Analyzing Fifty Years of Conversations in Kawaiisu, an endangered language of California

分析加州濒危语言卡哇伊语五十年的对话

• 批准号: 1561925
• 负责人: Laura Grant
• 金额: $ 23.68万
• 依托单位: Kawaiisu Language and Cultural Center
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Continuing Grant
• 财政年份: 2016
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2016-06-15 至 2020-06-30
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1561925&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Analyzing; Fifty; Years; Conversations; Kawaiisu

Just as archeologists have methods to analyze material objects to better understand human history and culture, linguists have methods to analyze recordings and manuscripts to better understand the relationship between different languages or how a single language has changed throughout time. As populations stop speaking them, languages, especially unwritten ones, become even more fragile than physical sites and all knowledge held within may easily be lost. This is true of endangered languages all over the world including Kawaiisu, a Uto-Aztecan language of Kern County, California, where just two Native American elder speakers remain. The Native American Languages Act, passed by the U.S. Congress in 1990, enacted into policy the recognition of the unique status and importance of Native American languages. This project will involve a linguist, Kawaiisu second language speakers, and the elder speakers to transcribe, translate, and analyze recordings covering fifty years of Kawaiisu speech. The broader impacts of this include broadening participation as Native American citizen scientists research their heritage language, as well as the implementation of an exemplary partnership between academic linguists and Native American communities. The resulting analyzed Kawaiisu materials will be publicly accessible and will generate data of scholarly interest to linguists and to other disciplines that depend on language-related material (i.e., anthropology, history, geography) in their research.Fortunately, technology has left a record of the sounds of Kawaiisu. The oldest audio recordings, made in 1958 by Sheldon Klein, clearly present the cadence, sounds, and linguistic patterns of 60 years ago, when Kawaiisu was in more regular use. Later Klein recordings from the 1980s are the bridge between these older ways of speaking and later usage in fluent conversations video-recorded at culturally significant sites by the Kawaiisu Language and Cultural Center between 2011 and 2015. Less than 10 percent have been translated. Kawaiisu is Uto-Aztecan language family, which has played an important role in many areas of linguistics, including linguistic classification, historical reconstruction, typology and theoretical linguistics. Despite this importance, there are still many questions about the family, including Kawaiisu and its place in the Numic branch of the family. This project will augment scientific knowledge of Kawaiisu and its relatives.Researchers will investigate language change via this newly annotated documentation. The conversational data spans a critical period in history when major shifts were occurring within indigenous communities, as well as throughout California and the United States. The involvement of Kawaiisu team members ensures that the knowledge gained will remain with the community as they mobilize data in their linguistic and cultural revitalization programs. Recordings and transcriptions will be archived at the California Language Archive at the University of California, Berkeley, where they will be accessible to other researchers and the general public.

就像考古学家有方法分析实物以更好地了解人类历史和文化一样，语言学家也有方法分析录音和手稿，以更好地理解不同语言之间的关系，或者一种语言如何随着时间的推移而变化。随着人们不再说这些语言，语言，特别是非书面语言，变得比物理场所更脆弱，所有蕴含在其中的知识可能很容易就会丢失。世界各地的濒危语言都是如此，包括卡瓦伊苏语，这是加利福尼亚州克恩县的一种乌托-阿兹特克语，那里只剩下两名说美洲原住民的老年人。美国国会1990年通过的《美洲原住民语言法案》将承认美洲原住民语言的独特地位和重要性纳入了政策。这个项目将包括一位语言学家，Kawaisu第二语言演讲者，以及年长的演讲者，转录，翻译和分析涵盖Kawaisu演讲50年的录音。其更广泛的影响包括在美洲原住民科学家研究他们的传统语言时扩大参与，以及在学术语言学家和美洲原住民社区之间建立模范的伙伴关系。由此分析的Kawaisu材料将公开可用，并将产生语言学家和其他学科的学术兴趣数据，这些数据依赖于他们研究中与语言相关的材料(即人类学、历史、地理)。幸运的是，技术已经留下了Kawaisu声音的记录。最古老的录音，由谢尔顿·克莱因于1958年制作，清楚地呈现了60年前Kawaisu更经常使用的节奏、声音和语言模式。后来Klein在20世纪80年代的录音是这些古老的说话方式和后来流利对话中使用的桥梁-由Kawaisu语言文化中心在2011年至2015年期间在具有重要文化意义的地点录制的视频。只有不到10%的人被翻译了。Kawaisu是一种乌托-阿兹特克语系，在语言分类、历史重建、类型学和理论语言学等领域发挥了重要作用。尽管有这样的重要性，关于这个家庭仍然有很多问题，包括Kawaisu和它在Numic家族分支中的位置。这个项目将增加关于川西及其亲属的科学知识。研究人员将通过这份新注释的文献来调查语言的变化。这些对话数据跨越了历史上的一个关键时期，当时土著社区以及整个加州和美国都发生了重大变化。Kawaisu团队成员的参与确保了所获得的知识将留在社区，因为他们在语言和文化振兴计划中调动数据。录音和抄本将保存在加州大学伯克利分校的加州语言档案馆，其他研究人员和普通公众都可以在那里查阅。