A grammar of Bilinarra : an Australian Aboriginal language of the Northern Territory / Felicity Meakins, Rachel Nordlinger.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Meakins, Felicity.

Contributor:

Nordlinger, Rachel, 1969-

Series:

Pacific linguistics ; 640.

Pacific linguistics, 1448-8310 ; volume 640

Language:

Australian languages

English

Subjects (All):

Pama-Nyungan languages--Australia--Northern Territory--Grammar.

Pama-Nyungan languages.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (558 p.)

Edition:

1st ed.

Place of Publication:

Boston ; Berlin : De Gruyter Mouton, [2014]

Language Note:

English

Summary:

This volume provides the first comprehensive description of Bilinarra, a Pama-Nyungan language of the Victoria River District of the Northern Territory (Australia). Bilinarra is a highly endangered language with only one speaker remaining in 2012 and no child learners. The materials on which this grammatical description is based were collected by the authors over a 20 year period from the last first-language speakers of the language, most of whom have since passed away. Bilinarra is a member of the Ngumpin subgroup of Pama-Nyungan which forms a part of the Ngumpin-Yapa family, which also includes Warlpiri. It is non-configurational, with nominals commonly omitted, arguments cross-referenced by pronominal clitics and word order grammatically free and largely determined by information structure. In this grammatical description much attention is paid to its morphosyntax, including case morphology, the pronominal clitic system and complex predicates. A particular strength of the volume is the provision of sound files for example sentences, allowing the reader access to the language itself.

Contents:

Front matter

Preface

Acknowledgements

Table of contents

List of tables

List of figures

List of abbreviations

Conventions used in transcription and glossing

Recording metadata

Map

Chapter 1 The language and its speakers

Chapter 2 Phonology

Chapter 3 Parts of speech

Chapter 4 Nominals 1: Nouns, case, adnominal and derivational morphology

Chapter 5 Nominals 2: Demonstratives, interrogatives, directionals and possessives

Chapter 6 Pronouns

Chapter 7 Inflecting verbs and coverbs

Chapter 8 Syntax of simple sentences

Chapter 9 Complex sentences

Appendix

Word list

List of suffixes

List of enclitics

References

Index of subjects

Index of suffixes and clitics by gloss

Notes:

Description based upon print version of record.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Description based on print version record.

ISBN:

9781614512745

1614512744

OCLC:

979911717