A Reference Grammar of Hausa

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ABSTRACT The aim of the project is to prepare a much-needed Reference Grammar of Hausa, the largest language in all of Nigeria, Africa's most populous country, and unquestionably one of most important languages in all of sub-Saharan Africa. This reference work, which will be the first new grammar of the language to appear in over fifty years, will consist in a comprehensive description of all aspects of the language, including pronunciation, word formation, syntactic structure, and dialect variation. It will also include information on its linguistic history and development. In addition to being a major contribution to Hausa linguistic scholarship per se, the grammar will also serve as an invaluable reference work for scholars interested in comparative Chadic and Afroasiatic, and for general linguists concerned with broad questions of linguistic theory and typology. The project will be carried out at Indiana University, a major center of African studies, by the Principal Investigator, an internationally recognized authority on the Hausa language, assisted by a team of Hausa language experts, including a number of linguistically trained Hausas speakers. The final product will be a large reference book prepared using modern computer capabilities and distributed through normal academic publishing channels.