Ethnolinguistics

Human culture and language are deeply intertwined. Anthropologists would have difficulty understanding a culture without becoming familiar with its language and vice versa. In fact, neither one can exist without the other. Like culture, language is continually changing. Societal norms and practices impact the ways that people communicate with each other. Thus, by looking at how people speak to each other, we can deduce certain things about their relationships and relative status in society.

A general model is proposed for language and dialect spreads and population movement in mountain societies. Languages (and societies) are ver- tically distributed and often discontinuous. Isoglosses and language spreads move downhill during warm periods and uphill during cold periods. Population movements go in the opposite direction. The ethnic scope and degree of mytho- logization of origin legends correlate well with chronology and vertical direc- tionality of movements, so that even highly mythologized legends are reliable evidence of movements. This model is demonstrated on the ethnolinguistic history of the Chechen and Ingush peoples of the central Caucasus. 1. Introduction. Mountains are as distinctive linguistically as they are geographically and biologically. When inhabited by settled farming and herding people, they harbor unusual diversity of language families and grammatical structures relative to nearby lowlands. The considerable ecological diversity of mountain landsca...

Prabhat Rainjan Sarkar (1922-1990), a spiritual guru (also known as Shrii Shrii Anandamurti) and social philosopher, describes remarkable previously unknown facts about the evolution of the earth and human civilization, and the birthplace of the first human beings in Ráŕh, an ancient area of India. This spoken discourse “Geology and Human Civilization” was given in Anandanagar, India on 28 December 1987.  –  Richard Gauthier, Department of Chemistry and Physics, Santa Rosa Junior College, Santa Rosa, California, USA, September 13, 2020.

This is a PDF output of the 2002 publication.  Unfortunately, the IPA has not come across as it should. You may find a 3rd edition of this grammar - with IPA intact - in the Appendix of Scottish Gaelic Speech and Writing (Lamb 2008), also available on this site.

Under the threat of Danish, the Faeroese language faced extinction in the nineteenth century. Today, the language is no longer considered 'corrupt' and is instead spoken by nearly the entire population as a first language. The reasons for its survival can be explained by a number of factors, including: the important role of oral heritage, the manner in which these traditions were practiced in Faeroese culture and the fact that a Faeroese identity was based upon them. The influence of this oral literature on the overall language was disproportionately significant as the Faeroese did not develop a written tradition until the nineteenth century. Faeroese was never a minority language as such and survived the onslaught of Danish as an oral form and as the 'low' variety in a diglossic, bilingual environment. The use of Faeroese was restricted to the homestead (and farm) where the tradition of oral literature continued to flourish. It turns out that this sociolinguistic context and specifically the introduction of an unphonetic orthography made a significant contribution to the survival of the language, albeit perhaps at the cost of the oral traditions. In the face of changing interaction between language and culture, the Faeroese have managed to maintain a sense of linguistic identity and produce a model of linguistic survival in the context of social change. The example of Faeroese shows us that given the right circumstances a language can survive with a minimal number of speakers for a sustained period of time and that provided there is a strong ethnolinguistic identity and the will to preserve the language, a minority language can in fact prosper.

The article is devoted to the analysis of the ethno-social and legal aspects of language policy in the Caucasus during the imperial, Soviet and post-Soviet periods. The information characterizing the specifics of language processes in the Caucasus is given. It is noted that the political and legal response to problems arising in the national-cultural sphere does not always correspond to the complexity and socio-political tension of the ethnocultural and linguistic processes taking place in the region. The importance of studying and using the historical experience
of national language policy to address the current, due to modern trends in the dynamics of ethnic language processes in the regions of the Caucasus is emphasized.

The article analyzes the pre-Slavic and Carpathian lexicon, borrowings of different times and specific terms in Moravian terminology of the mythological characters, considering the all-Slavic background. Based on the comparison and confrontation of demonological vocabulary and beliefs of the Moravian and Moravian-Silesian ethnographic regions with the Czech and Slovak regions, the isoleks and isodoxes that connect or separate these three closely related West Slavic regions, and partly continue in Slovenian and Croatian dialects.

