract and philosophical way (or using the objective “etic” scientific terms). And how would anthropologists even begin to know to ask a question about how things are controlled in the Navajo universe unless they already had some idea about it? Perhaps surprisingly, one way would be through a look at Navajo syntax. To simplify things greatly, the Navajo language can have these two sentence types: (1) A B yi- VERB, and (2) A B bi- VERB. The first sentence translates as “A VERBs B” or “A does VERB to B” (like the “[The] HORSE KICKS [the] MULE”). The second sentence (which we awkwardly will call “passive” for the moment) translates as “A was VERB- ed by B” (as in “[The] HORSE WAS KICKED BY [the] MULE”). The only difference in the actual Navajo sentence is the prefix attached to the verb. Now it turns out that not just any noun can go in any place in the sentence. A man can kick a horse and a horse can kick a man—these things happen in real life, after all—but they must be phrased in certain ways in Navajo. Thus, a better way of describing the two sentences might be like this:
A → B yi- VERB “A VERBs B”
A ← B bi- VERB “A was VERB- ed by B” or “B VERB- s A”
where the (unspoken, of course) arrow shows the direction of control or agency. But we must add this important qualification: the more animate or controlling noun must occur in the first, or A, place in the sentence. This is an example of what linguists call animacy, the grammatical or semantic category of nouns based on how sentient or alive they are in their language’s hierarchical scheme. So in order to say things like “The horse kicked the man” or “The mouse bit the cat,” they must be said in the “passive,” with “man” or “cat”
appearing first: “The man was kicked by the horse” or “The cat was bitten by the mouse”
(i.e., in the A <—B bi- VERB form). The other “active” “A—> B yi- VERB” form is not only ungrammatical, it sometimes sounds completely absurd in the Navajo view of things, as Gary Witherspoon explains in Box 4.1.
So we see, then, that some technical knowledge of Navajo grammar—AND English grammar, too—is necessary to fully understand the culture. For example, Westerners put value on various abstractions, for example, “truth” or legal technicalities. This is because these notions have a high degree of animacy in the English speaker’s view of things. West- erners say things like “Ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free” (as mentioned in the Bible). But to the Navajo, as we saw, abstractions lie low on the list of controlling objects. So in the rest of the chapter we will look at some of these formal tools that can help us understand how cultures think about, and talk about, their world.