Medumba [BYV] Linguistic Fieldwork and Collaborative Language Development

Medumba [BYV] 语言实地考察和协作语言开发

• 批准号: 1026724
• 负责人: Catherine O'Connor
• 金额: $ 8.65万
• 依托单位: Trustees of Boston University
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2010
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2010-08-15 至 2012-01-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1026724&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Medumba; BYV; Linguistic; Fieldwork; Collaborative

This project is a study of tone in Medumba, an Eastern Grassfields Bantu language spoken in Western Cameroon. Some description and analysis of Medumba was carried out in the 1970s, and it quickly became apparent that the tone system of the language poses significant challenges and differs in important ways from the Bantu languages found in surrounding areas. This language and its close relatives were the basis for the theoretical construct of "floating tone" and its critical role in understanding downstep. Reasoning about this phenomenon was closely linked to facts about the noun class system, which has become segmentally attenuated, resulting in very complex patterns of tone realization in a variety of constructions. This research aims to resolve a complex web of questions concerning tone, noun class, and largely undescribed verbal tone patterns. The research consists of one month of field work in Cameroon by four graduate student fieldworkers. It will provide an updated description of the language, along with answers to specific questions about the realization of tone in a variety of contexts. These data will then be used to decide between competing accounts of the tone system.The significance of this project lies in several areas. First, it will substantially increase what is known to the linguistic sciences about Medumba, a language that exemplifies one particularly complex and theoretically important type of tonal system. Scholarly work on the typology of tone is still developing and the results of this project will contribute to these efforts. Second, the project will provide training for four graduate students, all of whom are committed to becoming theoretically-informed linguistic fieldwork experts. As more languages become extinct, pressure grows on the linguistic sciences to fully understand the range of grammatical diversity in the remaining languages. As the field intensifies its efforts to describe and document these remaining languages, it is imperative to train younger scientists to conduct such work using best practices. The students will attend an international summer school on linguistic fieldwork and African tone systems prior to their visit to Cameroon. Finally, they will begin a partnership with a Cameroonian applied linguistic organization, which will contribute to efforts to sustain the language as bilingualism of colonial languages continues to encroach. One purpose of the partnership will be to develop written materials in Medumba, including a dictionary. This training and experience is co-funded by the Africa, Near East, and South Asia division in NSF's Office of International Science and Engineering. Combined with further mentoring by five senior linguists, it will prepare these young scientists to contribute to the infrastructure of the field in one of its most pressing domains: the description and documentation of under-described languages.

这个项目是对Medumba的语调的研究，Medumba是喀麦隆西部使用的一种东部草原班图语。在20世纪70年代，人们对Medumba进行了一些描述和分析，很快就发现该语言的音调系统构成了重大挑战，并且在重要方面与周围地区发现的班图语不同。这种语言及其近亲是“浮音”理论建构的基础，也是理解降调的关键。对这一现象的推理与名词类系统的事实密切相关，名词类系统已被分段弱化，导致各种结构中的声调实现模式非常复杂。本研究的目的是解决一个复杂的网络问题，有关语气，名词类，和很大程度上未描述的言语语气模式。该研究包括由四名研究生实地工作者在喀麦隆进行为期一个月的实地工作。它将提供最新的语言描述，以及关于在各种上下文中实现音调的具体问题的答案。然后，这些数据将被用来在音调系统的竞争账户之间做出决定。这个项目的意义在于几个方面。首先，它将大大增加语言科学对Medumba的了解，这种语言体现了一种特别复杂且理论上重要的音调系统类型。语调类型学的学术研究仍在发展中，本项目的成果将有助于这些努力。第二，该项目将为四名研究生提供培训，他们都致力于成为具有理论知识的语言学实地研究专家。随着越来越多的语言灭绝，语言科学面临着越来越大的压力，要充分了解现存语言中语法多样性的范围。随着该领域加紧努力描述和记录这些剩余的语言，必须培训年轻科学家使用最佳实践来开展这类工作。在访问喀麦隆之前，学生们将参加一个关于语言实地考察和非洲语调系统的国际暑期学校。最后，他们将开始同喀麦隆的一个应用语言学组织建立伙伴关系，该组织将在殖民地语言双语现象继续蔓延的情况下，为维持该语言作出贡献。合作的目的之一是开发梅登巴语的书面材料，包括一本词典。这项培训和经验是由NSF国际科学与工程办公室的非洲、近东和南亚分部共同资助的。在五位资深语言学家的进一步指导下，它将使这些年轻科学家为该领域最紧迫的领域之一的基础设施做出贡献：描述和记录未被描述的语言。