SGER: Exploratory Field Work on Reefs-Santa Cruz Languages

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This grant supports an initial five-week field trip to the Santa Cruz Islands in the Solomon Islands of the Western Pacific, to investigate the possibilities of conducting more extensive fieldwork on one of the non-Austronesian ('Papuan') languages spoken there. Three of these languages, which have not yet been described, are of considerable interest. First, they are the easternmost Papuan languages, separated by over 250 miles from the closest Papuan languages, and are at best only remotely related to other languages. Second, while they are generally classified as non-Austronesian, they are also appropriately classified as mixed languages: half of their basic vocabulary and many of the grammatical morphemes are Austronesian. Finally, these languages have a small number of speakers and may be considered endangered. The long-range goal is to conduct fieldwork on these languages.