Doctoral Dissertation Research: A Grammar of Sakun (Sukur)

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The Sakun language documentation project will produce a grammar of the endangered and undocumented Chadic language spoken by approximately 15,000 people at the UNESCO World Heritage Sukur Cultural Landscape. The Chadic language family constitutes over half the languages of the Afroasiatic phylum, but is the least studied. Many members of this family, including Sakun, are giving way to Hausa. This project will place an experienced fieldworker familiar with Sakun and with established ties to the community on site to conduct the research. Sakun contains a number of grammatical features that have yet to be described for languages of the Mandara mountains. A detailed description of the language will fill a crucial gap in the empirical base of knowledge about Chadic, and will contribute important evidence for more general theoretical questions about language structure and use. Building on the success of the pilot project conducted in May-August, 2008, a broad range of audio and video texts will be collected and analyzed with the aid of Sakun language consultants over a 5-month period. The collected texts will provide the corpus for the grammar. The word lists collected will provide the foundation for a future dictionary. Time is short due to increased contact and development resulting from UNESCO enlistment, which has increased pressure to use languages other than Sakun. The long term goals of producing a dictionary, grammar and texts, coupled with the training of Sakun consultants participating in the fieldwork, will support the local community in their ongoing initiatives towards maintaining their language and culture. This project will build important institutional connections between the Sakun Development Association, the University of Colorado, Nigeria's National Commission on Museums and Monuments, UNESCO and the University of Maiduguri.