Se analiza el universo de ideologías, prácticas y representaciones cosmológicas asociadas por los chané del noroeste argentino con el ámbito del monte. Se describen etnográficamente fenómenos como la división conceptual del espacio; la relación de la categorización espacial con la división sexual del trabajo y las relaciones de género; el protocolo ritualizado de conducta para con los seres del monte y los dueños tutelares de las cosas; la ambigüedad simbólica del ámbito del monte; el juego de analogías y paralelismos entre las representaciones montaraces y la estructura social (redes de parentesco, alianza, reciprocidad y redistribución, ideologías del liderazgo y la propiedad, etc.). Se discute la discriminación analítica de matices exegéticos en diversos contextos simbólicos, semánticos y experienciales en los cuales las acciones y los enunciados de los chané adquieren cotidianamente su sentido y su inteligibilidad. Se demuestra, finalmente, que el conocimiento del monte no conforma un registro abstracto de datos espaciales, biológicos o geográficos sino una auténtica percepción cultural de la realidad.

This paper is based on the author's Master's thesis in Linguistics, which was conducted at the University of Pisa. The study employs corpus linguistics methods, specifically a distributional approach based on the Vector Space Model (VSM) and cosine similarity. The primary objective of this research is to investigate the quantitative and qualitative differences between abstract and concrete nouns.

Two main goals guide this study:

Firstly, the research aims to demonstrate the significant role emotions play in the conceptualization of abstract nouns. By analyzing collocational patterns, we establish that abstract nouns are more frequently associated with emotions, indicating the presence of strong emotional connotations in the use of abstract language.

Secondly, we seek to provide evidence supporting the processing disadvantage of abstract nouns compared to concrete nouns, which arises due to the inherent variability in the meanings of abstract nouns. To explore this, we conduct an in-depth context analysis using the distributional properties of VSM and cosine similarity.

Through two distinct analyses—the emotive analysis and the context analysis—we shed light on the relationship between emotions and abstract nouns. The emotive analysis, based on collocation comparisons, confirms the prevalence of emotions in the usage of abstract language. Meanwhile, the context analysis, utilizing the measurement of cosine similarity within the Vector Space Model, uncovers the processing disadvantage faced while dealing with abstract nouns, attributed to the availability of diverse contextual associations.

In conclusion, our findings support the view that emotions play a crucial role in shaping the conceptualization of abstract names. Additionally, this research provides valuable insights into the processing dynamics of abstract nouns, contributing to the broader understanding of lexical semantics and cognitive mechanisms involved in language comprehension.

Nijakość w języku i neutralność w literaturze jako sygnał odmienności kulturowej? W myśl koncepcji " językowego obrazu świata " struktura gramatyczna może podpowiadać określone treści, uwypuklać je i akcentować, sprzyjając powsta-waniu swoistego " świato-oglądu " (unikatowego i często nieprzetłumaczalnego). Taką strukturą jest rodzaj nijaki w języku niemieckim, gdyż jego częstsze uży-cie spowodowane jest brakiem końcówek rodzajowych w formach czasownika, oraz faktem, iż wszystkie zdrobnienia (posiadające końcówkę "-chen " , "-lein ") są z zasady rodzaju nijakiego (stąd chociażby zaskakująca dla polszczyzny gramatyczna nijakość " dziewczyny " w języku niemieckim). Szczególnie istotny jest w tym kontekście zaimek " es " , który nie tylko zastępuje rzeczowniki w ro-dzaju nijakim, lecz spełnia ponadto szereg istotnych funkcji gramatycznych. Nieprzypadkowo Siegmund Freud wybrał " das Es " jako nazwę dla opisywanej przez siebie kategorii dziecięcości (tłumaczonej na język polski za angielskim przekładem mylnie jako " id "). Produktywność i częstotliwość użycia rodzaju nijakiego pozostawia oczy-wiście ślad. W literaturze pięknej kategoria ta służy nie tylko do wyrażania treści związanych z nijakością/dziecięcością, lecz werbalizuje również zjawiska związane z neutralnością/uniwersalnością, co pokazuję na przykładach zaczerp-niętych z baśni braci Grimm i Ernsta Theodora Amadeusa Hoffmana oraz współczesnej literatury dziecięcej (książek Paula Maara). Następnie chciałabym zapytać, co dzieje się z kategorią nijakości w sytuacji przekładu na język polski i czy jej redukcja wiąże się wyłącznie z faktem nieprzekładalności językowej i " terrorem polszczyzny " , czy może być także nieświadomym (a może świa-domym) odrzuceniem tej kategorii na rzecz dychotomizacji świata na żywioł męski i żeński. Na przykładzie jednego zjawiska gramatycznego pokazuję, w jaki sposób elementy języka manifestują się w literaturze i czy mogą stanowić barierę kulturową w sytuacji przekładu na inny język. Słowa kluczowe: językowy obraz świata; rodzaj nijaki; przekład literacki

