Group in American Indian Languages

Tuesday, February 5, 2002
7:30 pm at the home of Leanne Hinton

Speakers: Sheri Tatsch (UC Davis) and Lisa Woodward (UC Davis)
Title: "The J. P. Harrington Database Project"

Abstract:

The J. P. Harrington Database Project funded by the National Science Foundation and the Native American Language Center at University of California, Davis was developed to increase access to the linguistic and ethnographic field notes of J. P. Harrington. Over 375,000 pages of his field notes are dedicated to the Native peoples of California. A database is being created to format these notes into a continuous and searchable text to assist in community language programs and revitalization. Users will be able to generate word lists and phrases as well as search for specific terms, such as plants, animals, personal names, place names, and various cultural items. The project is enlisting community members to work on their languages. This workshop will provide an introduction and overview of the project, practice in reading and transcribing linguistic data, and an overview of the microfilm guide that lists Harrington's consultants and other information on the notes.

Thursday, April 11, 2002
7:30 p.m. at the home of Leanne Hinton

Speaker: Ian Maddieson (UC Berkeley)
Title: Fieldwork in Argentina: Mataco languages and Mapuche

Abstract:

This talk will be an informal report on fieldwork carried out in the fall of 2001 on several of the indigenous languages of Argentina. The target languages were three quite closely related languages of the Mataco (or Mataguayan) family, Wichí, Nivakle and Chorote, spoken in the Chaco region, plus the language of the Mapuche, the principle indigenous people of Patagonia. The languages of the Chaco are clearly still viable and are spoken by people in all age groups. Mapuche has few speakers under ago 60 in Argentina and is not being transmitted to younger members of the community. (In Chile the language has younger speakers and may even have children learning it).

The purpose of the trip was to obtain material for phonetic analysis of aspects of these languages. One objective was to solve the mystery of the segments in the Matacoan languages transcribed as [kL] and [xL] (where "L" stands for the voiceless alveolar lateral fricative symbol) and treated in prior linguistic analyses as unitary segments. Comparison of the three languages allows the progressive development of a cluster /xl/ into the fricative /L/ to be traced, but [kL] seems to consistently represent a cluster /kl/. In these languages another issue concerned whether the "glottalized" stops and affricates were pronounced as ejectives or represented a different category of sound.

Mapuche is famous for the reported contrast between dental and interdental stops noted in some of the earlier literature. This has proved persistently difficult for later researchers to find, and likely represents a stylistic variation rather than linguistic contrast. Dental and post-alveolar stops do contrast, however.

Preliminary findings from the phonetic materials collected will be discussed together with some of the logistical and other issues that were involved in their collection.

Thursday, May 9, 2002
7:30 pm at the home of Bob Oswalt

Speaker: William Jacobsen (University of Nevada, Reno)
Title: "Two Philological Problems: The Earliest Makah Vocabulary and Harrington's Encounter with Washo"

Abstract:

This is a consideration of two short vocabularies from the past which provide different kinds of information for our interests. The Makah vocabulary of 1792 was written down by Spaniards during a short visit; they must have merely pointed at items to elicit the words for them, leading to various misunderstandings, but showing us some differences from the contemporary language. The Washo vocabulary of 1915 tells us nothing new about the language, but allows calibration of Harrington's strengths and weaknesses as a transcriber as of that date, especially concerning certain classes of sounds.