This paper deals with the concept of ‘honour’ by applying the principles of an open de nition also known as a cognitive de nition. The aim of the article is to formulate a cogni- tive de nition of the concept of honour. In order to achieve this purpose, different aspects of the meaning of the word ‘honour’ have been investigated in ancient writings, contemporary lexicographic sources and contemporary discourses. The analysis has demonstrated that for Lithuanians honour is a two-fold concept which exists at both the subjective and the objec- tive levels, since Lithuanians express a desire to be acknowledged, respected and honoured, placing emphasis on the feeling of self-esteem, achievement of goals and other accomplish- ments that lead to being honoured. On the other hand, it is typical that Lithuanians are only able to see themselves as members of a community since only a community can grant value to an individual and, as a result, a personal honour is related to the collective honour with an inherent element of public expression. It is possible to conclude that in their de nition of the word ‘honour’ dictionaries do not rely on semantics but rather prefer synonymous terms and sometimes provide lexical meaning(s). Such de nitions do not fully re ect people’s concep- tion of concrete and, even more so, of abstract domains. The results of the present research lead to the following cognitive de nition of the concept of honour:
Honour is a sense of self-esteem and responsibility when one feels valued for their life, accomplishments as well as good reputation that one has gained in society for good deeds, virtuous behaviour and life, high morals, honesty, fairness, for keeping one’s faith, respect and care of others, self-sacri ce for one’s homeland, sacri ce for the sake of an idea, for other people’s welfare, for patriotism and heroism.

The early ethnological works of Alfred Métraux are analysed bearing in mind his first fieldwork trip to the Chiriguano, in 1929. The paper discusses personal, academic and professional features of Métraux’s ethnological experience, the nature of the 1929 trip and his concrete relationships with the Chiriguano groups and individuals. Next, we analyse his ideas on material culture as a privileged means of understanding the synthesis of Andean, Chaco and Amazonian cultural influences. Finally, the dilemmas and limitations of his analytical approach regarding Créole cultural influence and social and cultural change are discussed. [Key words: Alfred Métraux, Chané, Chiriguano, material culture, change.]
Se analiza la etnología temprana de Alfred Métraux a la luz de su primer viaje de campo a los chiriguanos, en 1929. Se discute el perfil personal, académico y profesional de Métraux, las peculiaridades de su trabajo de campo en 1929 y sus relaciones concretas con los indígenas chiriguanos en el terreno. Se examinan luego sus ideas sobre la cultura material como campo experimental privilegiado para rastrear procesos de síntesis de influencias culturales andinas, chaqueñas y amazónicas, así también sus dilemas y límites a la hora de interpretar el factor de la influencia criolla y el proceso de cambio social y cultural en un sentido amplio. [Palabras clave: Alfred Métraux, Chané, Chiriguano, cultura material, cambio.]

According to a new global narrative, the Danes are the happiest people in the
world. This paper takes a critical look at the international media discourse of
“happiness”, tracing its roots and underlying assumptions. Equipped with the
Natural Semantic Metalanguage approach to linguistic and cultural analysis, a
new in-depth semantic analysis of the story of “Danish happiness” is developed.
It turns out that the allegedly happiest people on earth do not (usually) talk and
think about life in terms of ”happiness”, but rather through a different set of
cultural concepts and scripts, all guided by the Danish cultural keyword lykke.
The semantics of lykke is explicated along with two related concepts livsglæde,
roughly, ‘life joy’ and livslyst ‘life pleasure’, and based on semantic and ethnopragmatic
analysis, a set of lykke-related cultural scripts is provided. With new
evidence from Danish, it is argued that global Anglo-International “happiness
discourse” misrepresents local meanings and values, and that the one-sided
focus on “happiness across nations” in the social sciences is in dire need of crosslinguistic
confrontation. The paper calls for a post-happiness turn in the study of
words and values across languages, and for a new critical awareness of linguistic
and conceptual biases in Anglo-international discourse.

This article continues the study of Ruthenian spiritual culture and aims at the determination of ancient elements in the selected rituals and their parts in folk meteorology, wedding, funeral and birth ceremonials, and beliefs about animals and birds in the all-Slavic context. It is shown that the traditional Ruthenian culture is very close to the West Ukrainian ones on the one hand and that it has substantive differences, which allow considering Ruthenian tradition a separate East-Slavic tradition with deep historical background.

An attempt has been made to reveal ethnocultural peculiarities of the lexemes-components god and devil representing the national Ukrainian and French mentalities. The semantic and stylistic correlates and antonymic connections of the analysed lexemes have been found in both languages. The dialectological sources have been involved in the analysis to illustrate ethno-meanings.
Key words: ethnolinguistics, ethnophraseology, phraseological unit, ethno-idiom, cultural and religious component, ethnocultural semantic.
Сделана попытка выявить этнокультурные особенности лексем-компонентов бог и черт, являющиеся репрезентантами национального украинского и французского мировоззрения. Найдены смысловые, стилистические соответствия и антонимические связи проанализированных лексем. В анализе задействованы диалектологические источники для иллюстрации этносмыслов.
Ключевые слова: этнолингвистика, этнофразеология, фразеологическая единица, этноидиома, культурно-религиозный компонент, этнокультурная семантика.

В статье рассматривается диалектная лексика, связанная с традициями собирательства на Русском Севере: наименования грибов и ягод, отражающие особенности их приготовления и кулинарные свойства, а также названия блюд из лесных продуктов. Материал статьи составили диалектные, фольклорные и этнографические сведения из Архангельской, Вологодской и Костромской областей, в том числе неопубликованные данные, собранные Топонимической экспедицией Уральского федерального университета. Статья направлена на выявление специфики категоризации лесных продуктов в языке севернорусских крестьян, локальных особенностей растительного рациона, а  также возможного влияния финно-угорской пищевой культуры. Этнолингвистический подход предполагает учет
количественного соотношения лексем, идеографический и ареальный анализ лексики, выявление ее семантико-мотивационных связей. В результате анализа материала устанавливается, что с темой сбора грибов и ягод на Русском Севере связан значительный круг языковых единиц и текстов фольклора. Выявляются характерные для культуры  собирательства категории и понятия: «количество грибов / ягод, принесенных за один раз», «лесные хозяева грибов
и  ягод», «родовые наименования лесных продуктов» (волога, обоща), «особо ценные лесные продукты» (царские
грибы, ягоды, рыба). Наименования блюд из грибов и ягод указывают на различные способы их приготовления, питательные свойства, состав. Названия блюд из ягод отразили влияние финно-угорской кулинарной традиции (вероятно, заимствованные обозначения мучных каш с ягодами галагатка, кипришиха, ляс). Представления о собирательстве сохраняются в фольклорных сюжетах и нарративах: мужчины как типичные сборщики грибов, дети и девушки — собиратели ягод; наличие у каждой деревни своей территории для сбора; неприятие «чужих» в своих местах; пищевые привычки локальных групп (прозвища вологодские рыжики, обабки и пр.).

Resumen

La presente investigación tiene como propósito el estudio de los aspectos más importantes de las nociones que emplean los hablantes del dialecto del Alto Perené de la lengua ashéninka para la orientación en el ambiente en cuanto al espacio y su relación con la distancia y la posición. La descripción y el análisis de estas estructuras que guían la orientación en el espacio están dentro de un enfoque sincrónico y están basadas en los datos recogidos entre 2014 y 2018 en tres comunidades nativas asháninka ubicadas en la provincia de Chanchamayo, en el departamento de Junín.

La deixis espacial en ashéninka se expresa a través de posposiciones adverbiales graduadoras de distancia, pronombres demostrativos y adverbios posicionales, incluyendo aquellas partículas que semánticamente tienen como puntos de referencia dimensiones naturales como el cielo, el suelo y el río; además de un verbo direccional que funciona como deíctico, permitiendo que el hablante se oriente dentro del ambiente donde habita. La orientación se origina desde la consciencia del emisor con respecto a su ubicación dentro del espacio, generándose al mismo tiempo un plano de referencia. Posteriormente esta noción se complementa con la consciencia del emisor sobre el ente referido, partiendo desde su ubicación, posición y distancia en la que este se halla desde el plano referencial del emisor o de otro referente; el segundo solo si fuera dentro de un contexto narrativo.


Abstract

The purpose of this research is the study of the most important and featuring aspects of the notions the speakers of Alto Perene dialect of the Asheninka language use for orientation in the environment regarding space and its relation to distance and position from a synchronic approach. The description and analysis of these structures that guide orientation in space are based on data collected between 2014 and 2018 in three native Ashaninka communities located in the province of Chanchamayo, in the department of Junin.

Spatial deixis in Asheninka is expressed through distance grading adverbial postpositions, demonstrative pronouns and positional adverbs, including those particles that semantically are related to natural dimensions such as sky, ground and river as reference points; moreover, there is a directional verb that works as a deictic. Every spatial deictic allow the speaker to orient himself within the environment where he lives. Orientation originates from the source’s consciousness with respect to its location within space, while generating a reference plane. Later, this notion is complemented by the source's awareness on the referred entity, starting from its location, position and distance in which it is from the source's referential plane or another referent’s; the latter only if it were within a narrative context.

During the last few years, mobile phones and social networks have deeply changed relationships and, insidiously, the use and representations of languages in Vanuatu. In spite of being very recent, it seems that new ways of communication imply changes regarding the various ways of using and adapting languages, amongst which are code-switching and language-shifting. Bislama, the national local lingua franca, is becoming more and more used in phone conversations. Internet and especially social networks (such as Facebook) are revealing new language strategies in social intercourses.
This article examines interactions of languages that are mediated through social networks and mobile phone exchanges. More specifically, this paper discusses different language ideologies that are manifest in and deployed over forms of telecommunication.

Four stars in the night sky have been formally recognised by their Australian Aboriginal names. The names include three from the Wardaman people of the Northern Territory and one from the Boorong people of western Victoria. The Wardaman star names are Larawag, Wurren and Ginan in the Western constellations Scorpius, Phoenix and Crux (the Southern Cross). The Boorong star name is Unurgunite in Canis Majoris (the Great Dog). They are among 86 new star names drawn from Chinese, Coptic, Hindu, Mayan, Polynesian, South African, and Aboriginal Australian cultures.

Прежде, чем перейти к рассмотрению проблем функционирования дерогативно маркированных этнонимов на современном этапе развития английского языка, определим, что задачей представленной статьи является изучение дерогативно маркированных этнонимов с позиций этнолингвистического направления языкознания: вычленение лексем американского варианта английского языка на основании их исторических, национально-культурных, этнических и психологических особенностей в этнолингвистическом пространстве.

В данной статье представлена биография крупного учёного-диалектолога А. Ф. Войтенко, благодаря фундаментальным трудам которой («Словарь говоров Подмосковья», «Лингвистический атлас Московской области», «Московская диалектная лексика в ареальном аспекте», «Что двор, то говор»), по словам ведущего научного сотрудника Отдела диалектологии и лингвистической географии ИРЯ им. В. В. Виноградова РАН А. В. Тер-Аванесовой, «Подмосковье является наиболее изученной с точки зрения лексики и этнологии территорией России».

This article shows biography of talented dialectologist A. F. Voitenko, thanks to the works of which («Dictionary of dialects of the Moscow region», «Linguistic Atlas of Moscow region», «Moscow dialectal vocabulary in areal aspect», «To each homestead, it's dialect»), according to A. V. Ter-Avanesova, «the Moscow region is the most studied in terms of vocabulary and ethnology, the territory of Russia».